Mariana Llanos / Leiv Marsteintredet

Introduction: Latin American Presidential Democracies in Times of Turbulence

Routledge Studies in Latin American Politics | 2023


  • Abstract

    This chapter introduces the topic of Latin American presidential democracies and their often-weak political institutions facing turbulent circumstances. Democratic institutions in Latin America have worked in a context marked by the eruption of popular protest and discontent, the widespread distrust of political institutions constituting a crisis of representation and, of course, the COVID-19 pandemic. Democratic institutions in the region have also had to respond to these external challenges. In this chapter we argue the responses have taken one of three forms: executive attempts or strategies to concentrate greater power in their hands, institutional innovation and change, and/or resorting to symbolic or incomplete institutional actions. With chapters clustering around the topics of fixed terms and other problems of presidentialism, inter-institutional relations and executive accountability, as well as old and new threats to democracy, the volume concludes highlighting the resilience of the region’s institutions to the often-overwhelming turbulent circumstances of the last few years.

    Published in

    Latin America in Times of Turbulence

    Editor(s)

    Mariana Llanos

    Leiv Marsteintredet

    Series

    Routledge Studies in Latin American Politics

    Publisher

    Routledge

    Pages

    1-16

    ISBN

    9781032322612

    9781003324249

    Location

    New York


    Prof. Dr. Leiv Marsteintredet

    Prof. Dr. Leiv Marsteintredet

    Department of Comparative Politics, University of Bergen


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