Cochabamba 2004

Olivera, Oscar, and Tom Lewis. 2004. Cochabamba!: water war in Bolivia. Cambridge, Mass: South End Press.


Oscar Oliveira  "Privatization" 7-24

• (11-12) "we were--and still are--tremendously worried by the fact that the Bolivian government evidently prefers to follow the dictates of the World Bank instead of taking into account what the population views as in its best interests"
• disconnenct between government and people, either in reality or in perception..."why don't they (the government" listen to us, help us??
• (14) describes selling mineral rights as "stripped of our material inheritance"
• (15) external debt was contacted "undemocratically--in our name, but without our consent"...and now Bolivia is hostage to its external debt, resulting in terrible conditions for the people
• (16) external debt is "a complete loss of sovereignty

Oscar Oliveira "Organizing" 24-32

• (27 28) offered office of the union for the Coordinaria en Defensa del Agua y de la Vida
•  a group formed by the union and a previous civil society org. interested in water issues (27)
• the Coordinaria spoke in the name of the people who felt ignored (28)
• hoped that the water issue would unite disparate factions, urban and country, etc etc, and it worked (30)
• in one protest Oliveira and Morales snared traffic, busted windows, were repressed by police when government promised (and failed to show up to) negotiations (31)

Raul Gutiérrez-Aguilar 2004 "The Coordinaria: One Year after the Water War" (53-64)

• the coordinaria movement differed from trade-union movements in the past in that it focused on basic, universal needs, not just individual proposals (55)
• the coordinaria used assembly-style poolitics, not internal institutions (56)
•  the coordinaria assembly became a place for other civil groups to discuss with each other more specfici problems, neighborhood to neighborhood, as well as a mass-mobilizing movement
• the coordinaria has had toruble in times of calm due to "the atomized society" and stretching of the social farbic by neoliberalism (58) -- people are lazy
• coordinaria hopes to poltiicize the people, and the working class, who have been under-political since the demise of the trade unions (64)

 
Álvaro García Linera 2004 "The 'Multitude'" 65-86

• 
  
• idea that unoins are being replaced by political parties as the means of negotiation between the state and society...is this surprising? (69)
•  this has looked more like clientelism, in this authors view
• "union" form of collective organizing is being replaced (in Bolivia) with the "Multitude" form (70-71)
• since the unified workplace has been diffused (often ino the niehgborhoods and homes), geographic groups and collective action organizations are more important now (71-73)
• Coordinaria members are uniting under an identity created through the struggle, but it is vauge, something like "ordinary working people" (78)  <<The breadth of this identity is an important weakness of it>>
• 
  
•  

Silva 2012

Silva, Eduardo. 2012. "Exchange Rising? Karl Polanyi and Contentious Politics in Contemporary Latin America". Latin American Politics and Society. 54 (3): 1-32.

• Introduction
• organized workers and their capacity for mobilization were a key nonparty political societal source of advocacy and defense of protections [from capitalism in the 20th century]" (1)
• But deindustrialization, privatizaion, deregulation, and business-friendly labor codes debilitated the workplace as the locus from which to organize effective societal countermovement [against neoliberalism]"
• so what now? who will stand up against capitalism?
• Argentina, Bolivia, and Ecuador suggest that Polanyi's theory may still be useful (2)
• that is, that the circuits of exchange in capitalism, the commodification of labor, land, and money, can be sources of mobilization and resistance
• this article seeks to anchor Polanyi in real events
• thsi article also needs an explanation for how social movements reocgnized the common threat of recommodification and then formed horizontal linkages to fight it (3)
• goes for contentious politics literature, using threat, framing, and brokerage
• this article combines this idea with Poanyi's circuits of exchaage
• NOTE: defnesive reactiosn to recommodification were also mized with identity, organization, and disruptive action, NOR DID LABOR DISAPPEAR FROM THE SCENE
• labor was important before neoliberalism, and likely led the charge against reforms initially, but in many places there is a new "head" organization in current contentious politics, and it tends to not be labor (4)
• Two Sources of Societal Countermovement to Free-Market Captialism: Production and Exchange
• Marx focused on point of production (4-5)
• concentration of workers created shared identities (5)
• large-scale industrial owrkplace provided place for uniosn to organize
• power depended on ability of unions to disrupt production
• Polanyi had a different persepective
• what's important are the attempts to subordinate market economics to SOCIAL RELATIONS
• people demadn some stability and reciprocity, but te market is to volatile to give it to them (6)
• ressistance to free-market (in Polanyi's view) can come from more places than just the industrial proleriat
• Polanyi predicts blacklash against the free-market, McAdam explains the nuts and bolts of how the movements are created (7)
• Market Reforms, National Populism, and Organized Labor
• "National populism was Latin America's version of the social democratic compromise that evolved in Europe during the long 20th century (8)
• a coalition of urban labor, middle classes, and domestic market oriented bourgeoisie, mediated by the state, supported ISI
• labor in Latin America was not as powerful as labor in Europe, which is why they had to rely on a coalition with the middle class and labor-friendly parties (9)
• labor led the popular sectors, most of the others got a decent deal, but not as good as labor (8-9)
• first and second stage structural (neoliberal) reforms intensified the commodification of labor , land, and money
• first stage was liberalizing the economy, shrinking the economic reach of hte state (10)
• second stage extended market logic to education, healthcare, other government services
• labor protested, but was too weakened by reforms to stop them
• Exchange, threat, and Contentious Politics
• new social movements arose from territories, social categories, identity politics because the point of production was no longer a relevant reference (11)
• but they operated alongside class-based groups, ie unions
• Many of the grievances sought by these groups were based around the commodificiation of land, labor, or money (12)
• peasants wanted land reforms, issues that were often intertwined with indigenous identity movements
• downside is that these movements tended to be a bit more heterogeneous that old union movements, since new movements were mobilized around multiple issues, not just at the point of production (like labor of old)
• but the weakness of labor also meant these movemetns had a chance to be of more central importance to the resistance against capitalism
• Argentina
• Unemployed movements showed up first in small towns in the interior (13)
• because they were unemployed, locus of fight was communities, not the workplace
• successful unemployed and underemployed movements in the WOrkers' Party in the late1990s (14)
• piqueteros, asembleas populares also happening
• these community-based movements linked up with the CTA
• the main CGT never hooked up with these movements, was mainly fighting rear-guard actions to control its own downsizing (15)
• Bolivia
• COB national union was powerful in Bolivia, but was massively weakened by privatization of tin mines and radical downsizing of the satate (16)
• coca federations, other peasant groups rose up in their place
• coca sindicatos were targeted for eradication by the US and Bolivian authorities in counternarcotics raids
• the CSUTCB union joined up with the cocaleros, framed the movement as anti-imperialism, neogtiated coca laws with the federal government (17)
• intertwining of material and indigenous culture strengthened the movement
• when the government took on indigenous rights and customs, the movement further consolidated itself and fought off this challenge
• also, water wars (18) and gas wars, demanding water access and use of money from gas mining to benefit the nation
• Ecuador
• urban labor movements mobilized against the reforms, but were weak and easily coopted (19)
• organized indigenous peoples became the main opposition to neoliberalism
• CONAIE, combined movement of highland and lowland indigenous movements, blocked land liberalization
• Exchange and the Repertoire of Contention
• direct action in the form of roadblocks, takeovers, and other disruptions to daily business overtook strikes on production as the most important form of direct action (19-21)
• Exchange and Framing
• exchange-based framing allowed individuals to unite despite the fact that they were in different locations in the structure of production (22)
• neoliberalism became an important frame
• it came to stand for loss of sovereignty to foreign governments, international institutions, and transnational capital
• corruption by government officials and helping foreign creditors and/or foreign banks was framed as theft
• moral indignation rallied people (22-23)
• life became an encompassing frame as well
• neoliberalism became an assault on life
• such big terms, frames allowed groups to make many horizontal linkages, more than just class-based ideas (23)
• (23-24) in Argentina many people experienced unemployment, precarity, or new forms of employment which they attributed to neoliberalism
• many differently situated people recognized themselves as part of the world of work, and saw neoliberal reforms as a worsening of their work lives (24)
• some dissident unions began proclaiming "the neighborhood is the new factory"
• this shifted the center of resistance away fro teh factory and into popular sector neighborhoods
• the demand for state intervention brought in other groups as well, environmentalists, gender, human rights, as they saw the state as the only actor who could protect them from the market
• Conclusions
• in practical matters, this means that movements need to be more broadly cooperative and coordinate with each other (26)
• but it also brings a challenge to the left in Latin America, who will be expected to agglomerate and channel these movements into real political power

Roberts 2002

Roberts, Kenneth M. 2002. "Social Inequalities Without Class Cleavages in Latin America's Neoliberal Era". Studies in Comparative International Development (SCID). 36 (4): 3-33.

• Introduction
• Social inequality along class "fault lines" is unusually pronounced and appears to be growing (3)
• despite inequality growth and economic insecurity, parties are not cleaving the political arena along class lines, but are building cross-class platforms (4)
• this is especially true in Latin America, which is contiuning historical subordination of the popular classes
• though in the past class cleavages were important, after neoliberal turn party systems now are more elite dominated than before, and the elites dominate the popular classes through diffuse, multi-class forms of representation (5)
• Distinction between "segmented" and "stratified" cleavages
• segmented cleavages are constructed across class lines (ELITE parties)
• stratified cleavages are grounded in class consituencies or organizations (LABOR MOBILIZING parties)
• neoliberal critical juncture was hard on stratified parties, made them seek/create more segmented party structures (5-6)
• Argumetn is that neoliberal juncture realigned party systems across Latin America toward segmented structures (6)
• Economic Crisis, Strucutral Adjustment, and Deepening Social Inequalities
• Given teh growth of inequliaty, one could expect rejuvenation of class-based politics (7)
• but it's not happening
• early protests against neoliberalism were not sustaine
• the economic transition drove new wedges between different sectors of the lower classes, diffusing class cleavages
• Party Systems and Cleavage Structures in Latin America: Historical Patterns
• uses term from European scholars, class cleavages, where a cleavage must: differentiate a group, organize them for political representation, and generate a sense of collective identity (8) (citing Lipset and Rokkan 1967 and Bartolini and Mair 1990)
• this rarely happens so neatly in Latin America
• most economic identities are rather shallow
• labor-backed parties have always had to attract other support as well
• better definiton of segmented versus stratified cleavages (9)
• segmented cleavages may be grounded in social/cultural distinction, or the may be entirely political
• at 1900 modernization began creating a more diversified social structure (10)
• the mobilization of workers created intense class conflict
• nevertheless, class cleavages were never quite as durable in Latin America as the were in Europe
• nor, indeed, were parties organized only within one class...most were at least partially multi-class
• this meant that labor either supported historical parties, or became a major supporter of populist/cross-class parties (11)
• though populism did not generate strict class cleavages, it did create stratified fault lines that differentiated elite adn mass parties (12)
• but the impportance of labor unions as backers for populist and left parties at least meant that some stratficiation occurred in class cleavages for left and labor mobilizing parties
• for elite/traditional parties, the relationship with labor was usually patronage-based, and did not encapsulate voters within a party, could be more personalistic (113)
• labor movemetns were, thus, weaker in elite-party systems
• Countries with l abor-mobilizing parties tended to adopt more and deeper ISI measures, thus the neoliberal turn buffeted both socioeconomic and political connections between parties and popular sectors (14)
• Party Systems in the Transition from ISI to Neoliberalism
• Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Mexico were regional leaders in ISI, joined by Bolivia, Peru, Venzuela
• in all these coutnries, the state became the focal point of social deamnds (15)
• thus the fundamental change in development model (from ISI to neoliberalism), and its commensurate withdrawing of the state from development, posed the greater political and economic shock to parties with labor mobilizing party systems (16)
• (up to that point) the most stable electoral party systems are those that have eschewed the organization of class cleavages and are grounded in intra-elite schisms (Roberts pulls this back and makes a different claim in a 2012 article!) (18)
• Market reforms pose a threat to the resources available for clientelism, but they pose little threat to the segmented organizational logic (19)
• in contrast, beoliberalism produced sharp discontinuities in labor-mobilizing systems with stratified organizations
• the stratified logic have been undermined by the more individualistic nature of neoliberalism
• The Erosion of Class Cleavages in the Neoliberal Era
• Argentina, Chile, and Peru demonstrated (in the past) that all three dimensions of class cleavage can develop in Latin America (20-21)
• But the new economic model has thrown much of that into doubt (21-26)
• the new economic model creates dispersion and segmentation among workers, with only a few having stable jobs, which fragments the labor movement (22)
• unionization has also dropped, meaning unions have a smaller political voice
• many labor-based parties have relaxed their ties to labor (Levitsky 1998, 2001, 2003, Murillo 1997, 2001)(23-24)
• class has also been less important in determining voting patterns (24-25)
• The Transformation of Political Representation in Comparative Perspective
• Brazil seems the last labor-mobilizing party left, but class still hasn't been important recently as it has in the past for voting (26)
• there has been an erosion of stratified axes of electoral competition, and a reinforcement of segmented patterns
• labor unions remain political actors, but their ties to parties and state institutions have loosened, their access to policy-making has narrowed, and their voice has diminished (26-27)
• suggests their is a "re-oligarchization" of politics

Roberts 2007

"The Crisis of Labor Politics in Latin America: Parties and Labor Movements during the Transition to Neoliberalism". 2007. International Labor and Working-Class History. 72 (1): 116-133.

•  Introduction
• the neoliberal turn dislocated the mode of political representation of the popular (working) class(es), as this incorporation was rooted in the state-led development model (116)
•  domestic consumption was previoulsy the driver of the economy
• this meant that wages generally rose over time, and unions flourished (117)
• "An elective affinity existed, then, between strong developmentalist states, mass party organizations, and dense trade-union movements"
• the neoliberal disruption undercut organized labor both in the political realm and in teh workplace
• Party System Differentiation Under ISI: Elitist and Labor-Mobilizing Patterns
• elitist
• 19th century oligarchic parties (or new, elite-driven parties) (Colombia, Uruguay, Paraguay)
• attracted support from the popular classes but did not drive union creation/membership (118)
• Labor-mobilizing
• new parties (usually)
• party could be populist (Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Mexico, Peru, Venezuela) of leftist (Chile, Nicaragua after 1979)
• in these countries, level of trade union membership and degree of organizational concentration were much higher, which usually is read as meaning unions were much stronger in these places
• labor-mobilizing countires tended to have a deeper commitment to ISI (119), elitist countries didn't stray nearly as far from liberal economic development (120)
• the depth of ISI system also helps predict which countries made neoliberal turn last
• stabilization was frequently delayed until a deep crisis
• needed austerity measures were usually worse, "shock treatment"
• contractions, crises, and disequilibria were not as strong in elite countries(121)
• paradoxically, the places with teh strongest labor movements endured the deepest and most painful wage cuts, adjustment (122)
• But what were the political consequences?!
• Economic Crisis, Market Reform, and the Transformation of Political Representation
• after neoliberal adjustment, there was an erosion of the social alignments and organizational forms that distinguished elite and labor-mobilizing party systems (123)
• the groups (unions) that used to supply grassroots activists, identities, and loyal voters are now much weakers
• at the same time, mass media has become more prevalent
• NEW parties: top-down, largely detached from an increasingly individualized, independent, and more volatile electorate
• with the dominance of neoliberal thinking, party programs have converged a great deal (124)
• bait-and-switch occurrences by many left and populist parties in 1980s and 1990s meant:
• they were saddled with the political costs of the transition, and
• the transition weakened their traditional supporters (125)
• this has forced many of these parties to seek new connections with the electorate, and they tend to do so using patron-clientelism, leadership appeal, or political marketing (instead of offering to change the economic system)
• The Puzzle of Electoral Volatility in Latin America
• lots of intraregional differences in electoral volatility (126)
• volatility increased in the context of growing economic stability and democratic consolidation in the 1990s
• thus volatility is not explained by "tough economic times"
• party systems anchored in mass parties saw lots of dislocation in the 1980s and 1990s during transition, whereas elite party systems were relatively stable (127)
• BUT recent divisions in elite party states f Uruguay and Colombia suggest the elite/mass differentiation isn't perfect either
• Overall, it seems that voters just don't identify with any party nearly as strongly as they used to (128)
• this volatility is especially striking given that many of these parties had all the institutionalization that should have made them very stable (129)
• strong grassroots organizations
• linkages to social blocs
• as labor unions grew weaker and more detached from political parties, electoral competition became less polarize but also less programmatic, less grounded in popular interests, and more fluid and personalistic
• Conclusion
• "Latin America's widely noted 'crisis of representation' is, at least in part, a crisis of a particular type of socialpolitical representation" (130)
• the Left might be able to fix this, but it's a long way away from being able to do that/actually doing that (130-131)

Bellinger and Arce 2011

Bellinger,, Paul T., and Moisés Arce. 2011. "Protest and Democracy in Latin America's Market Era". Political Research Quarterly. 64 (3): 688-704.

• Introduction
• LA has seen a generalized rise in protests (688)
• collective actors in LA are highly responsive to changes in economic policy, and democracy ahs given them room to move
• central question:  do economic reofrms in teh context of democracy demobilize political actors, or RE-mobilize them?
• literature notes discord between neoliberlal society and democratic protest
• paper is to test and see which effect is greater, demobilization associated with neoliberalism or re-mobilization associated with democracy (689)
• Literature review
• demobilization literature
• increase in poverty, decrease in equality, higher levels of unemployment, and lower standards of living all create "anomie" (Zermeño 1990)
• but this literature has trouble explaining the revival of protests in Latin America
• in this literature, market policies erode democracy (690)
• and state diminishes, leaving it an unhelpful target of economic grievances
• Repoliticization literature (690-691)
•  traditional class-based actors are protesting (labor)
• NEW actors are protesting (unemployed, indigenous, regional groups)
• elaborating the repoliticization argument (691)
• neoliberal turn:
• heightened economic insecurities
• offered a master frame for protest
• democracy enhanced opportunity for collective activity
• authors believe regime type is a core component of the political opportunity for collective mobilization
• Data and Method
• data from 1970-2003 (692)
• dependent variable: collective protest
• independent variables: economic liberalization, democracy, semi-democracy, autocracy, and interactions between these two categories
• Controls include the level of regional protest to account for cyclical, demonstration effect (693)
• Results
• economic liberalization x democracy and economic liberalization x semi-democracy interaction terms are positive, support repoliticization argument (695)
• econ lib x autocracy supports demobilization argument IN AUTHORITARIAN SETTINGS
• also protest is shown to be regionally cyclical (697)
• index of civil liberties shows that the political opportunities provided by democracy, outside of simple elections, are actually driving remobilization
• Conclusion
• authors cast doubt on demobilization perspective (699)
• Latin American citizens do not seem to be passive, atomized

Holzner 2007

Holzner, Claudio A. 2007. "The Poverty of Democracy: Neoliberal Reforms and Political Participation of the Poor in Mexico". Latin American Politics & Society. 49 (2): 87-122.

• Introduction
• Focus on core of democratic politics: citizen participation in the political process (87) 
• this paper on the non-electoral forms of political action, such as petitioning activity and protests (88) 
• Free market reforms require governments actively to suppress political participation and citizen voice by weakening trade unions, leftist parties, and other social organizations that advocate redistributive social and economic policies (citing Przeworksi 1991) 
• Though elected officials court the popular vote with promises of redistribution, once in office they face pressures to continue market reforms (citing Stokes 2001) (89) 
• "After an initial surge in political activity and growing feelings of political engagement by the poor during the 1990s [in Mexico], voter turnout, petitioning activity, and feelings of political interest and efficacy have declined overall since 1997” (91) 
• some of this apathy comes from Left’s inability to complete credibly in elections 
• BUT the changing structure and actions of the Mexican state in the 2000s are creating obstacles and disincentives for political mobilization, especially for the poor 
• Net effect of institutional reforms has been to stifle poor peoples political activity, especially in comparison to more affluent
• Political Participation in Mexico
• By 2000, high-income individuals participated in politics more frequently than low-income individuals, reversal from the past (92)
• Frequency of political activity peaked after 1982, declined after 1997
• after narrowing during 1990s participation gap widened between poor and affluent after 1997 
• affluent are now twice as likely to petition than the poor 
• Puzzle: why is political activity decreasing (for the poor) just as democratization should be opening up more avenues? (93) 
• Explanation: changes in the relationship between the state and the poor (95)
• suggestions seems to be that institutional reforms have created obstacles and disincentives to participation that affect the poor more adversely
• three possible mechanisms of discouragement
•  poverty, severity of poverty, and income inequality has worsened, meaning poor people find it difficult to muster the material and organizational resources necessary for petitioning the state
• free-market forces have weakened lower-class mobilization organizations, like labor unions
• technocratic policymaking sends the signal that the state doesn't have the interests of the poor in mind (96) 
•  Poverty and  Declining Resources for Participation
• Graph showing national survey results: (97)
• EVERY income group thinks they are worse off in 2003 compared to 2000
• in income groups 10x minimum wage and below, proportion is between 35 and 45%
• Petitioning government officials for direct assistance has historically been the most common form of participation of Mexico's poor, reflecting clientelism (98)
• this requires an investment of time, money, and lost wages
• but now the cost of petitioning too high for many poor (99)
• by 2003 income = best determinant of petitioning and protest activity. (Positive relationship)
• Declining Resources for Mobilization: Organizations
• organizations in civil society became more diverse in the 1990s as new groups came to fill in vacuum for retreating corporatist groups (101)
• BUT this also meant that political parties became the only/best game in town for articulating interests at the regional/national level
• organizations that now represent the popular sector, replacing old corporatist ones, haven't been able to gather the material resources or aggregate demands enough to become important in regional/national politics (101-102)
• Changing State-Society Relations
• neoliberalism radically changed the relationship between the state and the poor (102)
• by changing the basic functions of the state, neoliberal policies also changed the logic of political participation (103)
• the shrinking state made the state/politics less relevant to the poor
• other reforms have made it clear that the state cannot or will not provide for popular groups
• for example, new targeted poverty relief measures use formulas, which eliminates the discretion of implementing these policies by politicians
• my take: that sounds too naive...politicians can still game the system, no?
• poor people increasingly feel like petitioning is useless because traditional channels are closed (104-105)
• feeling that that government has abandoned their traditional role as caretaker of the poor (106)
• the poor are tired of neoliberal methods for fighting poverty and inequality (106-107)
• by the time the neoliberal changes to civil service institutions had been cemented by the late 1990s, the poor had little confidence in these institutions' ability to actually help them (107)
• poor see little relevance in political action, and thus see little importance in paying attention to politics
• neoliberal policies have alienated the poor to a much greater extent than affluent citizens (108)
• when the poor do act, they are more likely to target the local and state governments than the federal government (109)
• More affluent target federal government, less often state or local governments
• BUT ALL THE MACROECONOMIC DECISIONS ARE MADE AT THE FEDERAL LEVEL
• the poor simply cannot bear the costs of actually protesting/petitioning the level of government that has control of the economy (110)
• Statistical Analysis
• income is the most important predictor of protesting and petitioning activity (112)...make more money, more likely to petition/protest!...this basically meditated everything!
• membership in traditional corporatist organizations has no effect on petitioning (surprising....)
• respondents who believed the parties would listen to them were more likely to petition, but even then the effect was stronger for higher incomes (114)
• BUT poor people who receive government aid were more likely to petition
• this could be because of clientelism (114) or because the receipt of assistance creates incentives to petition again (115)
• Conclusions
• the decline of corporatism in Mexico has not meant an end to clientelism (116)
• nor have autonomous organizations been capable to mobilizing the poor effectively
• elections are losing their luster for the poor
• politics for the poor increasingly revolves around how to meet basic needs, less about the political ideology or directing reform of the state (117)

Kurtz 2004

Kurtz, Marcus J. 2004. "The Dilemmas of Democracy in the Open Economy: Lessons from Latin America". World Politics. 56 (2): 262-302.

• Introduction
• destabilizing political conflict is no longer the biggest threat to democracy because, paradoxically, it is less likely to emerge out of the current social makeup, because mobilization is less likely (263)
• Rather, the greater threat to democracy in the democratic, neoliberal era is the underarticulation of societal interests, atomization of the polity, which undermine the effectiveness of formal democracy
• this is because neoliberalism causes this atomization (263-264)
• neoliberalism had all sorts of downsides, which should have evoked political and societal mobilization, but these mobilizations didn’t occur (264)
• this is largely a function of the new relationship between the state and market, namely that the state can’t/won’t touch the market
• both liberal and statist patterns of organization have their own specific threats, neither is a panacea (265)
• statist patterns result in polarization and state control
• neoliberal patterns result in lack of participation in politics
• The Theory: Democracy in the Open and the Closed Economy
• statist system (267)
• elites control resources
• autonomy of citizens is threatened, clientelism can take root
• interest groups provide info to politicians, but also inform citizens about actions of politicians...check and balance
• BUT some interest groups may have more power than others (268), which will likely lead to rent-seeking (270)
• VIRTUE: it can encourage aggregation and blancing of societal interests (270)
• neoliberal model
• collective action problems decrease interest group formation (268)
• also, there are few associations to articulate groups interests, nor to keep polity informed of politicians actions (268-269)
• leads to a gradual decline in citizens ability to act politically (269)
• interest groups are more autonomous from government (271)
• BUT government has withdrawn from economy, so there so no obvious target for unhappiness when economy is bad (272)
• political decisions seem less materially consequential for citizens (273), so why bother voting/mobilizing?
• TWO EXAMPLES:
• labor law is weakened, making collective labor action harder
• modernization of agriculture weakens communal ties, creates collective action problems (273)
• Exploring the theory in Mexico and Chile (274-280)
• quick case studies of Mexico and Chile
• focuses on diminished labor movement and privatization/marketization of previously communal agricultural lands
• My Take: WEAKNESS:
• this account argues that neoliberalism weakened labor and peasants, reduced their ability to mobilize
• It is assumed that labor and peasants would be able to mobilize as context democratizes
• BUT, problems:
• organizations were already crushed during neoliberal era, can’t expect them to just bounce back in democracy
• limited protest during transitions in Mexico and Chile could have easily also been the result of authoritarian/repressive contexts
• Inequality, Poverty, and Economic Reform in Latin America
• Two ways economic reform could mitigate mobilization against itself (280)
• fix social problems
• create collective action problems (it did this one)
• my take: why is economic reform an actor here?
• up to 1997, economic liberalization has not solved social and economic conditions for most people (281)
• little improvement in standards of living (282)
• minimum wage has collapsed (284)
• inequality has increased (283-285)
• Despite fears of most scholars, economic reform was not met with protest, but actually hollowed out much of the capacity for protest, which is a danger to democracy (286-287)
• labor mobilization down through 1995ish (287-292)
• still no account for labor’s general weakening, need time to bounce back?
• Political protest
• economic liberalization associated with a DECREASED amount of political protest (294-297)
• Voting also decreases, even when including the massively voted-in founding elections (297-299)
• Conclusions
• leaders in neolib, democratic states should focus on promoting organization & participation, not limiting mobilizational & political challenges (302)