Levitsky 2005

"Crisis and Renovation: Institutional Weakness and the Transformation of Argentine Peronism, 1983-2003" Levitsky, p181-206

in Levitsky, Steven, and Maria Victoria Murillo. 2005. Argentine democracy: the politics of institutional weakness. University Park, Pa: Pennsylvania State University Press.

• Introduction
• although the PJ is well-organized it's internal structures are weakly institutionalized, its lacks stable internal rules and bureaucracy (181)
• the PJs weakly institutionalized party-union linkages allowed reformers to dismantle traditional mechanism of labor participation (182)
• this enabled the party to 
• attract the middle class
• create a clientelistic relationship with the urban poor
• The fluidity of the PJ sent it into crisis in 2000-2001 along with the rest of the country, but this fluidity also allowed it to adapt and survive the crisis
• Institutionalization and Party Adaptation
• institutionalization creates stable expectations, rules of the game (O'Donnell 1994) (182)
• but institutionalization also inhibits organizational change (Zucker 1977) (183)
• they are sticky
• The PJ as a Weakly Institutionalized Party
• PJ is well-organized with deep roots in working- and lower-class society (184)
• but it lacks even a minimal bureaucratic structure
• in the years following Perón's death, no faction was able to impose an organizational structure or binding rules (185)
• The Renovators in the 1980s tried to create more rules, but essentially failed
• "We use the party statutes when they are useful. When they are not useful, we don't use them."
• Three areas of institutional weakness
• Weak leadership bodies (186)
• the party's national leaders are routinely ignored by lower-level branches and officeholders
• the government runs the party, especially when their is a seated executive
• Fluid Party Hierarchy
• politicians and those with power have often parachuted into top leadership/electoral positions  (187)
• in many provinces internal elections are negotiated or imposed by party bosses
• Loosely Structured party-union linkage
• 62 organizations and the tercio (188)
• The effects of weak institutionalization
• the PJ suffers from low levels of trust in the organization (188-189)
• the PJ is highly malleable, and may be changed quickly to line up with short-term goals of dominant actors (189)
• Pj experiences bandwagoning effect (190)
• PJ officeholders have substantial autonomy from the party
• Peronism's dual transformation int eh 1980s and 1990s
• Crisis:
• working class had eroded (191)
• debt crisis and exhaustion of ISI left the PJ without the ability to continue a statist program
• to adapt the PJ dismantle union-party inks and replaced them with clientelistic links
• labor participation had been based entirely on need of party leaders for the resources unions had (192)
• 62 orgs and tercio were often imposed by union leaders
• as PJ won office, politicians were able to use state resources instead of union resources
• Erosion of union influence enhanced the PJ's autonomy, allowing it to attract the middle class... (195)
• ...meanwhile it created clientelistic networks to maintain ties to urban poor in era of de-industrialization, and shrinking working class
• but clientelism generated political costs, as the Pj became the part of corruption (196)
• though most of the Party didn't agree with Menem and neoliberal turn, bandwagon was created since he had control over appointments to office/government (197-198)
• The Crisis
• The PJ's fluid structure meant the party had no unified response to the 2000 crisis, sending Pj into its own internal conflict/crisis (200)
• no one had enough power to find a unified program or to discipline party members (201)
• Menem and Duhalde were bitter enemies and fought over control of the party (202)
• this rivalry meant there was no agreement on primaries, candidates
• in 2003 PJ supported no presidential candidate, allowed all three to run outside the party (202-203)
• Kirchner's victory pushed the party to the center-left (204)
• even though the PJ had undertaken the neoliberal reforms themselves, the internal fluidity allowed this leftist, dark horse candidate (Kirchner) to rise and have a chance in the election
• Kirchner realigned the PJ with leftist politicians, progressive intellectuals, and humans rights groups (205)
• Conclusion
• Peronisms current coalition change seem to be more permanent (ie away from labor unions) (206)
• PJ remains the party of the poor, but will likely never again be a labor backed party