1. Mesa-ology: Criteria for success for Tables of Dialogue as drawn from the cases of Peru and Venezuela.
- Author
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Cooper, Andrew F. and Legler, Thomas
- Subjects
- *
DEMOCRACY , *INTERNATIONAL relations ,FOREIGN relations of the United States - Abstract
This paper examines the intervention of the international community ? and specifically the form of new multilateralism activated by the Organization of American States (OAS) ? to crises in Peru and Venezuela. Although from a comparative politics perspective, these two cases present striking contrasts, with respect to the study of global governance it is the commonalities in the response that attractions attention. Reshaping existing regional sovereignty norms and practices, both interventions contained extensive ?internal? as well as ?international? components in which the boundaries or barriers between diplomacy and domestic politics were blurred. The centrepiece of both initiatives was the establishment of a ?mesa,? an OAS-facilitated dialogue roundtable or forum involving key domestic political and civil society actors from government and opposition in a sustained collective effort to negotiate a consensual and peaceful solution to political crisis. In the body of the work the process of this ?tale of two mesas? is traced through three distinctive components: the actors at the table; the agendas; and, relative achievements. As our paper demonstrates, significant differences between the two mesa processes make it difficult to articulate a single, coherent model. Nonetheless, we conclude that both the Peruvian and Venezuelan mesas exemplify a promising mode of multilateral intervention: ?intervention without intervening.? [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
- Published
- 2004