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This article examines the impact of civic action on enhancing accountability and combating corruption in political financing, focusing on two civil society initiatives in Uruguay. The initiatives aimed to digitize and map information on funding received by political parties and politicians in the 2009 and 2014 elections, presenting their findings through interactive online platforms. The paper engages theoretically with the literature on the dimensions of accountability and contributes to understanding the challenges faced by civil society organizations in promoting political financing accountability even in full democracies, a topic largely understudied. Findings highlight concerns beyond electoral authorities’ well-known resource constraints in detecting illicit political donations and spending in Uruguay. The paper shows that transparency is not enough to reduce corruption. We argue that for political finance accountability to be effective, it must encompass bottom-up, horizontal, and diagonal dimensions. The analysis suggests the need for complementary measures, such as digital solutions for reporting and disclosing political finance information, along with active horizontal and bottom-up oversight mechanisms. The article draws on qualitative analysis based on documentary research and 19 interviews with activists, academics, journalists, developers of the initiatives, and public officials involved in political finance regulation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article contributes to our understanding of how social movement coalitions with an intersectional political perspective function. It analyzes the development in Uruguay of a network of social movements that successfully promoted the so-called "new rights agenda" during the progressive government (2005-2020). This case is particularly interesting given its level of success in terms of legal changes and public policies and the role played by social movements in these changes. Considering the above, do Uruguayan social organizations in the new rights agenda form an integrated network of action? If so, what level of segmentation do these organizations assume based on their main issues? Through an analysis of networks, we show that these organizations operate within an integrated network, which is reinforced by the presence of specific entities that play a central intermediary role. However, the existence of organizational link segmentation is evident, indicating that while there is some capacity for interaction among different social movement industries, a thematic logic predominates when understanding interactions within the network. The network analysis presented is based on information collected in an original survey conducted with 49 organizations in Montevideo involved in the new rights agenda. Empirically, the article advances our knowledge of this unique case in the Latin American context through an innovative methodology for analyzing these phenomena. On a theoretical level, it addresses recent discussions in the literature concerning the impact of an intersectional perspective on the actions and outcomes of social movements and their capacity to create effective coalitions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The study of public policies, initiated in academic institutions of the United States, has had considerable development in Latin America in recent years. This article is based on three hypotheses: a) the theoretical approaches elaborated in the North are highly influential both in teaching and research that are currently taking place in the region; b) this influence limits the ability to explain the particularities of these countries' public policies, and c) the influence of northern theoretical approaches on the research and teaching activities of Latin-American experts is greater among those who obtained their most advanced degree in the North. In order to support and test these hypotheses, firstly, we describe the evolution of the discipline in the United States and the region. Secondly, we present the main epistemological perspectives involved. Finally, we present and analyze the results of a survey answered by 168 public policy experts who work in institutions from eight Latin American countries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present article analyzes training in public policy at the undergraduate level in Political Science programs at 11 Latin American countries. This research addresses the profile of instructors, the most often quoted authors and texts and the importance granted to knowledge produced both inside and outside the region. The examination of 109 syllabi from 69 universities can detect the incidence of significantly different training backgrounds among instructors. In some cases locally obtained degrees prevail, while in other cases, foreign training is predominant. This has a direct impact in the relative prominence granted to either domestic or external sources in course reading lists. The article is able to establish that --in spite of recent progress-- the use of references taken from texts produced within the region is still limited. In all countries --although in a different degree in each case--, the process of building a "science of policy" is hampered by the straightforward and indiscriminating adaptation of theoretical models and frameworks originally produced in and for countries in the developed world, as well as for the still scarce referencing of local intellectual production and/or of Latin American sources. This, in turn, obstructs a meaningful dialogue with the most influential international intellectual production and hinders future prospects for homegrown research able to account for specific national and regional experiences and dynamics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper proposes a research agenda for Political Science in South America: the study of the institution of the vice-presidency. The article points out the scarce academic attention that this institution has received. It presents a bibliographical review of the way the subject has been dealt with in Political Science in the United States and in South America, develops a comparative approach to the different institutional arrangements existing in South America, and proposes different lines of research that could be articulated and thus contribute significantly to other topics studied by Comparative Politics on the continental level. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

ABSTRACT The potential democratizing effect of political decentralization reforms has been a matter of substantial theoretical and empirical debate. This article analyzes the effect of local democratic institution building on the political attitudes and behavior of citizens living in small towns in Uruguay. More specifically, using a natural experiment design, this research seeks to establish the causal impact of recently established elections of local authorities on individuals' political engagement. It develops a comparative case study analyzing the consequences of this institutional innovation in two towns. It shows that individuals from the town where citizens have the opportunity to elect their local authorities have more positive attitudes toward politics than those from the town without such elections. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]