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Objective/context: In 2019, promoted by President Martín Vizcarra, the Congress of the Republic of Peru sanctioned a law on mandatory primary elections for voters and political parties. However, the regulation was not implemented, given that it was suspended by the Legislative Branch for the general elections in 2021 and the regional elections in 2022. Methodology: This paper studies the reform process of mandatory, simultaneous, and open primaries (PASO, for its acronym in Spanish) in Peru and its counter-reform based on its suspension on two occasions (2021 and 2022). Twenty-three key actors were interviewed for this research, including congresspersons, ministers, electoral officials, and researchers, in addition to the revision of secondary sources and newspapers of legislative sessions. Conclusions: The paper concludes that PASO were a “decorative” reform, i.e., a law passed without the intention of implementing it. Its sanction was the product of a reformist coalition between civil society and the President of the nation, where the objectives of increasing popular support for President Vizcarra and the need to improve the legitimacy of the political system converged. The reform was resisted by congresspersons who formed two counter-reformist coalitions that suspended the PASO on two occasions. Originality: The research shows that these counter-reform coalitions are intrinsically linked to the atomization and personalization of the Peruvian party system, characterized by hyper-personalism and a lack of party structures. In addition, it generates theoretical contributions to studying the processes of reforms and counter-reforms in the context of institutional weakness.

Objective/context: The article aims to analyze child recruitment as a form of human trafficking. Beyond the theoretical perspectives that focus on security or rights, it addresses the topic as a form of unfree labor. By means of a case study focused on child recruitment by right-wing paramilitary groups in Colombia, the paper analyzes how children entered and exited illegal armed groups, the functions they performed, and the exploitation they endured. The research argues that child recruitment operates as a large-scale labor-market uptake in the wartime social order, where the “employers” are paramilitary groups, and the labor force, in part, consists of children and adolescents. Methodology: This case study relies on different sources of information: a database on child recruitment provided by the special Justice and Peace Unit of the Colombian Attorney General’s Office (989 cases between 1981 and 2005), sentences of Peace and Justice, testimonials given by victims in judicial processes, and semi-structured interviews with different actors. Conclusions: The paper shows that child recruitment as a form of trafficking is functional to wartime social order in contexts of poverty and inequality. There is demand and supply; thus, both girls and boys, who worked as soldiers, are not only victims but also agents that make decisions in challenging conditions. Therefore, if the socioeconomic options for these children, even after their demobilization from the armed group, are still a choice between bad and worse, joining a violent (no longer “armed” but “criminal”) group will remain a feasible alternative. Originality: The article contributes to the academic literature on a recent topic, such as the overlapping between child recruitment and human trafficking in armed conflict and post-conflict situations. It also contributes to the literature on “unfree labor,” as the study focuses on an actor (illegal armed groups) that has not been analyzed until now. Finally, the research demonstrates the limits of understanding human trafficking (and child recruitment as a form of trafficking) as a problem of security or rights entitlement. It highlights the analytical and political advantages of categories such as “unfree labor” to provide effective solutions for the prevention and reintegration of child soldiers.

Objective/context: The organizational vitality of political parties is understood as their capacity to attract activists, keep them allied to the organization, and united among themselves. More vital parties reproduce greater participation of their activists and increase their ability to resist changing circumstances and exogenous shocks. Four conditions explain the reproduction of political party vitality: trauma, programmatic purpose, channels of ambition, and exit barriers. This paper aims to analyze the vitality levels of the Centro Democrático (CD) party from the year of its creation (2013) until 2020. Methodology: The paper examines the case of the CD. Empirical support comes, fundamentally, from in-depth interviews with (former) leaders and activists of the CD and experts in the party. Secondary sources are also explored. Conclusions: As one of its main findings, this work highlights the moderate vitality of the CD. Trauma has a positive and significant relationship with vitality, while purpose, exit barriers, and ambition channels have positive effects, but smaller than those produced by trauma. A variable that moderates the behavior of the explanatory factors of vitality is the strong personalistic leadership of the founder of the party, former president Álvaro Uribe. Originality: This work contributes to understanding the organizational structures of political parties and their impact on their performance.

Objective/Context: This paper analyzes factors related to political incentives for public organizations to cease operations. It suggests that political turnover has a negative effect on the duration of these types of entities. However, this effect differs according to the size of the governing coalition. Methodology: Semi-parametric models and Cox regressions are used to estimate the survival of 415 public organizations in Colombia. Conclusions: The data show that a change in the presidential administration allows the new president to reshape the administration according to their interests. Data analysis also indicates that the larger the size of the government coalition, the lower the probability that a public entity will be eliminated. Originality: The article uses an original database containing longitudinal information on public organizations in Colombia for the period 1958 to 2020. This database contains 415 observations on the organizational characteristics of each entity. This paper contributes to the scarce literature on the termination of public organizations in Latin America.

Objective/Context: The objective of this paper is to build a definition of the concept of the political in Marx as a third way between the autonomy and the heteronomy of the political. Methodology: This paper suggests a hermeneutical and philosophical methodology, which consists of interpretation of arguments and concepts of theoretical texts. Primary sources –hereupon: Marx’s texts– will be preferred, although they will be connected with other scholars. Conclusions: The paper arrives to a double conclusion. On the one hand, the essential connection (as championed by Marx) between the political and the world of material production does not involve a reductionist, mechanistic or heteronomous understanding of the political, for material production and the political are for him two distinct, albeit jointed, forms of human freedom. On the other hand, the concept of the political in Marx has two souls: the plasticity of the human second nature and the ideal of self-transparency of the philosophy of history. Facing this dilemma, the paper claims for an open and finite Marxism. Originality: Reflections on this topic are not new, but the thesis of the political and the production as two distinct, albeit jointed, forms of human freedom seems to be a relative new contribution to the theoretical and political discussion.

Objective/Context: This paper explores the relationship between corporate networks and business influence to figure out the conditions of state capture. Methodology: We analyze corporate networks through interlocking directorates in three Central American countries – Panama, Costa Rica, and El Salvador – using network analysis, and we pinpoint the relationship between the structure of the corporate network and two corporate political actions: contributions to presidential campaigns and revolving doors. Conclusions: Results show corporate networks were fragmented in the three Central American countries, except for a well-connected business cluster in Panama. The organization of business elites based on a single cohesive business cluster could facilitate coordination to finance political parties, which gives them more strength to demand government posts. On the other side, the absence of connections between business elites makes it difficult to reach agreements and weaken business influence. Findings suggest that networking among some (not all) business elites can be a source that precedes state capture, as it organizes access to the state through collective mobilization of resources and coordinated action planning. Originality: This paper is the first study on networks of interlocking directorates in Central American economies and combines original data on contributions to electoral campaigns and revolving doors. Therefore, it can be a benchmark for future studies on business power. In addition, this study introduces the analysis of interlocking directorates in the literature on state capture.

Objective/context: By developing an empirical study on the Colombian case, this article tests a flexible typology to identify the variants of partisanship of 196 ministers, grouped in 91 different cabinets, during six governments between 1998 and 2022. The paper also explores the factors associated with the strategic decision made by a president regarding the degree of partisanship of their cabinet. Methodology: For the former, we classified different variants of partisanship based on a biographical log, which grades the partisan experience of the ministers at the time of appointment. For the latter, we estimated a linear regression model, taking the aggregate index of cabinet partisanship as the dependent variable. Conclusions: A better identification of the ministers who are considered partisan allows for finding a statistically significant correlation between the president’s image and the cabinet’s degree of partisanship. Originality: We used an original database containing information on 196 ministers.

Objective/Context: Big Data is a novel and promising methodological approach to acquire and analyze information from an extensive range of scientific disciplines. Despite the fact that Big Data has wide dissemination and acceptance in different scientific disciplines, its use in the field of Global Studies is still incipient. Taking this into account, this paper discusses the methodological challenges and presumable contributions that Big Data offers to Global Studies. Methodology: The starting point for this paper is the critical analysis of the conceptual bases of Big Data and its relationships with Global Studies. So, this paper proposes the possible applications of Big Data in the Global Studies contrasting some key concept. In this way, the conceptual elements that define Data Science are examined and compared with the paradigmatic conceptions of Global Studies. On these conceptual fundaments, the article discusses links, limits and, scopes of Big Data and how it can contribute to Global Studies. Conclusions: This paper concludes that technological tools based on Big Data can enrich our understanding of global phenomena only if we position ourselves in a critical attitude that recognizes that the choice of data and its analysis are decisions embedded in historical and social contexts. In this way, as with any other methodological approach, Big Data is only a partial way to obtain and analyze information. Originality: The originality of this paper is to shed critical light on the scope and limits of Big Data, beyond a positivist vision of scientific knowledge. In other words, this article recognizes the biases behind the supposed neutral explanations regarding the use of techniques based on Big Data.

Objective/context: This paper is the result of Colombia Internacional’s call to reflect on Global Studies from the South. It is a critical theoretical contribution aiming at putting aside the binary opposing the global and the international. Instead, it seeks to think about them as mutually constitutive. Methodology: Through a bibliographical revision that inquires into its most important texts, it argues that Global Studies has as raison d’être a narrow conception of International Relations and of the international. The article holds that the latter is conceived as equal to interstate. This way, the global emerges in opposition to the state and linked to global civil society. The paper proposes Michel Foucault’s concept of governmentality as a tool to elude this binary. Governmentality is globalised and presented both as an analytical framework and as a liberal government practice. This way, it allows to think a power decentred from the state, as well as exercised in multiple directions, and not in opposition to civil society but through it. Conclusion: It concludes that governmentality allows conceiveing both the governmentalised state and civil society as products of liberalism understood as a globalised govermental practice, thus erasing the binary on which the emergence of Global Studies is based. Originality: The paper is a contribution from the Foucauldian perspective on governmentality to the debate between International Relations and Global Studies

Objective/context: This paper examines the open legal primary rule in Chile for the selection of the presidential candidate, established in 2012 through Law 20640. This rule contains elements shared with similar legislation in the region as well as specific characteristics. Methodology: Through a case study, we will investigate the results and consequences of the application of primaries on the three occasions they were implemented (2013, 2017, and 2021). We will review the formal changes adopted and the political events that occurred in the interim, considering the main variables that typically intervene in electoral events of this nature, drawn from the existing debate and literature. Conclusions: The case of Chile shows that the combination of an open legal primary system with voluntary internal voting, incomplete simultaneity, and the absence of stable political groupings produces effects that do not align with either the general aspirations for the implementation of primaries or the theoretical purposes outlined by the ideologists of Chilean legislation. Originality: This study contributes to the emerging literature addressing open legal primaries in their dual aspect, both as a nomination mechanism and as an electoral rule

Objective/context: In 2009, the law of mandatory, simultaneous, and open primaries (PASO, for its acronym in Spanish) was enacted in Argentina. Among others, this regulation seeks to democratize party structures. From a gender perspective, this paper studies the effect of PASO on women’s access to the Chamber of Deputies (2003-2023). To this end, it analyzes how the final lists are assembled, the places assigned to women candidates, the ease with which they gain access to expectable positions, and the permeability of groupings towards their participation since the implementation of PASO. Methodology: This is an exploratory and descriptive study of the effect of PASO on the allocation of seats for the category of female deputies in Argentina, considering all female legislators elected in successive elections (2011-2023). Conclusion: The findings show that PASO’s objective of democratizing party structures and making their components more representative does not seem to have impacted the country’s existing political and party traditions prior to implementing the law regarding the place given to women in a party. Originality: The article presents a study on the democratization effect of PASO on party structures from a gender perspective.

Objective/context: This article introduces debates on Nancy Cartwright’s concept of nomological machines applied to international relations theory. What the neo-neo synthesis claims as the essence of the international system is a set of conditions imposed upon international phenomena for the latter to fit into the theories themselves. It argues that the law-like explanations tailored by neorealism and neoliberalism are by no means a representation of the world as it is, but rather a predication of the world as these theories want it to be. Methodology: It critically reviews the foundations of neo-neo theories, suggesting a philosophical methodology by reframing the ontological terms of neorealism and neoliberalism based on the concept of nomological machines. Conclusions: This article contends that neo-neo theories could benefit from a capacities-oriented approach, which offers a less categorical understanding of how explanations of international phenomena are tailored, allowing alternative principles to provide invaluable insights about the international system. Originality: This paper innovates by intersecting the ideas of nomological machines with the metatheoretical debate on international relations, thus enabling theoretical improvement.

This paper is intended to conduct an exploratory analysis on the organization of local power, with a main focus on the relations among political parties and city councilors. To that end, in first place, this paper identifies demographic, social, economic and political characteristics of the city councilors elected in Sao Paulo. Second, we performed an in-depth review on the relations among councilors and political parties by analyzing forms of intraparty participation, grassroots networks and partnership-making. Third, we analyzed the perception of councilors from Sao Paulo with regards to the local force of the parties, employing a survey prepared by the project Organization and functioning of representative politics in the state of Sao Paulo. The main conclusion is that the more a given party contributes to the election of councilors the more prone it is to have perceptions concerning relations of loyalty, thus contributing to the survival of the party in the partisan sub-system.

This paper focuses on the process by which the legal recognition of gender identity has spread throughout the world, understood as a process of transnational diffusion of human rights standards. To that extent, the paper is founded in a dialogue between the literature regarding transnational diffusion and life cycle of norms in the international system. It argues that the analyzed norm is currently in an advanced stage of the emergence phase; therefore, states are influenced by the international context in order to adopt the norm, however internal pressure is still necessary. This is supported by the study of the Argentinean Identity Gender Law enacted in 2012.

This article summarizes the main arguments regarding the use of legislative activity as a dependent variable in political studies. While comprehensive, it is not exclusive, and it shows this variable’s main trends. Starting from the idea that there is a division of legislative work in presidential systems, this paper attempts to show the various ways in which this division has been assessed, to contribute to a new vision which focuses on the effects this has on the dynamics of government. In addition, this article proposes establishing new research agendas on the use of legislative activity as a dependent variable. Raised here are debates which remain open, as well as those which have been forgotten; this paper proposes that the research agenda be resumed and directed at the observation and evaluation of bicameral legislature.

This paper analyzes the political dynamics of capital account policy in South Korea. The first part is devoted to the historical evolution of capital account policy from the 1960s to the present day. It highlights the path of substantial financial opening that began in the early 1990s with two distinct waves of capital account liberalization before and after the Asian financial crisis of 1997-1998. The second part of the paper aims to detect the political origins of why capital account liberalization has not been complete and sustained. It locates them at the level of domestic informal institutions: first, the ideational legacy of the previous developmental state model – economic nationalism – that was predicated upon substantial barriers to international capital movements. Second, the political power of the export-oriented sector, namely of large conglomerates, that prefer exchange-rate stability and thus restrictions on capital inflows. This paper offers a heuristic argument based on a single case study which needs to be subjected to further empirical testing.

Objective/context: The paper examines the contribution of think tanks (TTs) to debating ideas and their relationship with the environment. Specifically, it analyzes the variations introduced by the electoral campaign in the political positions of TTs and the role of ideology and party affiliation as possible determinants. Methodology: The content of the web pages of ten TTs is monitored before and during the electoral campaign for the 2021 presidential elections in Chile, where numerous TTs have become protagonists. For each TT, attention to socio-political issues is analyzed, and the trend of their positions is recorded. Conclusions: The analysis shows that TTs adapt their communicative agenda to the electoral campaign and that their ideology is a principal variable in this strategy. Originality: Evidence is provided on the entry of TTs in electoral campaigns with differences between conservatives and progressives.

Objective/context: The paper analyzes the causes of the crisis of Latin American regionalism, seeking the reasons that determine its nature, scope, and consequences, as well as the dilemmas posed by different exit options. Methodology: Based on a definition of the concept of crisis, a model of analysis is proposed that traces significant governance processes and crisis factors at the systemic, regional, and domestic levels, using a series of indicators that allow interpreting their impact on Latin American regionalism projects and their effects in the form of crisis. Conclusions: The findings suggest the existence of structural conditioning factors that exceed the established paradigms and political dynamics that were unable to overcome their contradictions, which led to a triple crisis of results, model, and expectations, the effects of which directly affect the credibility of the projects. The crisis, therefore, does not appear as a mere question of political will but as a complex combination of multiple factors involving states and other national and international actors and social forces. Originality: The article broadens the analytical perspectives of Latin American regionalism by proposing a novel approach that helps better understand its particularities vis-à-vis other regionalisms and opens the possibility of continuing and deepening the empirical analysis of each specific regionalism.

This paper proposes establishing a critical dialogue between the most recent theoretical developments on populism and some of the most notable historiographical studies on the political process of Jorge Eliécer Gaitán in the mid-20th-century. The study is based on a conceptual framework of populism, which is understood as a process involving the creation of identities and political solidarities. The current paper looks to investigate the relevance of a complementary reading of the gaitanist process. It is within the dialogue between historiography and political theory that this paper suggests rethinking the relationship between the populist phenomenon, democracy, and violence in Colombia.

This paper has two objectives. Firstly, it proposes rethinking the relationship between populism and democracy, by challenging the positions which create a radical antagonism between these two political dynamics. In order to do this, the paper refers to guidelines put forward by Ernesto Laclau, relating to the rupture and reconstruction of populism understood as political logic. This idea is complemented by contributions from Jacques Rancière, in order to explore the democratizing dimension of populist movements. Secondly, the article analyzes two examples of contemporary governments – that of Nestor Kirchner in Argentina, and of Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva in Brazil – to show how they invite us to re-examine the theoretical-political debate on the concept of democracy as it is currently understood. Re-establishing the debate on the tension between the formal and the substantive dimension of democracy will allow us to rethink the various ways in which a populist logic might lead to a democratizing logic.

This paper examines the concerns which have led to the new wave of studies on populism in Argentina, focusing more on the debate surrounding the establishment of a new institutional framework typical of the 1980s than on the proliferation of 21st-century popular governments in South America. The typical characteristics and problems encountered in these studies are explained, and the defining features of the populist experience in 20th-century Argentina are analyzed by drawing comparisons with other populist processes in the region. Finally, the paper analyzes how certain features persist in the new political order, while others have gone through complete transformations since it was established in 1983.

This paper reflects on populism in the context of contemporary liberal democracies. This model can be understood through theories of democratic elitism in the 20th-century (Schumpeter 1984) which, in practice, had an influence on the model of representative democracies, or polyarchies (Dahl 1997). The article begins with two introductory elements on populism, within the context of representative democracy. In particular, attention is given to what is understood to be its essence; namely, populism as a political discourse which sets the public antagonistically against the political elite. The paper then considers the populist reasoning of Ernesto Laclau which, in spite of revisions and critiques of his work, has demonstrated the most sophisticated approach to the topic. Finally, the central idea of the populist phenomenon is discussed, based on the triad democracy-institution-populism.

Objectives/Context: The main objective of this paper is to present an explanation for the divergent development trajectories of two regions of the capitalist world-economy, Latin America and East Asia. Methodology: starting from the concepts of world-economy, world region, regional focus and long durée, it is intended to verify how the forms of integration of the two regions to the capitalist worldeconomy affected them in three essential dimensions for economic development: State, capital accumulation and technological capability, from the 16th century to the present. Conclusions: having autonomously developed the three dimensions analyzed to the point of equating to the West at least until the end of the 17th century, when it was incorporated into the capitalist world-economy in the first half of the 19th century, East Asia was able to take advantage of this integration and advance in global hierarchies of wealth and power. On the other hand, Latin America, which as a geopolitical entity was born together with the capitalist world-economy in the 16th century, was at that moment at a relatively low level of development in these dimensions, which, together with colonialism, continued to restrict its development and maintaining the region in its historical position as a periphery of the capitalist world-economy. Originality: the originality of this research is to establish a historically grounded principle of variation to explain the divergence in recent development trajectories of Latin America and East Asia.

Objective/Context: Much of the research on conflict resolution has focused on the conditions for getting parties involved in a conflict to sign a peace agreement. Less attention has been paid to what happens next. In this document, we offer a review of the factors shaping peace agreement implementation (PAI). Methodology: The paper is based on a review of the available academic literature on the factors that shape peace agreement implementation (PAI). Conclusions: We conceive the implementation process as composed of multiple temporal stages (short- to long-term), layers (from international to local), and dimensions (including politics, justice, the economy, and culture). In an implementation phase, all these need to be addressed in parallel, as they exert mutual impact and shape each other’s progress. Originality: The general overview presented here will provide scholars and policymakers with a broad sense of the most important debates within the literature.

This paper studies three mobilization episodes in which indigenous, feminists and state crimes victims litigated before the Constitutional Court. After showing which effects can be founded using a perspective focused on the study of judicial decisions, we propose a broader approach to their study that conceives the constitutional legal mobilizations as truly collective actions. The paper states that, from that standpoint, it is possible to identify how the interaction between the State and these three movements has change, as well as their internal transformations.

This paper investigates the suitability of the economic reintegration strategy for former Colombian combatants, taking into account the challenges facing this population. It argues that the international discourse primarily consists of a market-centred versus a people-centred perspective, each with a distinct approach to economic reintegration. The paper finds that in Colombia there was a lack of inclusion of key stakeholders in the initial design of the process. As a result, the economic reintegration strategy ended up merely accommodating certain neoliberal ideals and thereby leaned towards a market-centred approach. Lately, steps have been taken towards an increasingly people-centred approach. This is currently reflected in improved results of the process, which predict a brighter future for economic reintegration of former combatants in Colombia.

The paper argues that policies for controlling transnational crime are a crucial dimension for understanding neoliberal hegemony in global governance. It takes on the relation established by Foucault between biopolitics and neoliberalism, in order to reconstruct the discursive formation framing law enforcement and security strategies beyond the spatiality of the nation-state. The paper then turns to outlining the practical expressions of this discourse in the governance techniques deployed to control transnational crime. Overall, this study aims to show how neoliberal criticism of state power is not coupled with a reduction in governance but, on the contrary, implies many regulations and strategies for controlling the population.

This paper clarifies a distinction the sociologists make between the notions of spectator and public. Based on this distinction and on an ethnographic survey carried out in France among people who are distant spectators of the violence in Colombia, the paper states that these observers cannot be considered as a public concerned by Colombian issues. The purpose is to explain why it is difficult to turn those spectators into a public. This transformation does not come easily, not so much by the fact that many French viewers have no particular ties with Colombia, but rather because of two reasons. Firstly, because it is not common that the Colombian internal problems emerge as a subject of daily discussion in France. Secondly, because French spectators strive to make what is happening in Colombia intelligible.

There is mounting evidence that natural resources can influence the likelihood, course and outcome of armed conflicts. Much of these relationships depend on the institutional setting in which the conflict and resource exploitation occurs, and the specific characteristics of resources involved. This paper examines the relevance of two broad resource characteristics—lootability and legality—for conflict termination initiatives. Observing revenue sharing, economic sanction and military interventions in a total of 26 conflicts between 1989 and 2006, the paper suggests that resource characteristics can affect the effectiveness of resource-related conflict termination instruments.

This paper analyzes palm oil production based on theories on the relationship between resources and armed conflict, which state that financing resources are necessary for a conflict to continue. At first a review of the relevant literature on resource typologies and on the relationship between agricultural production and conflict is made. After this, data on the process of palm oil production is presented. Next it is shown how, in response to the claims that link palm oil to land problems, the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) was created, and the case of Colombia, where there has been an association both between the crop and forced displacement as well as between palm oil and peace building processes. Based on the analysis of the data, the paper suggests that costs involved in the production process make the palm oil growers an easy target for armed groups. In addition, while the palm doesn’t produce forced displacement by itself, its process of production might generate incentives in that direction.

This paper seeks to explain the increase in the level of Colombian Central Government debt as a result of the change in the rules that restrict the decisions of fiscal policy –i.e. fiscal constitution- involved in the new Constitution. The paper assumes that the Government is an agent that weighs the costs and benefits of its decisions in a context of political and economic institutions. First, the main changes in the rules that apply to the financing alternatives for government spending, different from debt, are shown.Then, the main changes to the rules regarding the creation of debt. Lastly, it concludes that the change in the fiscal situation of the Government is an outcome of the reduction of the relative price of debt compared with other financing options.

This paper argues that the success of the leftist Encuentro Progresista-Frente Amplio in the 2004 Uruguayan election is the result of being the only untainted and credible opposition in the party system. After many governments in charge of the Partido Colorado and Partido Nacional, the EP-FA was the only party that cannot be held responsible for the country's bad economic situation because it was never in charge of the national government. Using data from a 2004 national preelectoral survey the paper shows that attitudes towards risk and economic assessments of the country's situation influence voting behavior in Uruguay. Risk acceptant individuals who evaluate negatively the country's economic performance have a higher probability to vote for the EP-FA than risk averse voters with a positive assessment of the country's economy.The evidence from the Uruguayan case suggests that the increase of leftist parties in other Latin American countries could be explained in the same way.

The paper describes the main characteristics of the 2006 Brazilian Presidential elections. It explores two defining traits of this elections: the interplay between how retrospective economic voting and views towards corruption affected vote volatility and the final result of the election. The paper concludes by pointing out implications of the current elections to the strengthening of democracy in Brazil.

Objective/Context: This paper analyzes the discourse of three supranational policy instruments produced by the International Labour Organization and the United Nations regarding the political participation of Indigenous Peoples. We argue that these discourses promote a utilitarian view of the environment and pose severe limitations on substantial political participation by Indigenous Peoples. Methodology: To support this thesis, we present the results of a Critical Discourse Analysis that reveals how political participation is shaped through discourses, social actors are represented within hierarchical relationships, and nature is defined in terms of an exploitable resource. Conclusions: Our conclusions show that these documents stimulate a form of political involvement by Indigenous Peoples that excludes the administrative and political consequences of dissent and that represents consent as the only possible outcome. Nonetheless, further research is necessary to understand the resonance of these policy instruments within national legal frameworks and their political, environmental, and cultural effects. Originality: The article challenges the conventional assumptions that the success of supranational policies on Indigenous Peoples’ participation depends on the efficiency of their implementation process. Instead, it proposes a discursive comprehension based on the social practices and power relationships that configurate the policies’ discourse to the detriment of substantial political participation.

Objective/Context: The year 2021 marked the 50th anniversary of the Regional Indigenous Council of Cauca (CRIC), the first organization established in Colombia to fight for territorial and identity rights of Indigenous Peoples. From a historical perspective and proposing an approach related to the concept of resistance, this paper focuses on how this latter has been expressed through this indigenous movement since its inception. Methodology: The information and reflections presented here are based on a corpus of bibliographical and documentary sources, as well as on a follow-up of the political mobilizations of indigenous peoples in situ, in the media, digital social networks, official minutes, and other statements. Conclusions: The analysis reveals the persistence of indigenous resistance and an expansion of the project that accompanies it, from a struggle for land and territory to efforts carried out along with other actors and social organizations to create a “better world.” Originality: The originality of the article consists of an analysis of the political dimensions of the resistance of Indigenous Peoples, which are still little known. In addition, it offers a novel approach to stress the intersection of (sub) national and global dynamics in which the demands of Indigenous Peoples and issues related to Colombia’s society and the whole world converge.

Objective/Context: This article explores the reasons behind the imbalance and limitations that persist in Latin America to access public opinion information on public policy preferences. Methodology: A descriptive analysis of the development of public opinion studies in the region, based on interviews with academics and pollsters from Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Mexico, and Uruguay. Conclusions: Although data availability to study public policy opinion in Latin America has significantly increased in the last three decades, limitations persist due to three factors: (i) Latin American states have played a sporadic role in generating information for research in this field. (ii) The role of the private sector and politicians as funders and generators of public opinion data makes the availability of information very sporadic and of limited access. (iii) The agenda of open access public opinion studies is defined by academics from the Global North, whose research agenda moves more towards issues of stability and democratic values than towards citizens’ public policy preferences. Originality: This paper contributes to a more comprehensive descriptive overview of the evolution of the sub-discipline of public opinion in Latin America. In addition, it highlights the need for public funds to systematically survey the public policy preferences of citizens in the region and make microdata publicly available to inform political decision-making and academic research.

Objective/Context: This paper examines the arguments of the Constitutional Court of Colombia in a sentence declaring that Pentecostalism represents a threat to indigenous cultures and to the country’s cultural diversity. The sentence was issued in 1998, a few years after the political Constitution (1991) declared that Colombia is a pluralist nation that protects the cultural diversity of the country and the right to religious freedom. Methodology: A qualitative and hermeneutical study of the sentence was implemented to understand the arguments presented by the Court. Subsequently, a critical analysis of those arguments was carried out, questioning the pluralist presuppositions related to key categories such as “indigenous cultures,” “religion,” and “diversity.” Conclusions: The pluralist institution has been unable to recognize the dynamic and manifold realities of lived religion, as well as the problems related to the double marginalization of a religious minority within an ethnic minority. Furthermore, the pluralist imperative to protect cultural diversity places limits upon alterity and promotes new forms of exclusion. Originality: The jurisprudence under scrutiny is not studied in its legal or ethical dimensions—as it has been done in the past—but as the implementation of a pluralist ideology grounded in a certain worldview. Thus, pluralism is critically examined in its ontological, axiological, epistemological, and praxeological principles.

Objective/Context: To advance in the conceptualization of the State-bourgeoisie relationship, the paper returns to a classic debate in the Marxist tradition on the capitalist State. Methodology: In methodological terms, we carry out a critical analysis of the works of Ralph Miliband and Nicos Poulantzas —especially on the distinction of class power and State power, relative autonomy and State intervention in the economy— and we revisit the criticism of John Holloway. With this, we seek to understand the relationship between State and bourgeoisie, to explain the economic and political crisis of the forms of the capital relationship in Argentina, in 1998-2001. Conclusions: We conclude that there is a crisis of a specific form of State intervention in the economy, based on the expansion of market discipline, and, with it, both State power and capital power erodes. Originality: The article analyzes the Miliband-Poulantzas debate and, based on this, builds an explanation of the Argentinean crisis.

Objective/Context: This article analyses the causes and consequences of the transition from Marxism to post-Marxism in Ernesto Laclau’s work by establishing four permanent themes throughout his oeuvre that are scenarios of this shift: the question of the constitution of society, a theory of the political subject, the issue of political strategy and the question of the project. Methodology: The research strategy envisages genealogical archaeology. On the one hand, archaeology allows a synchronic analytical procedure to study the different stages in the author’s work. On the other hand, genealogy enables a diachronic study of the treatment of the four major themes in the successive theoretical interventions. Conclusions: This paper shows how the ontological rupture affects the theory of the subject, the strategic conception, and the position of the future. The category of hegemony and discourse intervene in a new conceptual matrix that admits the infinity of the social as a historical and theoretical condition. From this movement, developments in rhetoric and psychoanalysis offer tools for investigating the three theoretical problems, and the change of epoch opens up a reflection on the horizon of the democratic future. Originality: The article contributes to the knowledge of Ernesto Laclau’s proposal, explaining the conditions of his post-Marxist evolution and establishing conditions for a dialogue in the field of critical theory that focuses on the four problems: order, subjects, strategy, and the future.

Objective/Context: This paper analyses critically the integration model proposed by the Pacific Alliance (PA) from the perspective of the legal foundations of Colombia’s foreign policy, in order to determine the degree of normative convergence between the Colombian constitutional order and this particular trade agreement. Methodology: This research uses legal technique and case-law analysis as research methodologies, offering a detailed panorama of the normative development of the PA and its relationship with the constitutional requirements regulating the international relations of Colombia. Conclusion: Despite being at an initial stage in relation to its normative and institutional structure, the PA has emerged as a second generation regional trade agreement (RTA), which complements its commercial trajectory with political, social and productive integration agendas, promoting the diversification of international economic relations of its members without altering or modifying their sovereign powers. The above allows to show its compatibility with the constitutional mandate pro integratione, particularly in regard to the ideal of promoting the internationalization of Colombian economic relations with countries of Latin America and other world regions. Originality: The proposed approach has theoretical and methodological originality inasmuch as there are no previous studies analyzing the legal and normative nexus between the interests of Colombia’s foreign policy and the PA. Its relevance lies not only in the validity of the issue in question, but also for scenarios of reflection on the participation of the State in trade agreements or regional integration schemes.

Objective/context: This paper examines the contribution that an approach from Global Studies (GS) can make to obtain a broader and more comprehensive view of Latin American foreign policy (FP) by incorporating the global level to the international, regional and national levels traditionally observed, and question traditional distinctions, limited to explain behavior and decision making in peripheral states. It proposes the construction of a model analysis for the interpretation of the FP of peripheral countries. Methodology: The research is qualitative, with a critical reading of the existing approaches in FP and GS. It uses a documentary method, with the purpose of deepening existing theories to derive new knowledge. It is a theoretical work that, based on an analytical, inductive methodology and an epistemological discussion, seeks to build a method of analysis for Latin American FP incorporating the contributions of the GS. Conclusions: Explores FP studies and the emerging challenges in the face of global problems and processes that demand new methods of approach. It develops an interdisciplinary methodological strategy for a global approach to FP and international insertion in Latin America from the consideration of multilevel spaces. Originality: The originality of the work lies in the challenge of contributing to the scarce methodological approaches for the study of FP, raising the approach of multilevel spaces, transcending the state sphere, and especially, thinking of a model to be applied to the realities of Latin American countries.

Objective/context: In this paper, we describe the evolution of municipality-level homicide rates, during the 2003-2014 period in Colombia. Methodology: Quantitative analysis with multi-level regression models and finite-mix models. Conclusions: Our results show an important and statistically significant reduction of violence at the national level, and a large variability across geographical areas. We identify an association between profiles of change and a general government performance index, which provides support to the hypothesis of a differentiated State across time and space, and motives further studies and differential public policies across municipalities. Originality: The relationship between homicidal violence and the role of the State has been commonly analyzed on an aggregated level that ignores the disaggregated territorial view and heterogeneity of microterritorial realities. This article recognizes the local differences for the design of public policies that reflect contextual realities and assume that the performance of the State is heterogeneous and not static

Object/Context: This article analyses and compares the ideological dimension of anticorruption discourses and policies in Colombia during the presidency of Alvaro Uribe (2002-2010) and Juan Manuel Santos (2010-2018) and in Ecuador during the presidency of Rafael Correa (2007-2017). Methodology: We develop an ideological and discourse analysis of corruption discourses combining the theoretical framework of Laclau and Mouffe on discourse analysis with the morphological analysis of ideologies developed by Michael Freeden. We utilize this theoretical framework in order to analyze both qualitatively and quantitatively anticorruption discourses and policies. Conclusions: In the Colombian case the anticorruption discourse of presidents Uribe and Santos (2002-2018) legitimized a neoliberal order by articulating corruption as a phenomenon that belongs primarily to the public sphere. The government of Correa (2007-2017), however, identified corruption primarily with the private sector. As a consequence, his anticorruption discourse served to resist the neoliberal order and legitimize the ideology of the twenty first-century socialism. Originality: There are very few studies that unearth the ideological dimension of anticorruption discourses and policies. This paper seeks to fill this vacuum by utilizing an innovative theoretical framework that allows us to identify the ways in which anticorruption discourses and policies serve to legitimize and implement a political ideology

Objective/context: Gender mainstreaming policies have been adopted by local governments to advance gender equality as well as women’s rights. Existing research addresses several dimensions of this policy. However, a crucial dimension is its governance structure. In this article, we address the governance of gender mainstreaming policies under the governments of the Frente Amplio in Montevideo (Uruguay) and the Socialist Party in Rosario (Argentina), two left-wing parties with gender agendas. Methodology: The research is based on an analysis of policy trajectories over a decade and a half of implementation, comparing Montevideo and Rosario. By focusing on the governance structures of these policies, the paper examines legal, institutional and participatory instruments. The two cases are selected for their support to gender policies uninterruptedly for three decades, as well as for their recognition as successful experiences in Latin America. Conclusions: A significant contrast is identified between the two local administrations, despite their similarities. In general terms, the governance of gender mainstreaming in Montevideo tended to be broader and more democratic, while in Rosario it was partial and with a reduced multi-stakeholder participation. The explanations of these differences are linked to the characteristics of the local processes of decentralization and management reforms promoted by both governments. Originality: The originality of the article is given by an explanatory framework drawing upon broader discussions of the social sciences regarding decentralization and policy management, and extending it to account for the different governance structures of gender mainstreaming

Object/context: Natural parks are usually presented as the most important state-led strategy to promote the environmental conservation of a particular area. However, scarce anthropological and political science literature on this topic suggests that natural parks contribute to consolidate state power as well. This article explains how natural parks achieve said goal by studying the declaration and the initial years of the Alto Fragua-Indi Wasi Natural Park (located in Caquetá, Colombia). Methodology: The data for this study was gathered from official documents, historical archives and at least twenty in-depth interviews with state officials and social leaders. Conclusions: The article argues three central points. First, natural parks favor state power because they tend to make population and territories more legible. Second, there are six types of state legibility (convergent, denied, agreed, imposed, stopped and indifferent), which correspond to the historical moment and the social actors that relate to the state. Third, state legibility in the Alto Fragua-Indi Wasi Natural Park increased as the result of a political process characterized by the convergence of state and social interests. Contribution: The article provides conceptual and empirical tools to illustrate how natural parks strengthen the state and make state-society relations more complex. In general terms, this research paper is an invitation to study problems related to the state’s environmental and territorial planning from the optic of political science.

This article constructs a concept of memory as an open story in a domain of political reflection. It analyses the exercises of official memory-building found in reports such as the one written by the Historical Memory Documentary Centre (CNMH) establishing their paradoxical function with respect to social order and the victims. The argument is based on a claim regarding the impossibility of an absolute or totalizing closure of the political meaning of any narrative resulting from such reports. Methodology: The study was based on a poststructuralist theoretical perspective, with some conceptual corrections of the materialist paradigm and in consideration of the fieldwork involving the victims of the Colombian armed conflict in previous studies. We particularly emphasize the testimony of one of the victims interviewed in one of these previous works. Conclusions: The paper concludes that memory must constitute an open story that specifies a political and discursive interaction with the irrepresentable traumas linked to society’s historical foundation. Originality: Theoretical analyses of memory exercises usually exalt the role of memory narratives in overcoming violent events or defending a search for an alternative truth from the one produced institutionally. In this article, we highlight the incommensurability of the conflict and criticize the idea of memory narratives with a closed and stable symbolization. We set out the effects of the memory narratives on a political level in which the irrepresentable traumas that reflect unreconciled victims are at stake.

The purpose of this article is to reveal and analyze the emergence of the Provincial Commission for Memory (PCM) in Buenos Aires (Argentina). The work is based on a historical reference that allows us to reinstate the context in which the institution was created, and, in particular, the way in which Argentine society has processed this traumatic recent past. Methodology: The study’s design is flexible and involves crossed methodological strategies pertaining to sociology, history, and anthropology. The research question focuses on how the Provincial Commission for Memory entered the framework of the field of human rights and memory. To answer this question, we had to recover, through written documents, the institutional form that the Commission acquired, in order to understand its objectives, its internal regulations, its funding methods, and its composition. These written sources were, in turn, analyzed by cross-linking them with oral sources. Conclusions: The paper reveals that to understand the process of the emergence of the Provincial Commission for Memory, and some of the central features of the institution, we had to recap on the actors that staged the process and the context in which they acted. In terms of memory, what the PCM reinstated was an account centered on the horror; in other words, on that which the dictatorship had done with the victims, without addressing what these actors had had done before being victims: their political militancy. This implied the crystallization of the humanitarian narrative above other memories that highlight the importance of remembering the political projects embodied by the victims. With respect to the place of enunciation, the Commission faced a process of an “opening of the circle of those that remember” and of those that produce these memories. That is, from the PCM, it was thought that the families of the disappeared were not the only voice authorized to speak of the recent past; rather, and with the purpose of taking on the dispute, the institutions sought to support itself by a professionalized voice that could validate its enunciations, not so much in terms of personal experience but in terms of expertise. Originality: Studies of the recent past in Argentina are usually based on an enquiry into the relationship between civil society and the state, conceiving both as though they were self-contained areas. These analytical and methodological perspectives conceive social movements as actors that demand from the state from a position of exteriority, and conceive the State, from this same position, as an actor that responds more or less satisfactorily to these demands. What these perspectives do not show is an area of porosity that exists between civil society and the State. In this sense, this work is different from those perspectives that overestimate the distance between these spheres and resumes a careful examination of this area of confluence. This study attempts to account for a specific historical process, examining it with an analytical depth to prevent a simple description.

The relationship between legislative and judicial branches in constitutional democracies has been the subject of several academic debates. Nevertheless, this literature has made little reference to congresspeople’s role as active subjects in judicial scenarios, especially when they present complaints against legislation enacted during their incumbency. This study seeks to address the question of why members of the Colombian Congress make use of constitutional review to overturn laws that they took part in debating. Through the use of quantitative and qualitative analysis, this paper explains how the use of constitutional complaints by members of congress is not limited to a political strategy of opposition by independents and opposition parties, but also serves members of the governing coalition for at least three different purposes: i) to deviate from the political approach of the Executive bill when they do not agree with the contents or when the reforms affect the interests of their constituency; ii) to “clean up” Executive bills of content introduced by the opposition during the law-making process; and iii) to advance certain points of their own political agenda, avoiding the political cost of opposing the reform as it passes through the legislative process.

The control of energy resources is an important aspect within the geopolitical disputes between States. In this context, the purpose of this paper is to show that the US policy on shale gas exploration lies within the context of the country’s strategic issue of energy security. To achieve this aim it is necessary to: i) describe the relationship between the hegemony of the United States and the petroleum energy regime; ii) understand the American energy matrix and the role of shale gas exploration in the current global context.

In this paper, we analyze the effect of the position of the candidates on the voting card on their electoral performance. To do so, we use an open list voting system and the results of the Chilean local elections of 2008 and 2012, characterized by high-level party fragmentation and candidate lists. Using a multivariate linear regression model with fixed effects, we concluded that the voters —confronted with very large voting cards— use party labels as information shortcuts. Voters are subsequently more prone to vote for the first name that appears on the list of their coalition or party, increasing the probability of that candidate being elected. As such, in an open list voting system, the position of the candidate on the voting card is a relevant factor in explaining candidates’ success or failure.