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This paper explores dynamics of change and continuity in subnational (provincial) authoritarianism in nationally democratic regimes. Borrowing from theories of territorial politics, it provides a framework for analyzing the strategic context in which incumbent authoritarian elites and local and national opponents pursue strategies of territorial control and opposition. Subnational authoritarianism must be understood not as a local issue but as an outcome of broader dynamics of national territorial governance in democratic regimes. Conflicts between incumbents and opposition are played out across multiple territorial arenas in the national political system. In nationally democratic regimes, incumbent authoritarian elites will pursue three types of strategies across territorial arenas: the parochialization of power, the nationalization of influence, and the monopolization of national-subnational institutional linkages. Subnational democratization, when it occurs, will result from intervention by actors in national political arenas. To this end, a distinction is made between two ?modes? of subnational political change: ?party-led? transitions and ?center-led? transitions. The paper concludes with case studies of two recent conflicts over subnational democratization: the state of Oaxaca in Mexico, and the province of Santiago del Estero in Argentina. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper addresses the relationship between the Mexican government and the organized Mexican immigrant community in the United States from a historical perspective and within a framework of transnational politics. We argue that transnational relations between the Mexican government and Mexican immigrants in the United States are not new; however, these relations vary across time depending on political and economic circumstances that involve U.S.-Mexico relations. These historical links have provided the basis for the existence of current organizations of Mexican immigrants in the United States as well as the recent creation and development of the Mexican government?s institutions to manage this relationship. In recent years, we identify a change in Mexico?s traditional approach to migration issues in the bilateral agenda, as well as a shift in the relationship between the Mexican immigrant communities and the government. The process of institutionalization of this new relation began with the Program for Mexican Communities Abroad (PCME, in Spanish) in 1990, and was strongly consolidated in 2003 with the creation of the Institute of Mexicans Abroad (IME, in Spanish). We argue that the IME is the first Mexican governmental transnational institution in the history of relations between the Mexican government and the Mexican community in the United States. As such, we explore some of the challenges it faces in order to achieve its objectives and exert influence in American ethnic politics. In the first part of the paper we present a theoretical overview about the historical perspective of transnational politics. The second part offers a historical account of the development of the transnational relations between the Mexican government and the organized Mexican immigrant community in the last 156 years. In the third part, we analyze the challenges faced by the IME and its potential influence in American ethnic politics. Finally, we conclude with a section of remarks from both theoretical and empirical standpoints. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores the evolution of transnational human rights advocacy in the 1990s. Drawing on empirical data from research in Bangladesh, Mexico and the United States, the paper focuses on the emergence of economic and labor rights claims as central human rights concerns in a series of high-profile transnational advocacy campaigns. I highlight several types of strategic moves made by developing country-based activists who sought to position labor and economic rights claims as central human rights claims in the various cases. These unconventional moves, I argue, pushed a broader process of normative evolution that transcended the campaigns themselves - and enriches our understanding of the dynamics of transnational advocacy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores Mexican fiscal federalism from the point of view of legislative coalition building. In federal regimes legislators are constrained by their state affiliations. In order to evaluate the coalition formation strategies available to states, the paper analyzes minimal winning coalitions (MWC) of state delegations in the Mexican Chamber of Deputies. Banzhaf indexes of political power are calculated for each state. Players in this cooperative game are connected through their partisanship at the state level and the structural differences characterizing the states they belong to. Hence, the paper calculates connected minimal winning coalitions (CMWC) of state-party groups ranked according to their substantive disagreements on the reform of intergovernmental relations. The analysis of CMWC suggests that although coalition formation will be difficult, given the high degree of party discipline in the legislature, a reform of fiscal federalism in Mexico is possible. However, such reform can lead either to a highly redistributive system, which would further reinforce the vertical imbalances of the current arrangement; or a greater devolution of tax authority benefiting rich states, which would further enhance regional inequality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper comes out of a broader project entitled ?Two-Level Games and International Narcotics Control: Cooperation Between the United States and Mexico and Colombia, 1989-2000.? In the broader project, I examine how the United States handles narcotics control in its bilateral relationships with Mexico and Colombia during the presidential administration of George H.W. Bush and both William Clinton administrations. Working out of the ?two-level games? tradition associated with Robert Putnam, I seek to explain differences in cooperation across countries and across time by examining the interaction of domestic and international political processes. In so doing, I hope to contribute to the growing literature on this interaction as well as add theoretical and empirical rigor to the narcotics policy literature. In this paper I focus on the second Clinton administration and assess the degree of cooperation between the countries. I test three hypotheses consistent with the two-level games approach: strength of the president, timing of elections, and executive-legislative relations. I also address two alternative hypotheses: the ?interdependent? U.S.-Mexican relationship and the reputation of the Colombian president and probe their impact on narcotics control cooperation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In many mixed electoral systems voters cast two ballots, one for a party list and a second for a candidate in a single member district. In the Mexican mixed electoral system, since 1988 when the ballot structure was changed, voters cast a single vote to select both types of representatives. The single votes for district candidates are then aggregated for distribution of the party list seats in large M (40 seats) districts. In this paper, we examine the extent to which the Mexican one-vote ballot type affects strategic voting. We complement the Mexican data with district level data from Italy and Senegal. Through the SF Ratio and effective number of electoral parties comparisons, our findings indicate that strategic voting decreased from one comparable election to the next, although in modified form in concurrent (presidential and legislative together) elections. This, we argue, is at least partially an effect of the ballot structure. Check author’s web site for an updated version of the paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper examines the "moral economy" of electoral clientelism - the exchange of votes for goods - on the basis of qualitative interviews conducted in late 2000 in rural Mexico. Contrary to common assumptions about physical needs forcing the "poor and powerless" to trade their political rights for material favors, it finds that respondents reject clientelist practices, defend their individual autonomy, and demand universalistic policies. In democratic Mexico, the paper concludes tentatively, attempted vote trading may be a widespread practice; yet an illegitimate one. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper combines institutional and bargaining analysis to assess the consequences of decentralization policy reforms on the evolution of balance of power among presidents, governors, and mayors. I reject the limitations of static theories of decentralization in favor of a dynamic account of institutional evolution that incorporates the effects of policy feedbacks on preference formation in multi-staged processes. I define decentralization as a three-dimensional process that involves fiscal, administrative, and political reforms, and I distinguish between the partisan and territorial interests of bargaining actors. I propose a sequential theory of decentralization that considers actors? preferences, type of interests and coalitions, and the sequence of decentralization reforms. The argument of the paper is that the sequence and timing of fiscal, administrative, and political decentralization reforms and the type of political coalitions that initiate each round of reforms are two key determinants of the resulting evolution of intergovernmental balance of power. I test the argument by comparing the ways in which decentralization policies originated and unfolded in Argentina, Mexico, and Colombia between 1978 and 1999. The paper shows, against commonly held beliefs, that different trajectories of decentralization (a democratic path in Colombia, a technocratic path in Mexico, and an authoritarian path in Argentina) led to the strengthening of governors and mayors in Colombia and Mexico, and to the decline of governors? preexisting resources and capacities in Argentina. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

During the 1990s the average PAN voter had a centrist position on most relevant dimensions of political conflict in Mexico, and the PAN electorate as a whole has resembled a catch-all party that draws support from left to center-right. In this paper I demonstrate that the electoral coalition that supported the PAN and its presidential candidate in 2000 had grown even wider and more ideologically heterogeneous by the time the historical election took place. This phenomenon is explained by the shifts in the ideological distribution of the Mexican electorate, and, even more importantly, by the shifts in the average party placements on the relevant axes of political conflict. Vicente Fox benefited from a liberal electorate that had voted for the left in the past and even in the 2000 congressional races. Similarly, Fox received significant support from the right, still an electoral niche for PRI. Support for Fox was more likely among a younger, more educated, and urban electorate across the country, but especially in the most industrialized northern region. Vicente Fox not only benefited from the PAN’s pivotal position in the ideological distribution of the Mexican electorate, but also from the greater likelihood of voluntary participation inherent among PAN supporters. Typical explanatory variables of voting behavior, such as party identification and candidate image, account significantly for the vote choice, and the magnitude and significance of ideological orientations as well as the explicit desire for change account for both the election outcome and the coalition phenomenon before and, perhaps, after 2000. This paper relies on a collection of national surveys conducted between 1996 and 2000 among the general population and actual voters. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores the conditions under which economic and political decentralization in multi-ethnic federations may stimulate or inhibit the emergence of subnational movements of ethnic autonomy and self-determination. Rather than testing these hypotheses with a cross-country sample, in this paper I will use a cross-state and cross-municipal sample of one single federation: the United States of Mexico. Preliminary statistical results suggest that while economic and political decentralization may have a significant effect in the likelihood of ethno-protest, they bear no significant relationship with ethno-rebellion. In municipalities with higher levels of poor Indian populations, where electoral competition is weaker and protest or guerrilla activity are more intense, the decentralization of federal resources is more likely to increase the probability that subnational ethnic movements emerge in the region. In contrast, however, results presented in this paper suggest that in municipalities with larger poor indigenous populations, with high levels of peasant indigenous protest and where historical levels of religious competition have been high, a guerrilla group is most likely to adopt an ethnic banner. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The problem of political order in 20th century Mexico is framed in this paper as a bargaining game with outside options. Political Factions are "players" in a distributive game whose aim is to get the largest possible piece of the "pie of rule"-set of elective public jobs. The paper argues that although the basic problem and features of the political game were similar for the whole 20th century Mexican politics, in fact two different sets of rules were in place. One was form 1914- late 1940s, and another from the late 1940s on. The paper analyses the endogenous process that brought about a change in the rules, and the conditions under which the outcome of the games was war, authoritarianism, or democracy. Narrative and data are provided as evidence to test some the main predictions of the theory. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The impact of Information Communication Technologies (ICTs) on the poor and marginalized has been a matter of debate since the beginnings of the information revolution. Whether or not ICT penetration is causing increased inequality and poverty remains an unresolved puzzle (ICTs, defined broadly in this paper, include TV, radio, Internet and mobile phones). The puzzle stems from small-n studies tending to find that the impact of new ICTs has been positive for the poor, while large-n studies purport the opposite (Forestier, Grace and Kenny 2001). Recent empirical studies suggest the impact of ICT is 'Janus faced'-in some cases emergent ICTs create new opportunities for the poor, while in others they seem to exacerbate the challenges the poor face (Kenny 2006; Huerta, Esperanza and Rodrigo Sandoval-Almazan 2007; Hanson 2008). I argue that the socioeconomic context, and governance, shapes the impact of these emerging technologies. I posit that there is an interaction effect between governance and ICT which is the 'missing link' that plays a central, yet often overlooked, role in determining the impact of ICT on the poor. There are three primary mechanisms influencing how ICT and governance interact: First, ICT affects governance by enhancing opportunities for information sharing through increasing speed of communication, increasing penetration rates, and deepening of technology (Web 2.0); Secondly, ICT affects governance by generating social capital and enhancing civil society; Third, ICT affects governance by improving efficiency. Finally, I make the theoretical leap, digressing from the established literature, that this produces an interaction effect between ICT and governance leading, in general, to better outcomes for the poor. To empirically test these claims, this paper takes a mixed methods approach. First, I conduct a large-n study comparing Mexico to other similar developing countries. Yet to investigate the puzzle in greater depth, I also employ a small-n analysis focusing on the poor in rural and urban Mexico. I compare case studies of ICT access and use by the poor in two urban areas, Guadalajara, Mexico's so-called 'Silicone Vally', and Puebla. Comparative analysis between two rural towns in Oaxaca, confirm the findings of the urban case studies: ICT access and use among the poor can be enhanced through an interaction with governance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper argues that the exclusion of women from political offices in Mexico and Latin America's customary law communities, more broadly, is much more than a problem of the purported patriarchal cultures of indigenous and rural communities. We claim, based on a comprehensive survey of 466 mayors in the indigenous state of Oaxaca, that the underrepresentation of women is a function of institutions limiting female candidates. We test this "candidate pipeline" hypothesis, adapted from U.S.-based studies, against the hypothesis that culture--as measured by indigenous ethnicity--has an independent effect on women's representation. The paper disconfirms that patriarchal, traditionalist cultures of indigenous communities cause underrepresentation in the election of women and instead finds that a particular set of local institutions, which are more prevalent in indigenous municipalities, blocks the pipeline of potential women candidates. We conclude by considering the normative implications for customary law representation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Dollar et al. (2001) sparked off research on gender and corruption. They showed, in a crosscountry comparative study, that a high number of women in elected office is related to a low level of corruption. Whether there is a causal relationship is, however, disputed. Sung (2003) has argued that modern liberal democracy is the driving force behind a high number of women elected, as well as government accountability. This paper focuses on subnational variation in Mexico. Data from Transparency International indicate that corruption is ten times more likely to occur in requesting or receiving public services in the state most hit by corruption than in the state least affected. There is also considerable variation in the numbers of women elected, and the subnational analysis confirms previous cross-country findings: states with a high number of women elected tend to display lower levels of corruption than states with a low number of women elected. The Mexican case strengthens the idea that there are important links between gender and corruption. This paper launches a "rationality perspective," arguing that when calculating costs and benefits, women more often than men choose to abstain from corrupt behavior. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents a preliminary assessment of the way in which the Argentine Supreme Court, reformed in 2003, has contributed to redefine its own institutional role through its procedures and decisions. Based on empirical research conducted in Argentina in 2005 and 2007, the paper shows that this Court has set out to recover its institutional standing and legitimacy through a new jurisprudence on rights as well as through innovative ways of judicial intervention, associated with what has been called "experimentalism" in public interest litigation, which include the participation of new kinds of actors and entail an emerging new relationship between the Court and civil society's organizations in Argentina. Contrastingly, it is shown, based on academic works in the field, that the Mexican Supreme Court, since its reform in 1994, has contributed through its decisions to define its own institutional role as a mediator in political conflicts. The paper offers a preliminary account of some factors that may have contributed to these differential results. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper discusses the practices of state management of religion in Turkey and Tunisia as attempts to construct and maintain a civil religion in Rousseau's sense, a modified version of revealed religion or an alternative to it that promotes unity of the body politic, socially useful virtues, and loyalty to the state. Revolutionary France provides the prototype. But arguably Islam provides a more suitable basis for such a civil religion than does Christianity. In my 2007 PhD dissertation I analyzed data from key legal and educational texts—law and education being two privileged media for propagating civil religions of this type—that show the ideological content of these projects including, critically, what national community is evoked in them and what identities and practices are thereby excluded. The limits of state toleration of unofficial or uncontrolled religious expression—"popular" rather than "state" religion, in Sayyid Qutb's terminology—have been tested in sometimes violent action by religious, conservative, and popular forces, a dialectical process that changes the state and its critics alike. Understanding the goals and social engineering technologies of civil religions is as important as understanding radical religious movements in the region and beyond; we cannot truly understand the one without the other. In the second part of this paper I begin to extend the analysis by asking whether the pattern of Rousseauist civil religion which has put down roots around the Mediterranean might also have flourished elsewhere. Post-revolutionary Mexico is discussed as a plausibility probe, on the basis of secondary sources only. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the effects of the exchange of particularistic benefits for political support in Mexico during the presidential elections in 2000, more specifically, it looks at the competition of the three larger parties to gain votes through the distribution of gifts and services. Competition though gift-giving sheds light not only on the strategies parties follow to buy votes but also on the ways in which such an incentive interacts with other dispositions. Therefore, three major questions drive this inquiry: what strategies did parties follow in distributing particularistic benefits? What electoral effects do these have? What role do voter attitudes, like partisanship, play in voting choices in the face of particularistic benefits? Through the use of post-electoral survey data, I provide evidence that parties in Mexico engaged in vote-buying effectively during the 2000 presidential elections, they successfully bid and bought votes. While these results are not surprising, this paper also presents evidence that PAN, the eventual winner, managed to successfully demobilize PRI voters, while PRI did the same but to a lesser extent. In this election major parties in Mexico competed with one another to hold old wards, to win back lost ones, and to reduce the share of voters for their competition. Although the electoral effects are small due to the relatively small number of recipients of gifts, they are statistically robust. Furthermore, evidence suggests the development of long-term relationships between parties and recipients of benefits that affect their partisanship. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper develops a theoretical argument that explains the patterns of change in bothsocial insurance and social assistance in Mexico over the last two decades and explains some ofthe apparent contradictions in the existing literature on globalization, democratic institutions, andwelfare in Latin America. By comparing multiple social insurance and social assistance policyoutcomes during the Salinas (1988-1994), Zedillo (1994-2000), and Fox (2000-2006)administrations, the paper demonstrates that though globalization may constrain welfare policyoptions, its impact is often indirect, through its effect on the relative political capacity ofdomestic actors. Furthermore, political liberalization changes the incentives for politicians tosupply welfare. In addition, existing welfare institutions create powerful policy legacies thatinfluence the interests of some domestic political actors. The overall pattern that emerges inMexico is one of partial retrenchment of social insurance and the expansion of targeted socialassistance, a pattern that can be explained in light of economic liberalization, democratization,and policy legacies. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyzes the politics of banking reform in developing countries during the 1990s. Electoral competition helps to explain whether countries were likely to implement regulatory reforms after banking crises. The potential for wide swings in electoral support in highly competitive democracies should favor consumers, who benefit from reforms, and harm vested producer groups that prefer forbearance. Where electoral competition is muted, producer groups - such as a bankers' coalition - should benefit more than consumers given their economic and political power. To evaluate these arguments, this paper examines patterns of post-crisis regulatory reform implementation in Mexico, Venezuela, and South Korea during the 1990s. Within and cross-country evidence is consistent with the arguments. Surprisingly, it indicates that in countries with low levels of intra-party electoral competition, i.e. those with disciplined political parties, governments engaged in regulatory forbearance even with fierce inter-party competition. Crony financial capitalism seems less likely in multiparty settings with undisciplined parties. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Admiration and resentment of America are deeply rooted in the political traditions of the United States' nearest neighbors. As in other parts of the world, resentment has been on the rise in recent years. This paper distinguishes in its first part between critical opinion, skepticism, and prejudice on the one hand, and different types of anti-Americanism on the other. In the paper's next two parts, these general categories are confronted with data from Canada and Mexico and the dramatically different historical trajectories in the evolution of anti-Americanism in these two countries. In the fourth and final section, the paper seeks to identify commonalities, if any, in these radically different political settings. The expected finding is that even in close proximity to the United States, we find a plurality of different types of anti-Americanisms, a condition that characterizes world politics more generally. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The spread and consolidation of democratic regimes in Latin America over the past decades combined with the availability of new national and cross-national data sets (such as the CSES) makes it possible to study the causes of political participation in new settings where there is sufficient institutional variation to test the effect of political institutions and policies on political participation. This paper explores the empirical relationship between social and economic policies and political participation in Latin America, with a special focus on the case of Mexico. In particular, it examines the impact that neoliberal economic policies have on the political participation of the poor. New data from Mexico and other Latin American countries shows that patterns of political participation increasingly mirror those in the United States, where citizens that have more politically relevant resources (income, education, skills) participate more frequently than citizens who have fewer of these resources. The paper evaluates two competing hypotheses that might account for this pattern: 1) the poor participate less than the rich because they have fewer resources and are less engaged in politics; 2) the poor participate less than the rich because state policies and features of the political process create greater obstacles and fewer incentives for the poor to participate than for the rich. Evidence from Mexico supports the second explanation, suggesting that standard explanations of political activism need to be revised to better account for the effect of the state on political participation. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates how variation in subnational ethnic group presence and electoral rules vary, and whether they lead to differences in subnational ethnic political behavior that can affect local and even national elections, even in a case where national electoral laws prevent the formation of ethnic-based parties. To this end, the paper focuses on the political behavior of indigenous groups at municipal levels in Mexico. Certain institutional and demographic features of Mexico allow us to investigate how different local electoral laws interact with ethnicity to shape local and national party politics. It finds that, local electoral institutions appear to affect national voting behavior, as well as finds some preliminary evidence that ethnicity exaggerates the expected effects of said institutions. Simple statistical studies and data tables are used to support the investigation. ..PAT.-Conference Proceeding [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

What determines how judicial institutions perform? Prominent theoretical approaches such as international political economy, institutional rational choice, social capital, and structural theories suggest that international economic actors, political competition, political participation, and poverty may all be important forces driving institutional behavior. This paper analyzes these various theoretical approaches and uses qualitative and statistical analysis to compare judicial performance in the Mexican states. The paper provides evidence to support the institutional rational choice hypothesis that political competition generates judicial independence. Poverty, political participation, and an export-oriented economy seem to influence judicial access and effectiveness. ..PAT.-Conference Proceeding [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Teaching abroad poses unique challenges and rewards for US-based academics. This paper provides a primer that addresses these challenges, drawing from my experience teaching a course on the political economy of international migration in Morelia, Mexico. The paper provides recommendations on how U.S.-based instructors can make their teaching abroad experiences as productive as possible for students and themselves. Challenges included housing, language, the distracting local environment and a diverse classroom drawn from universities, community colleges and the host institution. Opportunities included numerous guest speakers, fieldtrips and the first hand accounts of local students. This paper serves as a useful primer for readers unfamiliar with study abroad programs, for faculty interested in applying to such programs, or for those already preparing to teach abroad. ..PAT.-Conference Proceeding [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Most of the literature on federalism has emphasized the relationship between national and subnational governments, but has overlooked the organization of power at the subnational level. Likewise, most of the debate on the separation of powers in presidential, parliamentary, and mixed systems has neglected the role of federalism in bolstering the separation of powers. In this paper, we argue federalism may be defined as a constitutional arrangement that creates executive, legislative, and judicial branches of government at the subnational level. This definition has important implications for the literatures on federalism and the separation of powers, two themes often treated in isolation. First, it directs the attention of students of federalism to the neglected subject of the separation of powers at the subnational level. Second, it directs the attention of students of the separation of powers to the issue of federalism. We show that the existence of institutional mechanisms that override the subnational separation of powers in federal systems is problematic for democracy and deserves further attention. We also point to the fact that by safeguarding the subnational separation of powers, federalism can strengthen democracy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent work on the effects of fiscal federalism suggest that the effect of decentralization on public good provision and fiscal restraint is largely determined by the social and political context in which the decentralizsation coccurs. This paper extends this work by showing that the outcome of decetralization is contingent upon the patterns of political competition that develop in the local political arena following decentralization. Specifically, the use of state resources to maintain clinetelist networks and low levels of budgetary discipline both predomidate in localities with either extremely high or low levels of electoral fragmentation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Civic environmentalism is gaining popularity as a model of second generation environmental policy. With its focus on civic engagement, market-based tools, and private-public partnerships, civic environmentalism has enjoyed some successes at the local, state, and regional levels. Yet, the question remains: Does civic environmentalism work when applied to more complex, large scale environmental problems? This paper applies the civic environmentalism model of environmental governance to the Mississippi River/Gulf of Mexico Task Force?s efforts to control the ?dead zone? located off the coast of Louisiana. I find that civic environmentalism does have its limits when applied to large geographic areas and temporally complex environmental problems. A lack of government funding and various barriers to collective action also play a role. In the end analysis, policy makers must be leery about relying too much on voluntary programs and the tyranny of individual decisions when dealing with the Gulf of Mexico?s dead zone. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Part I of this paper argues that most conceptualizations of electoral and competitive authoritarianism are based on a notion of democratic deficiencies rather than positive authoritarian attributes, and that modifications to Dahl?s concept of polyarchy are for the most part unnecessary. Special attention is given to four efforts to conceptualize hybrid regimes: Mainwaring, Brinks, and Pérez Liñán (2001), Diamond (2002), Schedler (2002), and Levitsky and Way (2002). Moreover, while most conceptualizations of democracy elaborate on Dahl?s polyarchy, I argue that changes to Dahl?s concept are for the most part unnecessary. I then compare four recent efforts to conceptualize hybrid regimes: Mainwaring, Brinks, and Pérez Liñán (2001), Diamond (2002), Schedler (2002), and Levitsky and Way (2002), I revisit several of the key concepts developed by O?Donnell and Schmitter (1986) and offer suggestions as to how these should be reconceived for the study of transitions from competitive authoritarian regimes. Part II gives a brief summary of the nature of the competitive authoritarian regimes in Mexico, the Dominican Republic, and Peru, and a description of the transition from competitive authoritarian to democratic regimes in those three countries. Part III compares the cases along three dimensions: causal factors internal to the regime, factors external to the regime but internal to the polity, and international factors that are external to both the regime and the polity. The results of these comparisons are mostly negative, finding few causal factors are common across the cases. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Drawing on an unprecedented survey of thousands of indigenous citizens in southern Mexico, this paper seeks to partially disconfirm primordialist theories about the ascriptive nature of ethnicity by demonstrating that while indigenous identities may be endogenous to linguistic groups, these identities may be readily activated and deactivated. That is, indigenous citizens, like their non-indigenous counterparts, usually view their participation in society through a statist/individualist frame, rather than from a collectivist-traditional/communalist perspective. Constructing a logit model based on variables derived from the survey, I conclude that ethnicity is less important in shaping peoples? attitudes than other causes. Independent variables like the form of state-society relations, agrarian structures, poverty and isolation are found to be more determinant in shaping attitudes about how indigenous Mexicans order relations with both traditional communities and the state. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the implementation of gender quota law on the 2003 midterm legislative elections in Mexico. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The recent wave of political transitions has often led to competitive elections, but not always to the minimal institutional guarantees of civil and political rights or the responsive policy outcomes that are generally associated with democratic regimes. Scholars have offered a range of explanations for the differences in the quality of these new democracies. Aspects of socioeconomic structure, institutional configurations, and the strategic choices of elite actors have each been proposed, but these hypotheses are rarely systematically tested against each other. In this paper, I draw on the experiences of Mexico’s thirty-one recently empowered state governments in the years since that country’s pivotal 1988 presidential election to provide just such a test. My statistical analyses indicate that legislative pluralism, the strength of radical opposition parties, and economic inequality each have an important effect on the quality of new democracies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyzes how legislative rules structure amending behavior in the lower chambers of Argentina, Chile and Mexico. The article emphasizes the theoretical relevance of voting agendas, order of voting, status quo position and sequence of amending moves by committees and floor challengers. It shows that although individual deputies can get improvements by introducing floor amendments, committees are usually able to mitigate the effects of unwanted changes. It also shows that in Chile (unlike Argentina or Mexico), the executive has procedural rights that allow him to respond to committee reports with amendments of his own, and that he uses these prerogatives often to successfully protect presidential bills. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

What are the factors that serve to shape an individual’s attitudes towards his/her political system, its fundamental institutions, and the politicians that occupy those institutions? This question provides the point of departure for this analysis of the attitudes of the Mexican voter on the eve of the country’s 2000 presidential elections. This paper examines how the sub-national political fault lines that run through Mexico affected the way Mexicans perceived the 2000 elections and their political system more generally. I test, and provide at least preliminary evidence for, the proposition that the local political environment serves as a principal determinant of how citizens view their larger political system, even perhaps to the point of trumping national-level regime characteristics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper engages in an empirical exploration of the link between political parties and democratic consolidation in Latin America using public opinion data collected in seven Latin American countries. Specifically, in each country I use structural equations analysis to explore factors that affect individual confidence in political parties and then examine the relationship between this level of confidence and support for democratic politics. Subsequently, I compare the findings cross-nationally, which allows for broader insights into the hypothesized connection between representative institutions and the strength of democracy. This analytical approach permits examination of these relationships within each of the countries studied and enables comparison throughout the region. We can draw two major conclusions from this analysis. First, in all seven countries a strong and significant link between confidence in political parties and confidence in Congress is found. Second, the analysis finds some support for the hypothesis that public confidence in political parties produces greater support for democracy, and by extension, that effective political parties can be important in democratic consolidation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As economic globalization progresses, so does the globalization of environmental disputes. Transnational NGOs and transnational corporations are often found in the center of environmental disputes in communities they knew little or nothing about before the dispute. While protecting the environment is an important cause, the globalization of environmental disputes poses questions, some normative and others theoretical. This paper is an attempt to answer these questions, using the case study method. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper investigates the institutional legacies of the one-party regime in Mexico and Russia respectively as they make the transition to democracy and market economies. Despite their differing histories, the countries are responding to similar globalization pressures, in roughly similar ways. However the Soviet legacy of strict limits on institutional pluralism and lack of a mechanism for ensuring leadership rotation left Russia ill-prepared for the democratic transition in comparison with Mexico. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper develops a theoretical account of how competitive elections might produce accountability in the subnational Mexican context. I argue that only two logical mechanisms exist: party sanctioning, in which the electorate casts judgment on parties based on the past performance of their office-holders, and candidate selection, in which the vote is based on anticipated future performance of candidates. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper argues that Mexico’s apparent three-party system comes closer to a no-party system. It is the result of social forces and political factions that took advantage of institutional changes resulting from the loss of elite consensus to defend either tradition or change, without committing to parties. The "vibrant" civil society praised by many is a sign of a weak government and leads to a dangerously high ratio of participation to institutionalization. Paradoxically, because parties are weak, rule of law can only be achieved through corruption, by backwards accommodation with traditional elites and practices. Three patterns of local political openings over the last fifty years correlate with three of Huntington’s phases of party development. Together they demonstrate both the weakness of political parties today, and the hope for democratic change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

When immigrants arrive to the U.S., do they learn new political orientations and behaviors, or do their prior political socialization continue to shape their attitudes and behavior even in their new setting? If prior socialization continues in new settings, then how much does it matter if immigrants arrive from more or less authoritarian or democratic contexts in their in their countries of origin? Are individuals with less experience with the functioning of democracy in their countries of birth also less likely to be participants in the democratic process in the United States? Using data from the 2006 Latino National Survey this paper examines the prior political socialization of Mexican immigrants in the United States, finds some counter-intuitive results, and suggest some of the implications for participation in the U.S. stemming from the continuity and discontinuity of prior political socialization among immigrants. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper seeks to understand how political ambition plays out in a federal system in which incumbency does not exist because of the constitutional prohibition against consecutive reelection. Using a unique dataset of the career paths of over 1,400 federal deputies, both before and after reaching the Chamber of Deputies, we estimate the impact of personal attributes, institutional and partisan constraints on their career choices. Our evidence indicates that Mexico's federal system leads many professional politicians to begin their political careers in the local and state political arenas before becoming federal deputies, and eventually return to their states when the single three-year legislative term expires. Comparatively, Mexican political careers (constrained by the nation's formal rules and informal relations) look much more like those of Argentina and Brazil, and less like those of the United States. This finding has important implications for Mexico's consolidating democracy, in that powerful governors control many of the resources that matter to ambitious politicians from all political parties. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Variations in economic voting are commonly linked to the ability of voters to hold politicians accountable. In contrast, we argue that they may also stem from the incentives that voters have to cast an economic vote or not. In this paper, we follow Pacek and Radcliff (1995) and argue that voters who receive welfare benefits from anti-poverty programs should be insulated from swings in the national economy and thus have fewer incentives to cast a sociotropic vote. Evidence from the Mexican public opinion surveys conducted over the 1991-2004 period offers support this proposition. The findings suggest the rewards for investing in anti-poverty welfare programs may increase with program efficiency rather than politicization and that effective social safety nets are political ones as well. It also suggests that variations in economic voting might not reflect the weakness of accountability but its strength: voters are getting what they ask for. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper studies the process of judicial independence building in democratizing nations from a political science perspective. It addresses the theoretical and empirical paradox: why does a ruling party agree to cede the control over a branch that could limit its future power? Using the cases of Argentina (2003-2006) and Mexico (1994-2004) we argue against two recent theoretical approaches developed to explain the structure of incentives leading governing elites to promote such institutional changes. Both explanations conceive reforms as rational strategies of actors to limit the power of opponents, the future government -according to the electoral incentives approach, and the party in power -according to the divided government approach. We challenge the notions of both approaches for the analysis or our cases and argue that both processes show a strong explanatory power of legitimacy and power building needs as incentives for self-limitation. We also argue that implementation of reforms occurred in these two cases in contexts both framed by a political institutional crisis in conjunction with a crisis of credibility of the courts. The results of this study suggest the existence of perhaps too many domestic contextual factors shaping incentives and strategies of reforming elites regarding judicial independence as to construct a single explanation behind judicial reform in democratizing nations. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper outlines the contours of an ongoing research project on the politics of banking-sector opening in Mexico, Brazil, and Indonesia. The project tries to understand why these three countries opened their domestic banking sectors to foreign participation in the 1990s and early 2000s after decades of financial protectionism, and why their governments countries exercised different degrees of control over the opening process. I find that international pressure by itself did not generate significant opening; only when external pressure converged with banking shocks, and sometimes also with domestically-driven ideational change, did significant opening follow. I also find that although the shocks forced major de jure opening in all three countries, in practice, policymakers gradually reasserted control over the opening process and were able to harness foreign capital to advance domestic political priorities. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper shows that despite intensely polarized political elites in Mexico and highly polarized campaigns based to a signigicant extent on distinct economic policy proposals by the leading candidayes, issue differences were small across party identifiers and played a very minor role in vote intention. Instead, the vote was most strongly affected by candidate traits, retrospective evaluations of the incumbent's performance in office, and partisan identification. These findings imply that Mexico is not undergoing a partisan realignment, that the virtual tie between the leftwing and rightwing frontrunners does not imply deep divisions in the electorate, and that office-holders have little clear mandate. Data include the Mexico 2006 Candidate and Party Elite Survey and the Mexico 2006 Voter Panel Study. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It has been argued that direct public funding of political parties is a catalyst of democratization and consolidation processes, both by leveling the playing field among competitors, and contributing to limit the abuse of state resources by the incumbent(s). However, in older democracies it has been criticized for the rent-seeking incentives it generates, as well as for its potential for decreasing political competitiveness. This paper integrates these perspectives into a dynamic theory of public funding of political parties, stressing the diverse effects it may have on party system development, and the role played by partisan incentives and opportunities in the implementation of this regulatory instrument. It tests some of the hypotheses derived from the theory using a database from sub-national politics in Mexico, and illustrates the theoretical insights through a narrative of the Mexican federal party finance enforcement system-itself a showcase of how both these allegedly "new" and "old" incentives may coexist. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Most studies of democratic transition and consolidation focus on the process of change from authoritarianism to democracy. However, in most regime transitions, numerous institutions from the past survive. A key source of continuity is the public administration. Once in power, new authorities rely, at least initially, on bureaucracies that were created by, and responded to, the purposes of control and loyalty of the previous authoritarian regime. This paper addresses the question of how democratic elites cope with the challenge of bringing about change in the bureaucratic apparatuses inherited from the past. I compare two democracies that emerged after a long lasting authoritarian episode: Mexico and Spain. Both the post-PRI and post-Franco regimes faced the complex challenge of reforming the political system, dealing with an overloaded agenda, and meeting high expectations. Yet, the new elites still depended on bureaucratic apparatuses that responded to old incentives. I will show that, paradoxically, the ability of new elites to reform the administration is negatively related to their capacity to carry out broader reforms in the state structure. Thus, while the Spanish elites were dealing with constitution-making and devolution to regions, they could not focus their attention on administrative reform before 1984 (and with very limited results). Conversely, the Fox administration in Mexico, constrained by a divided congress that blocked most of its reform agenda, turned its attention to less contentious issues related to administrative reform at an earlier point in the transition process. A second finding is that the relative success of those reform efforts was influenced to a great extent by the characteristics of the bureaucracy the new elites were trying to reform. In Spain, the prospects of change were reduced by the organization of the bureaucracy into corps, which provided a basis for organized resistance to reform efforts. By contrast, in Mexico the bureaucracy never enjoyed formal or informal cohesion and there was no form of collective action that could become an obstacle to reform. Still, it will be shown that, despite these differences, in both cases there was also a gradual process of adjustment, by which substantial change occurred, as the bureaucracy reacted to a new set of incentives provided by the democratic nature of the new regime, which transformed patterns of control and loyalty into a new emphasis on responsiveness and accountability. ..PAT.-Conference Proceeding [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The health care reform of 2003 in Mexico does not conform to the expectations of influential theories of social welfare reform, such as power resources or veto players theory. In this paper, the origins and nature of the Seguro Popular reform are analyzed, as well as the political process culminating in legislative approval by the Mexican Congress. I argue that the reform is more consistent with modified versions of both the Heclo-Hall approach to policy change, and David Rueda's theory of "insider-outsider politics." ..PAT.-Conference Proceeding [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper seeks to shed light on the relationship between democratic accountability and local public good provision in Mexico. I assess the way in which the system of intergovernmental finances has allowed municipal governments to remain rather unaccountable to citizens in the provision of public goods and services at the local level. By looking at the determinants of the reelection rates of the parties that control the municipal government, I explore the extent to which the process of decentralization and the way in which local governments use decentralized fiscal transfers is linked to the retention of municipal governments in the hands of the same party. Though this does not provide a direct test of the accountability of politicians to citizens, it suggests that the punishment of incumbents who fail to deliver in certain aspects of public policy is a critical tool that may allow Mexicans to align their interests with those of their representative governments. The findings, however, suggest a rather strong entrenchment of incumbents from all parties, based on the construction of clientelism and patronage networks, rather than the provision of public goods. ..PAT.-Conference Proceeding [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Argues that the spread of North-South preferential trade agreements (PTA) reflects the growing importance of foreign direct investment (FDI) in the international economy. Benefits of FDI in developing countries; Ways in ehich PTAs secure the competitive benefits of FDI; Reason for the spread of regionalism.

A flood of scholarship has demonstrated the importance of civil society to democratic transitions, democratic consolidation, and making democracy work. However, if civil society is important for democracy, what are the implications for countries where the state has historically controlled societal forms of organization? This research attempts to understand how civil society grows and develops in Mexico, a country with a traditionally weak third sector, which has grown exponentially since the decline of one-party rule. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]