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The resurgence of the Left in Latin America over the past decade has been so notable that it has been called “the Pink Tide.” In recent years, regimes with leftist leaders have risen to power in Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Ecuador, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Uruguay, and Venezuela. What does this trend portend for the deepening of democracy in the region? Benjamin Goldfrank has been studying the development of participatory democracy in Latin America for many years, and this book represents the culmination of his empirical investigations in Brazil, Uruguay, and Venezuela. In order to understand why participatory democracy has succeeded better in some countries than in others, he examines the efforts in urban areas that have been undertaken in the cities of Porto Alegre, Montevideo, and Caracas. His findings suggest that success is related, most crucially, to how nationally centralized political authority is and how strongly institutionalized the opposition parties are in the local arenas.

This paper maps the gender balance in the discipline of political science in Latin America by examining data from 16 countries where we could find the number of female professors in political science departments (over 100 departments) as well as from 69 journals publishing political science research in Latin America and from 16 Latin Americanist journals in Canada, the United States, and Europe. We compare the proportion of female political science faculty members to the proportion of women serving as editors and as members of editorial and advisory committees for relevant academic journals. We find that a significant gender gap remains, both in political science departments and in journals, and that the gender gap is worse in journals based in Latin America than in those based outside the region.

The longstanding debate around the trade-offs of formalizing institutions of citizen participation (ICPs) within legal frameworks is currently facing a revival with the spread of citizens’ assemblies. Among arguments in favour of “more” institutionalization, the expectation that it will protect ICPs from eventual political changes stands out. Among arguments against institutionalization, the fear of crystallizing certain “recipes” translates concerns that overly routinized institutions can be more easily manipulated. But what exactly does institutionalization entail? We offer three contributions to this conversation. First, we define institutionalization, identifying four constitutive dimensions: formalization, political embedding, professionalization, and social engagement. It is rare for any ICP to achieve high degrees of all four dimensions. Second, we propose four connected arguments: (a) the debate is not whether to institutionalize or not but about contextual configurations, (b) formalization alone does not guarantee the persistence or success of ICPs, (c) the extent and form of institutionalization will and should vary across ICPs and over time, and (d) if any single dimension of institutionalization stands out as crucial, it is political embedding. Third, we explore these ideas by analyzing three Latin American ICPs: popular initiatives (direct decision-making), participatory budgeting (deliberative decision-making), and sortition-based citizens’ assemblies (consultative deliberation).

The resurgence of the Left in Latin America over the past decade has been so notable that it has been called \"the Pink Tide.\" In recent years, regimes with leftist leaders have risen to power in Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Ecuador, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Uruguay, and Venezuela. What does this trend portend for the deepening of democracy in the region? Benjamin Goldfrank has been studying the development of participatory democracy in Latin America for many years, and this book represents the culmination of his empirical investigations in Brazil, Uruguay, and Venezuela. In order to understand why participatory democracy has succeeded better in some countries than in others, he examines the efforts in urban areas that have been undertaken in the cities of Porto Alegre, Montevideo, and Caracas. His findings suggest that success is related, most crucially, to how nationally centralized political authority is and how strongly institutionalized the opposition parties are in the local arenas.

Los estudios recientes dedicados a la ciencia política latinoamericana han tenido por principal objeto de investigación la institucionalización de la disciplina. Se ha avanzado mucho en el conocimiento de este tema, pero sin apenas incluir la perspectiva de género. Para incluirla, este artículo (1) estima la presencia de profesoras de ciencia política en 107 departamentos de 16 países de la región y (2) en los equipos y (3) consejos editoriales de 85 revistas de ciencia política o latinoamericanistas para luego (4) evaluar una encuesta de editores en 48 de estas revistas. Encontramos que hay una brecha de género significativa tanto en los departamentos como en las revistas (especialmente en los consejos editoriales), que no correlaciona con la institucionalización de la ciencia política. Además, la presencia levemente mayor en los equipos editoriales representa un arma de doble filo. La llegada de mujeres a estos equipos es una oportunidad para su reconocimiento profesional y para influenciar la disciplina, pero requiere trabajar más sin recompensa significativa, mientras que en el puesto más simbólico y menos demandante– el consejo editorial –hay menos mujeres.

Participatory budgeting (PB) has been one of the most popular local democratic reforms in Latin America in recent decades. This article examines what happened to PB when it was scaled up to the state level and integrated in a participatory system in Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil (2011–14). Using theories of deliberative systems, multichannel participation, ‘venue shopping’ (the practice of seeking the most favourable policy venue) and countervailing power, as well as a multimethod research design, we explain how the systems approach allowed for both deliberation and direct democracy and mobilised new sectors to participate online. However, on the negative side, the different participation channels undermined each other. Social movements migrated to other spaces, leaving the budgeting process open to control by well-established, powerful public-sector groups.

The three books reviewed here represent a new generation of rigorous scholarship on participatory institutions (PIs). They demonstrate that - under certain conditions - it is possible to build large-scale PIs that strengthen democratic governance and improve citizens' lives. Nonetheless, significant challenges remain. Due in part to the absence of either high-quality national-level comparative data or fine-grained subnational data, and in part to research design choices of existing studies, the literature remains limited in its capacity to make general claims about the causes and effects of large-scale PIs. Ultimately, the key question collectively addressed, but not fully answered, by the works reviewed is whether governments can build PIs that deliver on their promise to improve the quality of democracy and enhance public service provision on a large scale in diverse contexts beyond Brazil.

Causal analysis of why some recent experiments in participatory local government in Latin America have failed while others have succeeded is undeveloped. Comparison of three similar experiments in Caracas, Montevideo, and Port Alegre can provide a more thorough explanation. The program in Caracas largely failed; Porto Alegre's participatory budgeting became an international model; and Montevideo's outcome was mixed. Two factors best explain this divergence: the degree of national decentralization of authority and resources for municipal governments and the level of institutionalization of local opposition parties. These conditions shaped the incumbents' ability to design meaningful participatory programs that could attract lasting citizen involvement.