Latin America’s Pendular Politics: Electoral Cycles and Alternations (Studies of the Americas) 3031267605, 9783031267604

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STUDIES OF THE AMERICAS

Latin America’s Pendular Politics Electoral Cycles and Alternations Edited by Olivier Dabène

Studies of the Americas

Series Editor Maxine Molyneux, Institute of the Americas, University College London, London, UK

The Studies of the Americas Series includes country specific, crossdisciplinary and comparative research on the United States, Latin America, the Caribbean, and Canada, particularly in the areas of Politics, Economics, History, Sociology, Anthropology, Development, Gender, Social Policy and the Environment. The series publishes monographs, readers on specific themes and also welcomes proposals for edited collections, that allow exploration of a topic from several different disciplinary angles. This series is published in conjunction with University College. London’s Institute of the Americas under the editorship of Professor Maxine Molyneux.

Olivier Dabène Editor

Latin America’s Pendular Politics Electoral Cycles and Alternations

Editor Olivier Dabène CERI/OPALC Sciences Po Paris, France

Studies of the Americas ISBN 978-3-031-26760-4 ISBN 978-3-031-26761-1 (eBook) https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-26761-1 © The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023, corrected publication 2023 This work is subject to copyright. All rights are solely and exclusively licensed by the Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now known or hereafter developed. The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use. The publisher, the authors, and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither the publisher nor the authors or the editors give a warranty, expressed or implied, with respect to the material contained herein or for any errors or omissions that may have been made. The publisher remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations. This Palgrave Macmillan imprint is published by the registered company Springer Nature Switzerland AG The registered company address is: Gewerbestrasse 11, 6330 Cham, Switzerland

The original version of the book was revised: First author has been removed. The correction to the book is available at https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-03126761-1_18

Contents

1

Introduction: Electoral Cycles, Continuity, and Change in Latin American Politics: A Framework for Analysis Olivier Dabène 1.1 Electoral Alternations in Latin America 1.2 Typology of Alternations 1.2.1 Degree of Alternations 1.2.2 Temporality of Alternations 1.2.3 Content of Alternations 1.3 Looking for Factors of Alternation 1.4 The Database 1.5 Explaining Alternations 1.6 The Conservative Turn 1.6.1 Conservative Rhetoric 1.6.2 Voters’ Radicalization 1.7 Closing Remarks References

1 3 5 5 7 7 10 11 17 20 22 28 33 34

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CONTENTS

Part I Conservative Alternations 2

3

4

New Political Cycle in Chile: From Centrist Consensus to the Struggle for Cultural Hegemony Stéphanie Alenda and Javiera Arce-Riffo 2.1 Centrist Consensus and Moderate Reformism (1990–2013) 2.2 The Cycle of Hegemonic Disputes 2.3 Birth and Rise of the Frente Amplio 2.4 Conclusion References Step Right or Step Ahead? Explaining the 2019 Presidential Swing in Uruguay Luis Rivera-Vélez 3.1 A More Attractive Political Offer on the Right 3.2 Uruguay’s Electoral System and the Relative Victory of Coalitions 3.3 A Moderate Program from the Right Calling Out for Change Throughout Continuity 3.4 Conclusion References Radicalizing Alternation: Political Change and Degraded Democracy in El Salvador (2019–2021) Kevin Parthenay 4.1 The Path to Radical Change 4.1.1 The 2018 Legislative and Municipal Elections 4.1.2 The Presidential Election of February 2019 4.1.3 The 2021 Legislative and Municipal Elections 4.2 Delegative Democracy in El Salvador? 4.2.1 Voting for a Charismatic Leader Above Parties 4.2.2 Radical Political Shift: What About Values? 4.3 Conclusion: From Alternation to the Endangerment of Democracy References

39

41 46 49 53 54 57 59 61 64 67 67 71 73 73 75 79 80 80 84 86 86

CONTENTS

5

6

Guatemala, an Alternation in Continuity Erica Guevara 5.1 An Inevitable Alternation 5.1.1 Jimmy Morales’ Very Negative Image 5.1.2 An Illegible Political Offer 5.2 How to Explain the Failure of Sandra Torres? 5.2.1 Sandra Torres’ Unexpected Competitors 5.2.2 The Loss of Territories Despite a Significant Abstention 5.2.3 “Sandrophobia”: The Importance of the Anti-Sandra Torres Vote 5.3 Alternation at the Legislative and Municipal Levels? 5.3.1 Alternation at the Legislative Level? 5.3.2 Alternation at the Municipal Level? 5.4 Alternation and Territorial Divide 5.5 Conclusion References The Return of the Divided Rights: Alternations in Peru Gustavo Pastor 6.1 The Return in Force of a Divided Right 6.2 Hurricane Odebrecht on the Peruvian Political Class 6.3 Non-electoral Alternations Within the Government 6.4 The Renewal of All Peruvian Political Personnel References

ix

89 90 91 92 95 95 96 100 101 102 106 109 112 113 115 117 120 122 125 131

Part II Progressist Alternations 7

Polarization, Depolarization, and (Re)polarization: The 2019 Electoral Process and a New Alternation in Argentine Democracy Darío Rodríguez 7.1 The Rules of the Institutional Game and the Political Conjuncture 7.2 The (Re)positioning of the Actors: The Political Offer and the Electoral Campaign 7.3 Electoral Results at Different Levels of Representation and Type of Alternation 7.4 Conclusion References

135

138 140 145 151 151

x

8

9

CONTENTS

Mexico’s 2018 Tsunami-Alternation: Change and Continuities Following the Collapse of the Transitional Three-Party System Willibald Sonnleitner 8.1 Mexico’s 2018 Alternation from a Sociohistorical and Comparative Perspective 8.2 A Tsunami Called AMLO 8.3 Tracing the Origins of the Tsunami: The Rise and Fall of Tripartisanship (1991–2018) 8.4 The Reconfiguration of Partisan Forces: Coalitions and Presidential (Dis)Agreements 8.5 AMLO’s Moment: Split Ticket and Strategic, “Useful” or “Negative” Voting 8.6 After the Tsunami: Ruptures and Continuities of the Regeneración Nacional References Panama: Alternation Inside the Box Claire Nevache, Sophie Wintgens, and Harry Brown-Araúz 9.1 Ideological Position of Panamanian Parties and Candidates in the 2019 Elections 9.1.1 The Candidates’ Position in Venezuela 9.1.2 The Role of the State in the Economy 9.1.3 Security: Prevention, Repression, Resocialization 9.1.4 Same-Sex Marriage and Abortion: The Consensus of the Status Quo 9.2 Explanatory Elements of an Announced Alternation 9.2.1 Institutional Factors 9.2.2 Public Opinion 9.2.3 Electoral Offer: Strong Convergence of Programs 9.2.4 Volatility of Voting Behavior 9.3 Is It a Political Homogeneity That Seems to Avoid Radicalization? 9.3.1 Evolution of the Radicalization of the Electorate 9.3.2 The Emergence of a Greater Polarization Based on a New Division of Power

153

153 156 159 163 166 172 175 177

179 182 183 185 186 188 188 189 190 192 193 194 195

CONTENTS

9.3.3 9.3.4

9.3.5 References

The Role of Social Media in the 2019 Elections Mechanisms to Filter Radical Candidacies: Closed Primaries and Signatures for Candidates Not Registered in a Party Conclusion

xi

196

196 198 198

Part III Conservative Alternations Following a Destitution 10

11

Brazil 2016–2018: A Double Political Alternation Margaux De Barros, Kevin Kermoal, and Frédéric Louault 10.1 The Impeachment of Dilma Rousseff: Non-electoral Alternation and Democratic Backsliding 10.2 The 2018 Electoral Changeover: A Rejection of the Political System 10.3 The Consolidation of Evangelicals and Military Actors References

203

The 2019 Elections in Bolivia Sebastian Urioste 11.1 The “ Proceso de cambio” and the 2019 Elections 11.1.1 The End of Compromise and the 2019 Referendum 11.1.2 Such a Long Campaign 11.1.3 Contested Elections 11.2 An Unfinished Alternation: Understanding the Stakes of the October 2019 Elections 11.2.1 The Electoral Offer 11.3 From the Post-election Crisis to the Return of the MAS 11.3.1 From a Post-election Crisis to a Succession Crisis 11.3.2 The Government of Jeanine Añez 11.3.3 The Return of MAS 11.4 Conclusion

223

205 208 214 220

224 225 229 231 234 234 238 238 243 246 248

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CONTENTS

Part IV Partial Alternations 12

13

Colombia: The Country Where Peace Allowed Political Alternation Luisa Cajamarca 12.1 Colombian Political-Electoral Context 12.1.1 Uribismo as an Electoral Resource 12.2 Electoral Behaviour 2002–2018 12.3 Break Between Santos and Uribe 12.4 “Third Way” for Peace 12.5 2018 Elections and Plebiscite: Polarization and Venezuelizacion of Politics 12.6 Electoral Competition: Values and Ideology 12.7 Territorial Electoral Cleavage Tending to Conservatism? 12.8 The Unprecedented Left Turn 12.9 Conclusions References Paraguay 2018. A Country of Electoral “Intralternation”? Damien Larrouqué 13.1 Between Permanence and Transformation of the Political-Electoral System 13.1.1 The Resilience of a Dominant Asymmetrical Two-Party System 13.1.2 Rules and Tricks of the Paraguayan Elections 13.2 The April 2018 General Elections in Perspective 13.2.1 An Apathetic Campaign After a Politically Explosive year 13.2.2 Election Day on April 22, 2018: Victory or Setback of Democracy? 13.2.3 Conclusion: Reinforcement or Reconfiguration of Party Colorado Hegemony? References

255 256 256 258 259 261 263 266 267 269 272 273 275

277 278 280 282 282 284

286 288

CONTENTS

14

Costa Rica’s 2018 and 2020 Elections: A Partial Alternation and a Conservative Turn Erica Guevara 14.1 An Alternation that Almost Happened 14.1.1 The PAC Faces Its First Assessment 14.1.2 The IACHR’s Advisory Opinion on Same-Sex Marriage: An External Variable 14.2 A Partial Renewal of the Political Staff, or the Implementation of a Partial Alternation? 14.2.1 Renewal of the Legislative and Executive Branches of Government 14.2.2 Weakened and Fragmented Parties 14.3 Why Did the Presidential Alternation not Occur? 14.3.1 The Territorial Divide and Its Electoral Translation 14.3.2 Preserving Institutions, or the Conservative Turn 14.4 Conclusion References

xiii

293 295 295

300 304 304 306 308 309 314 316 317

Part V Electoral Authoritarianism 15

The Sandinista Order: Changes in Voting Procedures and Authoritarianism in Nicaragua Maya Collombon 15.1 Electoral Procedures to Guarantee Nicaragua’s Young Democracy (1990–2006) 15.1.1 The Consejo Supremo Electoral, an Electoral Institution Short History 15.1.2 Before and After “the Pact”, from Electoral Reform to the Transformation of the Voting System 15.2 Voting Systems and Sandinista Electoral Authoritarianism (2007–2018) 15.2.1 Transforming Voting Arrangements to Consolidate a “Sandinista State”: A Review of the 2011 Presidential Election 15.2.2 Modalities of Electoral Authoritarianism

321

323 324

325 327

328 332

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CONTENTS

15.3

Preserving the Sandinista Order. Political Violence, Legal Developments, and What Remains of Elections (Since 2018) 15.3.1 The Electoral Process Under Arrest References 16

17

The Authoritarian and Conservative Turn of Nicolás Maduro Thomas Posado 16.1 How to Explain the Absence of Alternation? 16.2 Is Madurism Still Progressive? 16.2.1 The Maintenance of a Strong Cleavage on International Issues 16.2.2 A Conservative Economic Turn Against a Background of Drastic Budgetary Restrictions 16.2.3 From “Participatory and Protagonist Democracy” to the Army as Arbiter 16.3 Conclusion References From Competitive Authoritarianism to State Capture: A Contested Re-Election in Honduras (2017) Kevin Parthenay 17.1 The Honduran Political System: Balance and Rupture 17.1.1 A Century-Old Two-Party System 17.1.2 The 2009 Coup: A Breakdown 17.2 An Election Without Democracy 17.2.1 Issue Voting: ‘#FueraJOH’? 17.2.2 The Capture of the State and Its Rejection 17.2.3 Post-election Tensions 17.3 A Radicalization of Conservatism 17.3.1 Multi-Faceted Repression 17.3.2 Denial of Political Ethics 17.4 Conclusion References

334 336 339 341 342 349 349

351 354 355 356 359 360 361 361 364 365 367 370 371 372 372 373 374

CONTENTS

Correction to: Latin America’s Pendular Politics Olivier Dabène Index

xv

C1

377

Editor and Contributors

About the Editor Olivier Dabène is full professor of political science at the Paris Institute of Political Studies (Sciences Po) and senior researcher at the Center for International Studies (CERI, Sciences Po). He is also the President of Sciences Po’s Political Observatory of Latin America and the Caribbean (www.sciencespo.fr/opalc) and visiting professor in many Latin American universities. His latest book in English is entitled Street Art and Democracy in Latin America (Palgrave Macmillan, 2020).

Contributors Stéphanie Alenda Andres Bello University, Santiago, Chile Javiera Arce-Riffo University College London, London, UK; Instituto de Economía Aplicada Regional (IDEAR), Antofagast, Chile Harry Brown-Araúz CIEPS, Panama City, Panama Luisa Cajamarca Free University of Brussels, Brussels, Belgium Maya Collombon Center of Mexican and Central American Studies (CEMCA), Mexico City, Mexico

xvii

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EDITOR AND CONTRIBUTORS

Olivier Dabène CERI/OPALC, Paris, France; Paris Institute of Political Studies (Sciences Po), Paris, France Margaux De Barros Free University of Brussels (ULB), Brussels, Belgium Erica Guevara Paris 8 University, Paris, France Erica Guevara Paris 8 University, Saint-Denis, France Kevin Kermoal Free University of Brussels (ULB), Brussels, Belgium Damien Larrouqué Paris Institute of Political Studies (Sciences Po), Paris, France Frédéric Louault Free University of Brussels (ULB), Brussels, Belgium Claire Nevache CEVIPOL-CIEPS, Brussels, Belgium Kevin Parthenay University of Tours, Tours, France Gustavo Pastor University of El Pacifico, Jesús María, Peru Thomas Posado Casa de Velazquez, Madrid, Spain Luis Rivera-Vélez University of Lausanne, Vaud, Switzerland Darío Rodríguez Paris Sorbonne University, Paris, France Willibald Sonnleitner Colegio de Mexico, Mexico City, Mexico Sebastian Urioste University of La Rochelle, La Rochelle, France Sophie Wintgens CEVIPOL-CND-CEFIR, Brussels, Belgium

List of Figures

Fig. 1.1 Fig. 1.2 Fig. 1.3 Fig. 1.4

Fig. 4.1 Fig. 8.1 Fig. 9.1

Fig. 9.2

Fig. 9.3

Fig. 9.4

Three examples of linear regressions (Source Author) Ideological positioning: Argentina, Chile, Brazil, Mexico (Source Author based on Manifesto Project ) Ideological distance: Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Mexico (Source Author based on Manifesto Project ) Evolution of voters’ radicalization in Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Mexico, and Peru (Source Author based on world value survey) Evolution of seats obtained in the Salvadorean National Assembly (Source Author’s elaboration) Historical trends and vote transfers (Mexico, 1991–2021) Ideological position of the three main Panamanian parties (Source Authors’ elaboration with data from the Barómetro de las Américas [Barometer of the Americas]) Ideological position of parties according to a poll of MPs (Source Authors’ elaboration with data from the Parliamentary Elites Project of the University of Salamanca) “Democracy is preferable to any other form of government”: Panama (Source Authors’ elaboration with data from Latinobarómetro) Panama: percentage who considered President Varela’s administration as “good” or “very good” (Source Dichter and Neira)

21 23 26

30 76 160

181

181

189

190

xix

xx

LIST OF FIGURES

Fig. 9.5

Fig. 9.6 Fig. 9.7

Fig. 9.8

Fig. 10.1

Fig. 10.2

Fig. 12.1

Fig. 12.2 Fig. 12.3

Fig. 12.4 Fig. 12.5

Fig. 14.1

Panama: factor analysis mapping the lexical proximity between the electoral programs of the 7 presidential candidates Panama: evolution of electoral volatility (Source Author’s elaboration with data provided by Brown Araúz [2020]) Evolution of radicalism in Panamanian public opinion (Source Authors’ elaboration with data provided Latinobarómetro) Panama: comparison of the evolution of the extreme right and the extreme left in public opinion (Source Authors’ elaboration with data provided Latinobarómetro) Brazil: electoral erosion of the two main political parties (PT and PSDB) between 2006 and 2018 (first round of the presidential election, in millions of votes) (Table prepared by the authors. Data Superior Electoral Tribunal of Brazil [TSE]) Brazil: ideological positioning of deputies (simple majority is 257 seats and qualified majority is 308 seats) (Graph produced by the authors. Data Superior Electoral Tribunal of Brazil [TSE] & Gazeta do Povo) Colombia: presidential elections 2002–2018 (Note In 2002 and 2006 there was only one presidential first round. Source Author’s elaboration using data taken from the Registraduría General del Estado Civil) Colombia: electoral map of the 2016 plebiscite (Source Registraduría General del Estado Civil) Colombia: electoral maps: (1) 2014 Presidential runoff elections; (2) 2016 Plebiscite; (3) 2018 Presidential runoff elections (Source Registraduría Nacional del Estado Civil) Colombia: map of 2022 presidential runoff election (Source National Registry of Civil Status) Colombia: voter history in regions where Gustavo Petro won the 2022 elections (Source Prepared by the authors with data from the Registraduria Nacional del Estado Civil) Change in electoral preferences between October 2017 and April 2018. (Source CIEP-ECP Public Opinion Survey, University of Costa Rica, April 25, 2018)

192 193

194

195

211

213

260 265

268 271

272

301

LIST OF FIGURES

Fig. 14.2

Fig. 14.3

Map 4.1

Map 8.1 Map 10.1

Map and cartogram (by amount of voters) of the cantons won by each party in the first round of the 2018 presidential election. (2018) (Source Estado de la Nación Program) Map and cartogram (by quantity of voters) of the cantons won by each party in the first round of the 2014 presidential election (Source Estado de la Nación Program, 2014) Comparison of the electoral maps for the legislative (top) and municipal (bottom) elections for 2018 (left) and 2021 (right) in El Salvador (Source For legislative elections [Wikipedia, source: TSE] and municipal elections [Wikipedia, source: TSE] The new geography of Mexican parties (Federal Deputies 2018) Brazil: electoral geography of the first and second round of the presidential election (Red: Electoral areas won by Haddad/Green: Electoral areas won by Bolsonaro/Blue: Electoral areas won by Ciro Gomes. Source O Globo/Eleições 2018)

xxi

311

312

81 165

212

List of Tables

Table Table Table Table Table Table

1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4 1.5 1.6

Table 1.7 Table 1.8 Table 1.9 Table 4.1 Table 4.2 Table 5.1 Table 5.2 Table 5.3

Table 5.4 Table 5.5

Degree of alternation Manifesto project categories Indicators of progressist/conservative positioning Likelihood of alternations: some hypotheses Operationalization of the hypotheses Alternations (/) and continuity (–) between progressist (P) or conservative (C) candidates Synthesis of changes Validation of the hypotheses (cycle 2) Correlations between the indicators and the occurrence and degree of alternations Results of past elections in El Salvador Campaign expenditure of the top three candidates in El Salvador Guatemala: results of the top four candidates in the first round of the 2019 presidential election, by department Guatemala: changes in abstention rates and the number of invalid votes since 1995 Guatemala: number of deputies per party elected to the National Assembly since 1995 (out of a total of 160) Guatemala: number of mayors elected by party in municipal elections Guatemala: number of town halls reported by UNE in each department since 2007

6 8 9 10 12 13 15 17 18 75 82 97 100

104 107 108

xxiii

xxiv

LIST OF TABLES

Table 5.6 Table Table Table Table

6.1 6.2 6.3 7.1

Table 7.2 Table 7.3 Table 7.4 Table 8.1 Table 8.2 Table 8.3 Table 9.1 Table 10.1 Table 11.1 Table 11.2 Table 11.3 Table Table Table Table Table

11.4 12.1 12.2 14.1 14.2

Table 14.3 Table 14.4 Table 14.5

Guatemala. Percentage of votes obtained in the 2nd round of the 2019 presidential election, by department First round election results (top five candidates) in Peru Results of the 2016 parliamentary elections in Peru January 2020 parliamentary election results in Peru Presidential elections in Argentina. National results of 27 October 2019 Vote concentration since 1983 in Argentina Comparing national results of the primaries and the general election in Argentina Argentine legislative Chamber’s Composition 2017–2019/2019–2021 Aggregated split-ticket vote between legislative and presidential elections (Mexico, 2018) Individual split-ticket vote between legislative and presidential elections of 2018 Percent of split-ticket vote cast for AMLO, nationally and in nine states (Mexico 2018) Result of the presidential elections of May 5, 2019 (Single round, majority election) in Panama Brazil: religious distribution of the vote before the 2nd round of the 2018 presidential election Presidential elections in Bolivia (national and foreign voting) MAS results in the 2014 Presidential elections (%) Bolivia: 2019 and 2020 presidential elections 2019 (%)—MAS and CC results Bolivia 2016: constitutional referendum results (%) Colombia: uribismo vs conservatism Colombia 2014 presidential elections (first round) Costa Rica’s socio-economic indicators, 2014–2018 Costa Rica. Percentage of votes obtained by each party in presidential elections 2002–2018 Costa Rica. Number of deputies per party elected to the National Assembly (out of a total of 57) Costa Rica. Number of Mayors elected by party in municipal elections Voting behavior of strategic municipalities with over 100,000 voters (29% of the electorate) in both rounds of the 2018 election

110 118 119 127 146 147 147 150 168 170 171 178 217 250 250 251 251 258 262 296 300 307 308

313

LIST OF TABLES

Table 16.1 Table 17.1 Table 17.2

Evolution of the Venezuelan political system ratings (1973–2018) Honduras: seats won in Congress in the general elections Honduras: results of the general elections for the presidency

xxv

344 361 362

CHAPTER 1

Introduction: Electoral Cycles, Continuity, and Change in Latin American Politics: A Framework for Analysis Olivier Dabène

An electoral cycle arises in a region when in a short time span a group of countries holds elections with a pattern of similar outcomes. Since the transitions to democracy in the 1980s, Latin America has experienced three and perhaps even four cycles the literature generally describes in terms of shifts to the left or to the right.

Several fine young scholars have contributed to the preparation of this introduction. I warmly thank the research assistantship of Luisa Cajamarca (Université libre de Bruxelles), Roman Perdomo (Sciences Po), Julia Mensa (Universidad católica de Córdoba, Argentina), Mariana Duque (Universidad católica de Medellín, Colombia), Salomé Garnier (Harvard University), and Mariana Chaise (Universidade de São Paulo, Brazil). O. Dabène (B) CERI/OPALC, Sciences Po, Paris, France e-mail: [email protected]

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 O. Dabène (ed.), Latin America’s Pendular Politics, Studies of the Americas, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-26761-1_1

1

2

O. DABÈNE

The first, in the 1990s, saw the election of many presidents who adhered to the neoliberal credo. In response, self-proclaimed left-wing presidents with an ambitious reform agenda came to power in the 2000s. Then since 2016, a new “turn to the right” or even to the extreme right, seems to have replaced the “pink tide”. Finally, progressive candidates winning elections in Mexico (2018), Argentina (2019), Peru (2021), Chile (2021), Colombia (2022), and Brazil (2022) fuel debates on a possible new “2.0 turn to the left”. The reference to a right/left/right/left sequence over a period of thirty years undoubtedly accounts for a singular pendulum pattern, but yet proves to be excessively simplistic. The right/left dichotomy hides fractures and nuances that characterize each political camp. Brazil and Colombia, for example, experienced a shift from the right to the far right in 2018, while Ecuador witnessed a post-electoral shift within the left towards more conservative positions in 2017–2019. This book seeks to explain why some elections result in alternations and others do not. When alternations do occur, rather than labelling them as simply rightist or leftist, it suggests distinguishing them according to their magnitude and content, progressive or conservative. This collective volume was inspired by OPALC’s1 research project on the “rightist” 2016–2019 election cycle in Latin America. It relied primarily on field surveys, but also adopted a comparative historical perspective by referring to the 2004–2007 “leftist” cycle and the intercycle period (2007–2016), accounting for a total of 65 elections. The final section of this introduction extends this approach to the 2020–2022 elections. The book offers an innovative perspective on electoral shifts. It aims to be part of broader debates on the periodization (Martin 2017) of elections and on political change and democracy in Latin America and elsewhere. This introduction presents the theoretical framework of the book, which is taken up by the various contributors. Based on theoretical and empirical considerations, it offers a model to explain alternations and to specify their modalities and contents.

1 Sciences Po’s Political (www.sciencespo.fr/opalc).

Observatory

of

Latin

America

and

the

Caribbean

1

1.1

INTRODUCTION: ELECTORAL CYCLES, CONTINUITY …

3

Electoral Alternations in Latin America

The literature on electoral shifts in Latin America has developed considerably in the wake of the early twenty-first century’s “left turn”.2 Most is based on classical explanations of electoral behaviour’s instability, which emphasize, among other things, the weak institutionalization of party systems and the fragility of voters’ loyalty (Mainwaring and Zoco 1995; Mainwaring 2018; Lupu 2014; Roberts 2014; Torcal Loriente 2015). Among the variables that have been explored,3 proportional representation intensifies the proliferation of candidates and thus offers voters a wide range of options. Some studies emphasize the importance of a retrospective vote to punish governments that implemented neoliberal policies in the 1990s (Murillo et al. 2010). Others point to a shift in economic preferences in favour of redistributive programs proposed by progressive candidates (Baker and Green 2011). Motivated by strategic voting or adherence to values, the victories of the left took place in a particular context. The economic recession of the late 1990s precipitated the crisis of some parties and the emergence of a renewed electoral offer that paved the way for a shift to the left, without voters overwhelmingly rejecting the market economy.4 In Brazil for instance, several scholars have explained that voters elected Lula in 2002 out of a negative evaluation of the previous centre-right governments (Carreirão 2004). Research also showed that the PT managed to win several elections in a row, thanks to successful redistributive policies (Nicolau and Peixoto 2007). The same argument was applied to Mexico (Diaz-Cayeros, Estévez and Magaloni 2017), Uruguay (Queirolo 2010), and Colombia (Nupia 2011). The economic boom in the 2010s was indeed very favourable to incumbents. Its downturn had the opposite effect, triggering alternations. Karen Remmer (2012) is right to point out that such abrupt changes in electoral behaviour reflect Latin America’s economic vulnerability and dependence on commodity cycles. Can these considerations about the left turn be extended to analyse the conservative electoral cycle that followed? 2 Among the abundant production, it is worth pointing out the contributions of the “Salamanca school” led by Professor Manuel Alcántara (2018, 2020). 3 See the discussion in Dabène (2012). 4 LAPOP (2010).

4

O. DABÈNE

The economic vote thesis seems to be applicable, insofar as the first defeats of leftist incumbents coincided with the slowdown in economic growth and the interruption of social progress after 2015. It has been shown that slow growth, coupled with high inflation (as in the case of Argentina in 2019), put incumbents in great difficulty (Murillo and Visconti 2017). More generally, the link between assessment of the economy and voting behaviour has been firmly established in the literature (Valdini and Lewis-Beck 2018). However, one must be cautious and nuanced, because the impact of economic factors on voting is context-dependent, which prohibits any hasty generalization (Carreras and Acácio 2019). It is also very much affected by the characteristics of electoral systems. The question of the clarity of a government’s responsibility in the face of bad times is complex. If voters were to focus on punishing the political formations responsible for economic crises, they would eliminate the main parties that have been in power for the past 30 years, not just the incumbents (Benton 2005). Such a strategy is observable, but it is motivated more by a rejection of corruption. In addition to the economic vote and the denunciation of corruption, there is also the adherence to values. For example, the eruption of evangelical church ideas in electoral campaigns has become widespread in Latin America (Burity 2021; Gomes Mendoça Ferreira and Fuks 2021). Evangelical candidates bring a popular vote to conservative parties (Corrales 2018). However, they should not be too carelessly equated with the right, as in 2018 evangelical churches supported Jair Bolsonaro in Brazil (far right) and Lopez Obrador in Mexico (left). As far back as 2002, Lula allied himself with the evangelicals to win a presidential election that had previously eluded him three times. The literature has undoubtedly made progress in describing Latin American pendular politics. It has tried to understand how a particular political family has imposed itself, emphasizing the weight of the economic context, the characteristics of the party systems, and the evolution of the voters’ convictions. Some studies have attempted to measure the extent of political turnover at various levels, including parliamentary (Matland and Studlar 2004), or have reflected on the meaning of electoral defeat (Louault and Pellen 2019). Some case studies stand out for their very rich approach to the performance of incumbents (Murillo et al. 2016).

1

INTRODUCTION: ELECTORAL CYCLES, CONTINUITY …

5

However, the scientific production devoted to electoral alternations in Latin America is surprisingly modest, precisely because researchers have been obsessed with the left/right divide, sometimes with a barely concealed normative bias. Research has essentially focused on the causes and consequences of “shifts” without opening the black box of alternations. This book partially fills this gap, by proposing to differentiate types of alternations and by confronting them with a rich empirical material.

1.2

Typology of Alternations

One of the contributions of this volume to the literature is to map the variety of alternations produced by electoral cycles in Latin America and to try to explain the differences observed. In line with the work on election typologies, since V.O. Key’s seminal piece (1955) on critical elections5 , this introduction suggests discriminating between alternations according to their degree, temporality, and content. 1.2.1

Degree of Alternations

Rather than considering the characteristics of the party systems and observing the governing coalitions resulting from elections6 , the degree of an alternation is assessed in this book in the light of the results of incumbents in presidential, legislative, and local elections (Table 1.1). The latter, rarely considered in the literature, can have a significant political impact, especially in federal systems (Argentina, Brazil, Mexico).7 By definition, however, they are not elections with national power at stake and their contribution to the dynamics of alternation is therefore less.8 Moreover, they may be desynchronized, which increases the complexity of their interpretation. In this volume, local elections that are closest to national elections are taken into account, considering, as is the case in the 5 See for instance these different categories of elections: consolidation, deviation, realignment, reestablishment, coined by Pelletier and Crête (1988). 6 Using Sartori’s classical typology revisited by Peter Mair (alternation can be complete, partial, or absent). 7 To compare all the countries, this research considers three types of elections: presidential, legislative, and local (municipal or governors in federal systems). 8 In Table 1.1, they account for half a point.

6

O. DABÈNE

Table 1.1 Degree of alternation Outcomes

Presidential

Legislative

Local

Degree

Incumbents

Victory Victory Victory Victory Defeat Defeat Defeat Defeat Defeat

Victory Victory Defeat Defeat Victory Victory Defeat Defeat Defeat

Victory Defeat Victory Defeat Defeat Defeat Victory Defeat Defeat

0 0,5 1 1,5 2 2,5 3 3,5 4

Incumbents and other dominant parties Source Author

literature on mid-term or second-order elections, that they can be used by voters to send a message to the government. This can be either to start the momentum for an alternation, if the local election is held before, or to contribute to an alternation in the case of a general election, or to confirm or deny an alternation afterwards. The alternation can therefore penalize incumbents at various levels. It can also punish non-leavers. When voters punish the main parties that had previously alternated in power and allow new political formations or outsiders to emerge, the alternation reaches its maximum degree. Argentina in 2015 and Mexico in 2018 fall into the latter category. This approach to degrees of alternation, which focuses on the defeat of incumbents, must be supplemented by considering the scores of newcomers. In legislative elections, the defeat of incumbents does not necessarily imply the victory of the opposition. A new president may find himself in a situation of divided government with a highly fragmented assembly that no one controls. We shall see that this is quite often the case in Latin America. In local elections, especially outside the big cities, the national political scene may not have a hold on local political formations that manage to impose themselves when the party system is not very “nationalized”(Harbers 2010). In short, causing defeat does not necessarily secure victory. As much as the literature on “divided” or “minority” governments is abundant, there is little research on situations where no majority emerges. In this book, we describe alternations as positive when incumbents are defeated by an opposition that manages to secure a majority in Congress (degree equal to or above 3), and as negative when this is not the case (divided governments).

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1.2.2

7

Temporality of Alternations

As far as temporality is concerned, three scenarios can be identified. First, alternations can take place in a non-electoral way, in the form of a more or less legal removal of a president before the end of his or her term. Such a change is explained by Pérez-Liñán (2007) as a combination of the erosion of the president’s authority, the strength of congress, and the mobilization of public opinion. A non-electoral alternation can also be the product of a political crisis leading to the dissolution of an assembly (Peru 2019), or of an Assembly using an impeachment procedure to vote a president out (Peru 2018 and 2020 or Brazil 2016). In both cases, the absence of trivialization of alternations in the long term is a determining factor (Przeworski 2015). Still before the elections, readjustments within a hegemonic party can trigger an “intralnation”, a notion Damien Larrouqué coined about Paraguay.9 Alternations can also take the “normal” form of the electoral defeat of incumbents in presidential elections, which can eventually also confirm an impeachment. Legislative, regional, and local elections can add degrees of alternation, as can the defeat of dominant parties (Table 1.1). Finally, alternations can occur after elections. They can be triggered by the political turnaround of a newly elected president who has succeeded another president from the same political family. The aim is to “kill the father” by eliminating those close to him and/or by initiating a radical change in public policy (Stokes 2001). Post-election changes can also be caused by parliamentary nomadism that deprives a president of his or her majority in congress. 1.2.3

Content of Alternations

The content of alternations can be analysed in various ways. As noted earlier, most of the literature on political change in Latin America over the past two decades has focused on describing pendular right/left dynamics. This approach has shown its limitations in countries where the right/left divide is not meaningful to voters. According to Zechmeister (2015), “the political significance of right-left semantics in Latin America is comparatively quite low”. For this reason, this book prefers to analyse the content of electoral alternations in terms of shifts towards conservatism or progressivism, to 9 Chapter 14 of this volume.

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Table 1.2 Manifesto project categories

Left

Right

Anti-Imperialism Military: Negative

Military: Positive Freedom and Human Rights Constitutionalism: Positive Political Authority Free Market Economy Incentives: Positive Protectionism: Negative Economic Orthodoxy Welfare State Limitation National Way of Life: Positive Traditional Morality: Positive Law and Order: Positive Civic Mindedness: Positive

Peace Internationalism: Positive Democracy Market Regulation Economic Planning Protectionism: Positive Controlled Economy Nationalization Welfare State Expansion Education Expansion Labor Groups: Positive Source Manifesto Project

grasp the fine mutations that can occur within a “family”. It understands these transformations as the product of two types of electoral behaviour: strategic voting, in the form of support/rejection of incumbents’ record, and the identity vote of adherence to values. To differentiate between conservative and progressive values, the project uses in part the Manifesto project database.10 This database evaluates the salience of certain references (quasi-sentence) in the programs of political parties and candidates. These references are grouped together to show a left or right leaning (Table 1.2). Inspired by the Manifesto project method, the contributors to this book have typified the positions of the candidates and political parties based on recurring references, during election campaigns, to divisive topics (Table 1.3).

10 https://manifesto-project.wzb.eu.

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Table 1.3 Indicators of progressist/conservative positioning Topics

Progressivism

Conservatism

Venezuela

Third way

Economy Insecurity Same-sex marriage and abortion

State as regulatory agent Prevention In favour

Diplomatic alignment with the United States Market-friendly policies Repression Not in favour

Source Author

Venezuela, in the first place, was the subject of bold positions during the campaigns, ranging from accommodation and dialogue with the Bolivarian government to confrontation and support for regime change. Third way diplomacy (neither acceptance nor overthrow) was opposed to alignment with US foreign policy. In the economic sphere, debates have classically focused on the role of the state. In a phase of slowing growth, the continuation of redistributive policies was no longer a priority for conservative parties (Luna and Kaltwasser 2014). Two other debates structured the electoral offer: insecurity, where preventive and repressive policies were opposed, and “societal” issues such as same-sex marriage and abortion. On all these topics, the positions taken followed a gradient rather than being concentrated around two poles, since progressivism and conservatism are shifting postures and not ideologies with well-defined contours (Bourke 2018). There was no absolute consistency within a “family”: a candidate could be economically progressive and socially conservative (Lopez Obrador, for example). Beyond the programmatic aspects, the project also assessed the prevalence of “reactionary rhetoric” in the criticism of the left’s record. According to Hirschman (1991), these are arguments that attempt to show that the reforms implemented by left-wing governments have produced perverse effects (perversity), or they have not solved the problems they set out to solve (futility), or they have represented a cost that will handicap the region’s development for a long time (jeopardy). These considerations legitimized a policy of liquidating the progressive legacy once the electoral alternation has been achieved, often masking a simple desire for revenge.

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Table 1.4 Likelihood of alternations: some hypotheses Institutions

Public opinion Electoral offer

Voting behaviour

Historicization/contextualization

Incumbents are not running for re-election Elections are free and fair Presidential approval rating is low Democracy’s legitimacy is low Opposition (parties, programs, and candidates) is united Programmatic convergence is high Incumbents’ electoral base is demobilized (differential abstention) Voters’ loyalty is shaken (volatility) Voters are accustomed to electoral defeats Vote is determined by an issue

Source Author

1.3

Looking for Factors of Alternation

This work reflects on the factors likely to favour alternations, in the different forms and to the different degrees mentioned in the previous section. To this end, it proposes to test several hypotheses grouped around five variables: (1) institutions, (2) public opinion, (3) electoral offer, (4) electoral behaviour, and (5) history/context (Table 1.4). These hypotheses were constructed based on a review of the literature and empirical considerations. At the institutional level, the issue of re-election has been the subject of numerous constitutional reforms since the return to democracy in the region. In the 2000s, the number of successive mandates allowed was extended, in a favourable economic context that seemed to guarantee the re-election of incumbents. In some cases, incumbents ran for re-election despite the constitutions prohibiting it.11 When an incumbent is not running for re-election, it opens a window of opportunity that the opposition may or may not exploit to its advantage. For this to happen, the election must take place in such a way that the opposition can campaign on an equal footing with the incumbents and anticipate a victory validated by the institutions. Respect for the choices expressed by the voters is obviously a prerequisite for any alternation. 11 Nicaragua (2009), Honduras (2015) and Bolivia (2017). In 2022, Bukele (Salvador) announced he would run in 2024.

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11

The state of public opinion is just as decisive. Alternations are always more likely to take place when a president’s popularity is declining. When such a drop in “specific support” for a government is accompanied by an erosion of “diffuse support” (Easton 1965) for democracy, the aversion of certain constituencies to the “system” can materialize at various levels. At the local level, the protections enjoyed by “enclaves” may break down (Gibson 2005). In that case, the degree of alternation may increase. The likelihood of an alternation is also affected by the electoral offer. A united opposition, with a coherent discourse, is more likely to win. Conversely, a weak “ideological distance” between the main candidates can cause a dilution of the parties’ identity (Lupu 2014) and disturb the voters. Their vote then becomes volatile. Coupled with a drop in voter turnout, this electoral behaviour can penalize incumbents. Finally, it is important to historicize and contextualize alternations. On the one hand, they are more likely to occur in countries that are accustomed to periodic democratic changes (Przeworski 2015). On the other hand, they are often also the product of a reaction to current issues, such as corruption scandals or rising inflation for example. The complete validation of all these hypotheses outlines a research program whose completion is beyond the scope of this book. This introduction is limited to proposing a first comparative approximation of alternations in Latin America, which is further developed in the chapters devoted to the different countries of the region. For this purpose, the research uses a battery of nine indicators (Table 1.5) that allowed us to test some of the hypotheses concerning the occurrence and degree of alternations. These indicators are broken down into absolute values and trends, to show changes over the period. In some cases, the thresholds used are somewhat arbitrary, but it seemed useful to set benchmarks for the comparative analysis.

1.4

The Database

The empirical material used in this introduction to test the general hypotheses consists of 65 presidential elections12 and 4 impeachments that took place between 2004 and 2019 in 17 Latin American countries (Tables 1.6 and 1.7).

12 In addition to legislative and local elections.

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Table 1.5 Operationalization of the hypotheses Variables

Indicators

Values

Pattern

Institutions

Re-election Quality of electoral democracy

YES/NO Above regional average

↑

Presidential approval rating

Below 50%

↓

Democracy’s legitimacy

Below 50%

↓

Polarization

Above 75%

↑

Below 50% or below 80% if vote is compulsory* Above 50%

↓

Public opinion

Electoral offer

Electoral behaviour Participation

Volatility

History/Context

Trivialization of alternations

YES/NO

Inflation

Above 10%

↑

↑

Sources Official V-dem’s Electoral democracy index (https://www.vdem.net) Latinobarómetro (www.latinobar ometro.org) Latinobarómetro (www.latinobar ometro.org) Share of the combined votes of the two leading candidates in the first round of the presidential elections Official

Pedersen index based on official sources Since the 1980s, incumbents have completed their term of office and their successions have not been contested CEPAL (IPC September)

* Compulsory voting with sanctions: Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Ecuador, Paraguay, Peru, Uruguay

Source Author

Regarding “regular” presidential elections, in fifteen years, Latin America has had slightly more cases of alternation (N = 33) than of continuity (N = 32). The changes occurred mainly in cycles 1 and 2. The inter-cycle period was more stable, with 19 cases of continuity out

Cycle 1 (2004–2007)

2007: P – P

2005: C / P

2006: P – P

2006: P – P

2006: C – C

2006: C / P

2006: C / P

2007: C / P

2005: C / P

2006: C – C

2006: C / P

2004: C / P

2003: C / C

Argentina

Bolivia

Brazil

Chile

Colombia

Costa Rica

Ecuador

Guatemala

Honduras

Mexico

Nicaragua

Panama

Paraguay

2009: P / C 2014: C / C 2008: C / P (2012*: P / C) 2013: C – C

2011**: P – P

2011: P – P 2015: P / C 2009: P – P 2014: P – P 2010: P – P 2014: P – P (2016*: P / C) 2010: P / C 2013: C / P 2010: C – C 2014: C – C 2010: P – P 2014: P / P 2009: P – P 2013: P – P 2011: P / C 2015: C / C (2009*: P / C) 2009**: C – C 2013**: C – C 2012: C / C

Inter-cycle (2008–2015)

2 4

2

1

3

– :2 /: 2

– :1 /: 2 – :2 /: 1 /: 4

– :3 /: 1

– :1 /: – :3 /: – :2 /: – :2 /: /:

– :2 /: 2 – :2 /: 2 – :3 /: 1

(/) & (–)

(continued)

4

4

3

3

4

4

4

4

4

4

4

4

4

Number of elections

INTRODUCTION: ELECTORAL CYCLES, CONTINUITY …

2018: C – C

2019: C / P

2016**: P – P

2018: C / P

2017**: C – C

2019: C / C

2017: P / P

2018: P – P

2018: C / C

2017: P / C

2018: C / C

2019***: P / C

2019: C / P

Cycle 2 (2016–2019)

Alternations (/) and continuity (–) between progressist (P) or conservative (C) candidates

Country

Table 1.6

1

13

2009: C / P 2014: P – P 2009: P – P 2014: P – P 2012: P – P 2013**: P – P – : 19 /: 12

P – P: 14 C – C: 5 C / P: 3 P / C: 4 C / C: 3 P / P: 2

2004: C – C

2004: C / P

2006: P – P

– :8 /: 9

P – P: 5 C – C: 3 C / P: 8 C / C: 1

Salvador

Uruguay

Venezuela

TOTALS

P – P: 3 C – C: 2 C / P: 3 P / C: 5 C / C: 3 P / P: 1

– :5 /: 12

2018**: P – P

2019: P / C

2019: P / C

2016: P / C

Cycle 2 (2016–2019)

P – P: 22 C – C: 10 C / P: 14 P / C: 10 C / C: 6 P / P: 3

– :1 /: 2 – :2 /: 2 – :2 /: 2 – :4 /: 0 – : 32 /: 33

(/) & (–)

65 7 non-competitive included 4 destitutions not included

4

4

4

3

Number of elections

13 https://www.electoralintegrityproject.com

*Destitutions **Non-competitive elections (Sources Electoral integrity project13 and V-Dem) *** Resignation of the incumbent president, following a contested election, amounting to impeachment. Transition handled by conservative opposition. Elections postponed to May 3, 2020, and then to October 18, 2020, due to COVID-19 Source Author

2011: P / P

2006: P – P

Peru

Inter-cycle (2008–2015)

Cycle 1 (2004–2007)

(continued)

Country

Table 1.6

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Table 1.7 Synthesis of changes Alternations

Cycle 1 Inter cycle Cycle 2 TOTAL

Continuity

Total

Electoral: 33

Not electoral*: 4

Electoral: 32

Non-competitive elections**: 7

Prog

Prog

Cons

Prog

Prog

Cons

Cons

Cons

8 5

1 7

0 0

0 3

5 14

3 5

0 2

0 2

17 31

4 17

8 16

0 0

1 4

3 22

2 10

2 4

1 3

17 65

*Destitutions ** Low or very low electoral integrity.14 Non-competitive elections are included in the list of continuity elections Source Author

of 31 elections. However, it also included three impeachments (Paraguay, Honduras, Brazil) and four non-competitive elections. In electoral cycle 2, there were only three cases of continuity in regular elections (Costa Rica, Ecuador, Paraguay). This proportion is even lower if we consider that Ecuador had a conservative post-election alternation15 . During this period, three other incumbent presidents managed to win re-election, but after flawed elections (Honduras, Nicaragua, Venezuela). In the other countries, there were changes of government that marked a conservative shift (Chile, Peru, Uruguay, Colombia, Brazil). In three countries, on the contrary, the alternation represented an evolution towards more progressive positions (Argentina, Mexico, Panama). El Salvador deserves a closer look, as the positions and values defended by Bukele are open to debate. Finally, in Bolivia, the incumbent president who was running to succeed himself resigned after winning the election under conditions that are subject of debate.16 The interim, as in Brazil

14 https://www.electoralintegrityproject.com 15 Hence, it is classified as an alternation in the database. 16 A report from the Organization of American states (OAS) mentioned “serious irreg-

ularities” that casted doubt on the results. Two separate studies reached an opposite conclusion. See all the documents in OPALC’s website. https://www.sciencespo.fr/opalc/ content/crise-en-bolivie-2019.html. Regardless of the alleged fraud, the fact that Morales

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in 2016–2018, allowed the right to begin a liquidation of the progressive legacy that was not validated by any voter mandate. All in all, from a quantitative perspective, these results partially confirm the “right turn” thesis, without it being the exact negative of the “left turn”. During cycle 1 (2004–2007), 8 out of 9 alternations and 5 out of 8 continuities favoured the left. Switches favouring more conservative candidates than incumbents increased from 1 in Cycle 1 to 7 in the inter-cycle and to 8 in Cycle 2. The resilience of progressive candidates declined. It was 5 in Cycle 1, 14 in the inter-cycle, and only 3 in Cycle 2. While the “right turn” thesis must be qualified by the number of countries involved, it must also be qualified by the types and degrees of alternation. In three cases, the alternation occurred after the elections (Brazil, Ecuador, Bolivia), which raises questions about the legitimacy of the measures taken by the “provisional” governments. In two other cases, the alternation occurred within the right wing to bring more conservative positions to power (Brazil, Colombia). In addition, five countries (Argentina, Chile, Mexico, Panama, and Peru) had a complete alternation (degree 3.5). In all the others, the change was partial, which led to complex situations of divided governments having to struggle to form parliamentary coalitions to govern. The difference with the “left turn” is important. Most left-wing presidents from Cycle 1 had comfortable parliamentary majorities to govern with. On the other hand, they could hardly count on relays in the local executives. Sometimes the alternation took place within the same political families. In Argentina, for example, the shift to the left in 2003 was carried out with no degree of alternation, because it took the form of a succession within the Peronist family. Conversely, the changes in 2015 and 2019 were more abrupt (degree of alternation of 3.5). Brazil experienced the opposite scenario. The defeat of the PSDB in 2002 was total (alternation degree 3.5) and then, after its long domination, the PT ceded power in 2018 while retaining the largest parliamentary group (degree 2.5). As we will see below, beyond the parties, considering the political projects and their ideological core references is essential for a fine understanding of the alternations. Before doing so, the next section runs a test of the hypotheses concerning the alternations (Table 1.4). was “invited” by the army to resign when he had just proposed a re-run of the election justifies his case being included in the category of “destitution”.

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17

Explaining Alternations

Election outcomes in 2016–2019 validate the hypotheses to a large extent (Table 1.8). Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, El Salvador, Guatemala, Mexico, Panama, Peru, and Uruguay experienced alternations that are consistent with expectations. Conversely, but also consistent with the assumptions, in Costa Rica, Ecuador, Honduras, and Nicaragua, continuity prevailed. Only three elections (out of 17) can be considered deviant cases: in Bolivia (before the cancellation of the election), Honduras, and Paraguay, the model suggested an alternation that did not take place. However, all three countries are characterized by weak electoral integrity, which leads to cast doubts about the results. In Paraguay, the alternation took place within the hegemonic party before the election. The model also performs well for cycle 1, with only three deviant elections out of a total of 17 (Argentina 2007, Ecuador 2006, and Guatemala 2007). The inter-cycle period, on the other hand, saw 12 results that contradicted the hypotheses out of a total of 31 elections. Interestingly, Table 1.8 Validation of the hypotheses (cycle 2) Country Argentina 2019 Bolivia 2019** Brazil 2018 Chile 2017 Colombia 2018 Costa Rica2018 Ecuador 2017 Guatemala, 2019 Honduras 2017** Mexico 2018 Nicaragua 2016 Panama 2019 Paraguay 2018 Peru 2016 Salvador 2019 Uruguay 2019 Venezuela 2018**

Conformity* (%) 56 56 89 67 78 44 22 56 56 67 44 67 44 67 78 78 67

Presidential alternation Yes No Yes Yes Yes No No Yes No Yes No Yes No Yes Yes Yes No

Degree of alternation 3.5 0 2.5 3.5 1.5 1.5 0.5 0.5 1 3.5 0 3.5 0 3.5 2.5 2 0

* Conformity with the 9 variables that hypothetically explain alternations (Tables 1.4 and 1.5) ** Deviant cases

Source Author

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Table 1.9 Correlations between the indicators and the occurrence and degree of alternations

Indicators

Re-election Quality of electoral democracy Presidential approval Legitimacy of democracy Polarization Participation Volatility Trivialization Inflation

Alternation occurrences

Degree of alternation

−0.52 0.25

−0.57 0.31

−0.61 −0.31

−0.54 −0.27

−0.27 −0.11 0.25 0.17 −0.12

−0.26 −0.12 0.21 0.19 −0.17

Source Author

the hypotheses explain alternations much better than cases of continuity. Of the 18 cases of deviant outcomes (out of a total of 65 elections between 2004 and 2019), only 4 involve alternations (Ecuador 2006, Guatemala 2007, Chile 2009, and Mexico 2012). To advance the analysis of alternations, the contributions of each variable were tested with the Pearson correlation index (r) (Table 1.9). Among the most robust correlations, re-election and presidential approval confirm expectations in this regard. The fact that an incumbent does not seek re-election favours alternations and reinforces their degree. During the period under review, with one exception, all presidents who ran for re-election were re-elected.17 Similarly, a drop of support for an incumbent president gives weapons to the opposition. Among the weaker correlations, voter turnout and context are more counter-intuitive. There is only moderate support for the differential abstention thesis. Declining voter turnout may penalize all parties, especially when voters wish to express their rejection of the entire “system”, and thus relatively spare incumbents. On the other hand, the incumbents 17 Reelections: Brazil 2006 (Lula), Colombia 2006 (Uribe), Venezuela 2006 (Chavez),

Argentina 2011 (Kirchner), Bolivia 2009 (Morales), Ecuador 2009 (Correa), Nicaragua 2011(Ortega), Venezuela 2012 (Chavez), Bolivia 2014 (Morales), Brazil 2014 (Rousseff), Colombia 2014 (Santos), Ecuador 2013 (Correa), Honduras 2017 (Hernandez), Nicaragua 2016 (Ortega), Venezuela 2018 (Maduro), Bolivia 2019 (Morales). Exception: Argentina 2019 (Macri).

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19

may fall victim to an increase in turnout due to the rise of an outsider who knows how to mobilize sectors of the population accustomed to avoiding the ballot box. The context, as measured by the inflation rate, does not appear to have had an impact on the observed election outcomes. Other indicators, such as GDP/capita growth, have been tested with similar results. Two explanations can be offered. One has to do with the period considered. Between 2004 and 2019, Latin America experienced very favourable economic conditions. Except for 2009 and then 2018–2019, growth has been robust throughout the period. Voters have become accustomed to gains in purchasing power and have not penalized incumbents for brief economic downturns, as in 2009. That year, Morales was easily re-elected in Bolivia. In Brazil the PT, which had been in power since 2002, won in 2010 with Dilma Rousseff. Only Chile had an alternation with the historic victory of the right in 2009. The other explanation has to do with the limits of an exclusively economic consideration of the political context. Other contextual elements specific to each country have affected the outcome of the elections. They will be discussed in the country chapters of this book. Other factors also show significant correlations. This is the case for the quality of elections and the legitimacy of democracy. Unsuspected elections are a guarantee for the opposition, while a decline in the legitimacy of democracy can lead to a rejection of incumbents at all levels, with an impact on the degree of alternation. The trivialization of political changes through the ballot box since the return to democracy also plays a role that deserves further investigation. Similarly, polarization impacts electoral competition. A united opposition can more easily defeat incumbents. Finally, traditionally very high in Latin America, volatility reflects the creation of new parties at each election. The electoral offer can lose coherence and readability, which does not facilitate the work of the opposition. However, volatility is also generated by the migration of part of the outgoing electoral base, which can trigger an alternation. Linear regressions confirm these unequal contributions to the explanation of alternations. Figure 1.1 provides three examples concerning the

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quality of elections (V-Dem), support for incumbents and legitimacy of democracy18 . In addition to these general arguments, which provide some answers to the question “why do some countries have alternations and others don’t?”, the book adds detailed country-case studies that explore the variety of alternations over a longer period. In Chile, for example, the opponents to the Pinochet dictatorship who formed the Concertación in preparation for the 1988 referendum, won every election between 1989 and 2009. In 2008, the right wing won the municipal elections and led by Piñera, won the presidential election in 2009. In the legislative election, it narrowly beat the Concertación (58 seats to 57 in the Chamber of Deputies) but did not win a majority (61 seats). The alternation is therefore 3.5 negative (minority government). In 2012–2013, the voters returned the victory to the right in the municipal elections, but the Concertación, by then “New Majority”, regained the presidency and the majority in the assembly (positive degree 3 alternation). Four years later, the same Piñera was elected again. His coalition won a majority in the municipal elections and beat its rivals in the legislative elections, but without obtaining a parliamentary majority (negative degree 3). In total, Chileans have only had two presidents between 2006 and 2022. Bachelet governed twice with a coalition holding a majority in Congress. Piñera also governed twice, but without a majority in either case. The empirical chapters also allow for a qualitative analysis of alternations’ content when they take place. They thus contribute to characterizing the scope and limits of the conservative shift of the years 2016–2019. The following section sets out some milestones.

1.6

The Conservative Turn

The empirical data allows us to characterize two components of the conservative shift: programmatic (electoral programs) and behavioural (voting). They thus make it possible to answer two questions: what ideas do conservative candidates defend to win elections? and what is the extent of polarization/radicalization provoked by the alternations?

18 All the figures are available on OPALC’s website.

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4

3.5

Degree of alternation

3

2.5

2

1.5

1

0.5

0 0.20

0.30

0.40

0.50

0.60

0.70

0.80

0.90

1.00

70%

80%

90%

100%

V-Dem 4

3.5

Degree of alternation

3

2.5

2

1.5

1

0.5

0 20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

Legitimacy of democracy

Fig. 1.1 Three examples of linear regressions (Source Author)

21

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3.5

Degree of alternation

3

2.5

2

1.5

1

0.5

0 20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

80%

90%

Incumbents approval

Fig. 1.1 (continued)

1.6.1

Conservative Rhetoric

In the right/left categories (Table 1.2) and in the countries for which the Manifesto project provides data (Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Uruguay, Mexico), the political references of the candidates have fluctuated to a greater or lesser extent over the period under consideration. Some political parties seem to have a stable ideological positioning, reinforced by electoral victories. Others, often in opposition, adjust their discourse according to the competition in the electoral market and the context (Fig. 1.2). The most striking example is Argentina, where Peronism has undergone a radical right/left/right/left cycle: in the 2013 legislative elections, the Justicialist Party (PJ) positioned itself as far to the right as it did during the Menem era in 1995, after having been one of the most radical left-wing parties on the continent in 2009. Winning an election can be the result of a centrist positioning strategy as well as a radicalization. In Chile, the right-wing opposition won by refocusing in 2009 and 2017. To achieve this, Piñera “leftisized” his

1

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Fig. 1.2 Ideological positioning: Argentina, Chile, Brazil, Mexico (Source Author based on Manifesto Project )

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Fig. 1.2 (continued)

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discourse in 2009, while he “rightisized” it in 2017. Meanwhile in 2013, the “right-wing” candidate Evelyn Mattei adopted a more left-wing positioning than the socialist Michelle Bachelet. Her unnatural speech disturbed traditional right-wing voters. They turned demobilized and facilitated Bachelet’s victory. In Brazil, the Workers’ Party (PT) gradually moved towards centrist positions between 1989 and 1998. From 2002 onwards, Lula won a series of elections based on stabilized centre-left references, which are not very far from the positions defended by the Brazilian Social Democracy Party (PSDB). Such a convergence also occurred in 2010. In 2018, on the other hand, the gap between the PT and the PSDB widened, in a context of the rise of the far right. Bolsonaro’s discourse in 2018 reached record levels of conservatism in the region. Finally in Mexico, the Institutionalized revolutionary party (PRI) moved strategically towards the left or the right, with no stabilized references. Its opposition (mainly PAN) did the same. The PRI lost the 2000 election with a conservative program and lost again in 2006, this time with a more liberal agenda. In 2018, the left (MORENA) won with a moderate left program. With all the due precautions inherent to the use of the Project Manifesto’s categories and incomplete data, it does appear that the rhetoric of right-wing candidates has moved further to the right during Cycle 2. The distance from left-wing candidates thus increased, especially in Brazil and Chile between 2013 and 2018, though not to historical highs (Fig. 1.3). What are the elements of discourse that have provoked such a hardening of the right and the “rightization” of the left? Expending the categories used by the Manifesto Project, the three examples examined provide converging lessons. In Argentina, the Justicialist Party (PJ) became “rightist” between 2009 and 2013, adopting a discourse with fewer references to the need for market regulation, less support for economic planning, protectionism, and the welfare state. At the same time, the Peronist agenda was less unfavourable to economic orthodoxy. In Chile, the “rightist” right between 2013 and 2017 relied on references to civic-mindedness and authority to deal with insecurity and, in the economic sphere, views unfavourable to the expansion of the welfare state and regulation of the economy. In Brazil, the classical right (PSDB) moved between 2010 and 2018 towards moderately more right-wing positions in the economic sphere.

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Fig. 1.3 Ideological distance: Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Mexico (Source Author based on Manifesto Project )

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At the same time, the radicalization of a fringe of the right under Bolsonaro has been based on clear economic options: support for the market economy and orthodoxy and firm opposition to the welfare state. This return to neoliberalism has been accompanied by a vigorous defence of repressive policies and a strengthening of the role of the police in fighting crime. In Mexico, MORENA moved in 2018 to more conservative positions mainly regarding environment and welfare. In sum, the Manifesto Project data indicates that the conservative turn in these countries amounts to a return to neoliberalism, with a critique of the welfare state developed by the left in the 2000s and the defence of the market economy, accompanied by a security rhetoric. The social topics defended by the Evangelicals have not found much resonance. In Brazil, in particular, moral and religious values or, conversely, the legalization of abortion, were not discussed in the “manifestos”19 during the campaign and do not help to account for the increasing polarization of debates and the climate of hatred that has taken hold in the country since the 2016 mobilizations. In the rest of the region, too, some voters have become radicalized, for reasons that will be elucidated by the authors of the different chapters of the book. 1.6.2

Voters’ Radicalization

Debates during the 2015–2019 election cycle campaigns have often been passionate without room for compromise, such as on Venezuela, abortion, same-sex marriage, migration, or in Colombia on the peace agreement. In the past, the discussions seemed to be calmer, concerning the economy, corruption, security, or the environment. Social networks have accentuated this radicalization/polarization dynamic in the opinion-forming phase prior to the vote. Subject to confirmation by larger surveys, this polarization seems to have become essentially affective, based on irreconcilable positions regarding “social” issues. In this sense, it differs from the affective polarization observed in the United States, where party affiliation is a vector of social identification (Shanto and alii 2019). 19 They were more present in social medias, a dimension that is neglected by the Manifesto project. See Guevara (2020).

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Data from the 2020 World Value Survey show that Argentina, Colombia, and Peru have experienced an increasing radicalization of their voters since 2013.20 The increase in self-identification with the far right is significant in Colombia, where it exceeds 37%. Elsewhere (Brazil, Chile, Mexico), radicalization has decreased. It is interesting to note that Brazil, and even more so Chile, experienced large-scale social movements during the period, which led to violent confrontations in the public space. This did not prevent the share of Chileans who identify with the extreme left from falling from 4% to 1.6%, illustrating once again a divide between electoral politics and street politics, at least until 2021.21 Over a period of thirty years, radicalization has been mainly propelled by the right in the countries studied. Respondents positioning themselves on the extreme right represented up to 19% in Mexico, 16.4% in Brazil, and 25.4% in Colombia! In Mexico and Brazil, despite a notable decrease in radicalization, it is still above 20%. (Fig. 1.4). Radicalization has been accompanied by significant party fragmentation, which has led to situations of polarized and, in some cases, atomized pluralism (Sartori 1976). However, alternations are not correlated with fragmentation or radicalization. Moreover, self-positioning on radical positions does not fully translate into voting for radical formations. It is therefore as if radicalization and electoral behaviour were the result of different logics. Here again, these questions open research programs for the future.

20 On a scale from 0 to 10, share of respondents self-positioning themselves on 0 (extreme left) or 10 (extreme right). Source World Value Survey. 21 The election of Gabriel Boric is a game changer: the social movements managed to have one of their leaders elected president, (momentarily?) closing the gap between the ballot and the street.

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Fig. 1.4 Evolution of voters’ radicalization in Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Mexico, and Peru (Source Author based on world value survey)

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Fig. 1.4 (continued)

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Closing Remarks

Nine elections were held in Latin America in 2020–2022.22 With notable exceptions,23 they prompted a new wave of explanations using the left/right dichotomy. The 2017–2019 “big cycle” (Zovatto and alii 2018) was a conservative one. Now the pendulum shifts back to the left, with a new generation of activists winning elections (Chile) or emblematic figures orchestrating a dramatic comeback (Brazil). As this introduction argued, the left/right divide is not much of help to account for these evolutions. The left has changed and the overall context is dissimilar. As suggested in this volume, looking at alternations is far more rewarding. The model used in this book anticipated 8 of the 9 outcomes, with Ecuador as an outlier. The model did not see the alternation coming in this country. Seven elections resulted in alternations of some sort. Nicaragua consolidated its regime of electoral authorianism, leaving Bolivia as the only regular election with no alternation. This wave of alternations largely favoured progressist candidates. Costa Rica and Ecuador were the only countries moving to conservatism. In some cases, the degree of alternation reached its maximum, proving that the anti-incumbent mood affected the full range of classical political offers. Peru, Chile, and Costa Rica saw the victory of outsiders, punishing traditional political parties that had monopolized elected positions in some cases since the return to democracy (Chile). Latin America’s pendular politics refers to a time of recurrent alternations. There is no reason to doubt that it will last, as long as democratically elected presidents keep on failing to deliver to frustrated voters.

22 Bolivia, Ecuador, Peru, Nicaragua, Chile, Honduras, Costa Rica, Colombia, and Brazil. 23 See for instance Gerardo Lissardy, “Porqué la idea de que América Latina gira hacia la derecha o izquierda perdió sentido en 2019”, BBC News Mundo, 30 december 2019, available at: https://www.bbc.com/mundo/noticias-america-latina-50818892 (accessed August 8th 2022).

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References Alcántara, Manuel (editor) (2018), Elecciones y partidos politicos en América Latina, CIS Alcántara, Manuel (editor) (2020), América Latina vota (2017–2019), Tecnos Baker, Andy & Kenneth Green (2011), “The Latin American Left’s Mandate: Free-market policies and issue voting in new democracies”, World Politics 63(1), 43–77 Benton, Allyson Lucinda (2005), “Dissatisfied democrats or retrospective voters. Economic hardship, political institutions and voting behavior in Latin America”, Comparative Political Studies 38(4), 417–442 Bourke, Richard (2018), “What is conservatism? History, ideology, and party”, European Journal of Political Theory, 17(4), 449–475 Burity, Joanildo (2021), “The Brazilian conservative wave, the Bolsonaro administration and religious actors”, Brazilian Political Science Review, 15(3). https://doi.org/10.1590/1981-3821202100030005 Carreirão, Yan (2004), “A eleição presidencial de 2002: uma análise preliminar do processo e dos resultados eleitorais”, Revista de Sociologia e Política, pp. 179– 194. https://doi.org/10.1590/S0104-44782004000100013 Carreras, Miguel & Igor Acácio (2019), “Electoral volatility in Latin America”, Oxford Research Encyclopedias Corrales, Javier, “A perfect marriage: evangelicals and conservatives in Latin America”, The New York Times, 17 Janvier 2018 Dabène, Olivier (editor) (2012), La Gauche en Amérique Latine, Presses de Sciences Po Diaz-Cayeros, Alberto, Federico Estévez and Beatriz Magaloni (2017), The Political Logic of Poverty Relief: Electoral Strategies and Social Policy in Mexico. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Easton, David (1965), A systems analysis of political life, Wiley Gibson, Edward (2005), “Boundary control: subnational authoritarianism in democratic countries”, World Politics 58(1) Gomes Mendonça Ferreira, Matheus and Mario Fuks (2021), “O hábito de frequentar cultos como mecanismo de mobilização eleitoral: o voto evangélico em Bolsonaro em 2018”, https://doi.org/10.1590/0103-3352.2021.34. 238866 Guevara, Erica (2020), “Redes sociales y ‘polarización’ : una mirada comparada de las elecciones de 2018 en Brasil, Colombia, Costa Rica y México”, 251– 288 in Democracia en digital : Facebook, comunicación y política en Costa Rica, Ignacio Siles González (editor), San José, Centro de investigación en comunicación Harbers, Imke (2010), “Decentralization and the development of nationalized party systems in new democracies: evidence from Latin America”, Comparative Political Studies 43(5), 606–627

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Hirschman, Albert (1991), The Rhetoric of Reaction. Perversity, Futility, Jeopardy, Harvard University Press LAPOP (2010), AmericasBarometer Insights n°38, edited by Elizabeth Zechmeister & Margarita Coral Louault, Frédéric and Cédric Pellen (2019), La défaite électorale. Productions, appropriations, bifurcation, PUR Luna, Juan Pablo and Cristóbal Kaltwasser (2014) The resilience of the Latin American right, Johns Hopkins University Press Lupu, Noam (2014), “Brand dilution and the breakdown of political parties in Latin America”, World Politics 66(4), p561–602 Mainwaring, Scott & Edurne Zoco (editors) (1995), Building Democratic Institutions. Party Systems in Latin America, Stanford University Press Mainwaring, Scott (editor) (2018), Party systems in Latin America. Institutionalization, decay and collapse, Cambridge University Press Martin, Pierre (2017), “Le temps des élections”, p855–905 in Études électorales, edited by Yves Deloye and Nonna Mayer, Bruyland Matland, Richard and Donley Studlar (2004), “Determinants of legislative turnover: a cross-national analysis”, British Journal of Political Science 34(1), p87–108 Murillo, M. Victoria, Virginia Oliveros & Milan Vaishnav (2010), “Electoral revolution or democratic alternation? Latin American Research Review, 45(3), p87–114 Murillo, Victoria and Giancarlo Visconti (2017), “Economic performance and incumbents’ support in Latin America”, Electoral studies 45, p180–190 Murillo, María Victoria, Julia Maria Rubio and Jorge Mangonnet (2016), “Argentina : el protagonismo de los votantes y la alternancia electoral”, Revista de Ciencia Política, 36(1), p3–26 Nicolau, Jairo and Victor Peixoto (2007), “As bases municipais da votação de Lula em 2006”, Cadernos do Fórum Nacional [Preprint]. Available at: https://www.academia.edu/1863106/As_bases_municipais_da_vota%C3% A7%C3%A3o_de_Lula_em_2006 (Accessed: 24 July 2022) Nupia, Oscar (2011) Anti-Poverty Programs and Presidential Election Outcomes: Familias en Acción in Colombia, Documentos CEDE. Universidad de los Andes. Available at: https://ideas.repec.org/p/col/000089/008743.html (Accessed: 17 July 2022). Pelletier, Réjean and Jean Crête (1988) in “Réalignements électoraux et transformations du personnel politique”, Revue canadienne de science politique, 21(1), p3–33 Pérez-Liñán, Aníbal (2007), Crisis without breakdown. Presidential impeachment and the new political instability in Latin America, Cambridge University Press Przeworski, Adam (2015), “Acquiring the habit of changing governments through elections”, Comparative Political Studies 48(1), p101–129

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Queirolo, Rosario (2010) “El rol de las transferencias monetarias en la reelección del Frente Amplio en 2009”, in Daniel Buquet and Niki Johnson, Del cambio a la continuidad. Ciclo electoral 2009–2010 en Uruguay. Montevideo: Editorial Fin de Siglo. Remmer, Karen (2012), “The rise of leftist-populist governance in Latin America: the roots of electoral change”, Comparative political studies, 45(8), 947–972. Roberts, Kenneth (2014), Changing course in Latin America. Party systems in the neoliberal era (2014), Cambridge University Press Sartori, Giovanni (1976), Parties and Party Systems: A Framework for Analysis, Cambridge University Press Shanto Iyengar and alii (2019), “The Origins and Consequences of Affective Polarization in the United States”, Annual Review of Political Science, 22, 2019, 29–146 Stokes, Susan (2001), Mandates and democracy. Neoliberalism by surprise in Latin America, Cambridge University Press Torcal Loriente, Mariano (editor) (2015), Sistemas de partidos en América latina: causas y consecuencias de su equilibrio inestable, Anthropos Ediciones UNL Valdini, Melody and Michael Lewis-Beck (2018), “Economic voting in Latin America: rules and responsibility”, American journal of political science 47(12), 1707–1737 Zechmeister, Elizabeth (2015), “Left-right identifications and the Latin American voter”, p196 in The Latin American Voter. Pursuing representation and accountability in challenging contexts, Ryan Carly, Matthew Singer et Elizabeth Zechmeister (editors), University of Michigan Press Zovatto, Daniel and alii (2018) “El súper ciclo electoral latinoamericano. Las elecciones del enojo”, Iberoaméricana, XVII, 69, 227–254.

PART I

Conservative Alternations

CHAPTER 2

New Political Cycle in Chile: From Centrist Consensus to the Struggle for Cultural Hegemony Stéphanie Alenda and Javiera Arce-Riffo

Most literature on political change in Latin America over the past two decades has focused on describing pendular right/left dynamics. This division, however, is insufficient to capture the nuances contained in

S. Alenda (B) Andres Bello University, Santiago, Chile e-mail: [email protected] J. Arce-Riffo University College, London, UK e-mail: [email protected] Catholic Northern University, Antofagasta, Chile

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023, corrected publication 2023 O. Dabène (ed.), Latin America’s Pendular Politics, Studies of the Americas, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-26761-1_2

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each category. The centrist consensus (Giddens 1994) and the emergence of various expressions of a “new conservatism” also blurred the boundary between “conservatism” and “progressivism” when the right with an intent to broaden its projection towards new electorates chose to moderate its programs and adopt left-wing issues such as ecology, quality of life, women’s rights, or sexual dissidence. In this sense, alternations can have different natures. Sometimes they guarantee continuity, other times change. In Latin America, one of the dominant arguments to explain either a shift in electoral preferences or re-elections is that of economic cycles. During the 1990s, the failure of neoliberal policies to respond to social needs ended up favouring the return of the left’s programmatic agenda (Levitsky and Roberts 2011; Roberts 2008). The commodities boom then allowed several incumbents to stay in power for more than a decade by giving greater latitude to public spending. This approach, however, does not allow to differentiate between types of leftist governments regarding their programmatic radicality. The economic argument also failed to explain the subsequent “swing to the right” that occurred in contexts of high inequality a priori unfavourable to that electoral option (Luna and Rovira Kaltwasser 2014: 2). Given the increasingly strong weight of the cyclical conditions of political offer and electoral volatility, it is necessary to strengthen the concept of alternation by revisiting certain shorter-term explanatory factors. Some of these factors can be the transformation of policy programs, the emergence of new issues—including “candidate-centred issues” (Wattenberg 1991)—or the intensification of the ideological debate, which can contribute to mobilizing the electorate, polarizing it, and eventually bringing it out of apathy. With the weakening of the partisan link, economic and political factors have become more powerful in influencing the vote. However, economic voting (Popkin 1995), in which short-term changes at the country level (sociotropic version) interact with individual economic conditions (egotropic performance), does not always account for the full complexity of the electoral decision. This also involves values, although not linked to party loyalties, or negative identities rooted in fears, hatreds, and resentments that stand out in the absence of party identification (Meléndez 2019). In this chapter, we seek to identify the intersecting factors that influenced the alternations in power that took place in Chile from the return of democracy in 1990 until the election of Gabriel Boric in 2021. We

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consider their intensity, which appears to be lower between the first three governments of the former Concertación—during which Christian Democrat and Socialist governments alternated—and the first government of Sebastián Piñera. It appears to be higher from the second government of Michelle Bachelet (PS) onwards. Revisiting the nature of the alternations leads us to a somewhat counter-intuitive sequencing, as it includes both left-wing and right-wing governments as part of the same political cycle. We focus on the re-politicization of an electorate that has to take a position in the battle of ideas being waged on the left and the right. This approach also requires paying attention to the alternations both ex-ante and ex-post, in order to evaluate changes from one government to the next. The first part of this chapter is devoted to analysing the centrist consensus and moderate reformism that characterized the first five postdictatorship governments in Chile. The second part deals with the new cycle of hegemonic disputes that began with the second Bachelet government and includes the second conservative government of Sebastián Piñera. The last part situates the current government of Gabriel Boric in this same cycle, focusing on the tensions between change and continuity.

2.1 Centrist Consensus and Moderate Reformism (1990–2013) In Latin America, economic voting has been one key factor explaining the turn to the left. In the context of the transition to democracy that took place since the mid-1980s, the failure of neoliberal policies to respond to social needs favoured the return to a left-wing programmatic agenda. That agenda evolved in an increasingly progressive direction throughout this period due to both the historical trajectories of the parties comprising the governing coalitions and changing political-institutional conditions. Inaugurated immediately after the return to democracy in 1990, the Christian Democratic government of Patricio Aylwin (with two representatives of the left) marked the first of four governments of the Concertación in Chile. The Aylwin government adopted a gradualist strategy of “change with continuity”. The next two Concertación governments—those of Ricardo Lagos in 2000 and Michelle Bachelet in 2013—maintained that strategy (Muñoz and Ffrench-Davis 2003), albeit with subtle variations. While it established the institutional bases for accomplishing its proposed objectives and re-established the rule of

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law, the Aylwin government preserved continuity regarding the political economic system implemented under the military regime. The reasons were both political and related to Aylwin’s own personal convictions (Garretón 2012). Aylwin inherited political institutions that significantly restricted the full exercise of democracy, as well as an economic system in which the general interest remained subordinated to market logic. Until the so-called “Asian crisis” of 1997, the market economy showed its fruits: macroeconomic results were spectacular, with high levels of growth and reduction of poverty by more than fifteen points by 1996 (Morales 2008: 19). The Constitution of 1980 established a binomial electoral system, an enclave of Senators designated by Pinochet, and supermajoritarian thresholds for approving legislation. These measures remained in force after the return to democracy. Together, they prevented the Concertación from realizing the reforms promised in its election manifesto, despite its victory in the elections for both houses of Congress. As a result, the consolidation of democracy was played out mainly in socio-economic terms, with the spotlight on reducing poverty. The political economic model based on private investment and external openness that was allowed to remain in place under Aylwin, proved exceptionally dynamic under the 1994–2000 presidency of Eduardo Frei Ruiz Tagle (DC) (Muñoz y Ffrench-Davis 2003). Promoting economic growth by strengthening foreign trade and boosting exports became the Frei government’s leading priority. Chile’s trade surplus was then among the most favourable in the region. Although crucial economic decisions were made about modernizing the country’s production, the economy tended to operate in a relatively unregulated manner. Efficiency figured as a central objective in the government’s strategic plan of public management, which sought to depoliticize and “technocratize” decisions of the public and semipublic companies’ executives, as well as those of State institutions’ leading administrators (Garretón 2012: 119). Politics were thus treated as subordinate to economic logic. Where social policy was concerned, eliminating poverty continued to receive priority, as reflected by the creation of the National Foundation for Overcoming Poverty in 1994. The general gap between rich and poor, however, persisted (Meller 2000). In 2000, PPD candidate Ricardo Lagos won the Concertación primary and was elected president. His election marked a turning point: his was the first Concertación government headed by a socialist, and the first time

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a socialist had assumed the presidency since the frustrated Allende experience. Adopting the slogan “A Chile for All”, he sought to distance his image from the Frei government’s technocratizing governmental management. During his presidency, various modernizing and democratizing advances took place, such as the Plan AUGE in health; the 2004 creation of the social protection program Chilean Solidarity, directed at families in situations of extreme poverty; and the 2005 constitutional reforms reducing authoritarian enclaves by eliminating designated senators and eliminating irremovability for military commanders-in-chief. His socialist origin, however, put him under pressure to demonstrate irreproachable economic leadership. Some argue that the neoliberal economic model even deepened under his government (Fazio 2007). He maintained the open economic model and open trade promoted by his predecessors, and deregulation and economic concentration increased. In terms of health reform, he introduced significant elements of equity and regulation to private health care. However, the hegemony of the private sector remained unaltered, as did the accumulation of surpluses invested abroad at low rates of return and without a solidarity component. Lagos nonetheless completed his term in office with approval ratings above sixty per cent, contributing favourably to his successor’s election (Morales 2008: 18). The fourth Concertación government was inaugurated in 2006 by Michelle Bachelet, a PS militant and the first woman in Chilean history to reach the presidency. Two main factors explain her victory at the polls: she was perceived as trustworthy and close to the citizens in a context of dissatisfaction with politics, and she received considerable support from the female electorate (Morales 2008: 12). Like her predecessor’s, Bachelet’s government benefited from the commodities boom, which allowed for greater latitude in public spending and contributed to consolidating the turn to the left in other countries of Latin America as well (Levistky and Roberts 2011). In Chile, public revenue linked to the significant rise in copper prices was handled conservatively by the Ministry of Finance. The government opted to accumulate state reserve funds to finance pension reform and use as savings for harder times. That decision left Chile better equipped for confronting the economic crisis of 2008 and the first signs of economic slowdown. The governing alliance had secured an absolute majority in both houses of Congress. Nonetheless, it opted for macroeconomic continuity, implementing orthodox policies. Where there were some modifications, they generally responded to social protests

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(by secondary students and copper workers, among others). At the same time, the previous governments’ social protection policies were reinforced. Above all, the 2008 reform of the pension system was enhanced by adding a solidarity pillar and a minimal universal pension. The system of individual capitalization inherited from the neoliberal model, however, remained unmodified. In 2009, the political balance that had existed since the end of the dictatorship was altered by the victory of Sebastián Piñera, the presidential candidate from the right-wing pact, Coalition for Change. Piñera’s election put an end to twenty years of electoral dominance by the centreleft coalition. The alternation, however, was of relatively low intensity. In effect, although the right came in first in the legislative elections, it did not win an absolute majority either in the House of Deputies or in the Senate, where the election resulted in a tie. Most importantly, far from razing the social gains realized under democracy, Piñera’s first, centrist government instead contributed positively to some of them. Various factors contributed to the turn to the right marked by Piñera’s election. First, it confirmed the exhaustion of the centre left, which had failed to convey a compelling vision beyond its founding mission of orderly transition towards democracy and leading the country along the road to development and progress.1 The great popularity with which Bachelet concluded her presidential mandate (reaching approval ratings of over seventy per cent in mid-2009) contrasted with the declining support experienced by the Concertación itself starting in the mid-1990s (Navia and Morales, 38–39). Frei failed to endorse Bachelet’s personal popularity and embody the kind of fresh, new image the coalition needed. Rather than demonstrating the renovation of the governing coalition, his candidacy instead tended towards representing its exhaustion. Nor did he succeed in taking advantage of the positive performance of the centre left over the course of its twenty years in power, despite the Bachelet government’s success in dealing with the economic crisis of 2008. Although economic indicators like the fall of GNP (−1.8%) did not play in favour

1 This exhaustion was also reflected by Marco Enríquez-Ominami, then thirty-six, who resigned from the PS to compete in the election as an independent in response to the PS’s refusal to hold a primary between him and Frei, a decision paving the way to Frei’s defeat.

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of the incumbents, it is difficult to believe that their impact was decisive, especially remembering that Lagos was elected in 1999 despite the economic recession the country was going through then. Besides the exhaustion of the Concertación, another factor contributing to the right’s electoral success was its programmatic moderation. That moderation was evident starting with the electoral race of the right’s candidate, Joaquín Lavin, against Ricardo Lagos in 1999 and continued through the candidacy of Evelyn Matthei in 2013. To maximize its votes, the centre right was gradually moving even further to the left than the median voter. This process of renovation involved distancing the centre right from the authoritarian legacy, a strategy exemplified by the candidacy of Piñera, who had voted for “no” in the plebecite of 1988 on Pinochet’s continuation in power. Piñera’s centrist positions were evident during the campaign. He not only declared his admiration for the governments of Aylwin and Frei, but also supported civil unions for sexually non-conformist couples, demonstrating a morally liberal attitude unusual on the right. The success of his candidacy also reflected the erosion of the authoritarianism/democracy cleavage that had constituted the organizing axis of electoral behaviour since the dictatorship. Finally, it reflected the increased volatility of an electorate that was growing more sensitive to medium- and short-term factors. Under Piñera’s presidency, increased cultural liberalism figured as part of a narrative presenting the right as successfully renewed. Demonstrating that renewal, that narrative highlighted the right’s post-Pinochet stamp and its support for the “Agreement to Life in a Couple” bill, which was touted as advancing what was called a “values agenda” (Alenda 2020). Pursuing an orientation similar to the Concertación’s, the Piñera administration also combined management and technocratic efficiency with an expansion of centre-left social policies. The administration thereby found itself nicknamed “the fifth government of the Concertación”. Measures like raising business taxes to finance the repair of damage caused by the earthquake of February 2010, extending maternity leave to six months, incorporating new health conditions in the Plan Auge, or reducing medical insurance co-pays for low-income retirees all followed the moderate, reformist line of the Concertación (Fairfield 2017). Although this first cycle involved a transfer of power from a progressive coalition—the longest in Chile’s history—to a conservative one, in reality it demonstrated a process of convergence towards the centre by both coalitions, each of whose identities blurred as a result. In that sense, this

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alternation in power involved a less marked disjuncture than the change of paradigm pursued by the second Bachelet government.

2.2

The Cycle of Hegemonic Disputes

In 2014, Michelle Bachelet achieved a resounding victory against Evelyn Matthei in the second round of the presidential election, winning 62.2% of the vote. Her second government represented a certain rupture with the previous five administrations. The government rested on a new party coalition—the New Majority—which, broadening the former Concertación, succeeded in uniting political forces from the Communist Party to the Christian democrats for the first time in the country’s history. Based on that electoral and programmatic agreement, the aim was to achieve a “change of paradigm with respect to the previous, reforming trajectory” (Brunner 2016: 422) and to build a social State guaranteeing rights and welfare through decommodification and deprivatization of strategic sectors (education, health, and pensions). A reform of the 1980 Constitution through a non-binding, participatory process was also proposed. The return of the centre left was due to more than just Bachelet’s personal qualities and her popularity, which had been adeptly boosted during her first term. The New Majority also showed itself better able to interpret the values and aspirations present in society, than the eight other candidates who unprecedentedly competed in the first round of the election. In contrast to the governments of the Concertación, the program of Bachelet’s second government was more in tune with demands for progressive transformation expressed during the student mobilizations of 2011, which had called for better regulation of the educational market, gender equality, and the construction of a multi-cultural society. Despite the election of four student leaders as congressional representatives, widespread scepticism about the transformative potential of electoral politics had grown especially acute among the young. Bachelet’s presidential campaign sought to reverse that sentiment (Martner 2014). Abstention nonetheless reached record levels (58%), partly due to voting being made voluntary.

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Bachelet’s victory was also due to a bumpy campaign on the right, which fielded three successive candidates.2 Considering Matthei’s slim chances of winning, she sought to maximize votes by moving even further to the left than the median voter to compete better with her opponent. Indeed, in 2013, the sector made its second and most significant move towards moderation since the return to democracy (Alenda, López, Bunker, and Miranda, forthcoming). In that election, the right lost more than a third of its supporters, possibly reflecting its electorate’s disagreement with what right-wing voters perceived as a blurring of its identity. Although the Bachelet government enjoyed a large majority in both houses of congress, the same internal divisions that had led the first Bachelet government to lose its legislative majority reemerged. The New Majority (NM) was characterized by tensions between a wing of the NM close to the PC that was favourable to structural transformation and a centre-left nostalgic for the Concertación’s moderate reformism. These frictions affected the government’s first year, but it nonetheless ended with important successes, such as enactment of the tax reform and passage of a reform replacing the binomial electoral system with a “proportional, inclusive” one. Such achievements were, however, obscured by a series of political-financial scandals that erupted starting in February 2015. The most damaging—the “Caval case”—involved the president’s own son.3 Ultimately, those corruption scandals led to the implementation of political finance reform. Requirements for forming new parties were also eased, favouring the appearance of new political formations that emerged as challengers of “old politics”. Despite advances in rights through establishment of the Civil Union Agreement and the reform making university education tuition-free for the most vulnerable 50% of the population, Bachelet’s reform agenda lost momentum at the implementation stage. Its failure to deeply transform 2 First, Laurence Golborne, a former minister who achieved popularity thanks to having led the rescue of the thirty-three miners in Atacama, had to renounce his run for president following controversies involving his past as a businessman. Then, after winning the sector’s primary, Minister of Economy Pablo Longueira dropped out of the race due to suffering depression, after which Evelyn Matthei, then Minister of Labor, was nominated. 3 This case involved supposed trafficking of influence for a multi-million-dollar realestate operation between March 2014 and February 2015 by Sebastián Dávalos, son of then president Bachelet and director of the Sociocultural Area of the Presidency of his mother’s second government.

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the Chilean economic and political model helped set the stage for the rise of a new left, which sought to truly break the mould of the Concertación. The tensions within the governing coalition; the “Caval case”, which undermined Bachelet’s credibility and popularity; and the deteriorating economic situation all called reformist continuity into question. In the presidential election of 2017, the New Majority improvised with a weak candidate—ex-Senator Alejandro Guillier—who was roundly defeated by ex-President Sebastián Piñera. The second Piñera government was born of a high intensity alternance in power. Changing direction with respect to the programmatic moderation characterizing the centre-right coalition until then, Piñera proposed to “start a second transition toward integral development” through counter-reform reversing the structural changes pursued by the second Bachelet government.4 As a departure from the existing political economic formula responsible for a fiscal deficit that had increased from 1.7% to 2.1% (Varas 2018: 26), Piñera proposed reducing the tax burden on large companies, ignoring the need to gradually augment fiscal reserves (Rivera Urrutia 2018). Piñera in 2017 thus ran on the most right-wing program of any candidate during the preceding two decades. The ideological polarization of the 2017 elections called into question the centripetal character of the party system inherited from the binomial system (Siavelis 2004). The hegemonic disputes expressed through the political alternance between Bachelet and Piñera were sharpened by the social uprising of October 2019, which opened a formidable window of opportunity for the dissemination of ideas available since the 2011 mobilizations. Seeking an institutional exit from one of the worst political crises since the return to democracy, representatives of all political parties except the PC and some more radical sectors of the Frente Amplio signed a historic “Agreement for Social Peace and a New Constitution” in November 2019 to give course to the construction of a new social pact. Its democratic legitimacy would originate in a constituent power. The implementation of the process was broadly validated by the plebiscite of 25 October where

4 Programa de gobierno 2018–2022. Construyamos tiempos mejores para Chile (30 de octubre, 2017).

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78.27% of voters approved the modality of a “Constitutional Convention”, while the right suffered a resounding defeat that left it as a practically irrelevant actor. As we shall see, Gabriel Boric’s victory in 2021, in a presidential election polarized between a new left that in the second round attenuated its refoundational accents and a radical right represented by José Antonio Kast, was consistent with the implementation of a constituent process of which Kast had been the main detractor. This critical juncture also helped to reinforce the project of a conservative renaissance, studied by Norris and Inglehart (2019) as a cultural reaction to the rise of progressive values—defence of gender identities, rights of minorities, etc.—the ones that are defended by Gabriel Boric’s new left.

2.3

Birth and Rise of the Frente Amplio

Within the Frente Amplio, it is possible to observe the influence of political ideas that could constitute its ideological matrix. On the one hand, the FA, whose prominent leaders were formed under the student movement, coincides with anti-system movements such as the indignados in Spain and still receives the influenced of the Spanish new left. Like PODEMOS’, FA’s ideology was inspired by the theories of Laclau and Mouffe (Araos and Pérez de Arce 2022). The authors proposed a counterhegemonic dispute against established power, challenging the left itself to open a space for subaltern and disadvantaged groups. Those demands had not been recognized by the state and the traditional left, such as feminist demands, gender identities, environmentalists, and indigenous peoples. In this way, the concept of the people (el pueblo) was extended to new diversities (Laclau and Mouffe 2001). Other groups and ideas started to influence this first matrix. The experiences of the Welfare State around the world fuelled an intellectual current that still relies on various postgraduate student who reached a scholarship to study in British universities such as the London School of economics. Various of them are part of the inner circle of the president and of his team of advisers (Radovic 2022). These ideas helped build critical arguments about the limited role of the state in the provision of public services (Ruiz Encina 2019; Mayol and Cabrera 2017). Other ideas were the indigenous autonomism (Meza-Lopehandía Glaesser 2009); feminism (Veloso and Boric 2017) and gender diversity groups, which leads to forming a Gender and Sexual Diversity Front, with not only a feminist perspective but also an intersectional one on inequalities.

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The Frente Amplio sought to move away from the traditional thinking of the ex-Concertación and the traditional left (Titelman 2019), becoming a party/movement confederation whose background was inspired by the ideology of the centre left but who was looking for a new way of doing politics. All this converged in two internal political streams: on the one hand, the extra-parliamentary left—the Humanistic Party (Partido Humanista-PH) and the Green Ecological Party (Partido Ecologista Verde)—; and on the other new movements and parties created to compete against the ex-Concertación such as Revolución Democrática (built in 2012), Izquierda Autónoma (and its multiple factions, like the Autonomist Movement), Izquierda Libertaria (Libertarian Left), Nueva Democracia (New Democracy), and Poder Ciudadano (Citizen Power). This new left inaugurated its parliamentary representation in 2013 with the election of Gabriel Boric as deputy for the Magallanes region and Giorgio Jackson for the Santiago district. The former ran independently and managed to get elected despite the binominal system. The latter ran due to a pact of omission made by the ex-Concertación, who decided not to present a candidate in that district to favour his election. This rapprochement with Jackson’s political group, Revolución Democrática, which was constituted as a party in 2012, led them to generate a critical collaboration agreement during Michelle Bachelet’s second term. Her government thus recruited a series of young professionals who decided to work for the transformations proposed in Nueva Mayoría’s manifesto to gain experience in public service (López 2014). Once in Congress, both leaders decided to create a new coalition at the left of the New Majority5 (Titelman 2019). This project started at the local elections of 2016, when a series of important figures of the new left decided to compete for relevant cities in Chile, obtaining a significant victory in Valparaíso (the third most crucial demographic city after Santiago and Concepción). This municipal victory marked Chile’s first period of new left governments (Titelman 2019). Jackson and Boric’s legislative work and staging did not go unnoticed in Congress. Their style responded to a need to leave behind the forms of old politics with a precise performative dimension. The disdain for the use of ties, formal dress, and the abundance of casual and disruptive accessories abounded in this new generation of young MPs.

5 Interviews to Alberto Mayol, Daniela López and Carlos Ruiz. September 2022.

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Jackson and Boric’s most relevant amendment introduced a project to lower parliamentarians’ allowances, emphasizing the moral dimension of their political actions.6 It acquired much symbolic resonance when the political-financial scandals came to the public light in 2015. This new way of doing politics also implied incorporating merit as the central axis of public sector recruitment, avoiding the privileges granted by informal networks in Chilean politics (pitutocracia) (Boric 2021). Along the lines of Mouffe and Laclau, it sought to reintroduce conflict into politics by displacing the worn-out forms of democracy coming from the transitional arrangements. The old politics had not only moderated and delayed the reforms needed to create a different Chile but had also made deals with the right thanks to the politics of agreements (Araos and Pérez de Arce 2022). After the social uprising in 2019, Gabriel Boric, despite his rebellious and radical left-wing profile, did not delay in helping to articulate the Agreement for Peace and the New Constitution. Demonstrators and members of the radical left criticized him for that. He was the only signatory of his party Social Convergence—Convergencia Social—(Cáceres 2019), which was founded in 2018 from the convergence of diverse organizations of the confederation as mentioned above. After the local and regional elections and the elections of constituents in May 2021, FA decided to present a candidate for the primary elections of the new coalition it formed with the Communist Party and the Frente Regionalista Verde Social (FRVS) called Apruebo Dignidad (I Approve Dignity). Gabriel Boric, nominated by default as none of those who were previously offered the option of competing as FA representatives accepted, ran against communist militant Daniel Jadue (current mayor of the commune of Recoleta) and won. He captured public attention because he garnered 1,750,829 voters, as compared to 1,343,892 voters (Servel 2021) in the case of the centre-right primary elections. Once in the race, Boric launched a draft program to capture the diverse interests within his coalition, which included the “anti-system” sentiment of some of FA’s supporters. The manifesto proposed to get rid of neoliberalism, enforcing a mandate that supposedly came from the October 2019 mobilizations through deep structural transformations that would give dignity back to the people (Government programme 2021). Among

6 Interviews to Alberto Mayol and Carlos Ruiz. September 2022.

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the statements in which FA moved a step forward to the Nueva Mayoría, was to subordinate the signing and ratification of trade agreements to respect for a global ecology agenda and binding democratic processes of citizen participation. In addition, other issues were introduced, such as legal abortion as part of the feminist and sexual diversity agenda and the promotion of the plurinationality and self-determination of indigenous peoples based on the construction of autonomous territorial statutes (Government programme 2021). All these issue areas emphasized the post-material dimension of politics, a distinctive characteristic of the Frente Amplio. Boric adopted a systematic discourse on order and security. His manifesto reconnected with reality by considering the future scenario of global economic recession, which would force him to constrain fiscal spending and prioritize public policies. The second version of the manifesto was similar to Michelle Bachelet’s campaign manifesto 2, a Chilean version of other social democracies achieved through progressive reforms. However, the candidate and his team had to recognize that the manifesto used during the first-round campaign required some adjustments to compete with Kast in the runoff election, moderating some perceptions of radicalism linked to this transformative agenda. Thus, a new team of technocrats and militants from centre-left groups made substantive corrections to the FA program, especially on economic issues, tightening the public budget in a realistic expansion and encouraging foreign direct investment. The second round was based on the old authoritarianism vs democracy cleavage, which had been at the centre of the debate as Kast’s proposals represented a decades-long rollback of acquired rights. Boric finally won, also focusing on symbolic aspects, such as the youngest President in Chile’s history, the first cabinet with more women than men, and the first female cabinet chief and interior minister, Izkia Siches. However, the program and policy issues were reduced to words like poetry and symbols rather than actions. The new government’s strategy was to centre its efforts on securing approval of the new draft constitution. Minister Jackson stated: “We will have to work from September 5 on how to make most of our government manifesto viable” (Gómez 2022). Boric and his government decided to wait for the new text to start working. However, the electorate said otherwise. The approval option lost the election, ending this political project. After the defeat in the September 4 referendum, the President invited more skilled and experienced politicians to join his government and

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replaced some of his younger advisors and friends. With this reshuffle, he reconsidered his government’s priorities, trying to find a way to secure some stability to the country that the people asked for through the plebiscite result.

2.4

Conclusion

In this chapter, we identified factors that alter power, focusing on the political offer’s circumstantial issues and the candidates’ weight. Additionally, we detected that specific personal attribute played a key role in some electoral outcomes. Positively, as in the case of Michelle Bachelet’s two elections, in which the candidate managed to compensate with her attributes for the distrust of political institutions and the weakening of party ties. On the contrary, in the second election of Piñera against Guillier, voting against one of the two candidates was installed, and even more clearly in the polarized election of Boric, where two models of society were pitted against each other. Reviewing the nature of each alternation, taking into account both exante and ex-post factors, allowed us to order the alternations according to their intensity. Hence, the chosen sequencing did not decide between left-wing and right-wing governments but instead opted to distinguish political cycles depending on the greater or lesser influence of the centrist consensus. That results in the alteration of traditional competition between parties but also responds to institutional or cultural constraints. After a long period of moderate reformism (1990–2013), Chile entered a new cycle of hegemonic disputes characterized by a repoliticization of the electorate. On the one hand, Bachelet’s second term sought to advance along the path of structural transformations that had not been addressed during the first four Concertación governments. This effort to manage Chile towards the transformations generated a counterreaction on the part of the right, which, in Piñera’s second government, sought to reverse the structural changes that had been promoted. On the other hand, the struggle for cultural hegemony intensified after the social outburst and the multidimensional crisis that the government faced, opening a window of opportunity to strengthen a radical right that contested the second round with Gabriel Boric, and contributed to his victory. Indeed, the anti-Kast vote partly explains why the FA leader was the president-elect with the most preferences in history, with a record turnout (55.6%).

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Despite a comfortable victory in the second round, Gabriel Boric’s attempts to lead a transformative government have come up against certain adverse conditions. First is the need to balance the two significant sensitivities in the governing coalitions—democratic socialism or ex-Concertación and the New Left. Second, limitations in Congress, where it does not have a majority. Thirdly, the economic conditions are not favourable to increasing public spending or building a welfare state along European lines. President Boric had to return to the centrist consensus after the defeat of the rejection alternative in the referendum on September 4, 2022. Perhaps this means moving towards a more realistic version of politics, considering his program’s obvious institutional, economic, and social limits. However, there is a risk that the ruling coalition’s lack of ideological, political, and organizational consistency will deepen.

References Alenda, S. (Ed.). (2020). Anatomía de la derecha chilena: Estado, mercado y valores en tiempos de cambio. Santiago de Chile: Fondo de Cultura Económica. Araos, J., & Pérez de Arce, R. (2022). Los límites de la revolución democrática. Revista Punto y Coma (7), 8–15. Brunner, J. J. (2016). Nueva Mayoría Fin de una ilusión. In B. Ediciones (Ed.). Boric, G. (2021). Programa de Gobierno primera vuelta presidencial. Cáceres, F. (2019, noviembre 15). El llanero solitario: ¿Por qué firmó Gabriel Boric y nadie más de Convergencia? La Tercera PM. Retrieved from https:// www.latercera.com/la-tercera-pm/noticia/llanero-solitario-firmo-gabrielboric-nadie-mas-convergencia/902892/ Fairfield, G. (2017). Redistribution Under the Right in Latin America: Electoral Competition and Organized Actors in Policymaking. Comparative Political Studies, 1–36. Fazio, H. (2007). Lagos: el presidente “progresista” de la Concertación. Santiago: LOM Ediciones. Garretón, M. A. (2012). Neoliberalismo corregido y progresismo limitado: los gobiernos de la Concertación en Chile 1990–2010. Santiago de Chile: editorial Arcis, CLACSO coediciones. Giddens, A. (1994). Beyond Left and Right. The Future of Radical Politics Cambridge: Polity Press. Gómez S. R. (2022, junio 27). Ministro Jackson: “Vamos a tener que trabajar desde el 5 de septiembre en cómo hacemos viable la mayor cantidad de

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nuestro programa de gobierno”. La Tercera. Retrieved from https://www. latercera.com/politica/noticia/ministro-jackson-vamos-a-tener-que-trabajardesde-el-5-de-septiembre-en-como-hacemos-viable-la-mayor-cantidad-de-nue stro-programa-de-gobierno/BQRW2CRSLREVDIWG3I6OZE5YCQ/ Government programme. (2021). Boric Presidente. Propuestas programáticas para el nuevo Chile 2022–2026. Laclau, E., & Mouffe, C. (2001). Hegemony and Socialist Strategy. Towards a Radical Democratic Politics (second ed.). Verso. Retrieved from https://files.libcom.org/files/ernesto-laclau-hegemony-and-socialist-str ategy-towards-a-radical-democratic-politics.compressed.pdf Levitsky, S., & Roberts, K. (Eds.). (2011). The Resurgence of the Latin American Left. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press. López, P. (2014, junio 18). Revolución Democrática. Retrieved from “RD no ha abandonado el movimiento social, pero ese espacio no es suficiente”: https://revoluciondemocratica.cl/rd-ha-abandonado-el-movimientosocial-pero-ese-espacio-es-suficiente/ Luna, J. P., & Rovira Kaltwasser, C. (Eds.) (2014). The Resilience of the Latin American Right. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press. Martner, G. (2014). ¿Un giro a la izquierda en Chile? Nueva Sociedad nº249, enero-febrero de 2014. Mayol, A., & Cabrera, A. (2017). Frente Amplio en el momento cero. Catalonia. Meléndez, C. (2019). El mal menor: vínculos políticos en el Perú posterior al colapso del sistema de partidos. Instituto de Estudios Peruanos IEP. Meller, P. (2000). Pobreza y distribución del ingreso en Chile (década del 90). Documentos de Trabajo 69, Serie Economía (pp. 1–31). Chile: Universidad de Chile. Meza-Lopehandía Glaesser, M. (2009). Territorio y autonomía de los pueblos originarios en Chile: una mirada desde el ordenamiento jurídico chileno y la urgencia del reconocimiento. Retrieved from Repositorio académico de la Universidad de Chile: https://repositorio.uchile.cl/handle/2250/110977 Morales, M. (2008). La Primera Mujer Presidenta De Chile: ¿Qué explicó el triunfo de Michelle Bachelet en las elecciones de 2005–2006? Latin American Research Review, 43(1), 7–32. https://doi.org/10.1353/lar.2008.0013. Muñoz, O., & Ffrench-Davis, R. (2003). Las políticas económicas y sus efectos In O. Muñoz & C. Stefoni (Coords.), El período del Presidente Frei RuizTagle. Santiago de Chile: FLACSO/Editorial Universitaria. Norris, Pippa, and Ronald Inglehart. 2019. Cultural Backlash: Trump, Brexit, and Authoritarian Populism. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Popkin, S. L. (1995). Information Shortcuts and the Reasoning Voter. In B. Grofman (Ed.), Information, Participation and Choice: An Economic Theory of Democracy in Perspective. Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press.

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Radovic, P. (2022). Londres: la cantera intelectual del Frente Amplio. La https://www.latercera.com/la-tercera-domingo/noticia/londresTercera. la-cantera-intelectual-del-frente-amplio/CIXLRPHXFZDUNBQTJAGUS VZSSU/. Rivera Urrutia, E. (2018). Escaramuzas, incertidumbres y pocos avances: la política económica del segundo gobierno de Piñera. In Piñera II ¿Una Segunda Transición? El primer año de su nueva administración (Barómetro / Vol. 14). Santiago: Fundación Equitas, Sur Ediciones. Roberts, K. (2008). El resurgimiento del populismo latinoamericano. In C. de la Torre & E. Peruzzotti, El retorno del pueblo: el populismo y nuevas democracias en América Latina (pp. 55–77). Quito: Facultad Latinoamericana de Ciencias Sociales. Ruiz Encina, C. E. (2019). La política en el neoliberalismo. Experiencias latinoamericanas. Lom. Servel. (2021). Much more than in the caso of the centre-right Primary Elections, whose participation reached 1,343,892 voters. Siavelis, P. (2004). Sistema electoral, desintegración de coaliciones y democracia en Chile: ¿El fin de la Concertación? Revista de Ciencia Política, XXIV (1), 58–80. Titelman, N. (2019). La nueva izquierda chilena. Nueva Sociedad(281), 117– 128. Retrieved from https://biblat.unam.mx/hevila/Nuevasociedad/2019/ no281/9.pdf Varas, A. (2018). Piñera II: Contrarreforma versus agenda gubernamental. In Piñera II ¿Una Segunda Transición? El primer año de su nueva administración (Barómetro / Vol. 14). Santiago: Fundación Equitas, Sur Ediciones. Veloso, M., & Boric, G. (2017, julio 1). En qué consiste el proyecto feminista del Frente Amplio. El Mostrador. Retrieved from https://www.elmostrador. cl/noticias/opinion/2017/07/01/en-que-consiste-el-proyecto-feministadel-frente-amplio/ Wattenberg, M. (1991). The Rise of Candidate-centered Politics: Presidential Elections of the 1980s. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.

CHAPTER 3

Step Right or Step Ahead? Explaining the 2019 Presidential Swing in Uruguay Luis Rivera-Vélez

After 15 years in power, Uruguay’s leftist coalition lost the 2019 presidential elections. Following the highly popular governments of Tabaré Vazquez (2005–2010, 2015–2020) and José “Pepe” Mujica (2010– 2015), the Broad Front (Frente Amplio) party was replaced by a rightwing coalition of five countries led by Luis Lacalle Pou of the National Party. This coalition is new to the Uruguayan political landscape and characterizes by the emergence of the Cabildo Abierto, the country’s first far-right political party, which won more than 11% of the vote in the first round of presidential elections. The far-right party gained a significant presence in parliament and became indispensable to the new government

L. Rivera-Vélez (B) University of Lausanne, Vaud, Switzerland e-mail: [email protected]

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023, corrected publication 2023 O. Dabène (ed.), Latin America’s Pendular Politics, Studies of the Americas, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-26761-1_3

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to pass legislation. The ghost of a conservative radicalization, such as that of Bolsonaro in Brazil, started haunting the country. The details of this political swing, however, are less explicit about a deep conversion of Uruguayans to the political right and/or the conservative ideologies. Three years after the 2019 election, the left-wing party remains the country’s main political force with nearly 40% of support and President Lacalle Pou’s ideology, while conservative, is not radical. How, then, can we explain Uruguay’s shift to the right in 2019? In this chapter, we argue that Lacalle Pou’s victory in 2019 does not correspond to an ideological shift to the right but rather to a moderate alternation that consolidates the country’s political centre. Three factors help illustrate this thesis. First, the alternation is explained in terms of the electoral offer, where Lacalle Pou has established himself as a charismatic leader after more than 25 years of political work, unlike the Broad Front candidate, Daniel Martínez, who fails to mobilize the distinctive charisma of traditional party leaders. Second, this charisma favours Lacalle Pou’s ability to form alliances with other opposition parties, a profitable dynamic in the competition for the presidency that does not translate into a strong majority in Parliament. The National Party remains a minority hence obliged to negotiate and moderate its policies. Third, and finally, in terms of the agenda pushed by the new government, the differences relate more to the way of managing the country than of the actual content of the policies. Despite a real differentiation between the left and right political manifestos and campaign promises, the policies adopted in the first years of government are less radical than expected. It is therefore Lacalle Pou’s personality and his capacity to form coalitions that brought him to the presidency. The characteristics of the Uruguayan electoral swing show a consolidation of moderate visions, more dependent on the electoral context than on a real ideological shift to the right. In the following sections, I will develop these three arguments in depth. Section 3.2 will show how the political offer became more attractive on the right than on the left during the last term of the FA. Section 3.3 will show that the electoral system favours coalitions without necessarily ensuring clear majorities in Parliament. Section 3.4 exposes the program of the right-wing coalition and compared it to the Broad Front’s policies. Finally, in the conclusion, we will put Uruguay’s turn to the right into perspective by emphasizing the cyclical nature of the 2019 election.

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3.1 A More Attractive Political Offer on the Right The 2019 election in Uruguay represents a milestone in terms of the renewal of the electoral offer (Serna 2020). On the one hand, the general ageing of the population that the country encounters put some pressure on the political system, obliging it to face the issue of generational renewal. This strongly affected the left, with the Broad Front struggling to find a replacement for its charismatic leaders responsible for a remarkable management of the country for 15 years (Larrouqué and Rivera-Vélez 2021). On the other hand, within the National Party, Lacalle Pou reached his political maturity and positioned himself as a charismatic and competent leader capable of governing the country. The personal images of the candidates are important in Uruguay (Altman 2000; Buquet and Piñeiro 2014). In this section, we will return in detail to the actors of the election to show a personality issue favoured the right and hence the alternation in 2019. The Broad Front has been characterized by a long march towards moderation (Lanzaro 2004; Yaffé 2005; Moreira 2009; Lorenzoni and Pérez 2013). While in the 1960s leftist movements engaged in armed struggle and clandestinity, after the return to democracy in 1985, all political groups, including the most radical, chose the electoral path (Garcé 2006; Labrousse 2009). This favoured three political leaders who marked the 15 years of left-wing government: Tabaré Vázquez, a member of the socialist party, mayor of Montevideo from 1990 to 1994 and president twice between 2005 and 2010 and 2015–2020; José “Pepe” Mujica, a former member of the Tupamaros’ guerrilla, parliamentarian, minister and finally president from 2010 to 2015; and Danilo Astori, a social democrat who served as minister of the economy during the two Vázquez’s governments and as vice president during Mujica’s administration. While these three personalities enjoy significant popular support, some episodes stain their image, such as the temporary loss of parliamentary majorities in 2015 or the drop in Vázquez’s popularity to less than 30% in 2018, a first in 15 years (Unidad de Métodos y Acceso a Datos 2020). For personal and ageing issues, however, in the 2019 elections these three leaders decided to take a step aside from politics, obliging thus the Broad Front to look for their replacement (El País 2018). For the first time since the 2005 victory, the AF is therefore faced with the question of leadership. This question is important as the party is facing

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fatigue and multiple discontent at the time, although relatives, of its militant base (Martínez 2018). The primary elections confronted four candidates coming from different political traditions: Daniel Martínez (close to Vázquez), Carolina Cosse (close to Mujica), Oscar Andrade (communist), and Mario Bergara (close to Astori). With a very well-established political career as minister, congressman, and mayor of Montevideo from 2015 to 2019, Martínez won the primary election with 42% of support. However, he was accused of lacking charisma, and, above all, the choice of his vice-presidential running mate raised questions about the solidity of the party. In fact, instead of inviting Cosse, who came second in the primaries with 25.5% of the votes, or even Andrade, who obtained 23.1% of the votes, he decided to look outside the visible circles of the Broad Front. The choice of Graciela Villar as vice president, an unknown municipal councilor from Montevideo, prevented him from bringing together the moderate and radical wings of the party, and showing a unifying leadership capable of renovating the party. As a result, his image as a manager was questioned. In contrast, Luis Lacalle Pou has had a smooth political career and in 2019 arrived at an age of political maturity. Son of President Luis A. Lacalle (1990–1995), Lacalle Pou became involved in the National Party at a very young age, gradually becoming one of its leaders. Since 2000, he has been consistently elected to Parliament and in 2014 he came second in the presidential elections with 43,5% of the votes. Since that moment, Lacalle Pou reaffirms his ambitions to become president, relaunches his campaign, and consolidates his support. In the primaries, he naturally won with 53.8% of the support, despite some last-minute challenges related to a rich, young, and outsider candidate, Juan Sartori (Nocetto et al. 2020). On the other hand, within the third traditional party, the Colorado Party, the decision of its leader Pedro Bordaberry not to run in the elections strengthened the secondary positioning of the party, which had a voting intention below 20% throughout the campaign. Trying to reverse the radical turn the party took in the last decades (Larrouqué 2016), the electors voted for the more moderate wing of the party, guided by Ernesto Talvi who became the third presidential runner. The surprise of the 2019 election is, however, the breakthrough of a new far-right party, Cabildo Abierto, created in March 2019 by Guido Manini Rios. Serving as General Commander-in-Chief of the Army, Manini Rios broke his duty by showing disagreement and publicly speaking against some of the government’s policies, in particular against

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the reform of the military pension system that sought to eliminate, in the very long term, the privileges inherited from the military dictatorship. This called into question the peaceful relations between the Broad Front and the military, especially when the General de-legitimized the judicial system in the face of accusations of human rights violations against the military. The President Vázquez decided then to dismiss him from his duties (Martínez 2019) and, as a riposte, the ex-General positioned himself as a presidential candidate for a popular party that sought to represent specific sectors neglected by the Broad Front and far from the traditional political elites. Cabildo Abierto’s discourse had a significant echo among conservative groups in Montevideo and the rural regions. Manini Rios presented himself as both conservative, against policies favouring LGBTQI+ minorities or migrants, and nationalist, rejecting overly liberal economic policy (Monestier et al. 2021). He thus embodied the Uruguayan cultural backlash movement (Norris and Inglehart 2019), claiming a certain proximity to Brazilian President Bolsonaro. It is also worth highlighting that in other sectors new groups also challenged the traditional stability of the Uruguayan party system (Buquet and Piñeiro 2014). For example, beyond the centre-left Independent Party, a historical challenger to the FA, other political forces emerged on the left. The Radical and Irreconcilable Ecological Party (Partido Ecologísta Radical Intransigente) became very critical of Broad Front’s environmental policies and, as its name suggests, decided not to negotiate with the historical leftwing leaders. Moreover, while the Broad Front was characterized by a very strong inclusion of the popular base and activism (Pérez Bentancur et al. 2019), during the years 2015–2019 numerous collective mobilizations rose against the government’s projects (e.g., an obligation to pay salaries into bank accounts, infrastructure projects), which distanced some social and economic sectors away from their traditional support of the left. The right-wing parties had then an easy path to ride the wave of the natural and moderate erosion of 15 years of the Broad Front’s management.

3.2 Uruguay’s Electoral System and the Relative Victory of Coalitions Uruguay’s electoral tradition also puts into perspective the idea that the country has turned sharply to the right. Favouring the formation of coalitions, it is the more moderate visions that prevail over the radical ones.

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This allowed Lacalle Pou to win the presidential election, although he did not obtain parliamentary majorities and was forced to negotiate his policies with its allies. In contrast with the supermajorities that the Broad Front had during its 15 years of management, the reformist power of Lacalle Pou is moderate. The Uruguayan electoral system favours coalition, strengthening dialogue and moderation from the different political contenders, at the same time that it prevents revolutionary changes. Indeed, historically, the Uruguayan electoral system is considered sui generis. Formalized in the 1910s by the “Ley de Lemas” (The Slogans Act), this system is known as one of simultaneously double voting. In a single ballot, each voter chooses a unique electoral list or slogan from which the president is decided by a simple majority and the parliamentarians are elected by proportionality. In short, each political group presents a list of legislative candidates, which could include a presidential candidate. Within a party, the list with the majority of the ballots collects the rest of the votes given to his or her party competitors, and the candidate of the most voted party becomes president. This model was replaced in 1996 by a more classic system of primary elections within each party and a single member two-round election for the presidency. However, the ideological underpinnings of the slogan’s system persisted, accepting that within a party, the different branches can have very different interests and ideologies. This is the model that benefited the left in the 2000s, bringing moderates, such as Vázquez, and radicals, such as Mujica, to unite within the Front Broad (Lanzaro 2004; Yaffé 2005; Moreira 2009; Lorenzoni and Pérez 2013). In 2019, this tendency to coalition benefited both the left and the right, although it permitted for an alternation. In fact, in the first round of elections, the Broad Front came out with an ample majority of the ballots counting for 39% of the vote. Admittedly, as compared to the 2014 election, the party lost 8.8 points, but it remained largely ahead of Lacalle Pou, who gathered 28.6% or Talvi with 12.3% of support. The great ability of the Broad Front to manage its internal conflicts and to rally around a single figure ensures it an advantage over its competitors. However, Lacalle Pou’s strength lied in his ability to federate discontent around the Broad Front to form a coalition of opposition parties. Even before the results of the first round, Lacalle Pou approached his competitors and publicly promoted their programs, which was well received by the other candidates. Lacalle Pou was expected to activate the traditional coalition between the National and the Colorado parties,

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called the “bicolor” coalition, that secured victory in the 1999 elections (Altman 2000). On election day, however, the surprise came from the far right, with a significant victory for Cabildo Abierto, which garnered 11% of the vote by attracting voters from all the traditional political parties. This led to its entry into Parliament where the party became a major political force, even matching the Colorado Party. The success of Lacalle Pou in the runoff election can be explained by his ability to unite all the opposition forces on the same program. Indeed, on the evening of the first round, the rejected candidates declared themselves in favour of Lacalle Pou as a sign of protest against the FA. Lacalle Pou then launched the idea of forming a “Multicolor Coalition” capable of rallying visions as different as those of the centreleft Independent Party or those of the Cabildo Abierto’s extreme right. According to the first-round results, the coalition together obtained only 54% of the vote, which guaranteed them victory but left them with little margin for error. The objective of the campaign between the two rounds was to avoid any error or political scandal, especially since the polls at the time showed a 49% rejection of Lacalle Pou (LaRed21 2017). Moderation became the better strategy of the coalition. On the Broad Front’s side, the objective of the campaign for the second round was to renew links with the popular base. Mobilizing party supporters, the Broad Front developed a door-to-door campaign, known as “voto a voto”, (vote to vote) using personal relationships to persuade the undecided (Nocetto et al. 2020). In the end, this campaign succeeded in balancing support for the left, and on election day the results were so close that the Electoral Court could not decide on a winner. Only four days later the Court announced the results, giving a slight victory of 1.2 points to Lacalle Pou, who obtained 48.9% of the votes against 47.7% for Martínez. The polarization during the second round was real (Bogliaccini et al. 2019), but it does not reflect a strong shift to the right in Uruguay. On the contrary, it reinforced the centre-left and centre-right positions already majoritarian in the country (Buquet and Piñeiro 2014). Both ends have consolidated towards the centre in part because the logic of a political coalition encourages parties to moderate their statements (Altman 2000). This is particularly evident when one looks at the programs that the different coalitions proposed.

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3.3 A Moderate Program from the Right Calling Out for Change Throughout Continuity The final factor explaining the shift to the right is the promise of better public policy management. Rather than putting forward an agenda that was completely radical from the Broad Front’s program, the objective of Lacalle Pou and the Multicolor Coalition was to improve the management of the state in two main areas: the economy and the urban security. Thus, when comparing the right-wing program with that of the Broad Front, the differences between the public policies advocated are reduced, even if the narratives behind the programs differ. In economic terms, the forecasts for 2019 predicted slower growth, higher unemployment, and a worsening public deficit. Compared to previous electoral years, the situation was unfavourable for the ruling government, although it does not compare to the socio-economic crises that affected Argentina or Brazil at the time. The opposition in this context tried to differentiate itself from the left by arguing a trade-off between growth and redistribution, criticizing the Broad Front’s inability to provide greater stability despite many years of growth (Pérez and Piñeiro Rodríguez 2016; Bogliaccini and Queirolo 2017). While this is typical right-wing rhetoric, it should be reminded that the economic policy of the Broad Front was not anti-liberal. Fifteen years of Broad Front administration have resulted in a consolidation of free trade and foreign investment as a source of wealth in the country, as well as an increase in the price of public services in line with the reality of the market. It is therefore less about the content of the policy than about its implementation, especially in relation to the place of Mercosur and the products to be promoted in international trade. In terms of security, the programs diverge more significantly but not radically. At the beginning of the electoral campaign, 47% of Uruguayans considered public insecurity to be the country’s main problem (Bottinelli 2019), and the indicators showed that armed robbery and homicide were increasing significantly in the country (Nocetto et al. 2020). Despite the very punitive approaches of the Broad Front’s policy to tackle delinquency (Tenenbaum Ewig 2021), the popular discontent kept growing denouncing the fact that the different governments of the Broad Front support Eduardo Bonomi, Minister of Interior for 10 years between 2010 and 2020, even when the situation was worsening. Concerned with this supposed inaction of the government, the opposition organized itself to

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try to push for a more repressive approach towards delinquency. The National Party called out for a popular referendum in favour of the creation of a militarized national guard, the facilitation of judicial procedures, especially at night, and the increase of sentences (e.g., introduction of life imprisonment and the suppression of parole for certain offences). This referendum failed with only 46.2% approval, a result that remains high and favoured the right wing insofar as they acquire the “ownership” of this public policy, that is, the capacity to define and manage it (Gusfield 1989). It is therefore in the management and implementation of these policies that Lacalle Pou attempted to differentiate himself from the FA. During the campaign, he promised to act quickly, as illustrated by his campaign slogan “It’s now” (Es ahora). To do this, Lacalle Pou promised to activate the particular mechanism called “Law of urgent consideration”, a system that allows the government to significantly shorten the time of parliamentary discussion. In drafting this law, Lacalle Pou was very cautious and skillful, avoiding any disclosure of its contents before the approval of all the members of the Coalition. With their support, the Lacalle Pou administration quickly activated its government program, on a large multitude of subjects grouped in 476 articles. The law contained provisions for a more repressive security policy, as the ones revendicated in the referendum, introduced fiscal rules to control public spending, and increased the power of the central government in matters of education or the control of labour strikes. Although this type of omnibus legislation makes it difficult to go into depth on issues, it is nevertheless useful for governments without parliamentary majorities (Chasquetti 2020). Introduced in April 2020 and adopted 3 months later, this law marked a great coordination capacity of the new president, who consolidated his coalition and achieved reforms in a very short time despite the pandemic. Moreover, during the first year of government, the coalition managed to pass a temperate budget for the five-year tenure, a second success for the implementation of its agenda (Rossel and Monestier 2021). This budget is somewhat contradictory, as it reduces the deficit by significantly lowing public spending while at the same time committing to the country’s social redistribution policy without raising taxes. In any case, its approval legitimized the president, who obtained a net high approval rating around 60%, equaling the first Broad Front governments (Equipos Consultores 2022).

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Despite these positive results, it is difficult to say that the Uruguayan political system is making a strong shift to the right. The more radical parties in the Multicolor Coalition have been forced to temper their words, as the Uruguayan system remains presidential with decisionmaking centred around the president. This can also be seen in the distribution of the cabinet, where the National Party keeps 8 out of 15 ministries, including all the powerful offices, and only distributes 4 ministries to the Colorado Party, 2 to Cabildo Abierto, and 1 to the Independent Party (Rossel and Monestier 2021). The case of CA is even more symbolic, because being the most conservative, anti-liberal, and nationalist party in the coalition, the new government has a certain inability to completely integrate it into the government, which wants an autonomy that sometimes brings it closer to the left. In December 2021, for example, Cabildo Abierto presented a bill restricting forest exploitation, without consulting the other members of the coalition or the government. This rose official criticisms and after the bill passed thanks to the support of the Broad Front, the president threatened to veto it (El País 2021). On the other hand, the 2022 election polls show a great stability in voting intentions, with a majority of citizens supporting the Broad Front (35%). The coalition of right-wing parties is still majoritarian, with a total of 38% of support, although the National Party has recovered the huge majority of support (30%) and the other parties are becoming a minority (Equipos Consultores 2021). The attachment of the Uruguayan population to the welfare system forces then the Multicolor Coalition to take social policy seriously. In fact, it is the social and economic policies of the AF that strongly mitigates the social impact of the economic downturn through wage protection, cash transfer policies, and sustained public spending (Nocetto et al. 2020). Because the pandemic caused an increase in poverty, one of the Broad Front’s greatest achievements, Lacalle Pou’s government has promised to maintain the social assistance policies created by the left, even though it rejects discursively the dependence of some people on this assistance and claims the importance of individual effort in success (Rossel and Monestier 2021). The Uruguayan right is then consistent with the behaviour of right-wing governments in other countries in the region (Fairfield and Garay 2017; Niedzwiecki and Pribble 2017). Lacalle Pou’s agenda is certainly conservative and economically liberal, but it is not radical compared to the left-wing agenda.

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Conclusion

In this chapter, we argue that the simultaneous presence of three factors favours the victory of Lacalle Pou without upsetting the Uruguayan political panorama. The political offer is more attractive on the right than on the left because of the renewal of the leadership and the charisma of the candidates. The electoral system values coalitions, which leads to a real moderation of programs. So, in sum, programmatic differences have centred more on the management of the government than on the substance of public policies. During its 15 years in opposition, the Uruguayan right has acquired a real capacity to adapt and include the demands of the population. The mechanisms of direct democracy, historically associated with the left, became a tool of contestation against the Broad Front, giving the right-wing coalition a slight majority that allowed for a political swing (Nocetto et al. 2020; Lissidini 2022). Undoubtedly, with the measures taken by the Lacalle Pou’s government, Uruguay is becoming more conservative. However, in accordance with what is happening elsewhere in the region, this shift should be seen more as a punishment vote against incumbents than a true rally to the right (Luna et al. 2021). Moreover, beyond the poor evaluation of public management that reflects the punishment vote, the Uruguayan left ideologies become more appealing to solve the extreme crisis. In the light of the climate emergency and the expected economic breakdown, the challenge for the different political forces in the country is to consolidate a sustainable system that has made the country an exception in Latin America.

References Altman, David. 2000. The Politics of Coalition Formation and Survival in Multiparty Presidential Democracies: The Case of Uruguay, 1989–1999. Party Politics 6: 259–283. Bogliaccini, Juan, and Rosario Queirolo. 2017. Uruguay 2016: mayorías parlamentarias en jaque y desafíos de revisión para sostener el modelo. Revista de ciencia política (Santiago) 37: 589–612. Bogliaccini, Juan, Ignacio Borba, Cecilia Giambruno, Martin Opertti, and Rafael Piñeiro. 2019. Twittarquía: La política de las redes en Uruguay. Montevideo: UCU-Edición Túnel.

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Bottinelli, Eduardo. 2019. Los principales problemas del país. Factum, June 5. Consulted on September 1st, 2022: https://portal.factum.uy/analisis/2019/ ana190605b.php. Buquet, Daniel, and Rafael Piñeiro. 2014. La Consolidación de un Nuevo Sistema de Partidos en Uruguay. Revista Debates 8: 127–148. Chasquetti, Daniel. 2020. Los proyectos de ley de urgente consideración en Uruguay. La Diaria, January 24. El País. 2018. Mujica renunció a su banca en el Senado “cansado del largo viaje.” El País Uruguay, August 14. Consulted on September 1st, 2022: https://www.elpais.com.uy/informacion/politica/vivo-jose-muj ica-deja-banca-senado.html. El País. 2021. Pese a anuncio de veto de Lacalle, Manini dijo que avanzarán con ley forestal porque es “necesaria,” March 2. Consulted on September 1st, 2022: https://www.elpais.com.uy/informacion/politica/pese-anuncioveto-lacalle-manini-dijo-avanzaran-ley-forestal-necesaria.html. Equipos Consultores. 2021. A dos años de las elecciones de 2019: ¿qué votarían hoy los uruguayos? Consulted on September 1st, 2022: https://equipos.com. uy/a-dos-anos-de-las-elecciones-de-2019-que-votarian-hoy-los-uruguayos/. Equipos Consultores. 2022. Evaluación de gestión de Lacalle Pou en junio: 46% aprueba, 37% desaprueba. Consulted on September 1st, 2022: https://equ ipos.com.uy/evaluacion-de-gestion-de-lacalle-pou-en-junio-46-aprueba-37desaprueba/. Fairfield, Tasha, and Candelaria Garay. 2017. Redistribution Under the Right in Latin America: Electoral Competition and Organized Actors in Policymaking. Comparative Political Studies 50: 1871–1906. Garcé, Adolfo. 2006. Donde hubo fuego: el proceso de adaptación del MLNTupamaros a la legalidad y a la competencia electoral (1985–2004). Montevideo: Editorial Fin de Siglo. Gusfield, Joseph R. 1989. Constructing the Ownership of Social Problems: Fun and Profit in the Welfare State. Social Problems 36: 431–441. Labrousse, Alain. 2009. Les Tupamaros: Des armes aux urnes. Monaco: Éditions du Rocher. Lanzaro, Jorge. 2004. La izquierda uruguaya entre la oposición y el gobierno. Montevideo: Editorial Fin de Siglo. LaRed21. 2017. El presidente Tabaré Vázquez es el único político que logra un saldo positivo entre simpatía y antipatía. LaRed21, July 10. Consulted on September 1st, 2022: https://www.lr21.com.uy/politica/1337796-el-pre sidente-tabare-vazquez-es-la-figura-politica-que-logra-un-saldo-positivo-entresimpatia-y-antipatia. Larrouqué, Damien. 2016. Du centre à la droite radicale: concurrence politique, tergiversations programmatiques et repositionnement idéologique du Parti colorado en Uruguay (1950–2015). Les Cahiers ALHIM [online].

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Larrouqué, Damien, and Luis Rivera-Vélez. 2021. Le Front ample en Uruguay (2005–2019): longévité au pouvoir et résilience d’un parti social-démocrate. In Gouvernements progressistes en Amérique latine (1998–2018): La fin d’un âge d’or, ed. Franck Gaudichaud and Thomas Posado, 187–198. Rennes: PUR. Lissidini, Alicia. 2022. Democracia directa y movilización social: lo que nos muestra Uruguay. Nueva Sociedad: 129–138. Lorenzoni, Miguel, and Verónica Pérez. 2013. Cambios y continuidades de la izquierda en Uruguay: un análisis a partir de las propuestas programáticas del Frente Amplio 1971–2009. Revista Uruguaya de Ciencia Política 22: 81–102. Luna, Juan Pablo, Cristóbal Rovira Kaltwasser, Juan Pablo Luna, and Cristóbal Rovira Kaltwasser. 2021. Castigo a los oficialismos y ciclo político de derecha en América Latina. Revista Uruguaya de Ciencia Política 30: 135–156. Martínez, Magdalena. 2018. El Frente Amplio uruguayo busca heredero para José Mujica y Tabaré Vázquez. El País, December 26. Consulted on September 1st, 2022: https://elpais.com/internacional/2018/12/24/ame rica/1545671475_189107.html. Martínez, Magdalena. 2019. El presidente de Uruguay destituye al jefe del Ejército por sus críticas a los juicios contra represores. El País, March 12. Consulted on September 1st, 2022: https://elpais.com/internacional/2019/ 03/12/america/1552413001_068945.html. Monestier, Felipe, Lihuen Nocetto, and Fernando Rosenblatt. 2021. Cabildo Abierto: oportunidades y desafíos para la construcción partidaria en un sistema de partidos institucionalizado. In De la estabilidad al equilibrio inestable: elecciones y comportamiento electoral, ed. Juan Andrés Moraes and Verónica Pérez Bentancur. Montevideo: Instituto de Ciencia Política. Moreira, Constanza. 2009. Entre la protesta y el compromiso: la izquierda en el gobierno Uruguay y América Latina. Montevideo: Ediciones Trilce. Niedzwiecki, Sara, and Jennifer Pribble. 2017. Social Policies and Center-Right Governments in Argentina and Chile. Latin American Politics and Society 59: 72–97. Nocetto, Lihuen, Rafael Piñeiro, and Fernando Rosenblatt. 2020. Uruguay 2019: Fin del ciclo progresista y reestructura del sistema de partidos. Revista de ciencia política (Santiago) 40. Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile: 511–538. Norris, Pippa, and Ronald Inglehart. 2019. Cultural Backlash: Trump, Brexit, and Authoritarian Populism. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Pérez, Verónica, and Rafael Piñeiro Rodríguez. 2016. Uruguay 2015: Los desafíos de gobernar por izquierda cuando la economía se contrae. Revista de ciencia política (Santiago) 36: 339–363.

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Pérez Bentancur, Verónica, Rafael Piñeiro Rodríguez, and Fernando Rosenblatt. 2019. How Party Activism Survives: Uruguay’s Frente Amplio. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Rossel, Cecilia, and Felipe Monestier. 2021. Uruguay 2020: El despliegue de la agenda de centro derecha en contexto de pandemia. Revista de ciencia política (Santiago) 41: 401–424. Serna, Miguel. 2020. La ola conservadora en Uruguay: claves de la derrota electoral de la izquierda en 2019. Cahiers des Amériques latines. Institut des hautes études de l’Amérique latine: 229–252. Tenenbaum Ewig, Gabriel. 2021. La política criminal uruguaya en la era progresista (2005–2020): el caso de la justicia para adolescentes. Sociologias 23: 80–104. Unidad de Métodos y Acceso a Datos. 2020. Opinión Pública en Uruguay. Montevideo: FCS-UdelaR. Consulted on September 1st, 2022: https://umad-fcs.github.io/Piso-I-OP/#Opini%C3%B3n_P%C3%BAb lica_en_Uruguay. Yaffé, Jaime. 2005. Al centro y adentro: la renovación de la izquierda y el triunfo del Frente Amplio en Uruguay. Montevideo: Linardi y Risso.

CHAPTER 4

Radicalizing Alternation: Political Change and Degraded Democracy in El Salvador (2019–2021) Kevin Parthenay

Putting an end to “los mismos de siempre” (the same as usual ) has been a constant leitmotif of Nayib Bukele’s campaign and since his election as President of the Salvadoran Republic. This idea embodies what has been played out in the last two elections in the country: presidential (February 2019) and legislative-municipal (March 2021). In this electoral sequence, what was at stake was as much the attempt of a new actor in the political field to break through as the attempt of the old ones to stay in

K. Parthenay (B) University of Tours, Tours, France e-mail: [email protected] University Institute of France (IUF), Paris, France

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023, corrected publication 2023 O. Dabène (ed.), Latin America’s Pendular Politics, Studies of the Americas, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-26761-1_4

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power. The political transformations at work also echo the country’s past, highlighting the fact that democratization has not yet been completed. Thus, the issues of alternation are closely intertwined with the evolution of Salvadoran democracy. This chapter will therefore aim to explain the origins, nature, and extent of the changes in the Salvadoran political scene observed through the 2019 and 2021 elections. The presidential election of February 3, 2019 saw the absolute majority victory in the first round of voting of the candidate Nayib Bukele (53.10%), head of the Gran Alianza para la Unidad Nacional (GANA), a so-called “third way” party. This electoral sequence had officially started on October 2, 2018, the opening date of the electoral campaign (closed on January 30, 2019). On Sunday February 3rd, 5,268,411 people were expected to go to the polls in the country, as well as abroad (5948 voters). The thesis that we defend in this chapter is to consider the 2019 election as the real breakthrough election in the Salvadoran democracy. This position is in contrast to the analyses that until now have considered 2009’s election to be the historic break. The importance of this election, which was considered historic because it saw the arrival in power of the left-wing party, the Frente Farabundo Martí de Liberación Nacional (FMLN), should undoubtedly be reconsidered in a broader context. If it produced effects that materialized in the breakthrough of 2019, we will see by observing the previous (legislative-municipal elections of 2018) and subsequent (legislative-municipal elections of 2021) elections that the nature and extent of the political shift is more profound, it will be described as “radical” according to the typology proposed in the introduction to this book, and it is part of a more profound evolution of Salvadoran society. The observation of these three consecutive elections allows us to take the pulse of a country confronted with a series of extreme phenomena: criminal violence; poverty and underdevelopment; the effects of climate change. Moreover, in a society marked by abysmal wealth gaps, the permanence in power of a political economic elite since the end of the civil war, signed in 1992 by the Chapultepec Accords, has led to frustrated expectations on both the social and political levels. Thus, each election has made the transformations at work a little more visible. From this point of view, the elections observed in this chapter have a different status: that of 2018 allows to identify the elements that heralded change, that of 2019 enacts this change and that of 2021 confirms its nature and scope.

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Thus, through the study of this three-year electoral sequence, we will be able to better understand the nature of this radical political change that reflects the contemporary state of Salvadoran democracy.

4.1

The Path to Radical Change

The presidential election of February 3, 2019, which resulted in the victory of Nayib Bukele, was unanimously hailed as a time of change by national and international observers. The results of this election were also considered historic insofar as, for the first time in the history of El Salvador’s young democracy, i.e. since the end of the civil war in 1992, a third way party won the presidential election, and moreover in the first round. Nayib Bukele, then 37 years old, won 53.03% of the vote at the head of the GANA party (centre right), against 31.78% for Carlos Calleja of the conservative right-wing ARENA party (Alianza Republicana Nacionalista), 14.42% for Hugo Martínez for the FMLN party—the outgoing left-wing party—and 0.76% for Josué Alvarado (VAMOS, a centre-right party created in 2017). The break is not made here by the arrival of an outsider—even if he presented himself as such for a long time during the campaign—or of a new face in Salvadoran politics, but by the reversal of political and partisan balances that have existed since the democratization of the 1990s. After the presidential election, many hypotheses were put forward as to the nature of the event. Was it an “electoral accident”, the product of a “rejection vote” of the political system, or was it a clear desire for change in Salvadoran society? In this first section, we will focus on the degree and content of the change, while recalling that the political shift was achieved without major contestation or de-legitimization of the electoral institutions. To explain the political path that led to this radical change, we propose a chronological reading of the three successive elections: legislative/municipal 2018; presidential 2019; legislative/municipal 2021. 4.1.1

The 2018 Legislative and Municipal Elections

The legislative and municipal elections of March 4, 2018 were the first steps towards a change of government and showed a number of weak signals of the changes to come. On the legislative side, turnout was very low, with 45.73% of registered voters turning out to vote. The right-wing conservative party ARENA won the election, gaining two more seats and

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increasing its number of seats from 35 to 37. The party thus maintained its position as the largest party in the National Assembly. On the other hand, the left-wing FMLN, which has been in power since 2009, was the big loser of this election with a loss of eight seats, i.e. 23 seats obtained, and a loss of 38.5% of its electorate. Parallel to this historical bipartisan struggle (dating from the postconflict democratic transition of 1992), GANA presents itself as a third way political force. In this legislative election, this party, created in 2010 by Antonio Saca (ex-President of ARENA and then dissident of the party), lost one seat but kept ten. With 11.45% of the vote (and a loss of 15.9% of its electorate compared to the 2015 election), GANA failed to consolidate the efflorescence of this third political way in the Salvadoran landscape. The minority political parties accumulate a total of six seats: three for the National Concertation Party (PCN), two for the Christian Democratic Party (PDC) and one for Democratic Change (CD). Also noteworthy is the atypical and unprecedented phenomenon of a nonpartisan candidate winning a seat in the Assembly (with 0.67% of the vote). Thus, the 2018 legislative election shows a fragmentation of the political offer at work. However, the accumulated gains of the parties on the right of the Salvadoran political spectrum (ARENA, PCN, PDC) allow to foresee weak signals of a classic political alternation (from the left to the right) for the presidential election to follow. At the end of this election, the scenario is again that of a weakening of the left because of two successive presidential mandates (2009–2014 and 2014–2019) and the possible return in force of the right. In the Assembly, this has been a traditional scenario since the democratization of the country. This trend is confirmed by the results of the municipal elections, which give a more detailed account of electoral volatility, i.e. the evolution of party loyalties or commitments. At the municipal level, turnout is also low with only 46.64% of registered voters casting their ballots. ARENA is the big winner of this election with 139 municipalities (against 129 in 2015). In the same sense as for the legislative elections, the FMLN is also the big loser with only 64 municipalities won against 85 obtained in 2015. Moreover, the lack of confirmation of GANA is also reflected

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Table 4.1 Results of past elections in El Salvador Legislative/municipal 2018 Turnout 45.73% Seats obtained in the assembly

Legislative/municipal 2021

ARENA FMLN GANA PCN PDC CD Indep FPS PSD NI VAMOS

14 4 5 2 1 – – – – 56 1

37 23 10 9 3 1 1 – – – –

50.25%

Presidential 2019 51.8% Results (1st round) 31.72% 14.42% 53.03% – – – – – – – 0.76%

Source Author’s elaboration

in the municipal level, with the party winning only 7 municipalities and losing 12 compared to 2015.1 4.1.2

The Presidential Election of February 2019

In a first analysis, the election of February 3, 2019 constitutes an alternation insofar as the country’s two historical parties, which have shared power since the transition, are losing. The conservative right-wing party, ARENA, obtained 31.72%. The left-wing party FMLN, the outgoing party, obtained 14.42%. While ARENA had been in power for nearly twenty years (1989–2009) and the FMLN for a decade (2009–2019), the election of Nayib Bukele is a real break. All the more so since, beyond the presidential victories, ARENA and FMLN have long been the largely dominant parties in the country’s political spectrum in the Assembly (Table 4.1 and Fig. 4.1). The other parties present in the electoral competition have remained largely in the minority since the democratic transition and their positions have been weakening since 2003. The creation of the GANA party and its arrival in third place in the 2014 presidential election (credited 1 The results for the smallest political parties are: 25 PCN; 5 PDC; 1 FPS; 1 PSD.

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Fig. 4.1 Evolution of seats obtained in the Salvadorean National Assembly (Source Author’s elaboration)

with 11.44% of the vote) has, despite everything, fuelled the idea of the emergence of a third way political force. However, it did not progress between the legislative elections of 2012 and 2015, not confirming a trend towards consolidation. In this respect, and following a strictly organizational reading of Salvadoran political life, the 2019 election may be misleading. In fact, the election of Nayib Bukele, as GANA’s candidate, should not be seen as the imposition of this political force in the country, for two reasons. The first one is that Nayib Bukele is a makeshift candidate for GANA and the second is that he did not have a consolidated program or a national platform. We precise these two aspects. The campaign for the presidential elections had many twists and turns. Nayib Bukele had to go through three political parties before he was allowed to run in the presidential election. First, the Supreme Electoral Tribunal (TSE, with Spanish acronym) did not allow his new political movement, Nuevas Ideas, to be registered as a political party (which will

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finally be registered on August 24, 2018). Bukele then ran on behalf of the Cambio Democratico (DC) party, before the latter was also suspended by the TSE. Ultimately, on July 26, 2018, six months before the election, he announced his participation in GANA’s presidential primary against Will Salgado, who eventually threw in the towel in the face of Bukele’s overwhelming popularity. This created the following paradoxical situation: a candidate largely outside the GANA galaxy found himself embodying its political representation in the national election, while relying primarily for his campaign on an emerging political movement that was directly attached to it (Nuevas Ideas ). In fact, once the primaries were won, the campaign was conducted outside GANA’s structure and organized by a small team from Nuevas Ideas. This situation reflects the reality that, apart from the two major historical parties, FMLN and ARENA, which still have territorial and programmatic roots, the new political organizations carry the seeds of structural fragility, i.e. without the development of an ideological backbone (denominated, “partidos de papeles”). These structures are commonly “winning machines” for ephemeral candidates who only last for the duration of an election or a mandate. On the other hand, this idea of alternation was fed by the construction of an outsider profile that responded rather to an electoral strategy. In fact, his background is far from being that of a political outsider. A former mayor of Nuevo Cuscatlán (2012–2015), then of the country’s capital, San Salvador (2015–2018), on the FMLN’s lists, Bukele quickly dissented by denouncing the party’s mismanagement—from which he was eventually expelled on October 10, 2017. Thus, it is on the basis of this experience of partisan exclusion and by capitalizing on his youth and mastery of communication codes that he was able to shape an outsider profile. Rather than an outsider in Salvadoran politics, Bukele transgresses the traditional codes of politics, particularly with regard to the formality and solemnity attached to the political office. In general, although the campaign allowed for a certain pluralism to be expressed, in compliance with the rules on political party financing (according to the Organisation of American States and the European Union) and without violence (a great success for a country plagued by endemic violence), it generated very little programmatic content, reducing the debate to simple cross-media interpellations. Is the February 2019 election an election of rejection or support? It is worth noting that since the 2004 election, turnout has fallen steadily

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(from 67.3 to 51.8%). In 2019, barely more than half of the Salvadorans registered on the lists turned out to vote, showing very limited confidence in the political system and in electoral democracy. The context lends itself to this decline in confidence in the ability of the political system to promote change. To better understand this, we get back in the next section to the effect of the 2009 political alternation and the steady deterioration of trust in this partisan alternative at the national (and local) level. Moreover, the corruption cases that affected the Mauricio Funes (2009–2014) and Salvador Sanchez Céren (2014–2019) administrations have greatly accentuated this loss of confidence in the system. This electoral scenario could not be more classic, with a pattern of confrontation between traditional parties, the competing ambitions of parties seeking to embody a third way, and an individualization that tends to transform political parties into “winning machines”, without any real programmatic depth, at the service of ephemeral leaders. From this point of view, El Salvador experienced a “normal election”. However, the Salvadoran political shift is presented as one that has sanctioned the incumbents but also the “non-incumbents”. The extent of the drop in the number of votes cast for the traditional forces is enlightening. Comparing the last two presidential elections, 2014 and 2019, we observe a drop of 7 points for ARENA (from 38.95 to 31.72%—in the first round) and of 34 points for the FMLN (from 48.95 to 14.42%—in the first round). Voters thus rejected the two main parties that had alternated in power until then and validated the emergence of a new political figure, more than a political formation. However, while this election marks an organizational and, in particular, a partisan change, the degree of political change remains limited and depends on electoral confirmation in the legislative and municipal elections to follow. Indeed, if the 2019 election brings a new political leader to power, it is necessary to look in more detail at the capacities of this leader to precipitate change and assert political alternation. In this respect, the relationship between the executive and the legislature is fundamental. The presidential election, taking place in the middle of the legislative term, constitutes a beginning of change that needs to be confirmed. Although widely elected, Nayib Bukele could only count on ten GANA members in the Assembly for the first two years of his mandate. Beyond this number, political practice meant that Bukele’s rise to power was in reality without any real support in the legislature, forcing him to coalesce as issues arose. Following the presidential election, the

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2018–2021 legislature remains under an ARENA majority (37 seats), which was an obstacle to President Bukele’s exercise of power. Thus, the defeat of the incumbents in the presidential elections did not necessarily imply the victory of an opposition or a new political offer, as the new president found himself in a situation not of cohabitation but of government by coalition constraint. In 2019, inflicting defeat did not mean giving oneself a winner. The February 2019 election would have resulted in a negative alternation, that is, an alternation that sees the defeat of the incumbents by an opposition that cannot rely on a majority in Congress. In the Salvadoran case, between the weak signals of alternation engaged in the legislative and municipal elections of March 2018 and the results of the presidential elections of February 2019, the nature of alternation has been gradually transformed. We will explain the reasons for this in the second part of this chapter. 4.1.3

The 2021 Legislative and Municipal Elections

The legislative and municipal elections of February 28, 2021 provided answers to the many unknowns that remained after the 2019 presidential election. Was it just a rejection vote, an electoral accident, or a deeper commitment to socio-political change in El Salvador? The 2021 election confirmed the “radical” nature of the political shift. In a context marked by the Covid-19 pandemic, voter turnout was up by 50.25%, 4.52 points higher than in 2018 (45.73%). If alternation reached its peak in this election, it was through the massive expression of support for the presidential party, Nuevas Ideas (NI), that was competing for the first time in an official electoral contest. In light of this increased participation, after two years of President Bukele’s administration, the legislative election was more clearly a vote of support than a rejection. While rejection materialized in a heavy defeat for the traditional parties in 2019, in 2021 the increased turnout is more a sign of support. The third part of this chapter will be devoted to specifying the content of this support. The election was an unprecedented victory for President Bukele’s party as it won a large majority, with 66.46% of the vote, but more importantly it won a two-thirds majority with the elected members of his party alone, i.e. 56 out of the 84 members of the legislature. By way of comparison, ARENA’s best score in history was 39 MPs in 1994. The achievement of a qualified majority means that NI has the ability to

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legislate without obstacles or constraints. Moreover, it opens up greater possibilities for constitutional reform (according to Art. 29 of the Constitution), appointment to high public offices (Supreme Court of Justice, Public Prosecutor, etc.) or public indebtedness. At the same time, the two historical parties, ARENA and FMLN, continued to collapse, obtaining 14 and four deputies respectively with 12.18 and 6.91% of the vote. This massive victory of the presidential party and the rout of the traditional parties is confirmed at the municipal level. With an almost equivalent turnout in the municipal elections (50.21%, +3.6 points), Nuevas Ideas won 50.78% of the votes (152 municipalities), ARENA 19.01% (35 municipalities) and GANA 11.16% (27 municipalities). The FMLN came fourth with 10.86%, winning 30 municipalities. It is particularly significant here to see the deconstruction of the partisan affiliation’s pattern and local partisan roots at the national level (see Map 4.1). Thus, according to the types proposed in the introduction to this book, the Salvadoran case would initially resemble a type 2.5—i.e. an intermediate or partial alternation—and then the advent of a radical type 4 alternation insofar as the new political force inflicts defeats on all fronts on the incumbents as well as the non-incumbents (ARENA/FMLN/GANA). This is an alternation that is becoming progressively more radical, motivated by a strong anti-system sentiment which is itself characterized by falling levels of confidence in both democracy and political institutions as a whole.

4.2 4.2.1

Delegative Democracy in El Salvador? Voting for a Charismatic Leader Above Parties

In the 2019 election, voter turnout fell slightly, by 3.4%, compared to the previous presidential election, but it was part of a significant downward cycle since the 2004 election (66.1% compared to 51.88 in 2019). The loss of more than 70% of its electorate to the FMLN is not a sign of differential abstention but of a massive transfer of electoral support to the political offer represented by Nayib Bukele (GANA). ARENA also lost 18% of its electorate. In this context, these transfers of support explain why Bukele became in 2019 the third best elected president, from the first round, since the early 1990s. Thus, it is indeed the loyalty of voters to a political family that is being shaken with significant electoral volatility in this election. It

Map 4.1 Comparison of the electoral maps for the legislative (top) and municipal (bottom) elections for 2018 (left) and 2021 (right) in El Salvador (Source For legislative elections [Wikipedia, source: TSE] and municipal elections [Wikipedia, source: TSE]

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reached a historic level between 2014 and 2019, with 57.06% (compared to 1.22% between 2009 and 2014 and a maximum of 19% between 1994 and 1999). However, Bukele’s election, which was overwhelming in the capital department (San Salvador, with a gap of 233,199 votes), was not the tidal wave evoked by the national and international media. In relation to the number of citizens who actually cast a vote, Bukele won the presidency of the country with 27.24% of the votes, which in reality makes him the second worst elected president in the country’s contemporary (posttransition) history (Flores in 1999 won with 19.37% of the votes). Despite this, Bukele’s personality has generated excitement and exerted significant influence on Salvadoran citizens, as demonstrated in the 2018 legislative election by his call for a “no vote” (a record increase in this election of 291.5%) (Rodriguez and Solano de Martinez, 2020). This increased influence is essentially explained by a campaign strategy and more particularly by communication. Capitalizing on a “millennial president” profile (Meléndez-Sánchez 2021), he made massive use of digital communication and in particular social networks (Ruiz-Alba and Mancinas-Chávez 2020), unlike the other parties, which have positioned themselves on a more traditional type of campaign (radio, television, meetings). Bukele boycotted all televized debates between candidates and launched his program, in parallel to the last official debate, via a Facebook Live (Table 4.2). It is on the occasion of the legislative and municipal elections of February 2021 that the tidal wave announced took place, as illustrated by the electoral maps below. Note that at the departmental level, the results (not apparent on the maps below) are even clearer insofar as the president’s party wins them all. The territorial network inherited from thirty years of power sharing between ARENA and the FMLN seems to have been erased in the space of two elections, first presidential (2019) and then legislative (2021). Table 4.2 Campaign expenditure of the top three candidates in El Salvador

Political Party—Candidate

Amounts

GANA—Nayib Bukele ARENA—Carlos Callejas FMLN—Hugo Martinez

9466.137, 50$ 8408.475, 97$ 7671.671, 94$

Source Rodriguez et Solano de Martinez (2020)

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This rapid collapse of party affiliations and loyalties reflects two distinct phenomena: the first reflects public fatigue with electoral democracy, including a loss of confidence in political parties; the second reflects a delegation to a charismatic leader. As we have seen above, while trust in political parties is indeed at half-mast, the rise in turnout points more towards the second phenomenon. Thus, the 2018 and 2021 elections would constitute the advent of a “delegative democracy”. According to Guillermo O’Donnell, in a delegative democracy, the President claims to embody the nation, above the parties and ignores accountability mechanisms (O’Donnell 1992). In this regard, it is worth recalling that Nayib Bukele quickly broke free of partisan ties once elected in the GANA primary to run a campaign inspired by what is initially presented not as a party but as a “political movement”. From this perspective, the 2021 legislative elections are a confirmation of this trend. The massive vote in favour of the presidential party, granting it a qualified majority, weakens the horizontal control between institutions, making it possible to control the power of the executive and protect the independence of the institutions of justice. This is also confirmed by the drifts linked to the concentration of power in the hands of the executive since December 13, 2020, echoing the militarized irruption of the president in the National Assembly (“Bukelazo”). Similarly, the controversial appointments to the Supreme Court of Justice in March 20212 are ex-post confirmations of the second side of O’Donnell’s definition. In this respect, it is interesting to note that very high levels of support and satisfaction with the President have been maintained despite these episodes. In the face of a population largely disappointed by thirty years of democracy, the attacks on the separation of powers and the little credit given to horizontal accountability (between the organs of power) do not diminish the capital of the man who was elected precisely for his “transgressive” dimension of the traditional patterns of Salvadoran politics.

2 The new parliamentary majority elected in February 2021 and favourable to Nayib Bukele, further accentuated the dynamics of power concentration by dismissing the judges of the Constitutional Tribunal of the Supreme Court. While this measure respects the Salvadoran constitution, its legitimacy is questioned because of the president’s total control over his parliamentary majority.

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4.2.2

Radical Political Shift: What About Values?

After two years in power, if President Bukele’s management has taken on an authoritarian tone, what about the values promoted through the public policies implemented? How does President Bukele position himself in terms of education, security, and inclusion? Does he embody a political proposal that is in line with the conservative policies of the ARENA party or rather with the progressive line of the FMLN? As mentioned above, for more than twenty years the Salvadoran political spectrum has been largely structured around two central issues: the fight against insecurity and socio-economic development (the latter being articulated around growth and the fight against poverty). Within these two perspectives, a transversal dimension has always been expressed, that of cooperation with foreign powers that work through foreign aid to implement (and/or finance) these programs. In the contemporary Latin American context, this relationship with foreign powers is all the more enlightening as it is strongly polarized around a US/China opposition (Brun et al. 2022). We therefore explore these three dimensions in order to position President Bukele’s political offer and to give some flesh to this idea of alternation beyond the purely institutional dimensions. In terms of security, violence statistics have improved historically since Bukele came to power. According to his plan of government, the fight against insecurity and crime is part of an extensive “Territorial Control Plan”. At the end of the first year of his presidency, the average number of daily murders has fallen from 12.6 (at the end of Salvador Sanchez Céren’s term) to 4.1. From 2018 to 2019, the homicide rate dropped from 51 per 100,000 inhabitants to 38.5. At the end of the first 100 days, 86.4% of Salvadorans perceived a decrease in delinquency, 72.4% at the end of the second year of government. These elements add to the understanding of the intensification of the support vote during the 2021 legislative elections. However, while during the campaign the theme of violence was linked to a wide range of public policies (inspired by his experience in the capital), such as the recuperation of urban centres or the dismantling of the communication networks of the maras, the policy implemented was in fact primarily directed towards a hardening of the conditions of those involved in delinquency and organized crime. Due to an increase in the number of homicides in April 2020, the President decided to tighten the conditions of isolation of imprisoned pandilleros and to mix rival gangs in the cells. These measures have even been

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denounced by human rights defenders, notably Human Rights Watch, who described them as “cruel” (BBC Mundo 2020). From a security point of view, the policy implemented by the President is more like a “mano dura” policy, symptomatic of conservative security management. It is also enlightening to note that in opinion polls on the President’s appraisal, 25.2% describe President Bukele as “a President who puts things in order with a firm hand” (un presidente que pone orden con mano dura) (IUOP 2021). This, coupled with revelations of negotiations between the government and imprisoned MS13 members to curb killings (El Faro 2020), has nevertheless led to the emergence of criticism of the President. In economic terms, the Bukele administration has focused on growth and international competitiveness, but with a concern for redistribution and equality, as specified in its government plan (Plan Cuscatlán 2019). It should be noted that the exceptional context linked to the emergence of the pandemic has slowed down the ambitions for development and growth of the Salvadoran economy. However, the relations developed with the outside world shed light on the Bukele administration’s approach. In this respect, Bukele’s arrival in power was marked by an immediate search for rapprochement with the Donald Trump administration (after a period of distance as much due to the policies of Barack Obama as to the Salvador Sanchez Céren government due to the maintenance of links with Venezuela) in order to continue to benefit from economic support, and to avoid being subjected to announcements of reductions in aid and trade relations in response to the influx of Central American migrants into the United States (Parthenay 2020). The United States has historically been a central partner for the Salvadoran economy. It is by far the largest trading partner with 40.4% of Salvadoran exports going to the United States (ahead of Guatemala 15.4%) and 29.8% of imports from it (ahead of Guatemala 12.5%) (2019).3 This proximity to the United States and the development of an open and liberalized economy have long structured the economic and foreign cooperation policy of the Salvadoran liberal-conservative axis, embodied by ARENA. Under Bukele’s presidency, these lines have shifted, notably with a rapprochement with China4 that reflects a policy that is more 3 Data from the Observatory of Economic Complexity: https://oec.world/en/profile/ country/slv. 4 Official relations with the PRC were initiated under Salvador Sanchez Céren’s tenure in 2018, with the severing of relations with Taiwan.

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pragmatic than liberal-conservative. During a six-day state visit to China, Nayib Bukele signed a large number of agreements allowing the country to benefit from increased non-reimbursable cooperation. This cooperation with China was further strengthened when relations between El Salvador and the United States cooled after the election of Joe Biden to the White House and the repeated criticism by the US President of President Bukele’s authoritarian ways. This context allowed China to extend its health diplomacy in the country (with supplies of masks and vaccines). Thus, as for security, if Nayib Bukele’s presidency is difficult to position on the progressive-conservative spectrum, since the approach is so pragmatic and differentiated according to the sectors, the political shift is characterized above all by an authoritarian style.

4.3 Conclusion: From Alternation to the Endangerment of Democracy The radical political shift in El Salvador over the last two years is the product of democratic fatigue accumulated since the transition. This radicalism is only echoed by the poor performance and progressive delegitimization of Salvadoran governments. The decay of political parties and the systematization of corruption complete the picture of a degraded democracy. This radicalization of the political alternation in El Salvador, tinged with anti-systemicism and degagism, gives a blank check to a President who no longer hides an authoritarian inclination. From this perspective, the Salvadoran case is illustrative of the effects of the failure of classic alternations in a context marked by the exhaustion of electoral democracy.

References BBC Mundo. (2020), «Un año de gobierno de Bukele en El Salvador: el contraste entre el aplastante apoyo que mantiene en el país y las acusaciones de abuso de poder en su contra», June 1, 2020. Available at: https://www.bbc. com/mundo/noticias-america-latina-52853997 (accessed July 13rd, 2021). Brun, E., Heras Rodríguez, C., Montiel Rico, J. J. (2022), «América Latina? Una propuesta analítica sobre populismo y política exterior», Revista De Ciencia Política, 42(1), 81–103. Carias Patricia (2013), «El gabinete del cambio», El Faro, octubre 7, 2013, https://elfaro.net/es/201310/noticias/13543/El-gabinete-del-cambio.htm.

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El Faro (2020), «Gobierno de Bukele lleva un año negociando con la MS-13 reducción de homicidios y apoyo electoral», septembre 3, 2020. Accessible en ligne: https://elfaro.net/es/202009/el_salvador/24781/Gobierno-de-Buk ele-lleva-un-a%C3%B1o-negociando-con-la-MS-13-reducci%C3%B3n-de-hom icidios-y-apoyo-electoral.htmFUSADES, «Evaluación de la seguridad publica 2014–2019», Analisis Politico, Junio 2019. Instituto Universitario de Opinion Publica (2021), «La poblacion salvadorena evalua el segundo ano del Gobierno del Presidente Nayib Bukele», UCA, June 2021. Available at: https://fr.calameo.com/read/00648062773df19d49124 (accessed July 13rd, 2021). Latinobarómetro (2014), “Informe 2013”, Santiago de Chile. Latinobarómetro (2016), “Informe 2015”, Santiago de Chile. Latinobarómetro (2019), “Informe 2018”, Santiago de Chile. Meléndez-Sánchez M. (2021), “Latin America Erupts: Millennial Authoritarianism in El Salvador”. Journal of Democracy, 32(3), July 2021, 19–32. O’Donnell Guillermo (1992), “Delegative Democracy”, University of Notre Dame, Kellog Institute Working Paper, 172, mars 1992. Parthenay Kevin (2020), «Trump’s US Foreign Policy and Latin American Multilateralism: An Assessment of Words and Deeds», in Quessard M., Heurtebize F., Gagnon F. (eds.), Alliances and Power Politics in the Trump Era, Palgrave Macmillan. Plan Cuscatlán (2019), «Economy». Available at: https://plancuscatlan.com/ tema.php?tema=18. Prensa Libre (2016), «Supremo Salvadoreño investiga a otros dos ex presidentes por corrupcion», November 22th, 2016. Available at: https://www.prensa libre.com/internacional/supremo-salvadoreo-investiga-a-otros-dos-expreside ntes-por-corrupcion/ (accessed June 8th, 2021). Rodriguez Luis Mario, Solano de Martinez Luisa Maria (2020), “Las elecciones de 2018 y 2019 en El Salvador: el ascenso de la tercera via?», in Manuel, Alcantara (ed.), America Latina Vota (2017-2019), Madrid: Tecnos. Ruiz-Alba, N. Mancinas-Chávez, R. (2020). Estrategia de comunicación en Twitter de Nayib Bukele: el presidente milenial de El Salvador. Communication & Society, 33(2), 259–275. Valiente Thoresen, A. (2019). Una nueva aproximación estadística al problema de homicidios en El Salvador. América Latina Hoy, 82, 149–173 World Bank Data (2019), “Gini Index: El Salvador”. Available in: https://data. worldbank.org/indicator/SI.POV.GINI?end=2019&locations=SV&start= 1991&view=chart.

CHAPTER 5

Guatemala, an Alternation in Continuity Erica Guevara

After the poor economic and social, as well as political, record of President Jimmy Morales, who came to the presidency almost by accident in 2015, there was little doubt that the 2019 presidential elections would be an alternative. Re-election is not possible in Guatemala, and no credible candidate seemed likely to emerge from the president’s party. On the other hand, with nineteen candidates running and a highly fragmented party system, there was great uncertainty about which party would win the election. The context was also marked by the large mobilizations of 2015, which led to the resignation of President Otto Pérez Molina and Vice President Roxana Baldetti due to corruption charges. Beyond the scandals that affected the presidency, these social mobilizations expressed a general frustration with the functioning of the Guatemalan political system, and were perceived by part of public opinion as a turning point.

E. Guevara (B) Paris 8 University, Saint-Denis, France e-mail: [email protected]

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023, corrected publication 2023 O. Dabène (ed.), Latin America’s Pendular Politics, Studies of the Americas, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-26761-1_5

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The expectations of the population were high with regard to this new electoral process. But the labourious and late implementation of a new electoral reform law quickly dampened hopes for change. The challenge of the alternation was therefore elsewhere. After two governments on the right of the political spectrum, the context seemed favourable for the success of the National Union of Hope (UNE), led by candidate Sandra Torres, former wife of former president Álvaro Colom (2011–2015). Leading in the polls throughout the campaign, she came out on top in most of the country’s municipalities in the first round. However, it was her right-wing rival, Alejandro Giammattei, who ended up winning the second round of the presidential election. Thus, while a change of party at the head of the executive branch was evident, the degree of alternation from one conservative party to another was ultimately very low. However, some form of alternation appears to be occurring at the legislative and then municipal level, with the UNE leading in Parliament, and winning the most municipalities. The strength of the party, in the face of the weakness of its candidate, led many journalists and the party itself, to wonder after if it was she who was preventing political alternation. These different elements question the factors that led to UNE’s success at the legislative and municipal levels, but not at the presidential level: why did Sandra Torres not win? Did the UNE’s strong arrival in the legislative and municipal power mean alternation? After a first section devoted to the record of Jimmy Morales’ government and a description of the electoral campaign, this chapter will analyse the results of the first and second rounds of voting, as well as some of the factors explaining Torres’ defeat. We then explore the hypothesis of an alternation at the legislative and municipal levels, and thus of a party that no longer needs its founder to win. Contrary to this assertion, we will show that, despite the organizational structure of UNE, it is difficult to speak of a real domination of this party, both in the National Assembly and at the local level. In the last section, we will address the issue of the territorial divide, which refines the analysis and explains much of the logic of the significant fragmentation of the vote in Guatemala.

5.1

An Inevitable Alternation

The record of President Morales’ government left no doubt that the 2019 election would result in an alternation. Elected in 2015 following the country’s deep political crisis, the former comedian, whose campaign

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slogan was “neither corrupt nor thief”, found himself accused in several corruption cases. He also forced the director of the UN’s International Commission against Impunity in Guatemala (CICIG), created to help Guatemalan public institutions fight corruption, to leave the country in 2019. After the resignation of former president Pérez Molina in 2015 due to the repercussions of the massive corruption scandal, which led to massive protests, it was difficult to envision his successor’s party being reappointed with similar accusations. 5.1.1

Jimmy Morales’ Very Negative Image

This is especially true since Morales’ economic and social record was bad. Growth had picked up, inflation and unemployment indicators were quite good, but social inequality and especially the gap between the richest and poorest remained very strong in the country. Little was done during Morales’ government to reduce the poverty rate. Various polls showed that support for the incumbent president was extremely low. In a poll published in April 2019, 81% of respondents said that Morales was not doing a good job.1 Democracy has been deeply affected by repeated political scandals, which have brought to light high-profile corruption cases, but also links between political staff and candidates with drug trafficking organizations. To say that the legitimacy of Guatemalan democracy, “reinstalled but not consolidated since the early 1990s” (Torres-Rivas 2011; Parthenay 2020) was weak in 2019 is an understatement. Support for democracy was only 28% in 2018, and 70% said the country was governed by a few powerful groups for their own benefit (Latinobarómetro 2018). The wave of hope generated by the 2015 mobilizations against the “pact of the corrupt” had ultimately had little impact. Thus, the course of the debates regarding the new Law on Elections and Political Parties (LEPP), rather accentuated the population’s disappointment with politics. The law did introduce new standards for political party financing and regulation of media propaganda, including the reduction of campaign time. However, it was widely criticized, with many experts saying that it did not go as far as expected on central aspects (Zelaya Rosales 2020). The organization of the first round of the election by the TSE was particularly tedious, as the legitimacy of the institution was repeatedly challenged.

1 Prensa Libre, «Gobierno bajo la lupa de los guatemaltecos», 4 avril 2019.

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This seemingly favourable context for opposition parties, however, has not allowed them to shine. Described by some as an “a-partisan system” (Meléndez 2015; Artiga-González 2000), Guatemala has very ephemeral party structures with blurred ideological identities, which are genuine machines for winning candidates in a specific election. Alejandro Giammattei is a good proof of this. Nicknamed the “eternal candidate” because of his four candidacies, he ran each time with a different party: in 2007 with GANA, in 2011 with CASA, in 2015 with FUERZA, and in 2019 with VAMOS, which was created in 2018 to enable him to run. However, “party spraying” is not new: Sonnleitner pointed out that between 1985 and 2009, no fewer than 73 political parties participated in the six successive elections (2009: 510). 5.1.2

An Illegible Political Offer

This weakness of the party system was even more evident in the 2019 election campaign, in which 24 candidates ran. Of these, “only” nineteen finished the race, as five candidates were revoked during the election campaign. The cancellation of candidacies in the middle of the campaign is not new either, as the country is used to this type of practice. But among the candidacies cancelled were those of two candidates who had long been ahead in the polls, Thelma Aldana and Zury Ríos. Both cases deserve attention. Prosecutor Aldana, whose role was very important in the impeachment of President Pérez Molina, worked closely with CICIG. She had powerful enemies and received death threats. Her candidacy was revoked on May 16, 2019, because she could not produce an administrative document which attested to the absence of pending proceedings or debts to the state. Involved in internal struggles between the different institutions of the judiciary, her candidacy has generated controversy. Her party, the “Semilla Movement”, registered as a political party in 2018 following the 2015 corruption scandals, and has attempted to form coalitions with other parties, but is ultimately an example of a party that serves primarily to promote the candidacy of a single individual. Aldana scored high in the polls throughout the election campaign, attracting the centre-left vote and anti-corruption protesters. On a completely different political level, the cancellation of Rios’ candidacy also reflects the complexity of Guatemala’s party system, which is still marked by its past and in which the weight of the military is considerable. The daughter of former dictator Efraín Ríos Mont was not allowed

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to run for office because the constitution prohibits it if you are related to a head of state who came to power in a coup. Ríos led numerous actions in the different legal forums to have her candidacy recognized anyway. However, her requests were rejected by the Constitutional Court, just one month before the election. The other three cancelled candidates were from parties with less chance of winning: Mario Estrada (UCN), following his arrest in the United States for links to drug trafficking; Mauricio Radford (Fuerza) due to an ongoing criminal trial; and Edwin Escobar (Prosperidad Ciudadana) for failure to comply with eligibility requirements, like Aldana. In short, just a few weeks before the election, a large part of the electorate was forced to turn to a new candidate. A new campaign then began. Until the cancellation of these candidacies, the polls showed an election dominated by three women: Thelma Aldana, Sandra Torres, and Zury Ríos. The arrival of a woman at the head of the executive branch would have represented another form of political alternation. The very late cancellation of two of these candidacies lead to an inevitable volatility of the vote, which was not simply the result of the instability of the voters’ preferences: disappeared parties, new parties, cancelled candidacies, scandals, and lawsuits marked the campaign and blurred the few partisan markers. Uncertainty prevailed, as the final list of candidates was not stabilized until less than two weeks before the first round. In the polls, the cancellation of the candidacies of its two main competitors has left Torres far ahead of the other candidates. The only party showing both electoral strength and stability over time was the UNE, which led Álvaro Cólom to victory in 2007. Despite its internal crises and splits, in 2019 this party was the strongest and most stable in the country, with an important parliamentary group in the National Assembly and many municipalities won in each election. However, the figure of Torres, although founder of the party, is, as we will see below, particularly controversial. A steadfast supporter of her ex-husband during his government, she had already been a candidate several times, without ever succeeding. Considered for a long time to be positioned on the left of the political spectrum, due to the social redistribution policies carried out by the Cólom government, in 2019 she was running for election with a much more centre-based program, which made her political positioning ambiguous. She was proposing to redevelop social programs and to focus on the creation of new jobs, but she also insisted on the need to implement austerity policies and to have the army patrol the streets to reduce

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levels of violence.2 She also opposed abortion and gay marriage, as did all candidates. The remaining eighteen parties offered a very blurred picture. Their programs were vague, and showed a great deal of convergence, especially on the conservative right. Posters in the colours of the parties and with the faces of the different candidates running for president, deputy, or mayor were superimposed in the streets in great disorder, making it almost impossible for citizens to identify them. The election was also taking place without two parties that had played an important role in the country for several years. Disappeared in 2017 as a result of the Línea corruption case, the right-wing Patriot Party, from which two former presidents and a good number of deputies came from, has given way to many small parties that have not or no longer obtained significant scores for a long time. The centre-left party LIDER, which had the majority in the legislative in 2015, was also absent. It disappeared when its candidate Manuel Baldizón was also accused of corruption and arrested in the United States. Finally, Roberto Arzú, son of former president Álvaro Arzú, was candidate of the National Advancement Party (PAN), a historic party created in 1989. The party has had poor results and few deputies for many years, but it remains Guatemala’s most enduring party, leading some to hope for good results. The other historic party was the URNGMAIZ, formed in 1982 with a socialist orientation, but has never obtained more than 2.6% in presidential elections since 2003. Other candidates from indigenous parties such as WINAQ, and the Peoples’ Liberation Movement (MLP) were also positioned on the left but divided their electorate. The 2019 Guatemalan electoral campaign was thus marked by the absence of parties rather than their presence and was characterized by a deep uncertainty in the electoral offer, with a fragmented opposition and strong programmatic convergences. Many parties developed programs with conservative content (in the sense of the definition proposed in the introduction to this book). But the number of parties does not necessarily lead to as much fragmentation of the electorate, with 9 parties sharing only 11.69% of the vote in 2019.

2 Prensa Libre, «Sandra Torres : hay que ponerle orden al estado con austeridad», 1er juin 2019.

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5.2 How to Explain the Failure of Sandra Torres? The results of the first round confirmed what the polls of the last two weeks of campaigning had indicated: a large victory for Sandra Torres with 25.53%, followed by Alejandro Giammattei, who went to the second round with 13.96%. The surprise came mainly from the third and fourth places, won by two candidates rather unknown: former diplomat and UN official Edmond Mulet, from the Humanist Party, in the centre right of the political spectrum (11,22%), and Thelma Cabrera, an indigenous activist candidate from the MLP, a left-wing party (10.4%). Torres dominates in 17 of the 22 departments, winning 234 of the 340 municipalities in the country (69% of the territory), often with a difference of more than fifteen points with the second-place candidate. UNE was always among the top three candidates in each department. In the departments not won by UNE, the vote was more fragmented, with the winner never obtaining more than 25%. 5.2.1

Sandra Torres’ Unexpected Competitors

Candidate Cabrera won three departments, and came second and third in nine others. The scores of this first-time candidate are particularly interesting, especially in urban areas with large indigenous populations. She represented a new party, from the Committee for Peasant Development (CODECA), a very active activist organization that refused to join the party system (and thus other left-wing parties). The rather high scores obtained in the cities were initially interpreted as a success of the indigenous movements, which had managed to go beyond rural issues, and to impose for the first time the issue of indigenous representation in elections, which had never really been the case until then. Analyses show that the ethnic cleavage variable is not really relevant to explain the results in Guatemala (IIDH 2011; Mendoza 2015). However, the low scores obtained by the MLP in the legislative (only 1 deputy) and municipal elections (no mayor, despite more than 100 candidates) rather suggest that the vote for Cabrera was mainly that of undecideds and voters wishing to support a candidate on the left of the political spectrum, bringing together particular characteristics (woman, indigenous, poor) and a certain anti-capitalist ideological discourse. On the other hand, Cabrera was an outsider because she was not associated with the

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“old politics”, in a panorama where the other left-wing parties were characterized by their constant partisan struggles. The same type of reasoning can be used to understand the good results of Mulet: on the other side of the political spectrum, this former diplomat, who was very involved in the Guatemalan peace negotiations and then in UN peace operations, who had experience as a deputy, but who stayed away from politics during the 2000s and 2010s, represented a kind of right-wing outsider. For his part, future president Giammattei came first in only two departments of the metropolitan region (Table 5.1). 5.2.2

The Loss of Territories Despite a Significant Abstention

Despite the comfortable lead of Torres (25.53%) over Giammattei (13.96%), it is finally the latter who wins in the second round, with 57.95% of the votes. Her failure is bitter at the level of the different territories: she loses ten departments where she was in the lead in the first round, including some where she was well ahead. In many of them, the gap between the two candidates is tiny. She did not manage to win any department where she was second or third, unlike Giammattei, who won more than 70% of the votes in Guatemala City, Quetzaltenango, and Sacatepéquez. Torres had more than 60% in two departments, Alta Verapaz and Quiché. The transfer of votes from other parties largely benefited Giammattei, especially in urban areas where the vote was more fragmented in the first round, while she did not manage to surpass a certain ceiling. The historic abstention rate in the second round (57.3%) did not favour Torres. It was thought that, in a context of low voting intentions, the partisan machines would be the only ones capable of getting voters out of their homes. Given the weakness of almost all parties, this gave a significant advantage to UNE, the only party that has been able to develop an organizational structure in the territory over the past two decades (Reyes Silva 2018). The greater apathy towards politics in urban areas reinforced the hypothesis of an advantage for Torres, whose electorate is more rural. However, this did not happen in the second round, where Giammattei managed to triple his votes. Elected on a conservative right-wing platform, Giammattei is ideologically in line with the governments of Morales and Pérez Molina, although he belongs to another party. A former director of the penitentiary system

Sandra Torres—UNE (27,63%)

Thelma Cabrera—MLP (19,39%)

Sandra Torres—UNE (37,75%)

Sandra Torres—UNE (32,25%)

Sandra Torres—UNE (34,14%)

Alejandro Giammattei—VAMOS (16,93%) Sandra Torres—UNE (31,81%)

Baja Verapaz

Chimaltenango

Chiquimula

El Progreso

Escuintla

Guatemala

Huehuetenango

Sandra Torres—UNE (36,94%)

Alta Verapaz

1st place

Thelma Cabrera—MLP (12,23%)

Edmond Mulet—PHG (15,43%)

Edmond Mulet—PHG (12,71%)

Alejandro Giammattei—VAMOS (12,52%) Edmond Mulet—PHG (18,81%)

Sandra Torres—UNE (18,35%)

Thelma Cabrera—MLP (13,30%)

Estuardo Galdámez (FCN—Nación) (9,96%)

2nd place

Estuardo Galdámez (FCN-Nación) (7,73%)

Alejandro Giammattei—VAMOS (16,13%) Alejandro Giammattei—VAMOS (12,05%) Sandra Torres—UNE (12,47%)

Alejandro Giammattei—VAMOS (12,79%) Alejandro Giammattei—VAMOS (15,72%) Edmond Mulet—PHG (10,47%)

Thelma Cabrera—MLP (8,93%)

3rd place

(continued)

Fredy Cabrera—TODOS (8,95%) Roberto Arzú (PAN—PODEMOS) (6,18%) Roberto Arzú (PAN—PODEMOS) (7,5%) Roberto Arzú (PAN—PODEMOS) (8,52%) Alejandro Giammattei—VAMOS (7,05%)

Amílcar Rivera—VICTORIA (7,9%) Edmond Mulet—PHG (11,99%) Edmond Mulet—PHG (9,53%)

4th place

Table 5.1 Guatemala: results of the top four candidates in the first round of the 2019 presidential election, by department

5 GUATEMALA, AN ALTERNATION IN CONTINUITY

97

Sandra Torres—UNE (35,86%)

Sandra Torres -UNE (40,89%)

Sandra Torres—UNE (37,92%)

Sandra Torres—UNE (37,81%

Sandra Torres—UNE (16,83%)

Sandra Torres—UNE (40,52%)

Sandra Torres—UNE (29,33%)

Alejandro Giammattei—VAMOS (17,93%)

Jalapa

Jutiapa

Petén

Quetzaltenango

Quiché

Retalhuleu

Sacatepéquez

1st place

(continued)

Izabal

Table 5.1

Thelma Cabrera—MLP (14,2%)

Thelma Cabrera—MLP (19,71%)

Alejandro Giammattei—VAMOS (16,35%) Thelma Cabrera—MLP (15,25%)

Thelma Cabrera—MLP (12,02%)

Edmond Mulet—PHG (15,27%)

Edmond Mulet—PHG (13,15%)

Edmond Mulet—PHG (12,56%)

2nd place

Alejandro Giammattei—VAMOS (14,24%) Alejandro Giammattei—VAMOS (11,22%) Edmond Mulet—PHG (12,77%)

Thelma Cabrera—MLP (14,8%)

Alejandro Giammattei—VAMOS (10,71%) Alejandro Giammattei—VAMOS (11,32%) Alejandro Giammattei—VAMOS (12,15%) Edmond Mulet—PHG (9,65%)

3rd place

Sandra Torres—UNE (11.08%)

Edmond Mulet—PHG (9,43%)

Alejandro Giammattei—VAMOS (9,54%) Manuel Villacorta—WINAQ (12,66%) Isaac Farchi—VIVA (6%)

Thelma Cabrera—MLP (8,9%) Thelma Cabrera—MLP (8,9%) Estuardo Galdámez FCN-Nación (9,79%)

4th place

98 E. GUEVARA

Sandra Torres—UNE (35,33%)

Thelma Cabrera—MLP (23,87%)

Sandra Torres—UNE (35,16%)

Thelma Cabrera—MLP (21,07%)

Sandra Torres—UNE (30,04%)

Santa Rosa

Sololá

Suchitepéquez

Totonicapan

Zacapa

Source Author based on data of TSE

Sandra Torres—UNE (30,89%)

San Marcos

1st place

Alejandro Giammattei—VAMOS (14,99%)

Alejandro Giammattei—VAMOS (13,53%) Sandra Torres—UNE (19,01%)

Alejandro Giammattei—VAMOS (12,69%) Alejandro Giammattei—VAMOS (14,04%) Sandra Torres—UNE (20,84%)

2nd place

Alejandro Giammattei—VAMOS (12,41%) Edmond Mulet—PHG (14,86%)

Thelma Cabrera—MLP (10,02%)

Pablo Ceto—URNG-Maiz (6,51%)

Edmond Mulet—PHG (14%)

Edmond Mulet—PHG (9,14%)

3rd place

Isaac Farchi—VIVA (12,69%)

Edmond Mulet—PHG (8,06%)

Thelma Cabrera—MLP (8,77%) Roberto Arzú (PAN—PODEMOS) (6,78%) Roberto Arzú (PAN—PODEMOS) (5,4%) Edmond Mulet—PHG (9,58%)

4th place

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Table 5.2 Guatemala: changes in abstention rates and the number of invalid votes since 1995 1995

1st Round 2nd Round 1st Round 2nd Round

1999

Abstention rate 43,56% 46,24% 63,12% 59,61% Number of null votes 58 070 119 788 188 169 55 367

2003

2007

2011

2015

2019

42,1% 53,1%

39,8% 51,7%

30,62% 39,17%

28,67% 43,68%

38,16% 57,3%

139 386 67 169

207 734 101 196

212 814 124 934

216 263 106 102

209 444 154 291

Source Author based on data of the TSE

under the government of Berger, he has been clearly identified with security issues for many years, as evidenced by his campaign slogan in 2007, “Total Security”. Although he spent ten months in prison during the socalled “Pavón case” (he was accused of the death of many prisoners during a large-scale police operation to regain control of a prison), Giammattei’s popularity was very high during the election campaign (Table 5.2). 5.2.3

“Sandrophobia”: The Importance of the Anti-Sandra Torres Vote

The analysis of the different results of the elections of 2019 can lead initially to affirm that it was not UNE that lost the presidential election, but Sandra Torres. Affective polarization (Iyengar et al. 2012), or voting behaviour that is expressed affectively and leads to voting not “for” one candidate but “against” another because of the strong feelings of rejection that the latter provokes, seems to be particularly strong in Guatemala. It would therefore have led to a form of incomplete alternation, given that UNE did not win the presidency but dominated everywhere else. The figure of Torres is indeed particularly controversial in the country. She acts as a repellent, so much so that some articles even speak of “sandrophobia”.3 According to Fortin (2019: 2), “a significant part of the population would see in her the very representation of all the vices of the political system: corruption, lack of ethics and authoritarianism”. Many

3 Javier Estrada Tobar, «Todo sobre Sandra: los mitos, los pobres, el narco y más», Nómada, 30 avril 2019.

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elements would have accumulated, since the arrival of her ex-husband to the presidency, to build this negative image of Torres, starting with her strategies of control of the UNE party, and the management of the conditional social transfer program “Mi Familia Progresa”. This program, and the active role she played in it, is particularly divisive in public opinion, as it is perceived, especially in urban areas, as being designed to establish clientelistic relationships. Another part of the population considers that it was motivated by a genuine desire for social redistribution. She is also criticized for having co-governed without being elected, alongside her husband. But it is also and above all her divorce from Cólom in 2011, just before the elections, in order to be able to run for the presidency, which would give her this image of a person ready to do anything to obtain power. Throughout her many years of political career, during which she participated in five election campaigns, she has also been accused of having links with the guerrillas in the 1990s, of being involved in drug trafficking and corruption, and even crime. None of these charges have been proven, but they have permanently affected her image. “It’s her turn”: this expression was used to refer colloquially to the “mechanism” of alternation that used to dominate Guatemalan politics and which consisted of bringing to power the candidate who came second in the previous election. This mechanism seems to have been stopped by the 2015 mobilizations, which were particularly critical of the candidacy of Manuel Baldizón, the loser of the second round in 2011 (one of the slogans of the mobilizations was the hashtag #NoLeToca, it is not his turn). It was also unusual for a party that won the legislative elections not to win the presidential election. Yet that is what happened to Morales in 2015, and then to Torres. The differences between the results of the presidential, legislative, and municipal elections reflect the autonomy of each of these elections for many voters.

5.3

Alternation at the Legislative and Municipal Levels?

In Guatemala, elections are general: the presidential election is held on the same day as the legislative and municipal elections. Only one round of voting is held for the latter two elections: the candidate who obtains the majority of votes wins the position of deputy or mayor. This particularity is of major importance in the conduct of elections, as the actors mobilized are not the same during the two rounds of the presidential election (Wall

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and Lehoucq 1997; Sonnleitner 2009). During the first round, the entire political class is mobilized: the presidential candidates can count on all the resources of the parties at the local and regional levels, which are activated in order to win their candidate for mayor or for the National Assembly. But once the first round is over, most political actors withdraw from the race. The result is a campaign with several thousand candidates in the first round and only two candidates in the second round. This can imply significant demobilization for the presidential election. In this section, we will explore the thesis that it was not UNE that lost the election, but rather Torres. It can be argued that the party was strong enough and would not really need the candidate, as it could do very well without her, as it had already happened in 2011, when despite the cancellation of Torres’ candidacy and her call for a null vote, the party had achieved good results (47 deputies). This reasoning could therefore lead to the assertion that there would have been a form of alternation in 2019 in Guatemala, in favour of the UNE, which won the majority of votes in the National Assembly and a significant number of municipalities in the country. On the contrary, we show that this assertion is also to be qualified. 5.3.1

Alternation at the Legislative Level?

Thus, at the legislative level, it seems possible to speak of an alternation, even though the National Assembly has never been so fragmented (19 parties represented). The UNE won 52 of the 160 seats, its best score since its creation. This puts it in a very comfortable position compared to the other parties, including the winning party in the presidential election, Vamos, which won only 17 seats. The other parties are far behind. The UCN is the third force in the assembly, with 12 seats, followed by the Valor party. The other 15 parties share the remaining 70 seats, but never manage to get more than 8. Since re-election to the position of deputy is possible in Guatemala, the turnover rate in the National Assembly can be an indicator of the level of alternation at this level of power. In 2019, 51 out of 160 elected deputies have served one term, 22 of them more than two terms. Among them, 20 deputies were elected with the UNE. Their partisan trajectories have been fairly stable over time, apart from a few temporary moves to LIDER and some exceptional cases. On the other hand, the deputies elected for the VAMOS party have no previous mandates, as do those of SEMILLA, the Humanist party and Winaq. This implies that 109 deputies elected to the

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National Assembly in 2019 had never held this role before. However, an analysis of the number of first-time deputies in every legislative election since 1995 shows that this number, although it has increased since 2015, remains rather stable. Similarly, the number of deputies who have served three or more terms in that office has remained roughly constant over the past 20 years. The degree of alternation represented by the UNE’s victory in the National Assembly in 2019 should therefore be qualified, especially since the parliamentary group is quickly crossed by internal splits (Table 5.3). The functioning of the UNE political group in the National Assembly during the period 2019–2022 also puts the degree of alternation into perspective. Far from imposing its agenda and voting as a block, and despite the prohibition of “transfugism” (the change of party of a deputy in the middle of the legislature, a common practice in Guatemala) by the new LEPP, the UNE parliamentary group faces a new split, essentially provoked by Torres (like the ones in 2008 and 2011, which led to the creation of the LIDER and Todos parties). It all begins barely a month after the election, when the candidate was arrested and imprisoned, in connection with charges of illegal and undeclared financing of her 2015 electoral campaign. After four months of pre-trial detention and numerous legal twists and turns, she was placed under house arrest in January 2020. She succeeded in getting out of prison, and in December 2021 she obtained the withdrawal by the Constitutional Court of the complaint. The conflict within the UNE parliamentary group arose in January 2020, during the election of the President of the Legislative Assembly: several deputies allied with Torres were criticized by other UNE deputies for not supporting the party’s candidate, but rather the one proposed by the government. Accusations of betrayal were made on both sides: the UNE deputies accused the pro-Sandra deputies of betraying the interests of the party; the anti-Sandra deputies accused the pro-Sandras deputies of betrayal to the party founder. The anti-Sandra group called for her expulsion, accusing her of defending her own interests and trying to prevent a member of her party from becoming Congress president so as not to lose control of the party. In the end, it was the government party’s candidate who took the presidency of the National Assembly, with the support of part of the UNE. A “parliamentary opposition group” of 22 UNE deputies was created, while the other larger group of 30 deputies formed an unofficial alliance with the group of parliamentarians associated with

– – – – 43 21 – –

– – – – – – – – – –

Valor BN FCN Semilla Todos VIVA CREO Humanista WINAQ Victoria

1995

– – – – – – – – – –

– – – – 37 63 – –

1999 32 – – – 17 43 – 47 (PP + MR + PSN) – – – – – – – – – –

2003

– – – – – – – – – –

51 – – 29 2 14 5 37

2007

– – 0 – – 6 (with EG) 12 – – 1

18 (with GANA) – 14 56 2 1 14 –

2011

– – 11 – 18 5 4 (with Unionista) – 2 (with URNG) –

36 – 44 17 3 – 5 –

2015

9 8 8 7 7 7 6 6 4 4

52 17 – – 2 – 12 –

2019

Guatemala: number of deputies per party elected to the National Assembly since 1995 (out of a total of

UNE Vamos LIDER Patriota (PP) PAN FRG UCN GANA

Table 5.3 160)

104 E. GUEVARA

– – – – – – 16 (6 parties) 8

– – – – – – 13 4 parties) 6

1999

Source Author based on data of the TSE

Nombre total de partis à l’AN

PC Unionista URNG Podemos MLP EG Autres

1995 – 7 2 – – – 10 (4 parties) 9

2003 – 7 2 – – 4 6 (2 parties) 11

2007

– – 6 (with VIVA) 3 (1 parties) 12

– 1

2011 – 4 (with CREO) 2 (with Winaq) – – 7 6 (2 parties) 15

2015

19

3 3 3 1 1 0 0

2019

5 GUATEMALA, AN ALTERNATION IN CONTINUITY

105

106

E. GUEVARA

the government. In February 2022, Sandra Torres was once again elected secretary general of the UNE, thus regaining control of the party, despite persistent accusations of illegal financing and the threat of dissolution of the party.4 Whatever the future of the UNE, these different elements lead us to qualify the thesis of the autonomy of the parliamentarians in relation to Torres, who still manages to control the party, against all odds. The splits and alliances with the ruling party in the National Assembly also run counter to the idea of alternation at the legislative level. It remains to be seen how the elections at the municipal level will unfold. 5.3.2

Alternation at the Municipal Level?

The UNE party’s victory is also confirmed at the municipal level, as it won a large majority of the city councils (107 out of 341), including ten of the municipalities that also head the departments. The other parties are far behind, with the UCN coming second with 37 mayorships, while Vamos has only 30. Giammattei’s party won very few departmental chief municipalities, but they were important: Guatemala City, Antigua and Chimaltenango. The MLP, which in the presidential election came first in 46 municipalities and second in 52, did not win any mayoralties. In 51 cases, these were won by the UNE. These results also confirm the strong territorial anchorage of UNE, the only party that has been able to develop solid organizational structures over time and space. A more detailed analysis of the names of the mayoral winners, as well as their party affiliation, shows the diversity of the strategies and negotiations implemented by the UNE (Table 5.4). The party manages to retain only 16 municipalities compared to 2015, 9 of which by having the incumbent mayor reappointed. In the other cases, these are newly conquered localities, especially when the incumbent mayor had won the 2015 elections with one of the defunct parties, LIDER or the Patriot party. In many cases, UNE wins either by poaching the incumbent mayor (or offering a new partisan vehicle), or by offering the name of a former mayor, who was not necessarily attached to UNE in the past. It is the former mayors of LIDER who most easily switch to UNE. This strategy of “poaching” incumbent mayors is not unique to 4 Prensa Libre, 2022, «La UNE de Sandra Torres se convierte en el mayor aliado del oficialismo», 18 march.

5

107

GUATEMALA, AN ALTERNATION IN CONTINUITY

Table 5.4 Guatemala: number of mayors elected by party in municipal elections 2003

2007

2011

2015

2019

UNE

37

103

62

107

UCN Civic Committees Vamos Todos PAN LIDER Patriota GANA FRG FCN Valor CREO PC BN URNG Unionista Fuerza VIVA Humanista Autres

– 27

12 19

120 (UNE and UNE-GANA) 17 18

11 18

37 30

– – 34 – – 76 122 – – – – – 8 9 – – – 18 (5 parties)

– – 13 – 39 78 23 – – – – – 7 24 – – – 14 (7 parties)

– – 5 22 118 3 2 – – 11 – – 4 2 – 5 (with EG) – 7 (6 parties)

– 19 – 130 75 – – – – 13 – – – – 1 1 – 7 (4 parties)

29 19 1 – – – – 19 15 13 13 12 5 5 7 6 7 16 (8 parties)

Source Author based on data of the TSE

UNE; all parties and mayoral candidates have been doing this for many years in a country where parties are often described as “empty shells”. It is therefore difficult in these cases to speak of real alternation at the municipal level in favour of the UNE. However, in some departments, UNE has won municipalities mainly by presenting new candidates who had not previously been mayors. Nevertheless, UNE also lost 41 municipalities. The analysis of the distribution of UNE elected officials according to departments shows that the party manages to double the number of its mayors compared to 2015 by winning very few new mayorships in each territory, but this in all departments. Nevertheless, the municipal panorama remains very fragmented, with no other party managing to do much better than UNE, including in the department of Guatemala City.

108

E. GUEVARA

It can never really be said that one party dominates in a territory, nor that there is a strong degree of alternation compared to 2015, despite the significant renewal of the party offer (Table 5.5). The weakness of party affiliations in Guatemala, including deputies and mayors, therefore makes it difficult to speak of a UNE victory at the legislative and municipal levels, and a strong degree of alternation in Guatemala. On the other hand, the statement that it was not UNE that lost, but Sandra Torres, must also be qualified, since she ended up controlling a large part of the National Assembly. A final key to understanding the form that the territorial fragmentation of the vote takes is that of the territorial divide, which can lead to electoral behaviour depending on the degree of urbanization of the municipality.

Table 5.5 Guatemala: number of town halls reported by UNE in each department since 2007

Alta Verapaz Baja Verapaz Chimaltenango Chiquimula El Progreso Escuintla Guatemala Huehuetenango Izabal Jalapa Jutiapa Petén Quetzaltenango Quiché Retalhuleu Sacatepéquez San Marcos Santa Rosa Sololá Suchitepéquez Totonicapan Zacapa Total de mairies

2007

2011 (alliance UNE-GANA)

2015

2019

4 2 6 2 4 4 5 10 4 1 4 7 4 6 3 4 8 7 7 5 4 2 107

4 0 6 6 1 4 4 16 1 3 7 3 10 11 6 7 10 6 5 4 3 3 120

7 0 4 2 2 3 2 10 2 0 2 5 2 5 0 2 4 0 2 6 0 2 62

3 3 6 4 4 6 6 12 3 4 5 4 7 12 3 2 3 6 3 6 2 1 105

Source Author based on data of the TSE

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Alternation and Territorial Divide

The mapping of the results of the first round of the presidential election shows a very strong difference in electoral behaviour in rural and urban areas, in a country where 51.2% of the population lives in rural areas, more than 62.4% lives in poverty, and 49% of children under five years of age are malnourished. The territorial variable and differences in electoral behaviour are increasingly important, depending on the degree of urbanization of municipalities and the activation of a divide linked to developmental fractures and territorial inequalities. The electoral maps also had a strong tendency to show a clear differentiation between the vote of the departments of the Altiplano (mountainous areas that cross the country, where the main cities are located) and the less populated areas of the north and south of the country, rural and coastal. It was the cities that tended to decide the outcome of the election, as evidenced by the high scores obtained by most candidates in the capital. This situation lasted until 2007, when Alvaro Cólom won the election thanks to the support of the rural areas, whose abstention rate decreased. Sonnleitner (2009: 523) attributes this increased turnout to the creation of new voting centres in rural areas, which brought the ballot boxes closer to the citizens. But also to Cólom’s mobilization strategy in these areas, his ability to forge local alliances with mayors elected by other parties, and his strong territorial base compared to his opponent Pérez Molina. Since this period, the UNE’s territorial mesh has been strongly consolidated, especially in rural areas, and it appears as the most organized and institutionalized party in the country (Reyes Silva 2018). Thus, the analysis of the different voting maps since 2007 shows above all the solidity and consistency over time of the vote for UNE at the departmental level (Fortín 2019: 11). On the other hand, UNE’s electoral base has always been weak in the large metropolitan areas and is even declining in the department of Guatemala City (Table 5.6). Similarly, some authors (Fortín 2019) show how the family assistance program carried by Cólom and Torres, led to an increase in the number of women registered to vote. This can be interpreted as a form of clientelism, as the municipalities with the largest number of poor people benefiting from these programs tend to vote more for UNE and thus for Torres (Fortín and Naveda 2012). But this also reflects a form of inclusion of the low-income population in the political life of rural areas, and a greater degree of national integration. But if Torres’ potential support has grown

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Table 5.6 Guatemala. Percentage of votes obtained in the 2nd round of the 2019 presidential election, by department

Alta Verapaz Baja Verapaz Chimaltenango Chiquimula El Progreso Escuintla Guatemala Huehuetenango Izabal Jalapa Jutiapa Petén Quetzaltenango Quiché Retalhuleu Sacatepéquez San Marcos Santa Rosa Sololá Suchitepéquez Totonicapan Zacapa

AG

ST

36,73% 51,34% 62,35% 46,91% 54,94% 54,29% 74,49% 46,92% 47,49% 43,4% 50,02% 44,64% 70,53% 38,33 50,19 75,77% 50,18 50,57% 50,86% 50,98 58,26% 57,5

63,27 48,66 37,65% 53,09 45,06% 45,71% 25,51% 53,03 52,51 56,6 49,98 55,36 29,47% 61,67 49,81 24,23% 49,82 49,43% 49,14% 49,02 41,74% 42,5

Source Author based on data of the TSE

considerably in rural areas over the past 15 years, how can we explain her failure? Several analyses point to increasing urbanization as a possible explanatory factor. Indeed, the country has experienced a significant increase in its urban population over the past two decades. This phenomenon is linked to high birth rates nationwide, as well as migration of young people to the cities in search of opportunities. This is reflected in the considerable urbanization of medium-sized cities across the country, but also in “rurbanization”, the accelerated urbanization of rural areas around cities. According to Roche Lebeau, Godoy, and Reynoso (2019), the phenomenon of rurbanization occurs essentially “from below”, without urban planning or regulation. It takes the form of medium and extensive industrialization in rural areas, especially in altiplano territories, and it transforms rural settlements into “polycentric geographic spaces that are neither urban nor rural”, as a network built around roads, alternating

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urban, industrial residences and forms of rural habitat. This dispersed growth of habitat adds pressure on agricultural land. The rurban world is also particularly connected, thanks to the telephone and the Internet, while keeping a close link with the rural world. The country is segmented into several types of territories: the metropolitan space of Guatemala City, intermediate cities in the process of rapid urbanization, a rural world composed of much more remote communities and a new “rurban continuum” of territories in transition. These changes affect the functioning of economic and social exchanges between territories, but also the electoral behaviour of the population. Through a cartographic analysis, these authors show that there was a tripartition of the vote in the territory in the first round of the 2015 presidential elections: while Morales won most of the urban territories (the metropolitan area and intermediate cities), Torres won the rural areas and Baldizón the rurban or transitional areas. In the second round, Morales was the most successful in attracting the vote from these rural areas. This was the key to the success of this candidate, managing to get more than a million additional votes compared to the first round. In 2015, the populations living in territories in full transition would have refused to vote Torres. A comparison with the electoral map of the first round of 2019 shows above all a strong advance of the UNE party in rural areas, but also in rural and urban areas of intermediate cities. The rurban vote is dispersed among many parties, especially Vamos, but also for the Humanist Party, and even for the indigenous party Winaq. Thus, the dispersion of the vote was very important in the cities, as shown, for example, by the fact that in the central district of the municipality of Guatemala City, four different parties won at different levels. The territorial explanation is also relevant and interesting for analysing the results obtained by the MLP, which won in 46 municipalities. The analysis of Roche Lebeau, Godoy, and Reynoso shows that this party won in places where the party has a previous territorial base but also in highly connected and growing urban areas. It was not the poor indigenous population that voted for Cabrera: they mostly voted for the UNE. Instead, the entire urban and rurban vote converged in the second round, and voted overwhelmingly against Torres. However, it is difficult to understand how Cabrera’s votes were transferred, since in 24 of the 46 municipalities where she came first, Torres came second. In this way, the indigenous candidate clearly competed with the UNE in territories where it had been well established for many years, such as Totonicapán and Quiché.

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What is new is that the voting behaviour of “rurbans” is much more difficult to predict than that of clearly urban or rural populations. They would be more likely to vote for outsiders, such as Morales, but also Cabrera or Mulet, as opposed to Torres. Recall that in 2015, most of the protests took place in cities and urban areas. The rurbans would not recognize themselves in the eminently rural agenda of Torres, despite the “conservative” stunt she would have made during the 2019 election campaign. The word “conservative” is understood in the sense of preserving social class structures, privileges of elites, especially entrepreneurial ones, and promoting security. If, as Sonnleitner (2009) argues, political cleavages in Guatemala are activated primarily in the runoff, it would be possible to argue that the urban–rural cleavage, which is primarily affected by issues of class and social mobility, but also by the “morality” of politicians (e.g., rejection of corruption), is the one that best explains voting behaviour in Guatemala. Thus, the increasing urbanization of the country would be unfavourable to Torres, despite the relative strength of her partisan structure. This is a working hypothesis, which is not yet sufficiently supported by empirical data, but it is particularly interesting because it articulates the reflection on the territorial divide with the programmatic content of the candidates. Integrating the study of the territorial divide also makes it possible to explain electoral behaviour in Guatemala and the mechanics of the alternation in greater detail, which is something that the classic variables do not allow us to do today.

5.5

Conclusion

In this chapter, we have tried to show that, despite the change of party at the head of the state, talking about an alternation in Guatemala in 2019 is not so obvious. Indeed, what the 2019 elections show above all is the failure of the 2015 mobilizations to produce a change in the functioning of the political system. These social movements demanded above all the creation of mechanisms for the renewal of the political class, and access to the electoral race for a greater number of citizens, as well as an end to the ways of the “old politics”. In this sense, the main demand of these protests was that of alternation. Four years later, the results are particularly disappointing: not only was the electoral reform insufficient in substance, but the election was conducted in a manner quite similar to previous ones, favouring long-established political figures who implemented very classic and decried strategies (clientelism, “transfugalism”,

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localism, personalism), at all levels. Despite the breakthrough of two new figures from two new parties, it was personalities well known to the public who reached the second round. The election results thus demonstrate the importance of historical cleavages, such as territoriality, which deeply divide a highly unequal country. The hypothesis that the UNE is strong and no longer needs its candidate has also been widely qualified: as the analysis of the results of legislative and municipal elections over a longer period shows, while it is true that the UNE is a strong and stable party over time, it is above all personal strategies that make the candidates win, whose partisan affiliation is often weak. The UNE’s strength therefore often comes from its ability to negotiate with local caciques. On the other hand, as evidenced by Torres’ recent victory in her party’s third defeat and the extent of “sandrophobia” in the cities, it is far from abandoning electoral competition. With one year to go until the next general elections in 2023, the scenario is one of continuity in the functioning of the political system in Guatemala.

References Artiga-González, Álvaro, 2000, Partidos políticos y sistemas de partidos en Centroamérica, San Salvador, Fundaungo. CID-Gallup, 2019, Tercera Encuesta Nacional de Opinión Pública, Fundación Libertad y Desarrollo, 17 july. El Periódico, 2015, «Jueza dicta medidas a favor de Sandra Torres», 21 Mai. Estrada Tobar, Javier, 2019, «Todo sobre Sandra: los mitos, los pobres, el narco y más», Nómada, 30 April. Fortín, Javier, 2010, «Transfuguismo parlamentario en Guatemala: algunas causas», América latina Hoy, 54, pp. 141–166. Fortín, Javier, 2019, «Entre el clivaje social y el clientelismo: una posible explicación de los resultados electorales del 2019», Universidad Francisco Marroquin. Fortin, Javier, and Naveda, Enrique, 2012, «Inciden las transferencias condicionadas en las elecciones? El caso de Mi Familia Progresa», Espacios Politicos, V, 6, pp. 27–44 Iyengar, Shanto, Sood Gaurav, and Lelkes, Yphtach, 2012, «Affect, not ideology. A social identity perspective on polarisation», Public Opinion Quarterly, 76, 3, pp. 405–431. IIDH, 2011, Un acercamiento a la participación política desde la dimensión de la pobreza, IIDH/CAPEL, Costa Rica

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Latinobarómetro, 2018, Informe 2018, Santiago de Chile. Lebeau, Jean Roch, Godoy, Quique, et Reynoso, Jonathan, 2019, «Segunda vuelta : Torres o Giammattei, un análisis territorial», Plaza Pública, 22 June. Lemus, Jonatan, 2019, «El camino al autoritarismo competitivo en Guatemala: un análisis de los resultados de la primera vuelta de las elecciones 2019», Centro para el análisis de las decisiones públicas, Universidad Francisco Marroquin. Meléndez, Carlos, 2015, «Guatemala: una democracia sin partidos», Revista Latinoamericana de Política Comparada, 10, pp. 173–197. Mendoza, Carlos, 2015, «No sólo por la coyuntura vota el votante», Plaza Pública, 22 september. Parthenay, Kévin, 2020, Crises en Amérique latine. Les démocraties déracinées, Armand Colin. Prensa Libre, 2019, «Gobierno bajo la lupa de los guatemaltecos», 4 april. Prensa Libre, 2022, «La UNE de Sandra Torres se convierte en el mayor aliado del oficialismo», 18 March. Reyes Silva, Gabriel Eduardo, 2018, La institucionalidad del partido Unidad Nacional de la Esperanza, Université Rafael Landivar, Guatemala. Rodríguez Quiroa, Luisa Fernanda, 2018, Plaza Pública, «Ley electoral y de partidos. Las reformas que cambian la forma pero no el fondo», 26 february. Sonnleitner, Willibald, 2009, «Dos décadas de elecciones en Guatemala : en las fronteras de la democratización», Estudios Sociológicos, 27, 80, pp. 509–549. Torrez-Rivas, Edelberto, 2011, Revoluciones sin cambios revolucionarios. Ensayos sobre la crisis en Centroamérica, Guatemala, F&G Editores. TSE, Memorias electorales de 1999, 2003, 2007, 2011, 2015, 2019, República de Guatemala. Wall, David; Lehoucq, Fabrice Edouard, 1997, «Social and spatial characteristics of voter turnout in Guatemala: the 1985 elections», Yearbook, 23, pp. 133– 149. Zelaya Rosales, Raquel, 2020, «Desafíos de las elecciones en Guatemala. Crisis de representación y legitimidad, y la implementación de reformas electorales», Revista de Derecho Electoral, 29, pp. 223-234.

CHAPTER 6

The Return of the Divided Rights: Alternations in Peru Gustavo Pastor

The objective of this chapter is to explore the main characteristics of the Peruvian political process between 2016 and 2021 that have caused various alternations within a single democratic period. Let us remember that this country has experienced the exceptional figure of five presidents in a single five-year term. To understand the causes of this strong political instability, we will analyse the behaviour of the actors, the electoral competition, the dynamics of confrontation between the legislative and executive powers, as well as all the difficulties generated by the governability of the country. We argue that this extreme political instability was produced by the conjunction of two parallel processes. On the one

G. Pastor (B) University of El Pacifico, Jesús María, Peru e-mail: [email protected]

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023, corrected publication 2023 O. Dabène (ed.), Latin America’s Pendular Politics, Studies of the Americas, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-26761-1_6

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hand, an extreme rejection of the political elites that have shown themselves incapable of solving the main problems of the country. Indeed, this deep disapproval is the cause of the constant alternations and electoral surprises that have marked the recent history of this country. This deep rejection was further exacerbated by the Odebrecht affair that marked the period. On the other hand, to this dissatisfaction with the electoral offer was added an extreme political instability produced by the permanent confrontation between the executive and the legislative power. This extreme confrontation is part of the difficulties of the Peruvian political system in maintaining a balance of power when a government has not obtained significant representation in Parliament. This situation has caused several governments in the past to find it impossible to govern because of too much opposition from the legislative branch.1 Exploring the causes of the extreme political instability seems to us very important to understand the logic of the Peruvian political transitions. In line with the objectives of this book, we will analyse the modalities, temporalities and contents of political alternations in Peru (2016–2021). To do so, we will rely on empirical data and on the theoretical framework proposed in the introduction to this book—five factors facilitating power shifts (institutions, public opinion, political offer, electoral behaviour, history/context) and the nine indicators (re-election, quality of democracy, support for the incumbent president, legitimacy of democracy, polarization, participation, volatility, trivialization of powershifts, inflation)—in order to be able to detect the peculiarities of the political changes in this Andean country. In order to explore the various power-shifts, we will divide this chapter into four parts. In the first part, we will present the political power-shift (2016) that allowed the return of a divided right to power. Then, we will review the consequences of the Odebrecht case on the Peruvian political class. In the third part, we will discuss the non-electoral power-shift produced by the resignation of President Kuczynski. Finally, we will examine the new changeover opened by the dissolution of the Parliament, which will see the renewal of almost all the political personnel in power.

1 CONTRERAS, Carlos, CUERTO, Marcos, Historia del Perú contemporáneo, Lima, IEP, 5 ed., 2013.

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The Return in Force of a Divided Right

The 2016 general elections allowed the neoliberal right to regain control of the political apparatus. Nevertheless, the results of these elections were extremely close. The main problem with this new alternation is going to be the extreme polarization between the executive and legislative branches.2 The cause of this extreme polarization must be sought in the deep wounds caused by the split in the Peruvian far right. These wounds, combined with the possibility of using their strength in Parliament to try to improve their position in the next elections, will be the source of great political instability. The vulnerability of the new government, unable to obtain significant political representation in Parliament, also explains much of this political instability, and why it will continue even after the dissolution of the Fujimorist Parliament. The Popular Force party and its leader Keiko Fujimori arrived very well positioned for the 2016 electoral process. The members of the teams of this political party had gained a lot of experience in the previous campaign (2011). From that moment, this party had begun an important work of strengthening its political committees mainly within the country. Also, the thirty-seven Fujimorist parliamentarians had managed to maintain a critical and coherent discourse on their extreme right-wing neoliberal positions under the Humala government. All this discreet work placed Keiko Fujimori among the favourite candidates for the next elections and in a way, convinced her political entourage that they would win the next presidential elections easily. In the first round of the election of 2016, Keiko Fujimori had managed to maintain a significant lead ahead of her rivals. This candidate never went down below 30% of voting intentions, far ahead of her main competitors. On the other hand, Pedro Pablo Kuczynski had been a very unstable candidate, but who could count on a solid support of a non-negligible part of the economic elites and the media. In the end, Kuczynski qualified for the second round without really convincing most Peruvian voters, garnering almost half the votes obtained by Keiko Fujimori (Table 6.1).

2 PASTOR, Gustavo, “Pérou : la difficile cohabitation démocratique”, in Olivier Dabène (ed.), Amérique latine. L’année politique 2018/Les Etudes du CERI , nos. 252–253, January 2019 [online], pp. 31–36.

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Table 6.1 First round election results (top five candidates) in Peru

Candidate

Political party

Number of votes

Percentages

Keiko Fujimori Pedro Pablo Kuczynski

Popular Force

6,115,073

39.8%

Peruvians for Change

3,228,661

21%

Source Oficina Nacional de Procesos Electorales (ONPE)

The main feature of these results is the extreme right’s control of the Peruvian Parliament. The large gap in votes obtained by Popular Force candidates at the national level ahead of their main competitors was amplified by the proportional representation system (d’Hondt system) and by the small number of seats allocated to each region. This amplification allowed the Fujimorist party to obtain 73 of the 130 seats in Parliament. That is, with 40% of the votes obtained in the first round, the Popular Force party was awarded 56% of the seats in Parliament, a simple majority. Another very important feature of this first round was the strong dispersion of votes among the other five political forces that managed to pass the electoral threshold (5% of valid votes). The Left became the second political force in Parliament with 20 seats, while Pedro Pablo Kuczynski’s party obtained only 18. All the other forces (rather different tendencies from the centre) controlled less than 20 seats in Parliament, making it very difficult to build solid alliances to try to balance the parliamentary power of the Fujimorists (Table 6.2). The presidential election runoff was more competitive. Many voters who did not want to support the daughter of the former dictator supported the candidacy of Pedro Pablo Kuczynski. Indeed, the main characteristic of this ballot was the extreme confrontation between the two political sensibilities that have divided the country since the 2000s: fujimorism and anti-fujimorism.3 Pedro Pablo Kuczynski’s candidacy did not succeed (despite the alignment of all anti-fujimorism behind him) in connecting with the popular sectors of society that considered him too distant, too elitist, too white. On the other hand, Keiko Fujimori managed to stay on top of the polls thanks to the projection of an image of a more determined and credible politician, closer to the working classes 3 PASTOR, Gustavo, “Pérou : la difficile cohabitation démocratique", Op. cit, p. 31.

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Table 6.2 Results of the 2016 parliamentary elections in Peru

Political party

Popular Force Peruvians for change Broad Front Alliance for Progress APRA Popular action

Number of votes at the national level

119

Seats obtained Percentage in of seats Parliament in Parliament

4,431,077

73

56.1%

2,007,710

18

13.8%

1,700,052 1,125,682

20 9

15.3% 6.9%

5 5

3.8% 3.8%

1,013,735 877,734

Source Oficina Nacional de Procesos Electorales (ONPE)

(especially after the first presidential debate). The electoral strategies of both sides were gradually increasing in power while being particularly defamatory towards their political rivals. Kuczynski understood very well that in order to win this election, he had to polarize and rely on the antiFujimorist sectors of Peruvian society. This meant making alliances with progressive sectors and making constant attacks on the dictatorial past of the Fujimori family. One week before the election, all the polls gave Keiko Fujimori in head of the electoral preferences with approximately five points of advance. All the anti-Fujimorist forces supported the candidacy of Pedro Pablo Kuczynski. After a few days of uncertainty, Pedro Pablo Kuczynski finally beat Keiko Fujimori with only 42,000 votes.4 This surprising result was obviously disputed by the Fujimorists who were convinced of the existence of a fraud organized to steal the presidential election. The Fujimorist leaders denounced a series of irregularities that prevented various groups of voters from voting and that were sure to favour their candidate. Disappointment with the results and the wounds opened by a highly defamatory campaign prompted the extreme right to launch a political war from Parliament against the right-wing president and his allies. This decision was relayed by the other camp of the democratic right, which, 4 Official data published by the Oficina Nacional de Procesos Electorales (ONPE) in Peru.

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with these actions, contributed to the rise of this political polarization. In addition to this extreme political polarization, there was a series of corruption scandals, most notably the Odebrecht affair, which highlighted decades of bribes paid by the construction company to high-level public officials and politicians.

6.2 Hurricane Odebrecht on the Peruvian Political Class The United States Department of Justice released an explosive piece of information in late 2016: a dozen countries in the region received millions of dollars in bribes from the Odebrecht company in exchange for infrastructure contracts between 2001 and 2016. These countries included Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, the Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Guatemala, Mexico, Panama, Peru, and Venezuela. The Peruvian authorities initiated an investigation and asked the United States authorities to provide them with all available information regarding illicit acts committed in the country. The Attorney General of the Nation (Pablo Sanchez) coordinated the formation of a “special team” to investigate all the serious accusations against the Brazilian company. The great novelty of this initiative lay in the competence and honesty of the professionals of the special team. Their investigations quickly began to bear fruit and severely complicated the legal situation of many businessmen, public officials and politicians. The work of the prosecutors to clear up this case opened Pandora’s box of political corruption in Peru, bringing to light a vast system of spoils between politicians and contractors in the irregular awarding of large infrastructure works.5 The officials who had given their authorization to favour the interests of the Brazilian company were the first to be questioned by the courts. Also, the businessmen who had maintained privileged commercial relations with Odebrecht were heard by the prosecutors. Many of them became effective collaborators, agreeing to share key information about certain corruption cases in exchange for reduced sentences. At the same time, prosecutors on the task force signed agreements with senior Odebrecht officials in exchange for privileged

5 DURAND, Francisco, Odebrecht: la empresa que capturaba gobiernos, Lima, PUCP, 2018.

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information. In this way, the top executives of the Brazilian company in Peru began to provide key information about many cases of corruption and the names of political figures involved in receiving bribes. Many political authorities at the local, regional, and national levels were investigated by prosecutors and their names disclosed in the press. As a result, many former presidents and candidates found themselves in the trouble. Indeed, the investigations of the Odebrecht task force contributed to the extreme polarization between the executive and the legislature. The investigations of the special team had the effect of a hurricane that progressively complicated the legal situation of almost all the Peruvian presidents of the XXI century (except Valentin Paniagua), as well as that of many local and regional authorities. Alejandro Toledo (2001–2006) was the first former president to be accused of having received the sum of 30 million dollars from Odebrecht for the works contracts of the South Inter-Oceanic Highway. For this reason, Toledo is currently under house arrest and awaiting extradition proceedings from the United States to Peru. Former president Alan Garcia (2006–2011) was also investigated by the special team for his numerous links with the Brazilian company. Particularly, on the suspicions of corruption that weighed on contracts of the line one of the Lima subway, the South Interoceanic Highway, the two millionaire conferences in Sao Paulo that Odebrecht had paid to Garcia, as well as the numerous indications of corruption that involved the companies of his personal secretary (Luis Nava) and another character suspected to be his main nominee (Miguel Atala). On April 17, 2019, prosecutors from the task force arrived at Alan Garcia’s home in the residential neighbourhood of Miraflores to make his arrest. Garcia requested permission to call his lawyer from his room, only to take advantage of the opportunity to end his life. Former President Ollanta Humala (2011–2016) was also investigated by the special team based on suspicions of corruption related to the southern gas pipeline and money laundering of contributions made by Odebrecht during his presidential campaigns in 2006 and 2011. On July 13, 2017, he was preventively incarcerated for nine months with his wife Nadine Heredia. Currently, the Humala couple is at liberty but awaits the start of their trial in court. For her part, Keiko Fujimori has also been investigated for laundering money from Odebrecht donations during her 2011 campaign. The political capital of Keiko Fujimori and the Popular Force party began to crumble because of this corruption case and their systematic defence in Parliament of the judges and prosecutors involved in the “cuellos blancos del Puerto” corruption case.

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Much of the information about the Odebrecht case was continuously filtered through the media by the prosecutors of the task force, leading some groups to use these revelations as political weapons to destabilize their rivals. Indeed, the effective work of the prosecutors in the Odebrecht case has contributed (as we will see later) to prolonging political instability through the progressive revelations about corrupt political figures. This information reserved for investigations swept away a part of the Peruvian political class that was very strongly involved in this system of economic prebends.

6.3

Non-electoral Alternations Within the Government

The Kuczynski administration was characterized by the impossibility of governing because of too much political confrontation with the Parliament controlled by the extreme right. At first, the government tried to calm this polarization by giving in on several points with the Fujimorists, but the Popular Force parliamentarians had no intention of negotiating. On the contrary, they used their large majority in the legislature to try to destabilize the executive by all means. The constant questioning, resignations and censures of ministers complicated the continuity of government public policy. When the Fujimorists tried to force the resignation of the second Minister of Education, Marilú Martens, the Kuczynski government decided to confront the Popular Force party in Parliament more vigorously. However, the Fujimorists immediately moved up the ladder in their policy of destabilization with the censure of Prime Minister Fernando Zavala and all his ministers just fourteen months into the Kuczynski five-year term. At that time, the executive had already been the subject of five interpellations, one censure and two questions of confidence. During his term, Pedro Pablo Kuczynski appeared to be a relatively weak president in the face of the Fujimorist parliamentarians. It seems that he did not really understand the nature of his political rival. His democratic mores were not compatible with the authoritarian mores of the Peruvian extreme right. The work of the task force once again ignited the political arena when prosecutors began to investigate evidence of corruption against the president. Kuczynski was suspected of influence peddling for Odebrecht when he was Minister of the Economy and Prime Minister in the Toledo administration. These serious accusations served as an excuse for the Fujimorist

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opposition to immediately call for his resignation. President Kuczynski managed to survive the first impeachment motion thanks to the antiFujimorist forces in Parliament and, above all, to the surprising help of Alberto Fujimori’s youngest son. Indeed, Kenji Fujimori and a group of Fujimorist parliamentarians decided to break with their political party following a series of negotiations benefiting the former dictator. A few days later, Kuczynski signed a humanitarian pardon for former president Alberto Fujimori. This proved to be his most serious political error insofar as this decision would cost him the instantaneous loss of support of all the anti-Fujimorist forces who had supported him since the beginning of his mandate. Numerous civil society associations for the defence of human rights have come out to protest the humanitarian pardon of the former dictator, and left-wing parliamentarians initiated a new impeachment procedure against the head of state. President Kuczynski, alone against the Fujimorists, was forced to resign, opening the door to a nonelectoral alternation within the government with the arrival in power of his vice-president, Martin Vizcarra. He was an engineer from the region of Moquegua and was not well known to the general public. His ideology was more in line with the progressive centre and his style was much closer to the population. President Vizcarra had a much more pragmatic and populist style than his predecessor. Moreover, Vizcarra knew how to show himself as a much more energetic politician and he managed to gradually build an image of a good manager who was not afraid to confront corruption firmly. He travelled to all regions of the country, applied professional political communication (with the help of his Argentine advisor Maximiliano Aguiar) and took every opportunity to criticize the Parliament. In this way, and thanks to this new discourse, President Vizcarra established a very positive image of his person among the public opinion, which allowed him to gradually rise in the polls. In fact, Martín Vizcarra revolutionized the levels of approval of the Peruvian presidents during the last two decades, managing to maintain always above the 50% of favourable opinions and arriving at the highest moment of his approval to 79%.6 The local elections (2018) were another important moment in the political renewal of all regional and municipal authorities. This election presented two main characteristics. On the one hand, they confirmed an 6 According to the Ipsos Peru poll Martín Vizcarra’s approval has reached its highest level in September 13, 2019.

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electoral trait that had persisted for some decades: the Peruvian political parties are not very popular at the local level. In these elections, the majority of those elected to the 1,678 district mayorships, 196 provincial mayorships and 25 regional presidents came from local or regional political movements.7 This confirmed that political parties, although very important in general elections, are gradually losing their representativeness at the subnational level. The second feature of these results was the decision of the population to punish those political parties that were perceived to be in favour of defending corrupt judges and unnecessarily confronting the government of President Vizcarra (especially Popular Force and APRA). Both political parties emerged from the elections very weak: Force Popular won barely three provincial mayoralties and APRA only one.8 With his increasingly populist leadership, President Vizcarra continued to win greater support among the Peruvian people and to confront the Fujimorist parliamentarians, taking advantage of Keiko Fujimori’s thirteen-month pre-trial detention following the Odebrecht affair. The very good political reflexes of president Vizcarra allowed him to succeed in changing the dynamics of the relation of power between his government and the legislature, constantly using the card of the legal possibility of dissolving the Parliament if this one refuses once again to grant his confidence to one of his ministerial cabinets9 and by using his wide support in the public opinion to maintain the Fujimorist parliamentarians against the ropes. The president even forced parliamentarians to undertake a series of judicial and political reforms, foreshadowing motions to censure his government. Under the threat of a possible closure of the legislative power, the parliamentarians decided to accept the terms of the president. Vizcarra also called a referendum for the people to give their opinion on the proposed reforms. In this hectic atmosphere, the confrontation with Parliament would last for a long time because

7 MUÑOZ, Paula, “El entusiasmo de los que no entusiasman: descentralización y competencia electoral en el Perú”, En Perú Hoy, n.3, 2018, pp. 91–107. 8 MUÑOZ, Paula, “Gobernabilidad y desarrollo subnacional: problemas de la baja calidad de la democracia”, In Agenda 2014. Propuestas para mejorar la décentralización, Lima, Universidad del Pacífico, 2014. 9 The constitution allows the president to dissolve parliament if there have been two denials of confidence to the government. The denial of confidence to the Zavala government opened this possibility for the Vizcarra government.

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of the many issues that prompted the president to propose during his annual address to the nation (2019) to shorten the terms of office of the executive and the legislature in order to call for new general elections. The Parliament refused this proposal and preferred to prolong the political instability that weighs each time more on all other aspects of social life. The confrontation between the Parliament and the Executive increased until President Vizcarra decided to constitutionally dissolve the Parliament. The President took advantage of a new confrontation in the election of new members of the Constitutional Court to close down the legislative branch, arguing a tacit denial of the motion of confidence presented by Prime Minister Del Solar that same day in Parliament. The president called for new elections in January 2020 to elect new members of Parliament. This decision, although very controversial, was massively supported by the population and was corroborated a few months later by the Constitutional Court.10

6.4 The Renewal of All Peruvian Political Personnel The dissolution of the Fujimorist-majority Parliament opened a new space for political change. Peruvian voters were indifferent to the election of new parliamentarians, who would remain in office for only 18 months. A week before the election, the Ipsos Peru poll gave the favoured party, Popular Action, barely 10 per cent of the vote,11 while undecided voters accounted for 46 per cent. The large number of candidates and the inability to buy commercials in the private media made it difficult for the contenders to stand out from their competitors. The results were ultimately quite surprising. They showed a strong dispersion of forces in the new Parliament (especially compared to the previous one), which now had two right-wing parties (36 seats), four centre parties (67 seats) and three left-wing parties (37 seats). Peruvian voters seemed to have wanted to punish once again the parties associated with the impunity of recent years (Force Popular went from 73 to 15 parliamentarians, APRA and National Solidarity got no parliamentarians at all) and to have chosen political

10 The population according to the Ipsos Peru poll approved 85% of the decision of the president to close the parliament (13 September 2019). 11 Ipsos Peru poll published in the newspaper El Comercio on January 19, 2020.

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groups that embodied some form of break with the traditional political elites.12 Thus, 23 per cent of the vote went to groups that were not even considered by the main electoral polls. The evangelical group Frepap was the biggest surprise of the elections, emerging as the third largest force in Parliament with a moral-religious discourse unheard of on the continent. These results, together with a high rate of abstention (25.3%) and numerous invalid (16.93%) and blank (2.35%) votes, undoubtedly signified a rejection of the entire Peruvian political class (67.9%) (Table 6.3). The results of the parliamentary elections (2020) radically changed the correlation of forces within the legislative branch. That said, this change did not necessarily contribute as expected to the greater governability of the country. President Vizcarra’s big mistake was not to present a list of candidates to Parliament that could offer stability to his government in the legislative branch. In fact, one of the main characteristics of this new Parliament (compared to previous ones) is that it was composed of a large majority of parliamentarians with no previous experience. The 2018 reforms included a ban on the immediate re-election of parliamentarians. This impossibility of re-election leads experienced political party officials to prefer to wait until the 2021 general election to run. In addition, the balance of power between the executive and the legislature had shifted once again in favour of Parliament, as the president, according to the constitution, lost any possibility of dissolving Parliament one year before the end of his term. The polarization between the legislative and executive branches was increasing with another aggravating factor: the Covid-19 pandemic.13 Peru became progressively in 2020 one of the most affected countries in the world by the Covid-19, appearing during months in the second position in the classification of the countries with the biggest quantity of deaths per hundred thousand inhabitants. The cruel images of this pandemic in Peru were seen all over the world: thousands of people walking to their regions fleeing the misery in the cities, the sick dying 12 PASTOR, Gustavo, “Les Élections Législatives Péruviennes”, in O. Dabène (Ed.), Amérique Latine. L’année Politique 2020/Les Etudes Du CERI , nos. 252–253, January 2021 [Online], pp. 75–78. 13 VERGARA, Alberto, “La crisis del COVID-19 como Aleph peruano”, En América Latina: Del estallido al COVID, ROJAS, R. y PETTINA, V. (Eds.), Lima, Ed. Planeta, 2020.

17%

19%

12%

15

Popular Agricultu ral Front of Peru (Frepap)

12%

15

Popular force

Compilation by the company. Source National Electoral Processes Office (ONPE)

22

25

Number of seats in parliament Percentage of seats in parliament

Alliance for Progress

Popular action

January 2020 parliamentary election results in Peru

Parties Policies

Table 6.3

10%

13

Union for Peru

8%

11

Podemos Perú

8%

11

Somos Perú

7%

9

Broad front

7%

9

Purpl e Party

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in the streets because of the collapse of the sanitary system, the families lining up for days to get oxygen balloons, etc. Indeed, this pandemic made visible the unresolved structural problems of Peruvian society: the extreme socio-economic inequalities, the dominant role of informal work, the deficient state capacities, etc. The effects of the Covid-19 health crisis undoubtedly fell most heavily on the most disadvantaged families in terms of income. Indeed, the acute economic crisis caused by the severe containment has pushed many Peruvian families back into poverty and exposing them to severe economic stress. In the midst of all these crises, the political confrontation between the legislative and the executive was growing, and the Parliament legislated on a series of areas that complicate the government’s tasks. However, the work of the special team tended once again to complicate the political chessboard from the moment a new investigation was opened on Martín Vizcarra. Indeed, the Odebrecth case had allowed us to discover the existence of a Peruvian cartel of big companies of construction known as the “Club of the Construction”. This construction cartel included various national and foreign companies that systematically agreed on prices and on the companies that should be included in the bids for major infrastructure projects offered by the Peruvian government. This construction club provided a commission that varied between 3 and 8% of the price of the work to be distributed in various forms of bribes. When prosecutors listened to the testimonies of the bosses of these companies (who had become immunized witness), the name of Martin Vizcarra emerged in two corruption cases that involved the Obrainsa companies and the ICCGSA-Incot consortium for acts committed during his period as regional governor of Moquegua. The parliamentarians presented two motions of censure against Vizcarra as his legal situation became more complicated with the appearance of evidence provided by the immunized witness. Finally, the same Parliament that had been created by Vizcarra’s decision to dissolve the previous Parliament voted to impeach the President, thus provoking a new great political crisis that added to the health and economic crisis. This new political crisis opened the doors to a new alternation that implied the transfer of the executive power to the president of the Parliament, since the second vicepresident Mercedes Aráoz had resigned a few months before just after wanting to take the place of Vizcarra when the latter had decided to close the previous Parliament.

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The unexpected fall of Vizcarra opened the door to a new non-electoral alternation, this time to the progressive centre. This new transition was much more difficult to implement because the Parliament’s decision to remove President Vizcarra was based on a very limited level of legitimacy. About 90 per cent of the population, according to all opinion polls, were opposed to the removal of President Vizcarra from office and believed that he should finish his term before being investigated by the courts.14 The very expeditious manner in which the Parliament proceeded to remove the president also opened the door to all sorts of suspicions. The political actions of parliamentary president Manuel Merino de Lama (Popular Action) and his collaborators reinforced the impression that there was a group that wanted to seize power by any means necessary to try to neutralize the advances made in the fight against corruption and the progress made through various reforms (such as the university reform). The legal formula of “impeachment by permanent moral incapacity” was controversial because this legal figure had been designed in the nineteenth century for cases of insanity or serious mental illness. A large part of the population immediately came out to show their support for President Vizcarra and their indignation at the oath of Manuel Merino de Lama as the new president. Indeed, the transfer of political power took place in an atmosphere where thousands of people protested in the streets of several regions of the country. The new president appointed a very conservative government with experienced right-wing figures such as Prime Minister Antero Flores-Aráoz. The numerous peaceful demonstrations by the (mainly young) population in the streets of various parts of the country continued to grow. The Merino government decided to deal with this atmosphere of social unrest by means of firm police repression, which exacerbated the violence in the streets as the young people fiercely confronted the police each time. After forty-eight hours of violent repression, in which two young people died and hundreds of demonstrators and police officers were injured, the Merino government, faced with the indignation that this indiscriminate repression caused among citizens of all political persuasions, had no alternative but to resign. The forced fall of the flamboyant Merino administration left the country, once again, in a new political impasse. The board of directors of the Parliament was forced to resign because of the massive rejection by 14 According to the survey conducted on November 18, 2020 by the Instituto de Estudios Peruanos (IEP).

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the population of the situation that this Parliament had created. Negotiations started between the different parliamentary groups to try to quickly appoint a new board of the Parliament. Popular pressure in the streets demanding a dignified exit from this new political crisis finally forced the parliamentarians to agree that the next board of directors should be chosen from among the nineteen parliamentarians who had voted against the impeachment of Martin Vizcarra. The first proposal was rejected by all the parliamentarians because the figure of Rocio Silva Santisteban (Broad Front) was considered too far to the left. The next day, a new vote succeeded in placing the Violet Party parliamentarian Francisco Sagasti at the head of Parliament. The parliamentarians’ vote legitimized the new configuration of executive power, because the new president of the Parliament, Francisco Sagasti (progressive centre), was to serve as president of the Republic for a period of ten months, and the vice-president of the Parliament, Mirtha Vasquéz (left), was to head the board of directors of the legislative branch during that same period. The election of the Parliament was much more legitimate in the eyes of Peruvian citizens because the figure of Francisco Sagasti (a 76-year-old conciliatory intellectual) at the head of the executive branch has given more peace to the demonstrators who were still in the streets. The country was entering a new alternation with new authorities in the executive and legislative branches. The confrontation between the executive and legislative powers continued in this transitional period, maintaining the high levels of political instability that had characterized this Andean country for the past five years. In the end, this extreme political instability has not been beneficial for anyone, since almost all the authorities of the Peruvian Parties for Change and Popular Force that had been elected to the positions of the executive and legislative powers in 2016, were no longer in their respective positions in March 2021. Also, this permanent political confrontation added to the numerous corruption scandals and accentuated the chronic refusal of the voters towards the political elites. That favoured the election of the outsider Pedro Castillo to the presidency of the Republic in 2021.

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References CONTRERAS, Carlos, CUERTO, Marcos, Historia del Perú contemporáneo, Lima, IEP, 5 ed., 2013. DABENE, Olivier, “Uses and misuses of the ‘left’ category in Latin America”, In Manuel Balánand Françoise Montambeault (ed.), Legacies of the left turn in Latin America, edited by , Notre Dame, University of Notre Dame Press, 2020, pp. 347–369. DURAND, Francisco, Odebrecht: la empresa que capturaba gobiernos, Lima, PUCP, 2018. INSTITUTO NACIONAL DE ESTADISTICAS E INFORMATICA (INEI), Panorama de la economía peruana 1950–1919, Lima, Publicación electrónica, 2020. LEVITSKY, Steven, ZIBLATT, Daniel, ¿Cómo mueren las democracias?, México, Ed. Ariel, 2018. MUÑOZ, Paula, “Gobernabilidad y desarrollo subnacional: problemas de la baja calidad de la democracia”, In Agenda 2014. Propuestas para mejorar la descentralización, Lima, Universidad del Pacífico, 2014. MUÑOZ, Paula, “El entusiasmo de los que no entusiasman: descentralización y competencia electoral en el Perú”, In Perú Hoy, n. 3, 2018, pp. 91–107. PASTOR, Gustavo, “Pérou : la difficile cohabitation démocratique”, In Olivier Dabène (dir. ), Amérique latine. L’année politique 2018/Les Etudes du CERI , nos. 252–253, January 2019 [online], pp. 31–36. PASTOR, Gustavo, “Les élections législatives péruviennes”, In O. Dabène (ed.), Amérique latine. L’année politique 2020/Les Etudes du CERI , nos. 252–253, January 2021 [online], pp. 75–78. QUIROZ, Alfonso, Historia de la corrupción en el Perú, Lima, Lima, IEP, 2013. VERGARA, Alberto, “La crisis del COVID-19 como Aleph peruano%”, In R. ROJAS y V. PETTINA (Eds.), América Latina: Del estallido al COVID, , Lima, Ed. Planeta, 2020.

PART II

Progressist Alternations

CHAPTER 7

Polarization, Depolarization, and (Re)polarization: The 2019 Electoral Process and a New Alternation in Argentine Democracy Darío Rodríguez

The victory of Alberto Fernández in the presidential elections inaugurated the fifth cycle of political alternation in Argentina since the transition to democracy in 1983. While the 2015 elections were marked by the unprecedented arrival in power of a centre-right political force, four years later, and for the first time in thirty-six years of democratic stability, an incumbent president failed his re-election project and a non-Peronist force had to give up power (Casullo, 2019, p. 1). Unlike other periods in

D. Rodríguez (B) Paris Sorbonne University, Paris, France e-mail: [email protected]

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023, corrected publication 2023 O. Dabène (ed.), Latin America’s Pendular Politics, Studies of the Americas, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-26761-1_7

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the country’s history, the antagonisms that feed the conflictive nature of any democracy were once again processed through institutional channels, confirming the place of the vote as the principle of legitimacy of political decision-making.1 Despite the serious deterioration of the economic and social situation, the authoritarian exits and the political crises that overwhelmed the country in the past were avoided. The defeat of Mauricio Macri finally marked the end of the process started in 2015 after the cycle of the “turn to the left” inaugurated with the victory of Hugo Chávez in December 1998 (Levitsky and Roberts, 2015). Two elements distinguish the Argentinean case from the other national cases of the second electoral cycle (2016–2019): (a) Macri was the only candidate who failed to win a presidential re-election; (b) Alberto Fernandez’s victory was the first election that marked an ideological change in the region.2 Our general goal is to classify this new alternation process at the national level of representation (executive authority and legislative power) and to identify the factors that have favoured it. To do this, we rely on the theoretical and methodological framework proposed in the introduction to this collective work. The classification exercise will suppose specifically the observation of the following indicators: (1) the degree of alternation (intensity); (2) the temporality of the process (electoral/non-electoral); (3) the ideological content (progressive/conservative). The analysis will consider the different levels of institutional representation of the 2019 electoral process3 : (a) the presidential elections and the new composition of the legislative chambers at the national level; (b) the local elections and the distribution of legislative power in the provincial districts. While the exam of electoral data and the distribution of seats will allow us to evaluate the first two indicators, the examination of the electoral speeches

1 The Argentine case also differed from other countries in the region such as Ecuador, Chile, Bolivia and Colombia, which were marked by important cycles of public mobilization (Llanos and Maia, 2019; Murillo, 2021). 2 We do not forget López Obrador’s victory in Mexico in 2018. However, the historical cycle in this country was different from the regional tendency as Mexico was not part of the cases included in the so-called “left turn”. 3 Only for the examination of the degree of alternation and its temporality. For the study of the ideological dimension, the analysis will focus on presidential elections.

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and campaign strategies will allow us to identify the characteristics of the political-ideological change.4 The central aim of this work is the study of the process of alternation; that is the changes registered in the control of the executive and legislative structures. Without denying the fact that the causes explaining the vote are related to this process, our general objective goes beyond this analysis. First, because alternation will be defined by a succession of moments in which we seek to identify the reasons for the opposition’s victory and second because this process includes contextual dimensions in which operate different actor’s practices allowing the rise or avoiding the alternation process. Concerning the classification of alternation, our first working hypothesis is that we can verify its presence at the national level and that its degree of intensity was positive at the legislative and executive structures if we consider the institutional dimension but also examine the programmatic discourses that delimit the bipolar configuration of the political scene (ideological dimension).5 However, a different scenario emerges at the provincial level taking into account the legislative and executive powers. In a panoramic view, the permanence in the power of traditional political actors defines the political and institutional configuration. If we want to understand Alberto Fernández’s victory, our second working hypothesis is that we have to start considering different elements that define Argentine democracy in terms of the basic procedures regulating the political succession, the electoral behaviour and the banalization of the alternation process. After, we have to focus on the presentation of the historical process that marked the last years of Macri’s administration: the socio-economic crisis and the fall in the president’s popularity. Finally, it is on this context defined by the deployment of long-term and short-term institutional and historical factors that we have to identify the practices of the political leaders and actors defining the electoral offer and mobilizing a specific campaign discourse. We affirm that these practices have had a decisive impact on the distribution of electoral preferences allowing the alternation.

4 Our database is composed of the Manifesto Project ’s analysis of electoral platforms and an audio-visual corpus of the electoral campaign. 5 According to the indicators presented in the introduction of this collective work.

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Our work plan starts with a presentation of the institutional characteristics that marked the 2019 electoral process and different contextual elements that distinguished the holding of the presidential elections. We will then study the political leadership practices and the composition of the electoral offer. In the third part, thanks to the presentation of the electoral results and the new distribution of institutional power, we will be able to classify the alternation.

7.1 The Rules of the Institutional Game and the Political Conjuncture Different institutional elements condition the practices and strategies of the political forces in the electoral struggle to gain access to provincial and national power, imposing limits and offering opportunities.6 In a few words, three institutional characteristics of the Argentine political regime seem to be relevant.7 First, the constitutional recognition of the right to re-election to executive office; then, the possibility of elections being held simultaneously or not and finally, the mechanism of primaries for legislative and executive office. If these characteristics must be considered when identifying the institutional context in which the practices and strategies of different political actors take place at the national level, another important element operates at the provincial level, mainly having a dragging effect on the presidential battle. We are referring to the mechanisms of control and the transfer of resources in the hands of the provincial executive powers that enable the federal organization of the territory (Calvo and Murillo, 2004). Considering this institutional framework, the study of the last years of Mauricio Macri’s government (2015–2019) allows us to focus on the particular historical context that enabled a new cycle of alternation in Argentinas democracy.

6 A description of the Argentine political regime is presented in the web site the OPALC attached to this work. 7 Other institutional factors have also to be taken into account, such as the type of electoral system.

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If the victory in 2015 presidential elections gave to Cambiemos 8 the unprecedented possibility of concentrating in its hands the control of presidential power, but also of the provincial executive structures in the key districts of the City and the Province of Buenos Aires, it was in 2017 that this political force succeeds to consolidate its legislative power. An atomized Peronism in the midst of a leadership crisis suffered a new defeat,9 leaving its multiple actors to face the challenge of political survival. On the contrary, at the government, all was euphoria. Although economic growth was slow and inflation was not under control, the election results and the population’s positive expectations10 fed Macri’s dream of being re-elected and continuing the “modernization” of Argentina. Indeed, the arrival to power of Cambiemos in 2015 was marked by an electoral discourse of renewal focused on institutional purification, the correction of the dysfunctionalities of the Kirchnerist economic model, and the image of new modernity embodied in the efficiency of management and its proximity to the daily concerns of the people (Vommaro, 2017).Macri sought successfully to detach himself from the neoliberal experience of the 1990s by setting out the urgent task of recreating a new balance between the liberated forces of the market and the tutelary and regulatory presence of the State. However, an orientation in favour of the interests of the most concentrated sectors of economic power, linked mostly to the financial sector, began to draw very quickly a new model in rupture with the Kirchnerist administrations. Unsurprisingly, these policies did not have the expected effects. During the first two years of government, international commodity prices did not stop falling and in 2018, in an international context aggravated by the US decision to increase the Federal Reserve’s interest rate, this led to a sustained increase in public debt11 and the generalization of a climate of mistrust. A few months later, the devaluation of the currency and the

8 In 2015 presidential elections and the 2017 legislative elections, the electoral front led by President Macri “Cambiemos included PRO, the Civic Coalition and the Radical Civic Union. 9 Under the hegemony of Kirchnerism, the Peronism lost in the 2009 and 2013 (midterm elections) and in the 2015 (presidential elections). 10 Macri’s positive image stood at 52, 8% in the fourth quarter of 2017 (Rouvier & Asociados, April 2019). 11 To a detail of a fiscal deficit evolution, see Graphic 1 on the Appendix (OPALC Web Site).

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increase in interest rates, the measures decided by the government in the midst of the monetary crisis, failed to generate the expected inflow of foreign currency into the productive system and control the financial capital sectors. On the contrary, they fueled speculative adventures. Cornered by the lack of financing, the government signed a new agreement with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) in September 2018.12 However, during 2019, the economic situation did not stop worsening: the GDP fell 2.2% year-on-year in real terms and inflation registered in July an increase of 53.9% year-on-year.13 In this unprecedented context of stagflation, the social reality of the majority sectors of the Argentine population became openly unbearable. If in the second half of 2018, 32% of the population was below the poverty line, during the second half of 2019, the number of poor people rose to 35.5% of the population, and if we take into account the indigence rate, comparing the same periods, it rose from 6.7% to 8%.14 Moreover, citizens’ expectations accompanied the downward trend in the real economy. In April 2019, 37.6% of the population considered that their economic situation would get worse, 21.8% that it would get much worse, 23.6% that their economic situation was bad and 40.9% that it was very bad.15 Finally, this has had a correlation with the popularity of the incumbent president. If Macri’s positive image reached a peak of 71.3% in 2015 and then it was stabilized at over 50% during 2017, from January 2018 it fell to 43.5% and ended at 37.9% in April of the following year.16 It was in this context, defined by the social and economic crisis, that the political actors began to define the electoral offer.

7.2 The (Re)positioning of the Actors: The Political Offer and the Electoral Campaign On 18 May 2019, Cristina Fernández de Kirchner (CFK) announced that she would not run for another presidential term. In an unexpected 12 The agreement was the largest loan in the IMF’s history, amounting to $57.1 billion. 13 To a detail of GDP evolution, see Graphic 2 on the Appendix (OPALC Web Site). 14 To a detail of the augmentation of poverty and indigence, see graphic 3 on the Appendix (OPALC Web Site). 15 National Poll, 1.844 cases, Pollster Circuitos, Clarín, April 2019. 16 Rouvier &. Asociados, national report, April 2019, p. 5.

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move that upset the political chessboard, the leader of the Kirchnerism put an end to media speculation disconcerting everyone. Surprisingly, the candidate with the best voting intentions desisted from competing for the presidency.17 To win the election: “Without Cristina it is not possible, but with her it is not enough”.18 Aware of her strength, but also of her weaknesses,19 CFK decided to run for the vice-presidency leaving first place on the ticket to Alberto Fernández: former chief of staff of Néstor Kirchner’s administration (2003–2007) and of her own (2007–2008) who became since 2009 a tenacious critic of his government. In a political space organized dichotomously around an exclusionary division,20 between those who were identified with Kirchnerism and those who adhered to Macrism, this decision aimed to depolarize the scene by seeking to build a new majority. Its immediate effects were quickly felt both in the “Peronist galaxy” and in the political force led by President Macri. While the Peronism was, after the defeat of Kirchnerism in 2015, in a state of dispersion without a defined party leadership, in this new scenario its different political figures and social actors started weaving ties in view of a possible reunification. This process of articulation, launched by CFK political leadership, was consummated in June 2019 thanks to the decision of Sergio Massa, the leader of the Frente Renovador (FR), to make official his support for the presidential ticket presided by Fernández allowing the creation of the Frente de Todos (FdT). The former chief of staff between 2008 and 2009 of the first CFK government, then victorious candidate in the 2013 mid-term elections, but now outside the Partido Justicialista (PJ) and in direct opposition to Kirchnerism, pragmatically rebuilt his strategic alliances allowing the Peronism to become 17 CFK had 33.4% of voting intentions in April, ahead of Mauricio Macri who had

24.9% (Rouvier &. Asociados, national report, April 2019). 18 The phrase belongs to Alberto Fernández (source: Perfil, 7/2/2018). 19 CFK had an important and consolidated negative image that was always above 50%

between the end of her mandate, where it reached 57.2%, and April 2019, where it reached 57% (Rouvier & Asociados, National Newsletter, April 2019). 20 This division was public presented as a “rift” that recovers and re-signifies the game of founding oppositions of the Argentine political regime, principally the decisive antagonism between Peronism and anti-Peronism. Without reaching the extremes of other eras, Argentina’s political space was structured around two opposing sides in a battleground in which intolerance nullified any possibility of coexistence and plural expression. This strategy of power was used by Kirchnerism and Macrism to create intense minorities of loyal supporters limiting their hegemonic capacity.

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a real alternative to power. Its entry was key, first, because of its electoral base: the FR had obtained 21,39% of the votes (5,386,977 voters) in the previous presidential elections, and second, because its decision left little chance for any other initiative that sought to seduce the electorate appealing to moderation without identifying itself directly with Kirchnerism or Macrism. Several weeks earlier this tactic decision, various provincial governors identified with the PJ had already made public their support for the FdT21 and were joined by the main social movements22 and the trade union world.23 In this way, the multiple political, social, and partisan actors identified with Peronism developed a process of articulation, interrupting the logic of fragmentation repeated since the 2003 presidential elections. Despite this process of unification, all the main political forces in the electoral race included in the ticket a vice-presidential candidate of Peronist origin. Leaving behind the doubts about his own nomination, Macri announced on 11 June—on his twitter account—that he would run for re-election and that his running mate would be the PJ senator Miguel Pichetto. The incorporation of the former head of the Kirchnerist bloc in the Senate for twelve years, who became in 2015 the articulator of the legislative backing of different government policies and founded in 2018 the non-Kirchnerist Peronist space, Alternativa Federal (AF), enabled the creation of a new political coalition: Juntos por el Cambio (JC).24 This new version of the old electoral front that brought Macri to power, Cambiemos , sought to include “the Peronist leg” and create a broad, cross-party political space, polarizing the electoral scenario against the only alternative to the Government: the FdT. The positioning of the different political actors under the initiative of their leaderships of reference led to the configuration of a dichotomous scenario in which the articulation of these two large coalitions left any other electoral project in a very unfavourable position. The main candidates for participation in the P.A.S.O were thus defined in a process in which the absence of internal competition at the national 21 Infobae, 28/6/2018. 22 Le Monde Diplomatique, June 2018. 23 Mainly the two currents of the Central de los Trabajadores Argentinos (CTA) and

the Confederación General de Trabajo (CGT). 24 At the national level, this front brings together the Propuesta Republicana (PRO), the Unión Cívica Radical (UCR), the Coalición Cívica and local parties’ representations.

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level for the presidential ticket underlined the importance of the political leadership, to the detriment of partisan mechanisms defining the political offer. The different campaign discourses were now delineating the ideological divisions that defined the electoral scenario at the national level.25 The configuration of this scenario was developed in two moments: before and after the Primaries. In the first moment, the electoral messages mainly sought to respond to the context of the crisis. Macri insisted on the need to regain confidence, not to give up, as the government sought to implement “profound changes, those that take time, but remain forever”, to assert the achievements of the administration in terms of public works, fighting corruption, mafias and drug trafficking, but also to value those who think differently, giving proof of a true democratic faith based on tolerance and pluralism. Macri showed himself empathetic to the daily anguish of the population and to renew their individual efforts, because the definitive enter into progress in which everyone could play a leading role, was just a few steps away, because “we have already laid the structural foundations for change”. In addition, this long-delayed dream was now possible thanks to the government’s vocation to build broad majorities, overcoming differences because “together, we the Argentines, we are unstoppable”. This same ambition was also present in FdT’s strategy to articulate, instead, an alternative to get access to presidential power. In his first campaign speech, Alberto Fernández declared: […] “Let’s go out and call on everyone, let’s forget about the time when everyone was pulling for each side” […]. This vocation to put aside disagreements sought to seduce a sector of the electorate that was disenchanted with Kirchnerism breaking the dichotomous logic of excluding sides. They had to reinvent themselves, reviewing their mistakes, recovering the best of the Kirchnerist governments, in short: “…We are going to return, to be better…”. Alberto Fernández appealed to his past as Néstor Kirchner’s chief of staff, which gave him the experience to get out of the crisis, but also to the integrity of his principles, revealed in his ability to express disagreement but on the same time to build bridges and new consents. This desire to depolarize the electoral scene (synthesized in the FdT’s slogan: “The future is with everyone”) was completed with a project in economic and social terms. 25 Source selection of public speeches, Audio-visual Corpus, Electoral Campaign, 2019. A detail of the Corpus composition is presented on the Appendix (OPALC Web Site).

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These new policy orientations were made up of wide-ranging general definitions focused on the importance of returning to a model centred on production, on the reactivation of consumption and work, in order to “Restart the economy”. In contrast to the government’s policy, which was based on the idea that sacrifices were necessary to achieve growth and social progress, the FdT presented the broad outlines of a model that reproduced the classic formula that defined Peronism in different periods of its changing history: favouring an increase in domestic demand—as an almost automatic condition—for achieving development. This ideological demarcation between the two models was clearly present in the electoral platforms of these new alliances. Thanks to this, it was possible to draw a bipolar division of the political space between a centre-left coalition (FdT) and a centre-right coalition (JC), or in its local translation: a “left-progressive” vs. a “liberal-conservative”. A detailed study of both documents revealed an important difference in the order of priorities. If the main actor in the FdT’s program was the “State” and after the idea of the “economic development”, in JC’s platform it was “the defense of institutional democracy” and “the citizen security and the fight against drug trafficking”. This opposition was also present in terms of the content. The first policy, in the case of the FdT, referred to the role of the State in its planning capacity, defining priorities, and reaching social agreements between the productive sectors. The second related to the economic development was imperative to break with the neoliberal model of Macri’s government because “it has to exhibit only catastrophic economic results ”.26 In JC’s program, an open identification with liberal democracy was recognized concerning the first dimension and the role of the State was affirmed in its capacity to guarantee public order and to bring social peace. This contrast between the two platforms was confirmed, finally, in the defense of a model of economic and social development. In the case of the FdT, it was centred on the protection of the poorest sectors with a State present to guarantee the right to health and the defence of public education; while in the JC document its main points were the importance of macroeconomic stability, the defence of an entrepreneurial culture, the respect for dialogue and the promotion of open integration with the world.

26 Electoral Program, FdT, p. 3.

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The results of primaries held on 11 August gave the FdT an unexpected victory over JC considering mainly the size of the difference.27 This produced an immediate reconfiguration of the electoral strategies in a particular scenario where Fernández was already acting as a President when he was only a candidate, and Macri was reinventing himself as a candidate, when he was still the President. Inaugurating the second moment of the electoral campaign, Macri made a turn, first, in its way of reaching out to the electorate. If, before the Primaries, communication through social networks was privileged, he sought now direct contact with the electorate in their territory organizing public acts in the main cities. An old campaign slogan “¡Si, se puede!” (Yes, it can be done!) was also taken up highlighting the capacity to achieve the improbable, to reverse adverse situations, calling on the voluntarism of each voter to overcome the weight of what seems inevitable. The message also became more aggressive and organized dichotomously through the opposition between the Republic and the Populism. Two main lines shaped this demarcation between “republicans and liberals looking to the future” and “populist and authoritarians anchored in the decadent past ” searching to seduce the electorate located more on the ideological spectrum of an extreme right-wing vote. The first focused on the problem of insecurity and the fight against drug trafficking. The second one that confirmed this conservative shift was the position on abortion. On this point, Macri made public his position against promoting the discourse of “two lives ”. This orientation was opposed to the position advocated by the FdT, soughing to root its message in the progressive ideological spectrum in favour of its legalization. If the implementation of this strategy of polarizing the election was effective for the government, considering the augmentation in votes in the general elections, it was not enough to avoid the political alternation at the top of the national executive.

7.3 Electoral Results at Different Levels of Representation and Type of Alternation The victory of the formula headed by Alberto Fernández in the general elections of 27 October came as no surprise to anyone. The FdT’s resounding victory in the primaries and the results of the local elections

27 To detail of P.A.S.O results see Table 1 on the Appendix (Web site OPALC).

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Table 7.1 Presidential elections in Argentina. National results of 27 October 2019 Electoral formula and political forces

Votes

%

Fernández/Fernández de Kirchner (Fdt) Macri/Pichetto (JC) Lavagna/Urtubey (CF) Del Caño/Del Pla (FIT) Gómez Centurión/Hotton (NOS) Espert/Rosales (UNITE) Positives Votes Blank Vote Null Vote Contested Vote Total Voters Total Eligible Voters

12.473.709 10.470.607 1.599.707 561.214 443.507 382.820 25.931.564 399.751 232.208 31.937 26.595.460 33.858.733

48,1 40,37 6,16 2,16 1,71 1,47 97,5 1,5 0,87 0,12 100

Source Sendra (2020, p. 44)

held since the beginning of the year had already revealed a clear trend in favour of an alternation at the top of the government, creating a climate favourable to change (Table 7.1).28 Regarding these results, we can highlight first the degree of concentration of the vote between the Fdt and JC. With more than 88%, it was the highest since the founding elections of 1983, revealing the configuration of a two-pole political system. If we consider the support obtained in the first round in 2015, the FdT managed to win 3,607,547 votes and JC obtained an additional 2,210,455 votes (Table 7.2). Secondly, the difference between the two political forces was reduced, compared to the Primaries, to almost 8% (2,003,102 votes). This is explained by the fact that JC’s vote volume grew more than that of the FdT: 2,348,918 more votes against 267,771. The rest of the political forces lost votes compared to the results obtained in the open primaries (Table 7.3). Thirdly, it is worth mentioning the territorial distribution of the vote.29 The FdT candidate received the most votes in the northern provinces

28 A detail of the results of this electoral cycle is presented on the Appendix Graphic 4 (OPALC Web Site). 29 For a detail, see map 1 on the Appendix (OPALC Web Site).

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Table 7.2 Vote concentration since 1983 in Argentina 1983

1989

Political UCR PJ Forces + + PJ UCR % Votes 91.9 79.9

1995

1999

2003 2007 2011 2015

2019

PJ + FREPASO 79.2

ALIANZA + PJ 86.6

FpL + FpV 46.7

FdT + JC 88.47

FpV + CC 68.3

FpV + FAP 70.9

Cambiemos + FpV 71.23

Source Sendra (2020, p. 44)

Table 7.3 Comparing national results of the primaries and the general election in Argentina

P.A.S.O General election

FdT

JC

CF

FIT

12.205.938 12.473.709

8.121.689 10.470.607

2.081.315 1.599.707

723.147 561.214

NOS

UNITE

670.162 550.593 443.507 382.820

Source National Electoral Commission

(Salta, Jujuy, Chaco, Formosa), the northwest (Catamarca, La Rioja, San Juan, Tucumán, and Santiago del Estero) and the south of the country (Neuquén, Rio Negro, Chubut, and Santa Cruz),30 and in a key province in terms of its electoral weight, the province of Buenos Aires,31 and mainly in a specific region: the “Conurbano Bonaerense”. In this territory, hard hit by the economic and social crisis and where 9,679,113 voters are concentrated (28.5% of the national electoral roll), the FdT obtained in the first and third electoral sections 1,629,685 votes more than JC, which represents 81% of the advantage obtained at the national level. Decisive in this distribution was the victory in the third section where Fernández managed to beat Macri by a distance of 1,059,685 votes and, more particularly, in the municipality of La Matanza, one of the poorest districts, where the FdT obtained a total of 510,420 votes while JC obtained 186,183 votes. At the national level, JC won in the City of Buenos Aires (CABA), in the interior of the Province of Buenos

30 For a detail of the vote of FdT and JC in the difference province, see Table 2 in the Annexes. 31 The Province of Buenos Aires has 13,185,036 voters, 37% of the total number of eligible voters nationwide.

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Aires and in the provinces of Entre Ríos, Santa Fe, Córdoba, San Luis, and Mendoza.32 In the provinces of Entre Ríos, Mendoza, San Luis, and Santa Fe, the government managed to reverse the adverse results of the Primaries, and in the districts of CABA and Córdoba it consolidated its broad hegemony. In the former, the JC obtained 1,039,750 votes (52.39%) while the FdT obtained 707,158 votes (35.63%) and in the latter, where the governor is a Peronist, Macri obtained 61.31% while Fernández reached 29.28% of the votes. Finally, electoral participation augmented in the general elections compared with Primaries from 76.4% to 80.4%. This increase explains, in part, the better result obtained by JC: new voters would have decided to participate motivated in this new scenario by their “anti-Kirchnerism” but also because of the vote of third forces, ideologically closer to JC, their voters opting for a more strategic decision in the general election (Antenucci y Page, 2019, p. 4). Considering the configuration of the electoral map after the 2019 presidential elections and its institutional dimensions, we affirm that alternation at the national level was possible, first, thanks to the consolidation of an alternative electoral option to Macrism bringing together, after years of separations and disputes, the different sectors of the Peronist family. Because of CFK’s political leadership capacity for articulation, the opposition to Macrismo became a real alternative for power. However, this process would not have been possible without considering the context in which the electoral process took place, marked by the economic and social crisis. In other words, this crisis generated incentives and opened the window of opportunity for unity. At the same time, it should be noted that this unity allowed for alternation due to the profile of the candidate Alberto Fernández, prone to dialogue and critical of Cristinism. It allowed him to win the support, mainly of a fluctuating electorate that was able to accompany Kirchnerism in the early days and then opted to be a sort of third way embodied by the FR. In other words, the main electoral support for the FdT came from the electorate most loyal to Kirchnerism in the peripheral provinces and the urban districts of Buenos Aires province, overwhelmed by the economic and social crisis, but the difference that allowed him to defeat Macri was provided by the

32 In the first four provinces, we can find the most dynamic and socio-economically rich agricultural areas.

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urban electorate, the more independent middle sectors in electoral terms, seduced by his depolarizing figure and his vocation to “return better”.33 If we propose now to classify the type of alternation, we have to say first that it took place respecting the institutional procedures of democracy. To examine its degree of intensity, we must consider the new legislative composition at the national level resulting from the 2019 electoral process. At the Chamber of Deputies, FdT increase its representation from 67 deputies in 2017 (considering the sum of the Frente para la Victoria and the PJ) to 109 deputies in 2019, thus becoming the second minority behind JC, with a consolidated bloc of 119 legislators. Thus, the FdT had to add allies from other forces to become the first majority and it was always far from achieving the number needed to reach the quorum (129 deputies). In the Senate, the situation was different. Thanks to the unity of Peronism, the FdT managed to form a bloc of 38 senators out of a total of 72 members, achieving an absolute majority and leaving behind the fragmented representation that defined this force in the 2017– 2019 period. In this way, the Fernández government did not have a majority in the 2019–2021 period allowing it to obtain its own quorum in both chambers (it only achieved it in the Senate), but it did obtain the legislative majorities. The alternation rate was therefore positive (Table 7.4).34 If we focus on the electoral process at the provincial level, we can say that unlike the national level, the tendency was towards continuity rather than alternation at both the executive and legislative levels. Only four provinces (CABA, Buenos Aires, Catamarca, and La Rioja) held their local elections at the same time as the presidential elections. Taking into account the results of the general elections, 22 elections were held between March and November of 2019 with only three cases of alternation at the local executive. This was the case in the province of Santa Fe, where the Peronist front JUNTOS defeated the Frente Político Cívico y Social, a force that had controlled provincial power since 2007. It was 33 Without claiming to be exhaustive, we can illustrate this by considering that in the municipalities with this voter profile, for example, in the City of Buenos Aires (municipalities 13, 14 and 6) and in the “Conurbano Bonaerense” (municipalities of San Isidro and Vicente López) the formula presided over by Fernández obtained 81,169 more votes than the Frente para la Victoria (FPV) achieved in the 2015 presidential elections. Source: Table 3 (Appendix OPALC Web Site). 34 Being greater than 3 according to the indicators presented in the introduction to this collective work.

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Table 7.4 Argentine legislative Chamber’s Composition 2017–2019/2019– 2021 2017–2019

2019–2021

Political Force

Deputies

Senators

Political Force

Deputies

Senators

Cambiemos Unidad Ciudadana Partido Justicialista Frente Renovador Izquierda Otros

107 67 38 22 4 19

24 10 23 0 0 15

Juntos por el Cambio Frente de Todos Consenso Federal Izquierda Otros

119 109* 7 2 20

28 38 0 0 6

Source Own elaboration based on data from the Electoral Commission * The FdT reached the first minority (120 legislators) due to the inclusion of allied Senators from different provincial Parties

also the case in the Province of Buenos Aires, where the FdT managed to defeat JC, putting an end to María Eugenia Vidal’s term as governor. Finally, in Tierra del Fuego the victory of the FORJA coalition of parties put an end to the re-electionist project of the Peronist candidate. The electoral map confirms the trend towards the re-election of the parties in power (19 cases) among which 11 belongs to the Kirchnerist Peronism, one (the case of the Province of Cordoba) is presented as non-Kirchnerist Peronist, 3 are from JC and 4 are provincial political fronts. This tendency towards mainly continuity at the provincial level was also verified at the level of the legislative chambers. From the analysis of two chambers, we can verify the following configuration according to the institutional design of each province after the electoral results: (a) Out of the 8 provinces with a bicameral system (Buenos Aires, Entre Ríos, Corrientes, Santa Fe, San Luis, Salta, Catamarca, and Mendoza), there was only one alternation in the province of Salta, where the electoral front of the new governor obtained the first majority in both legislative chambers. In the Province of BuenosAires, the FdT just reached a new relative majority in Deputies but not at the Senate; (b) In the case of electoral districts with a unicameral system (the rest of the provinces), only one alternation was noted in the province of Tierra del Fuego.

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Conclusion

We set out in this analysis to identify the factors that enabled a new cycle of alternation in Argentine democracy at the level of national representation and to point out the characteristics that distinguished it. Considering first the institutional framework that defines the political regime, we identify different contextual dimensions: (a) the long and medium-term (the democratic stabilization and the normalization of a new cycle of alternation); (b) the short-term (the economic and social crisis). In this scenario, we analyse the decisive action of political actors in shaping the political offer and constructing their “representative figures” in the electoral campaign. Finally, the electoral results allowed us to justify, considering different types of voters, our working hypothesis explaining the alternation and to classify it as positive marked by an intense degree of ideological polarization. Leaving behind the intense phases of crisis and democratic instability, the Argentine political regime is normalized in the routine reproduction of cycles of electoral renewal, but also of alternation. Its current reorganization has also left behind both the prominence of political parties during the transition to democracy and the state of atomization that marked the decade following the crisis of representation in 2001. The presence of two ideologically opposed coalitions revitalizes Argentina’s democracy defining ideological alternatives, but also weakens it due to the absence of coordination and dialogue mechanisms going ahead with the electoral consensus. In this situation, Argentina’s democracy will not be able to avoid permanent cycles of crisis and the risk of extreme political choices in a context of increasingly alarming citizen apathy.

References Antenucci Pedro y Page María. (2019). “Otra mirada de la elección presidencial 2019”, Documentos CIPPEC-OEAR, N°11, p. 1–4. Calvo, E. and Murillo, V. (2004). “Who Delivers? Partisan Clients in the Argentine Labor Market”, American Journal of Political Science, 48 (4), 742–757. Casullo, M.E. (2019). El eterno retorno…del peronismo Revista Nueva Sociedad, 10, 1–6. Levitsky, S. and Roberts, K. (2011). The Resurgence of the Latin American Left, John Hopkins University Press.

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Llanos, M. and Maia, J. (2019). Argentina 2019: Broken Economy Strengthened Democracy GIGA Focus, Latin America, 6, 1–11. Murillo, V. (2021). Protestas, descontento y democracia en América Latina, Revista Nueva Sociedad, 294, 1–13. Sendra, M. (2020). “Elecciones 2019 en argentina: ¿hacia un bipartidismo de coaliciones entre peronismo y anti-peronismo?” in América latina vota (2017–2019), Manuel Alcántara (Dir.), Editorial Tecnos. Vommaro, G. (2017). La larga marcha de Cambiemos. La construcción silenciosa de un proyecto de poder, Editorial Prometeo.

CHAPTER 8

Mexico’s 2018 Tsunami-Alternation: Change and Continuities Following the Collapse of the Transitional Three-Party System Willibald Sonnleitner

8.1

Mexico’s 2018 Alternation from a Sociohistorical and Comparative Perspective

The concept of alternation is key to assessing the democratic—or authoritarian—character of a political regime. To paraphrase Adam Przeworski (2010): in a democracy, incumbent governments that lose elections accept their defeats. Moreover, winners emerge with the sovereign mandate of the People to implement alternative policies and to respect the rules that

W. Sonnleitner (B) Colegio de Mexico, Mexico City, Mexico e-mail: [email protected]

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023, corrected publication 2023 O. Dabène (ed.), Latin America’s Pendular Politics, Studies of the Americas, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-26761-1_8

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allowed them to be elected, so there can be other regular alternations in the future. How can Mexico’s 2018 alternation be interpreted within the general context of Latin America and the distinctive history of its national politics? From a comparative perspective, the landslide victory of Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO) represents a belated and countercyclical shift to the left coming 20 years after Hugo Chávez’s first election in Venezuela. At first sight, the change could hardly be more radical. In the typology that Dabène constructs to synthesize the cases that comprise this collective work, Mexico registers the highest score of alternation. From a regional perspective, this time lag is comprehensible because the Mexican transition was singularly slow and progressive: it began in the mid-1970s, gradually passing through a series of municipal and state alternations until finally resulting in the defeat of the official party in the legislative elections of 1997 and the presidential elections of 2000 (Becerra et al. 2000; Gómez Tagle 2001; Domínguez and Lawson 2004; Loaeza 2008). Within the Mexican political process, however, the numerous local and national alternations of 2018 form part of a remarkable historical continuity: they represent an additional stage of a broader trajectory of political disintegration. They are the result of the fragmentation of the post-revolutionary family, the erosion of its legendary electoral machinery and the collapse of the transitional three-party system following a prolonged passage from one hegemonic party regime to another, more pluralistic and volatile one, despite its apparent stability and consolidation (Sonnleitner 2018). This third democratic presidential alternation contrasts with the first— inaugural and transitional—of 2000. That election confirmed that the official party, defeated at the polls, was willing to hand over Executive power peacefully. Eighteen years later, for the first time, no party contested the results and the incumbent government’s candidate conceded defeat minutes after the polls closed. Oddly enough, subsequent elections have continued to be contested by many losing aspirants, even when their own parties did control the offices at stake. López Obrador’s election also recalls some features of the second presidential alternation of 2012, when Enrique Peña Nieto sought to restore the post-revolutionary pact with a supposedly renovated PRI. Despite presenting itself as a radical rupture, some objectives of the “Fourth Transformation” that emerged from the polls in 2018 are anchored in the nostalgia of that same golden age and seek to restitute the strong

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and centralizing Presidency of the authoritarian past. Far from being an outsider, AMLO is one of the last representatives of revolutionary nationalism, a genuine insider formed in the culture of the Ancien Régime. In a historical perspective, the alternations of 2018 are paradoxical. Under the reign of the hegemonic party, there were no competitive elections and PRI candidates simply could not lose. Elections were not held to select them since their designation was made through internal party mechanisms. These were “elections without choice”, whose function was to introduce and legitimize the new leaders (Hermet et al. 1978). And yet, during that period informal mechanisms of alternation operated within the PRI and guaranteed the regular rotation of party elites through the legal prohibition of re-election. These practices seemed to have been overcome. In recent decades, elections have become competitive and, under the combined effects of increasing volatility and party fragmentation, the number of alternations has not ceased to rise. In sharp contrast with the United States, where representatives running for re-election have a clear incumbency advantage, in Mexico alternations now predominate at all levels of institutional power. After being banned in 1933, the re-election of legislators and mayors was re-authorized in 2014. At the municipal level, these reforms came into force in 2015 and, since then, seven out of 10 local officeholders who have sought re-election have been rejected by the electorate. For federal lawmakers, the reforms only applied to those who were elected in 2018. In 2021, 449 of the 500 deputies sought to stay in office but only 213 met the requirements and just 139 obtained re-election (Valencia Escamilla 2022). In many cases, these alternations reveal a clear vote of repudiation. The 2018 presidential election can also be interpreted as the product of a massive vote rejecting the governing parties. It was transferred in part to a newly created party, and to the candidate who was able to embody the hope for change. As this chapter shows, AMLO’s victory would appear to be a radical alternation that spelled the demise of the three-party system that had structured Mexican politics since the democratic transition. Peña Nieto’s administration resulted in a radical reconfiguration of these parties. The Movimiento Regeneración Nacional (National Regeneration Movement, or MORENA), in turn, benefitted from the widespread dissatisfaction with the ruling elites that translated into a pivotal vote of

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repudiation. However, this reading conceals many elements of continuity essential to understanding the essence of the Mexican case. With a socio-territorial approach, this chapter analyses three processes that converged to produce a new political map: beginning with a discussion of the most profound changes in order to situate the reconfiguration of political forces, we then explore the ruptures, negotiations and reconfigurations of the national and regional party elites, before analysing split ticket voting and the new electoral geography.1 Lastly, subsequent elections make it possible to assess the effects of the tsunami, the structural strength of the new ruling coalition, and the remnants of the party system that emerged from democratization.

8.2

A Tsunami Called AMLO

Announced months in advance, AMLO’s triumph was nonetheless a surprise by its margin of victory. Like a tsunami, his coalition Juntos Haremos Historia (Together We Will Make History) swept the rival coalitions Por México al Frente (For Mexico to the Front) and Todos por México (Everyone for Mexico), headed by a long-time PAN party member (Ricardo Anaya Cortés) and by a technocrat with no party affiliation (José Antonio Meade Kuribreña), who displaced the PRI party contenders.2 The independent candidacy of Nuevo León’s 1 This chapter was elaborated for this collective book. It is based on ongoing and previous research, that has been partly published (Sonnleitner 2020). Methodologically, it relies on case studies, on the pre-electoral survey performed by Berumen and Ipsos in June 2018 and on spatial analysis at the level of the 32 states and the 300 federal legislative districts. The survey is available at: https://www.ine.mx/voto-y-elecciones/encuestas-ele ctorales/elecciones-federales-ordinarias-2017-2018-estudios-entregados/berumen-2/ (last consulted: May 20, 2019). For statistical analysis we use the official results published by the electoral authorities available at: http://www.ine.mx/voto-y-elecciones/resultadoselectorales/ (last consulted: July 17, 2021). Enhancements for this chapter are available online and include maps of the emerging Mexican electoral geography, additional figures and analysis on volatility and vote transfers. 2 Juntos Haremos Historia was formed by MORENA, the Partido del Trabajo [Labor Party, PT] and the Partido Encuentro Social [Social Encounter Party, PES]. POR MÉXICO AL FRENTE comprised of the Partido de Acción Nacional [National Action Party, PAN], Movimiento Ciudadano [Citizen’s Movement, MC] and the Partido de la Revolución Democrática [Party of the Democratic Revolution, PRD]. TODOS POR MÉXICO consisted of the Partido Revolucionario Institucional [Institutional Revolutionary Party, PRI], the Partido Verde Ecologista de México [Green Party of Mexico, PVEM] and the Nueva Alianza [New Alliance, PANAL].

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governor, Jaime Rodríguez Calderón (“El Bronco”), was relegated to a distant fourth place. The metaphor of the tsunami, which others have conceptualized as a landslide (Moreno 2019), captures the exceptional and unexpected, massive and disruptive effect that López Obrador’s third campaign had in the presidential elections. With 30 million voters, his candidacy captured 54.8% of the valid vote, surpassing Anaya by 32 percentage points and the candidate of the outgoing government by 38 percentage points (Meade obtained barely 16.9%).3 For thirty years, Mexican politics had been structured around three parties that captured 90% of the vote, with stable bases in different territories and with lasting identities among broad segments of the electorate. This three-party system had begun to erode in 2009 but did not collapse until 2018. Having garnered 82.7% of the vote in the presidential elections of 2012, the PRI, the PAN and the PRD lost the support of six out of 10 voters and held barely 35.1% in the presidential elections of 2018. Carried by an overpowering wave of discontent, MORENA asserted itself as the primary force, going from 7.8% in 2015 to 37.8% in the legislative elections, while AMLO won the presidential elections in 31 of the 32 states and 267 of the 300 federal districts, leading to the demise of the tripartisanship that had structured Mexican politics since 1991. However, the 2018 elections cannot be reduced to the coalition of discontents that rallied around the leadership of the newly elected president. In them, 18,311 positions were contested, starting with nine governorships, followed by the seats in Congress and 27 local legislatures, as well as 1612 municipalities. Our interest in investigating the origins and structural effects of these atypical elections on the Mexican political process derives from this complexity. Enrique Peña Nieto’s presidency resulted in a radical reconfiguration of political forces. In 2012, his election was interpreted as a “restoration” of the PRI, a party supposedly renovated by a group of young politicians unified under the leadership of the then-governor of the State of Mexico. However, his administration resumed many practices of the past, fuelling

3 In the media, it is commonly said that AMLO won the presidential election “with 53% of the vote”. As summarized in Table 1, he obtained 30 million votes in 2018, that is, 53.2% of the total votes and 54.8% of the valid votes cast. In this chapter we distinguish between the two and privilege the use of valid vote percentages, as is customary in academic electoral analysis.

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W. SONNLEITNER

frustration at first, then alienating some of its sympathizers and ultimately spurring the open rejection of broad sectors of society. In the electorate, this was reflected in a late but marked decline, not only of the PRI but of the set of parties that had governed the country over the last three decades. To begin with, voter turnout was not exceptional at the national level. At 63.6%, it was situated between the 77.1% reached in the 1994 presidential elections and 58.6% in 2006, at levels almost identical to those recorded in 2000 (63.9%) and 2012 (63.1%). There were markedly participatory entities that had always been characterized by high voting rates (such as Yucatán, Campeche, and Mexico City, where participation reached 77%, 71.3%, and 71.1% in 2018). At the same time, there were also traditionally abstentionist entities with very low rates of participation (such as Baja California and Chihuahua, with only 52.5% and 54.7% participation). However, there were also changes that broke with the usual patterns of electoral mobilization. Among them, the decrease in participation in Guanajuato and Sonora (where it fell below 54%), as well as the increased participation in traditionally abstentionist states, particularly in Guerrero (64.3%), Oaxaca (65.9%), Chiapas (68.2%), and Puebla (69.4%), are notable. The reconfiguration of the partisan forces was of a structural nature and accompanied by new subnational dynamics of electoral mobilization. Secondly, party fragmentation was attenuated but did not disappear, going from 5.7 effective parties in the legislative elections of 2015 to 4.4 effective parties in those of 2018. Despite the coattails effect and the negative campaigns, the contest did not polarize voters into two opposing camps but rather developed in various multiparty formats, in the midst of a more complex reconfiguration of political options. It would therefore be a mistake to speak of the emergence of a new hegemonic or dominant party. It is impressive that AMLO effectively obtained a higher percentage than any of his five predecessors, including Carlos Salinas in 1988 (50.4%). But despite its ability to attract a myriad of disenchanted voters in the presidential elections, MORENA only obtained 38.7% in the legislative contest, mobilizing 24.5% of registered voters. In addition to the presidency, thanks to the split-ticket of millions of disaffiliated voters and a complex strategy of alliances with the PT and the PES, the national and regional candidates of Juntos Haremos Historia won Mexico City and four of the eight governorships in

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dispute; 57 of the 128 Senate seats and 252 of the 500 seats in Congress. Yet, at the municipal level MORENA only conquered 142 mayoralties (which, thanks to the coalitions formed in 2015, allowed it to govern 335 of the 2449 municipalities from that point forward). Even so, MORENA’s victory was decisive. In addition to the personal defeats of Anaya and Meade in the presidential elections, both the PAN (18.7%) and the PRI (17.2%), but especially the PRD (5.5%), hit rock bottom in the legislative elections. The weakness of the PANAL and the PES was also evident (neither of them reached the threshold of 3% and both lost their legal registration), as well as the geographical concentration of the PVEM, the MC and the PT (which, despite their local influence, barely garnered 5%, 4.6% and 4.1% of the national vote). In short, MORENA captured an amorphous mass of disenchanted voters who abandoned their old party loyalties to bet on a new political acronym, multiplying its electoral return fivefold in just three years. From this perspective, the electoral tsunami is the product of a profound transformation of the former partisan options. The wave resulted from a tremor that occurred before it formed and expanded, made landfall, and flooded the polls in July 2018. The earthquake that caused the collapse of the PRD, the PRI, and the PAN was preceded by a slow process of decomposition that dates back to the midterm legislative elections of 2003 (Sonnleitner 2017). Beyond the conjunctural success of AMLO we witnessed a structural reconfiguration of the partisan forces, whose leaderships and bases deserve to be studied in greater depth.

8.3 Tracing the Origins of the Tsunami: The Rise and Fall of Tripartisanship (1991–2018) On the surface, as observed through the votes that AMLO was able to add up, the magnitude of the alternation is staggering: having obtained 7.8% under the acronym of MORENA in the legislative elections of 2015, his coalition amassed 54.8% in the presidential elections of 2018, increasing its volume by 700%. However, this result cannot be explained by the charisma of the candidate, especially if one considers that Lopez Obrador was defeated in two previous contests, obtaining 35.3% in 2006 and 32.4% in 2012. The electoral tsunami is the product of deeper changes. Figure 8.1 situates the scale of the earthquake from a historical perspective and captures the essence of the three-party system that had stabilized since the 1990s. It revolved around the PRI, which experienced a gradual

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Fig. 8.1 Historical trends and vote transfers (Mexico, 1991–2021)

decline as a result of growing competition with the PAN and/or the PRD, leading to an increasing number of alternations at all levels of government. At the height of this period, the PRI captured four out of 10 votes, while three benefited the PAN and two the PRD. Between 1997 and 2006, only one in 16 votes was cast for any other political party (Fig. 8.1).4 These historical trends allow us to visualize the dimension of the tsunami: the rise of MORENA is exponential in 2018, when it sweeps away the traditional parties in the manner of a wave of public repudiation. It is important to distinguish the results of the parties and alliances in the different types of elections: in contrast to AMLO, Juntos Haremos Historia only obtained 45.4% of the vote for federal deputies (which 4 We add the averages of the PRI, the PAN and the PRD in the four federal legislative elections held between 1997 and 2006, during the peak of the transitional tri-partisan system. As very few Mexicans know the candidates competing for deputies, the results of these elections provide a good approximation of the structural strength of the parties. Since 2009 we consider the results both of parties and coalitions, in the elections for senators (“S”), federal deputies (“D”) and the presidency (“P”). This allows us to visualize the magnitude of split-ticket voting between these different types of elections. We report the results recorded by each party separately (awarding them their share of votes for coalitions), as well as the sums obtained by the alliances (“-Al”), to observe the effects of coalition strategies.

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reveals the weight of the split-ticket) and MORENA barely captured 38.8% (reflecting the weight of the PT and the PES). Despite the concentration of the presidential vote, a strong fragmentation persisted in a context of impressive volatility. It was within this unique moment of widespread dissatisfaction with the ruling political class that AMLO triumphed. And it is at this critical juncture of the collapse of the traditional party system that MORENA increased its vote by 500%. This meteoric growth is directly related to the decline of the PRD, the PRI, and even the PAN. To understand the origins and composition of this new electorate, the transfers of votes between 2015 and 2018 must be analysed by party. The most intuitive case is that of the PRD, which López Obrador helped found in 1990, over which he presided over in the late 1990s and which nominated him successfully for Mayor of Mexico City in 2000, and for president in 2006 and 2012. A significant part of MORENA’s leadership and base come from the ranks of the PRD, who left it along with AMLO to create their own political organization. This rupture can be observed in Fig. 8.1: thanks to the effect of López Obrador’s presidential candidacy, the PRD still obtained 19.3% in the 2012 congressional elections. His break with the PRD leadership, after the latter joined Peña Nieto’s Pact for Mexico, catalyzed the transformation of his faction into a new party in 2014 and resulted in a massive depletion of voters in 2015, when the PRD only retained 10.5% of the vote. The party was further reduced in 2018, obtaining only 5.5% of the legislative vote, after having joined the candidacy of Anaya of the PAN. The most notable decline occurred in 2015 (when it lost 8.8 points) but was accentuated in 2018 (with an additional 5 point drop). It is no mystery that many of those who vote for MORENA now come from these sectors. But the composition of this new electorate is much more heterogeneous.5 The decline of the PRI is less dramatic in relative terms, but it is crucial in substantive terms. Despite the corruption scandals, the flight of several PRI governors from the country, the “white house” scandal, and the mass protests over the disappearance of the students of Ayotzinapa, the strength of the PRI seemed to remain intact until 2015. Perceptions 5 The shifting sociological composition of MORENA has been mainly studied through public opinion polls (Aguilar 2019; Moreno 2019; Buendía & Márquez 2019). In this chapter, we focus on its socio-territorial transformations, through election results aggregated at the level of the 32 States and the 300 federal districts.

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changed drastically in the second half of Peña Nieto’s term and the PRI went from 33.5% to 17.2% of the vote in 2018, registering a loss of − 16.3 percentage points, much greater than that of the PRD during the entire administration. Its results were even worse in the presidential elections, in which Meade drew 16.9% but the PRI barely obtained 14%. The alliances with the PVEM and the PANAL mitigated the defeat in the legislative elections but did not stem the debacle of their presidential candidate, who obtained eight points less than the legislative candidates. The National Action Party withstood this transition a little better. After having obtained 27.3% in the legislative elections of 2012, it sustained two consecutive losses of four and a total decrease of 8.6 points over the presidential term of office. Its alliances with the PRD and the MC also cushioned its fall in the legislative elections of 2018, although Anaya turned out not to be an attractive option and registered 5.8 points less than the candidates for deputies in his coalition. As we will see, the PAN’s split-ticket benefited Meade, “El Bronco” but especially AMLO, despite the discursive divergences of the campaigns and the presidential debates. The transfers of votes between the rest of the parties were not disruptive. There were substantive changes in the regional composition of some of these forces, particularly in Chiapas (where the PVEM won the governorship with Manuel Velasco in 2012), in Nuevo León (governed since 2015 by Jaime Rodríguez who, after having broken with the PRI, ran as an independent candidate) and in Jalisco (where Enrique Alfaro won the governorship in 2018 under the acronym of the MC). We will revisit the growing importance of these parties for the formation of competitive subnational coalitions since their weight varies considerably throughout the country. For now, we emphasize that these parties obtained a combined total of 19.8% in the legislative elections of both 2012 and 2018 (Fig. 8.1). In short, the exponential increase of MORENA is explained by the decline, fragmentation, and collapse of the three parties that had been structuring Mexican politics since 1991. Between 2012 and 2018, seven out of 10 PRD voters, five out of 10 PRI voters, and three out of 10 PAN voters broke with these parties to bet for alternative options. As the proportion of the other parties did not change, these votes went essentially to MORENA. In four years, AMLO’s movement became the main national ruling party, with a force inferior to that of the party it displaced

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but far superior to that of the party that gave rise to it. This structural reconfiguration arose from several subnational logics.6

8.4 The Reconfiguration of Partisan Forces: Coalitions and Presidential (Dis)Agreements It is worth exploring the characteristics and effects of the main electoral alliances, starting from the strategies of the national leadership in the negotiation of the presidential coalitions but also considering the territorial weight of the different forces in a context of strong party fragmentation. The most intuitive coalition emerged between the PRI, the PVEM and the PANAL, parties with well-known affinities in past elections. On this occasion, however, the successes of the Verde and Nueva Alianza in some entities led them to diversify their alliances. Initially, both even tried to negotiate their participation in a “Broad Opposition Front” promoted by the PAN, which failed to succeed. For its part, the PRI managed to avoid public ruptures in the selection of its presidential candidate. After modifying its statutes to allow the nomination of a citizen without formal party affiliation, Secretary of Finance José Antonio Meade was designated by a national convention of delegates and formally obtained the support of his most visible competitors. Finally, the PVEM and PANAL ended up joining his campaign and became part of the Todos por México coalition. However, tensions persisted in the selection of the rest of the candidates and the coalition was fractured at the subnational level. In legislative elections, agreements were only reached in half of the states. In addition to fragmenting the vote and generating confusion among the electorate, this broke the unity of the official presidential campaign and would be reflected in distancing, dissent, readjustments, and ruptures, with critical consequences. The ruptures were even more noticeable in the ranks of the coalition Por México al Frente. This was conceived, at first, as a broad citizen front to promote common candidacies among the PAN, the PRD and MC. Likewise, negotiations were opened with the PVEM and the

6 Electoral volatility and vote transfers are analyzed in further details in this chapter’s online enhancements.

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PANAL, which solely came to bear for some local races. The presidential candidacy became the bone of contention. In the absence of an agreement on a selection method, it was rejected by several contenders, among them the powerful PRD Mayor of Mexico City, Miguel Ángel Mancera. The tensions even split the PAN, whose party chair Ricardo Anaya managed to replace the primaries with a controversial collection of supports, dismissed as a dedazo [hand-picked nomination] in disguise by his opponents. The most glaring rupture translated into the resignation from the PAN by Margarita Zavala, who, after a long party affiliation and having been the first lady of Mexico during the mandate of Felipe Calderón (2006–2012), chose to compete as an independent candidate (Prud’homme 2020). In contrast to these two residual, unstable and improvised coalitions, which lacked programmatic and ideological foundations, AMLO’s unquestioned leadership galvanized a solid singular candidacy around MORENA. Since 2016, López Obrador had declared that his party would not seek alliances for the presidential elections. Without candidates of its own, the PT registered him for the third time as its external candidate in 2017, as it had done in 2006 and in 2012. The PES, on the other hand, was weighing different options, including its own national party chair, Hugo Eric Flores Cervantes, the former PAN member Margarita Zavala and the soccer player star-mayor of Cuernavaca, Cuauhtémoc Blanco. Only in December would this new evangelical party end up selecting AMLO as its candidate and joining the Juntos Haremos Historia coalition. The importance of these coalitions may be observed in the federal legislative elections at the level of districts. Map 8.1 synthesizes the territorial correlation of forces in 2018. It displays confirms MORENA’s advantageous position in 154 districts of the Northern Pacific Coast, Central Mexico, the Southeast, and the Yucatán Peninsula (in light and dark brown colors), with a majority presence in 76 of them (located in Baja California, Baja California Sur, Nayarit, Mexico City, Cuernavaca, and Puebla, as well as in Veracruz, Tabasco, Quintana Roo, and Chiapas). The PAN, in contrast, still keeps an advantage in 61 districts of the Bajío (particularly in the industrial corridor that crosses Aguascalientes, Jalisco, Guanajuato, and Querétaro), in some regions of Chihuahua, Durango, Tamaulipas, Puebla, and Veracruz, as well as in the cities of Monterrey, San Luis Potosí, Toluca, and Mérida (in light blue). The PRI only maintains a competitive position in 40 districts of the North, the Bajío, Central Mexico, and Yucatán (in green), where the vote is disputed

Map 8.1

The new geography of Mexican parties (Federal Deputies 2018)

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W. SONNLEITNER

with MORENA and the PAN. The other parties also do play an important role, especially in the remaining 45 districts located in Chiapas, Morelos, Guerrero, Michoacán, and Jalisco (in pink) where, under different leaders and brands, they get 43.5% of valid ballots. The legislative vote of Mexicans disperses across more than five relevant forces, whose configuration varies throughout the national territory (Map 8.1).7 The primary beneficiary of this profound reconfiguration of political parties was AMLO, whose third presidential campaign was favoured by four decades of combat and experience, in government and from the opposition.

8.5 AMLO’s Moment: Split Ticket and Strategic, “Useful” or “Negative” Voting Although his adversaries stigmatize him as an outsider, Andrés Manuel López Obrador is one of the most genuine insiders, with the longest trajectory and expertise in traditional Mexican politics. Brought up from his youth in the ranks of the PRI, the Tabasco native made an extensive career in this party before resigning to compete as a candidate for governor of his home state in 1988, championed by the Frente Democrático Nacional (National Democratic Front) that nominated Cuauhtémoc Cárdenas for the presidency that year. After the local elections of 1991, he organized a protest march called Exodus for Democracy, competed again for the governorship of Tabasco in 1994, and led another Caravan for Democracy, making him one of the most popular politicians of the PRD and leading him to preside over the party between 1996 and 1999 (Proceso 2018). In 2000, AMLO was elected Head of Government of the Federal District, a position that situated him as the central figure of the left and as a presidential candidate in 2006. After he lost by 243 934 votes (0.58%), he alleged fraud, refused to acknowledge Calderón, proclaimed himself

7 Map 8.1 was constructed using an Ascending Hierarchical Classification (AHC). This method groups the territorial units minimizing the internal variance of the averages of each category, while maximizing their differentiation with respect to the rest of the categories. This makes it possible to cluster the most similar and the most different cases, situating the primary logics of their territorial distribution and borders (Minvielle & Souiah 2003: 61–82). For further analysis of Mexico’s new electoral geography, see the chapter’s enhancement online.

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“ Legitimate President”, and formed his own “Legitimate Government”. In 2012, his second defeat in the presidential race led him to again disregard the results, to break with the PRD and to form his own party, taking the cadres and rank and file of his Movimiento de Regeneración Nacional with him. Despite all these defeats, López Obrador exerted important coattails effects and brought together a significantly higher proportion of votes than his supporters in the legislative elections. But it was not until 2018 that his third presidential campaign catalyzed a true tsunami, a product of the massive rejection of the ruling elite that was reflected in a conclusive split-ticket vote.8 While the candidates of Juntos Haremos Historia registered 45.4% of the vote for federal deputies, AMLO amassed 10 additional points in the presidential elections. Table 8.1 summarizes this “useful vote” [voto útil ] at the national level. The split tickets come from voters who chose one of the parties of Todos por México or Por México al Frente in the legislative elections but did not vote for Meade (−7.9 points) or Anaya (−5.3 points) in the presidential race, as well as from citizens who abstained or annulled their ballots in the first but voted validly in the second. The most significant transfers occurred among the voters of the PRI and the PVEM (among whom Meade lost 3.2 million votes), while PAN sympathizers voted in a more disciplined manner (Anaya lost 1.4 million PRD voters and 1.5 million voters from the MC). Logically, “El Bronco” captured part of this split-ticket vote, since he did not even have allied candidates in the legislative elections. There are different ways to interpret this type of electoral behaviour. From an optimistic perspective, these voters preferred López Obrador’s candidacy because it was simply more attractive to them. On the other hand, in the light of rational choice theory, it is often argued that in a majoritarian electoral system with a single round, the best-informed voters anticipate the chances of victory of the main contenders and vote for the candidacy with the greatest chance of defeating that which they consider least desirable, thus exercising a strategic vote for their second choice

8 According to the series of pre-election polls conducted by Alejandro Moreno (2019) for the “Universal” newspaper and by Jorge Buendía’s polling firm, AMLO’s advantage was less than ten points until February 2018, and only grew when Ricardo Anaya was publicly accused of money laundering by the Federal Attorney General’s Office on Februrary 21, 2018, reaching 18 points by the end of March (Buendía & Márquez 2019).

Table 8.1

2.8%

5.5%

5.3%

2,967,452

22.3%

Anaya

2.9%

MC

4.6%

4.4%

2,484,185

22.9%

Anaya

1.8%

1.8%

1,010,891

28.8%

13.6%

1.9%

5.0%

4.8%

2,694,654

16.4%

Meade

1.9%

-5.8%

Anaya

Anaya -5.3%

-2.8%

-2.6%

-2.6%

-2.4%

NA

13,392,769

23.8%

-4,102,916

Meade

-3.3%

-3.0%

-7.4%

Meade

-3.1%

-2.9%

MORENA

44.5%

30,113,483

AMLO

45.8%

-7.9%

Meade

-1.6%

-1.5%

-829,689

24.8%

2.6%

2.5%

PT

4.1%

3.9%

2,210,988

53.2%

AMLO

6.2%

6.0%

3,396,805

ES

5,580,137

AMLO

7.0%

7.2%

4,217,718

24,533,346

43.6%

9.6%

AMLO

2.1%

2.1%

1,185,817

2.7%

9.4%

AMLO

0.3%

0.3%

176,602

45.4%

2.5%

2.4%

1,353,499

54.8%

AMLO

2.8%

5.2%

0.0%

0.0%

3,989

5.4%

Bronco

4.4%

4.3%

0.0%

0.0%

2,426,757 -3,989

1.0%

1.0%

534,975

5.4%

Bronco

5.4%

0.0%

0.0%

-956

0.1%

0.1%

32,938

0.1%

0.1%

31,982

Indep. 1 Indep. 2 No Reg.

1,530,101 2,961,732

Juntos Haremos Historia

38.8%

37.3%

1,390,882 20,968,859

16.9%

Meade

1.0%

1.0%

561,193 25,186,577

Todos por México (parcial)

17.2%

16.5%

9,307,233

9,289,853

Meade

14.0%

PVEM 1,051,480

-1,364,737 -1,473,294 -1,630,053 -1,643,174

27.6%

PRI 7,677,180

FUENTE: Elaboración propia con base en resultados electorales definitivos (INE 2018)

(sumas y %Tot.yVál.) -2,934,529

Anaya

-0.5%

%Voto Válido

Candidatos

-0.3%

%Voto Total

-96,498

(sumas y %Tot.yVál.) 15,544,649

Voto cruzado

PRD 1,602,715

Por México al Frente (parcial)

18.7%

%Voto Válido

Coaliciones

17.9%

10,093,012

%Voto Total

DIPUTADOS

(sumas y %Tot.yVál.) 12,610,120

Anaya

%Voto Válido

Candidatos

17.7% 18.2%

%Voto Total

PAN 9,996,514

Votación

PRESIDENTE

TOTAL

-1.2%

Nulos

-1.2%

-1.1%

-637,954

4.2%

4.0%

0.59%

Total

0.59%

0.58%

326,550

2,241,811 56,284,477

2.9%

2.8%

1,603,857 56,611,027

Nulos

Aggregated split-ticket vote between legislative and presidential elections (Mexico, 2018)

168 W. SONNLEITNER

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(Burden and Kimball 2002; Campbell and Miller 1957). Another “Madisonian” argument, recurrent in the literature on US elections, claims that these voters intentionally split their tickets to limit the power of the Executive by balancing the composition of the Legislature (Lewis-Beck and Nadau 2004; Fiorina 1996). It may also be argued that this reflects a “negative” vote, rejecting the candidacy of the party of choice, which is transferred to another option perceived as “less bad”. Citizen perceptions support this last interpretation: 42% of those surveyed by Berumen-Ipsos in June 2018 stated that they would “never vote for the PRI ”, while only 14% planned to vote for its candidates for Congress and 13% for the presidential contender. This survey also makes it possible to investigate the individual logic of split-ticket voting, which cannot be inferred from aggregate results. As illustrated in Table 8.2, Anaya retained 83% of those voting for the PAN in the legislative elections but only captured 48% and 34% of those voting for the PRD or the MC; Meade retained 82% of the PRI voters but only captured 42% and 32% of the PVEM and the PANAL. In contrast, AMLO not only retained 96% of MORENA, 87% of the PES and 84% of the PT voters; he was able to attract 55% of the voters of the MC, 40% of the PRD, 42% of the PANAL, 35% of the PVEM, and even 12% of the PAN and 10% of the PRI (see Table 8.2). Despite the coalitions negotiated by the PAN and PRI leaderships, López Obrador’s candidacy was more attractive than that of Meade for those of the PANAL and that of Anaya for voters from the MC, achieving to divide the electorates of the PRD and the PVEM. The composition of split ticket votes also varied according to territorial contexts. The same survey captures its sources in the nine entities that elected governors. With the sole exception of Guanajuato, AMLO always retained more than 94% of those who stated they wanted to vote for MORENA in the legislative elections; he captured more than half of the PRD voters in Mexico City and attracted at least two out of every three MC voters in Chiapas, Puebla, and Yucatán, as well as those of PANAL in Puebla, Chiapas, and Jalisco. He attracted four out of 10 PVEM voters in Jalisco and Puebla, as well as 23% of the PAN and 21% of the PRI in Chiapas (see Table 8.3).

Table 8.2

2622

Total de preferencias válidas para presidenciales

26%

20% 1757

113

38

27

4

23

72

1353

15

34

78

Recuento

17%

9%

1%

7%

4%

32%

42%

82%

6%

9%

3%

% fila

FUENTE: Elab oración propia con b ase en los micro-datos de la Encuesta Berumen-Ipsos (2018)

68 245

8 Movimiento Regeneración Nacional (MORENA)

Otros (otros partidos, no sabe, no responde, etc.)

2%

7% 6%

6

9 Partido Encuentro Social (PES)

23%

19%

7%

21

16

7 Partido Nueva Alianza (PANAL)

5 Partido del Trabajo (PT)

33

110

34%

48%

180 88

83%

% fila

1855

Recuento

2 José Antonio Meade Kuribreña

5550

742

3604

305

79

30

59

166

143

149

273

Recuento

54%

60%

96%

84%

87%

42%

35%

10%

55%

40%

12%

% fila

3 Andrés Manuel López Obrador

256

138

34

8

2

2

6

14

15

10

27

Recuento

3%

11%

1%

2%

2%

3%

4%

1%

6%

3%

1%

% fila

5 Jaime Rodríguez Calderón -El Bronco-

10185

1238

3744

361

91

71

170

1643

261

373

2233

% fila

100%

100%

100%

100%

100%

100%

100%

100%

100%

100%

100%

Total Recuento

P1_5 Por quién va a votar el primero de julio para Presidente de la República 1 Ricardo Anaya Cortés

4 Partido Verde (PVEM)

2 PRI

6 Movimiento Ciudadano (MC)

3 PRD

1 PAN

P1_14 El primero de julio ¿por cuál partido va a votar usted para Diputado Federal

Individual split-ticket vote between legislative and presidential elections of 2018

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Table 8.3

79 53

9 Partido Encuentro Social (PES) Total

74

94

94

67

21

FUENTE: Elab oración propia con b ase en los micro-datos de la Encuesta Berumen-Ipsos (2018)

96

8 Movimiento Regeneración Nacional (MORENA)

68

52 42

33 81

4 Partido Verde (PVEM)

5 Partido del Trabajo (PT)

6 Movimiento Ciudadano (MC)

24 93

39

3 PRD

7 Partido Nueva Alianza (PANAL)

44

9

2 PRI

23

12

1 PAN

%AMLO Chiapas

%AMLO (NACIONAL)

P1_14 El primero de julio ¿por cuál partido va a votar usted para Diputado Federal?

44

98

100

37

91

43

40

6

7

%AMLO Jalisco

46

56

95

17

16

30

39

21

12

8

%AMLO Morelos

60

60

96

60

81

54

40

45

13

14

%AMLO Puebla

70

100

96

31

44

100

25

35

4

6

%AMLO Tabasco

51

50

95

38

56

83

37

20

5

14

%AMLO Veracruz

36

100

96

100

82

25

5

11

%AMLO Yucatán

61

86

97

43

40

77

33

54

7

6

%AMLO CDMX

27

100

89

42

82

6

33

2

9

%AMLO Guanajuato

Voto cruzado por partidos (en las legislativas) / por candidatos (en las presidenciales), por entidades con elecciones para gobernador

Percent of split-ticket vote cast for AMLO, nationally and in nine states (Mexico 2018)

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8.6 After the Tsunami: Ruptures and Continuities of the Regeneración Nacional The energy of a tsunami—and its consequences—depends on the magnitude of the tectonic movement that determines its height, the number of peaks, its wavelength, and the size of its front. In Mexico, everybody knows the dimension of the wave that devastated the traditional parties in 2018. Now, the relevant question involves establishing the number of peaks and the length of the wave: When and where did it originate? What lasting effects will it have once its energy has been released and the tides have receded? The tectonic movement that led AMLO to the Presidency was the product of a widespread rejection of the ruling parties, which resulted in a massive negative vote and alternation. Three processes with distinct temporalities converged and profoundly re-shaped the electoral map in 2018: the reconfiguration of political forces, produced by the erosion, fragmentation and collapse of the transitional party system; the renegotiation of presidential alliances and the redistribution of leaderships following the ruptures that led to the nomination of their candidates, both national and local; and the conclusive rejection of the outgoing governments, reflected in a decisive split-ticket vote to the detriment of Meade and Anaya, in benefit of López Obrador. It is still early to assess whether MORENA will be able to consolidate itself as a new majority, dominant or hegemonic party, since this depends on how the internal struggles for AMLO’s succession in 2024 are processed. What is clear is that the earthquake has transformed the foundations of the transitional party system which shows no signs of recovery. The crises opened by the defeats of Anaya in the PAN and Meade in the PRI have not been resolved and the internal ruptures continue to emerge, along with new dispersals of cadres, party members, and voters. As subsequent elections have demonstrated, Regeneración Nacional has taken hold as fragmentation and partisan disaffection have continued to prevail. After having won the governorships of Chiapas, Morelos, Tabasco, Veracruz, and Mexico City in 2018, diverse coalitions led by MORENA won Puebla and Baja California in 2019, less by their own strength than thanks to high levels of abstention and the disintegration of traditional parties. Despite the crisis opened by the tragic death of the newly elected governor, turnout in Puebla plummeted from 65.8% to 33.4% and

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the MORENA-PT-PVEM coalition won the governorship with 44.8% of the valid vote against a dispersed opposition. Luis Miguel Barbosa Huerta took the governorship with 687,000 suffrages (15% of registered voters), after having lost with 1,031,043 votes in 2018 (22.5%). MORENA barely captured 393,000 votes (8.6%), less than the PAN and the PRI could have obtained if they had competed together.9 In Baja California, the MORENA-PT-PVEM-Transformemos coalition won the governorship with 50.6%. Its candidate Jaime Bonilla Valdez swept his rivals from the PAN (22.9%), the PRD (8.7%), the MC (6.6%), the PRI (4.7%) and the local PBC party (3.6%), which all competed separately. However, participation only reached 29.9%: MORENA obtained 43.3% of the valid vote but barely mobilized 12.6% of those registered.10 In 2020, the elections in Coahuila resulted in a comeback by the PRI, which obtained 49.3% of the vote and won 16 of the 25 seats of the local Congress, compared to 19.3% and five seats for MORENA.11 Similarly, the elections for municipal governments in Hidalgo resulted in 32 victories for the PRI, 18 for the PAN-PRD and only 10 for MORENA (four of them in coalition with three other parties).12 A year later, however, the midterm legislative elections coincided with 30 local elections and the renewal of 20,446 positions redistributed power. MORENA won 11 of the 15 governorships and obtained a majority in 19 of the 30 state legislatures at stake. In 2022, this party won four of the six governorships and 37% of the contested legislative seats, allowing it to now control 20 governorships and 21 state legislatures. Nonetheless, when abstention rates are considered, the proportion of registered voters that MORENA mobilized was between 13.3% and 15.4% in Quintana Roo, Durango and Aguascalientes, and between 23.6% and 26.5% in Oaxaca, Hidalgo, and Tamaulipas. Far from corroborating the strength of Regeneración Nacional, these alternations are the result of the bankruptcy of the transitional party system, which revolves around a new pivotal coalition with a majority vocation facing a highly dispersed opposition.

9 https://www.ieepuebla.org.mx/ (last consulted June 14, 2022). 10 https://www.ieebcs.org.mx/ (last consulted June 14, 2022). 11 http://www.iec.org.mx/ (last consulted June 14, 2022). 12 http://www.ieehidalgo.org.mx/ (last consulted June 14, 2022).

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MORENA’s capacity for mobilization also reflects in two referendums promoted by AMLO. In August 2021, 6.6 million citizens (7.1% of those registered) went to the polls to answer a controversial question and 97.7% of them did in the way suggested by Lopez Obrador.13 In April 2022 a second “recall” exercise, no less controversial, was promoted by his own partisans and 16.5 million citizens participated (17.7% of the nominal list), of whom 91.9% voted in favour of him “continuing as President ”.14 Both consultas involved logic very different from competitive elections (with alternative options and uncertain results), since both were promoted by the ruling party to boost AMLO’s legitimacy and boycotted by the opposition. In 2021, 6.9% of registered voters answered affirmatively to the presidential call, in contrast to the 17.8% who voted for MORENA two months earlier. In 2022, 16.3% of those registered mobilized to confirm AMLO, in contrast to the 33.7% who voted for him in the presidential elections and to the 24.5% who voted for MORENA in the legislative elections of 2018. The correlations in the territorial distribution of these five results vary between +0.621 and +0.871 (at the level of the 300 districts) and reveal an impressive geographical continuity. On the other hand, the countless coalitions, conjunctural and partial, that the PAN, the PRI and the PRD have formed in recent years have not only gained votes. They have also contributed to the blurring of the programmatic proposals and partisan identities that have differentiated them in the past. What effects can an alliance with the PRI–whose rejection rates now exceed 70% of the electorate—have for the PANin conservative states such as Aguascalientes, San Luis Potosí, Jalisco, and Guanajuato, where Catholic voters already felt abandoned or orphaned? Without an opposition with differentiated programs and coherent proposals, there can be no consistent alternations, nor effective checks and balances, nor any efficient mechanisms of accountability. In some respects, Mexico is currently undergoing a situation comparable to that experienced by Bolivia, Ecuador, and Venezuela during

13 Phrased as follows: “Do you or do you not agree that the pertinent actions be carried out in accordance with the constitutional and legal framework to undertake a process of clarification of the political decisions made in recent years by political actors, aimed at guaranteeing justice and the rights of potential victims?”. 14 Phrased as follows: “Do you agree that the mandate of Andrés Manuel López Obrador, President of the United Mexican States, should be revoked due to a loss of confidence or that he remains in the Presidency of the Republic until the end of his term?”.

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the first elections of Evo Morales, Rafael Correa, and Hugo Chávez in the late 1990s, when their party systems collapsed. However, there are fundamental differences. Like his Andean counterparts, López Obrador galvanized a massive coalition of discontents but, in contrast to them, he is not an outsider. With a long-standing affiliation that began in the PRI and matured in the PRD before creating his own party movement, AMLO acts as the last sincere insider of post-revolutionary politics. His government is pragmatic and heterogeneous, embodying and incorporating the ideals of the golden age of the PRI, when it promoted a national-popular State-centered development project. Neither his policies nor his projects are comparable to those of Morales, Correa, or Chávez in the Andean region. What is similar, however, is the level of polarization and violence of the internal ruptures produced by this electoral tsunami-alternation among the elites, old and new, impassioned or terrified by the rhetoric of AMLO’s Fourth Transformation. Without the traditional parties realizing it, Mexico endured a political earthquake of unprecedented force and weathered a perfect storm democratically. The time has come to call up the crews and repair the vessels, to weigh the magnitude of the change in its proper proportions and to rebuild a plural party system, to include the growing political diversity, and to represent the new correlation of forces.

References Aguilar, Rosario (2019). “Las coaliciones electorales de López Obrador a través del tiempo: variaciones sociales y políticas”, in Moreno, Alejandro; Alexandra Uribe Coughlan & Sergio C. Wals, El viraje electoral: opinión pública y voto en las elecciones de 2018, México, Centro de Estudios Sociales y de Opinión Pública, Cámara de Diputados/LXIV Legislatura, pp. 57–74. Becerra, Ricardo, Salazar, Pedro & José Woldenberg (2000). La mecánica del cambio político en México, México, Cal y Arena. Buendía, Jorge & Javier Márquez (2018): “¿Por qué el tsunami?” Nexos, julio 1, 2019. Burden, Barry C. & David C. Kimball (2002). Why Americans Split Their Ticket? Michigan, University of Michigan Press. Campbell, Angus & Warren Miller (1957). “The Motivational Basis of Straight and Split Ticket Voting”, The American Political Science Review, Vol. 51, No. 2 (Jun.), pp. 293–312.

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Domínguez, Jorge I. & Chappell Lawson (eds.) (2004). Mexico’s Pivotal Democratic Election: Candidates, Voters, and the Presidential Campaign of 2000, Stanford, Stanford University Press. Fiorina, Morris P. (1996). Divided Government (2nd ed.), Boston, Allyn and Bacon. Gómez Tagle, Silvia (2001). La transición inconclusa: treinta años de elecciones en México, México, El Colegio de México. Hermet, Guy, Rouquié, Alain & Juan Linz (1982). ¿Para qué sirven las elecciones?, México, Fondo de Cultura Económica [Elections without choice, English versión published in 1978]. Lewis-Beck, Michael & Richard Nadeau (2004). “Split-Ticket Voting: The Effects of Cognitive Madisonianism”, The Journal of Politics, Vol. 66, No. 1, Feb. 2004, pp. 97–112. Loaeza, Soledad (2008). Entre lo posible y lo probable: La experiencia de la transición en México, México: Planeta, 236 p. Minvielle, Erwann & Sid-Ahmed Souiah (2003). L’analyse statistique et spatiale. Statistiques, cartographie, télédétection, SIG, Nantes: Éditions du temps, pp. 61–82. Moreno, Alejandro (2019). “Introducción: Landslide 2018”, in Moreno, Alejandro; Alexandra Uribe Coughlan & Sergio C. Wals, El viraje electoral: opinión pública y voto en las elecciones de 2018, México, Centro de Estudios Sociales y de Opinión Pública, Cámara de Diputados/LXIV Legislatura, pp. 25–53. Proceso (2018). “El largo y rudo camino al poder”. Edición extraordinaria coordinada por Álvaro Delgado, Revista Proceso, Año 41, No. Extraordinario, Septiembre 2018, 84 p. Prud’homme, Jean-Francois (2020). “Partidos y sistema de partidos en las elecciones mexicanas de 2018”, Foro Internacional, LX, 2020, No. 2, Cuad. 240, pp. 397–450. Przeworski, Adam (2010). Qué esperar de la democracia. Límites y posibilidades del autogobierno, Buenos Aires, Siglo XXI. Sonnleitner, Willibald (2017). “Rastreando las dinámicas territoriales de la fragmentación partidista en México (1991–2015)”, América Latina Hoy, Revista de Ciencias Sociales, Vol. 75, abril de 2017. Sonnleitner, Willibald (2018). Lo que el voto se llevó. La descomposición del pacto posrevolucionario en México [Gone With the Vote: The disintegration of Mexico’s post-revolutionary pact ], México, El Colegio de México, 396 p. Sonnleitner, Willibald (2020). “La re-configuración territorial de las fuerzas políticas: Geografía de la fragmentación, el colapso y la re-composición partidista (2012–2018)”, Foro Internacional, LX, 2020, No. 2, Cuad. 240, pp. 451–500. Valencia Escamilla (2022). Laura, “Representación y reelección legislativa México: la elección federal de 2021”, Revista mexicana de opinión pública, No. 32, ene./jun. 2022.

CHAPTER 9

Panama: Alternation Inside the Box Claire Nevache, Sophie Wintgens, and Harry Brown-Araúz

The latest general elections in Panama on May 5, 2019, saw the victory of the Democratic Revolutionary Party (PRD) over the other two parties that have taken turns in power since 2009, namely the outgoing Panameñista Party (PPa) and Democratic Change (CD). Laurentino Cortizo (PRD) thus marked a new presidential alternation by beating

C. Nevache (B) CEVIPOL-CIEPS, Brussels, Belgium e-mail: [email protected] S. Wintgens CEVIPOL-CND-CEFIR, Brussels, Belgium e-mail: [email protected] H. Brown-Araúz CIEPS, Panama City, Panama e-mail: [email protected]

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023, corrected publication 2023 O. Dabène (ed.), Latin America’s Pendular Politics, Studies of the Americas, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-26761-1_9

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Table 9.1 Result of the presidential elections of May 5, 2019 (Single round, majority election) in Panama Candidate (M/F)

Parties that make up the alliances

Results

Laurentino Cortizo

Partido Revolucionario Democrático (Democratic Revolutionary Party or PRD) Movimiento Liberal Republicano Nacionalista (Nationalist Republican Liberal Movement or MOLIRENA) Cambio Democrático (Democratic Change or CD) Partido Alianza (Alliance Party) Not registered in a political party Partido Panameñista (Panameñista Party or Ppa) Partido Popular (PP) Not registered in a political party Frente Amplio por la Democracia (Broad Front for Democracy or FAD) Not registered in a political party

33.35%

Rómulo Roux Ricardo Lombana José Isabel Blandón Ana Matilde Gómez Saúl Méndez Marco Ameglio

30.99% 18.78% 10.84% 4.77% 0.69% 0.58%

José Isabel Blandón (PPa) and Rómulo Roux (CD). These results are the product of the socio-economic and political situation of a country whose electoral system systemically favours alternations between three ideologically (they are all centre-right parties) and sociologically (all of them represent the dominant social class) homogeneous parties. These systematic alternations at the presidential level thus maintain the economic model that aims to make Panama a global hub. However, the systemic alternation that exists at the presidential level hides a more important continuity in the rest of the institutions. The voting system gives a considerable advantage to the PRD, which is systematically over-represented in relation to the number of votes obtained (Sonnleitner, 2010). Furthermore, Alvarado de León (2020) showed that the PRD is the party with the greatest consistency between the number of votes obtained in the presidential and legislative elections. It has achieved a relative or absolute majority in all legislative elections since 1994. Thus, the PRD, which had a group of 26 members of the National Assembly and forced the previous government into difficult negotiations, further strengthened its majority in the 2019 elections with 35 MPs (Table 9.1). In this context, this chapter aims to identify the factors that favour these systemic but ideologically similar alternations in Panama.

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9.1 Ideological Position of Panamanian Parties and Candidates in the 2019 Elections Panamanian politics is frequently characterized as non-ideological because of its low polarization. This impression of non-ideology is in fact mainly due to a significant ideological homogeneity (Otero Felipe, 2006; Brown Araúz, 2018, 2020; Wintgens & Nevache, 2020). All governing parties are positioned between the centre right and the right spectrums and are characterized by a high degree of personalization. Traditionally, the party system was characterized by a bipolar dynamic around the Democratic Revolutionary Party (PRD). The PRD was founded by an authoritarian regime in 1979 with the idea that it could lead the democratic transition process. The figure of General Omar Torrijos, and in its lineage “Torrijismo”, remains the central idea on which the party defines itself ideologically (Otero Felipe, 2006; Brown Araúz & Sonnleitner, 2016). Since 1990 and the democratic transition, the party has however undergone a shift to the right. The second most important party in the country historically is the Panameñista Party (PPa). It dates back to the beginning of the twentieth century (1932 or 1933, depending on the origin story selected) and before 2005 was called Partido Arnulfista. Indeed, this political current is marked by the charismatic figure of Arnulfo Arias Madrid, who was elected president three times in 1940, 1949, and 1968, and whose three mandates were interrupted by coups d’état. His political doctrine, Panameñismo, is characterized by nationalism and conservatism. After the presidency of his widow, Mireya Moscoso (1999–2004) the party distanced itself from the figure of Arnulfo Arias (Brown Araúz & Sonnleitner, 2016). Historically, these two parties (PRD and Panameñista) embodied two poles with few ideological and programmatic differences, but which in the 1990s represented the continuity of the military regime and/or the democratic opposition to it. The party that managed to prevail in the party system and break this traditional bipartisan alliance logic is Cambio Democrático (Democratic Change or CD). It was originally a charismatic organization (Panebianco, 1990, pp. 113–114) created in 1998 by the millionaire Ricardo Martinelli, owner of one of the main supermarket chains in the country Upon his departure in 2014, the multiple corruption scandals in which he was directly involved forced him to flee the country and take

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refuge in Guatemala and then in the United States (Pérez, 2017), where he was arrested. We can try to position ideologically the main parties active in 2019 using the Barómetro de las Américas (Barometer of the Americas) and data from the Proyecto de Elites Parlamentarias (Parliamentary Elites Project) of the University of Salamanca (Alcántara, 2019). The analysis proposed by Colomer and Escatel (2005) consists of crossreferencing individual responses on ideological positioning (from 1 to 10, with 1 being the extreme left and 10 the extreme right) with the responses to the question “If the elections were this Sunday, for which party would you vote?”, assuming a correlation between the ideological identity of the individuals and the chosen party.1 We find it interesting to present the results that emerge and confirm the proximity between the three governing parties (all three with sufficient responses): the most “left-wing” score of 5.12 was obtained by the PRD in 2012 and the most right-wing score of 6.55 by the CD in 2004. All mean ideological positions fall within this margin of 1.43 points located between 5.12 and 6.55, which means a very moderate level of polarization. In addition, the curves of the three parties cross each other several times, further signaling a certain ideological equivalence (Fig. 9.1). Additionally, the Parliamentary Elites Project of the University of Salamanca allows us to address the ideologies of the parties as perceived by the elected representatives. The MPs were also asked to rank the parties on a scale of 1 to 10. The result of this exercise is somewhat different from the previous one. For those elected, the parties have a clearer ideological identity: the lines of the three main parties do not cross and Cambio Democrático is the most right-wing party over the whole period, while the PRD is the most left-wing party, with the Partido Panameñista in an intermediate position. Nevertheless, the convergence among the three is evident in the last survey (Fig. 9.2). The high ideological convergence of parties turns elections into a choice of individuals and electoral programs and debates into depoliticized technocratic discussions. Despite their promises of change, independent candidates, included in the 2014 presidential elections, have 1 Nevertheless, it is extremely revealing to note the lack of statistical correlation between the two data. We could conclude that the notions of “left” and “right” are alien to Panamanian political logic or to its electorate, or that the parties have little to do with these notions.

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10.00 9.00 8.00 7.00 6.00 5.00 4.00 3.00 2.00 1.00 0.00 2004

2006

2008

Democratic Revolutionary Party (PRD)

2010

2012

2014

Democratic Change (CD)

2017

2018

Panameñista Party (Ppa)

Fig. 9.1 Ideological position of the three main Panamanian parties (Source Authors’ elaboration with data from the Barómetro de las Américas [Barometer of the Americas]) 10.00 8.00 6.00 4.00 2.00 0.00 1999-2004

2004-2009

2009-2014

2014-2019

2019-2024

Democratic Revolutionary Party (PRD) Panameñista Party (Ppa) Democratic Change (CD)

Fig. 9.2 Ideological position of parties according to a poll of MPs (Source Authors’ elaboration with data from the Parliamentary Elites Project of the University of Salamanca)

not modified this de facto state of affairs. If we look at the four lines of fragmentation identified in the introduction of this book (the position on Venezuela, the role of the State in the economy, insecurity, and social issues pertaining to abortion and homosexuality), we can identify

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certain ideological characteristics of the candidates in the 2019 elections, confirming at the same time the overall similarity of their proposals. 9.1.1

The Candidates’ Position in Venezuela

As in the rest of the region, Venezuela is a sensitive issue in Panama: frequently used to discredit the few leftist political forces, it also refers to the historical fault lines on the role of the United States in the internal politics of Latin American countries. Indeed, the hypothesis of an eventual military intervention in Venezuela or of US support for the overthrow of Nicolás Maduro by the armed forces, often mentioned in the first months of 2019 by President Donald Trump, had a particular resonance for the Panamanian population, echoing the invasion of December 1989. Panama’s official position on Venezuela is that of the Lima Group, to which the country has belonged since its creation: on 23 January 2019, Panama recognizes Juan Guaidó as president in charge of Venezuela and on 22 March of the same year, the day after the arrest of Juan Guaidó’s chief of staff, Juan Carlos Varela’s government announced the withdrawal of credentials to the Ambassador of Maduro’s government and diplomatic relations only with the Ambassador representing Guaidó’s government. It was thus against a tense backdrop on this issue that the electoral campaign took place. On this issue, as on many others, the most conservative position was that of the independent candidate Marco Ameglio. On March 12, 2019, during a forum for students at the University of Santa Maria la Antigua, he declared that “the only instance left was the use of force” and that talking about anything else was equivalent to “wasting time”. He thus called on Latin America to “put on its big-boy pants” and coordinate with its northern neighbour to create a joint force (Chacón, 2019). Saúl Méndez, the candidate of the Frente Amplio por la Democracia and the only left-wing candidate, opposed this point of view and was continuously confronted on the issue of Venezuela during the campaign, with journalists and his opponents systematically referring to this issue. In an interview with El Siglo newspaper, Saúl Méndez stated that his vision of foreign policy was that Panama should not be subordinated to any other country, that it should be respected in the concert of nations and that the self-determination of its peoples and their sovereignty should be respected (Méndez, 2019).

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Without calling for a military intervention like Marco Ameglio, CD candidate Romulo Roux and independent candidate Ricardo Lombana, remained in a position aligned with the United States: “The interim president Guaidó has received significant support that must be maintained until the usurper Maduro leaves power and returns freedom to the noble Venezuelan people”. Ricardo Lombana likewise indicated that Nicolás Maduro was a dictator, an “illegitimate president” and that he wanted Panama to remain in the Lima Group and strongly supports free and democratic elections in Venezuela (Chacón, 2019). Panameñista Party candidate, José Isabel Blandón, stated in an interview that it was necessary to be “consistent around the struggle for democracy and respect for the will of the people” and that in this sense he would always be an advocate of dialogue, condemning at the same time anti-democratic regimes, pointing out the cases of Venezuela, Nicaragua, and Honduras. He also stated that he would invite Guaidó and not Maduro to his inauguration were he to win the election. Ana Matilde Gómez, a candidate not registered with a party, was firmly opposed to military intervention, recalling that Panama had itself been a victim of this type of intervention. She declared that “we must be neutral but never indifferent”. The elected candidate Laurentino Cortizo declared in the same vein his refusal to “pick a side” and proposed to review Panama’s role in the Lima Group (which was not the case during the first two years of his mandate) including the recognition of Juan Guaidó, and to seek a diplomatic, peaceful and democratic solution to the conflict. Regarding the issue of Venezuela, two poles clearly appear: one represented by Marco Ameglio, the other by Saul Mendez, the FAD candidate, both of whom are in the minority. Among the other candidates, we observe a position rather aligned with the United States (Rómulo Roux, Ricardo Lombana and José Isabel Blandón) and a third-way position (Ana Matilde Gómez and Laurentino Cortizo). This last position was the one chosen by the electorate, even though the policy ultimately implemented was that of alignment. 9.1.2

The Role of the State in the Economy

Panamanian economic policy has historically been guided by the socalled “transit-based consensus” (Castillero Calvo, 1995), that is, the idea that the country’s geographical conditions “naturally” orient its

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development model towards an outward-oriented economy; a service economy in which the primary and secondary sectors become increasingly marginal, an economy that is concentrated in the “transit zone” around the Canal and the associated logistical and banking infrastructures. Panama is undoubtedly one of the most liberal countries on the continent. For 2019, ICEFI (The Central American Institute for Fiscal Studies) estimated a net tax burden of 8% and a public expenditure rate equivalent to 16.4% of GDP. Most of the presidential candidates did not question this model. Some, such as Romulo Roux, proposed an income tax reduction from 15 to 10% for the lowest bracket and to be more rigorous regarding the deficit. Ricardo Lombana was also in favour of reducing the size of the State, even proposing the elimination of public funding for universities, as well as a review of all redistribution programs and the modification or elimination of several taxes. Marco Ameglio proposed the reduction of the number of civil servants through the non-replacement of retirees, as well as the “re-evaluation of the participation or justification of the State’s participation in public utility and public service enterprises.” Laurentino Cortizo’s economic program was rather vague. But his program mentioned the creation of new special economic zones, which constitutes additional tax reductions. In a slightly more interventionist position, Ana Matilde Gomez proposed several subsidy programs for training in the industrial and agricultural sectors, as well as a first job program in the public sector. José Isabel Blandón proposed the extension of existing social benefits, such as the inclusion of self-employed workers, housewives, and informal workers into social security, while advocating a limitation of benefits to “those who really need them” and a limit on the fiscal deficit. Not surprisingly, the candidate who advocated much greater state intervention in the economy is FAD candidate, Saul Mendez, including a general increase in wages and pensions, rationalization of company margins, a freeze on the price of certain basic staples, prohibition of speculation, the establishment of unemployment insurance, establishment of a minimum price for agricultural products, a general subsidy policy, and transformation of the tax system into a progressive one. Thus, as described by the economist Javier Stanziola (2019), six of the seven candidates have shown little interest in a major change in the country’s development model. Despite some concerns about the state of public finances, no changes to the financial system have been proposed.

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Security: Prevention, Repression, Resocialization

Most of the candidates’ plans organize their security proposals into prevention, resocialization, and repression. However, it would be hasty to jump to conclusions about the ideological positions of the candidates. Indeed, several of them include proposals presented as preventive that could easily be described as extremely conservative, particularly when this prevention of insecurity is understood as increased control of migratory flows, thus directly associating migration with insecurity. Similarly, the policy of preventing insecurity is often presented in a somewhat caricatural way, i.e. as a cultural or sports policy, without necessarily considering it as part of a policy of access to leisure and health. Another preconceived conservative idea frequently observed in crime prevention is the idea of the need to reinforce “values”, for example in penitentiaries (present in Laurentino Cortizo’s program) or through the media (Romulo Roux’s program). Thus, in his “prevention” section of the program, Laurentino Cortizo proposed, for example, the creation of closed boarding schools called “Finding the Right Path” in coordination with the Ministries of Education, Security, and Social Development, without specifying who would be the recipients, an increase in police presence in rougher neighbourhoods and an increase in their equipment. In addition to increasing the police force, candidate Marco Ameglio proposed in his section on prevention, to authorize the importation and carrying of weapons. Romulo Roux proposed recreational centres with “discussions on the comprehensive development of values” and “zero tolerance” for illegal immigration. His program also included a very harsh repressive portion, notably the doubling of prison sentences. Ricardo Lombana also planned a greater police presence and increased penalties for certain crimes. The security-related programs of José Isabel Blandón and Ana Matilde Gómez appear to be more moderate. José Isabel Blandón’s proposals for the prevention of insecurity revolved around cultural, sports, and civic education programs, in addition to a major surveillance camera program. Ana Matilde Gómez referred to the fight against poverty and unemployment as the basis for the fight against crime. Lastly, Saul Mendez’s program on insecurity focused solely on prevention and resocialization (especially by taking poverty into consideration), as well as on the fight against police violence and human rights violations.

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Once again, on this issue, we observe a central point between the more conservative Marco Ameglio and the more progressive Saul Mendez. On the issue of security, the positions of Laurentino Cortizo, Ricardo Lombana, and Rómulo Roux appear extremely close and generally repressive, while José Isabel Blandón has a more moderate position and Ana Matilde Gómez a progressive position, but much more moderate than that of Saúl Méndez. 9.1.4

Same-Sex Marriage and Abortion: The Consensus of the Status Quo

Since 2016, the issue of same-sex marriage has become increasingly important in the debates of Panamanian society. Indeed, two appeals for unconstitutionality were filed in 2016 and 2017 by homosexual couples married abroad, in order for their unions to be recognized in Panama. Three major conservative demonstrations took place in July 2016, July 2017, and March 2018, initially in opposition to a bill that claimed to introduce sex education in schools, and then increasingly focused on the issue of same-sex marriage. No candidate announced any change on same-sex marriage in his or her program. However, we find the same nuances as aforementioned. Marco Ameglio’s program is undoubtedly—in this issue as well—the most conservative, announcing, “We will defend the natural heterosexual marriage bond (man and woman) as the social institution of our society”. He reiterated several times in his program his intention to “defend the family”. Although Laurentino Cortizo issued two tweets in 2015 celebrating the favourable decision of the US Supreme Court on same-sex marriage, he reversed his statements during the campaign and finally opposed this reform. Rómulo Roux also expressed disagreement with any “attack against the Panamanian family”, although he said that he would respect the decision of the Supreme Court and, on the other hand, declared himself willing to discuss an eventual civil union proposal. Ana Matilde Gómez also disagreed with same-sex marriage in an interview given to La Prensa newspaper on January 9, 2019. On this issue, it was Ricardo Lombana who had a more intermediate position. While recalling that he is Catholic, he specified that he believed in the separation of Church and State and that his beliefs should therefore not be related to government decisions. Thus, despite his rather opposite personal conviction, he

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punted on the issue by pointing out that it was up to the Supreme Court to decide. The most interesting case is probably that of José Isabel Blandón who, after holding a very progressive position on the issue as mayor of the capital, at the end of the campaign signed a “Commitment to the Values of Profound Change” (the name of his campaign), pledging not to propose any legislative changes on same-sex marriage and abortion. This reversal, together with the nomination of Nilda Quijano as the vice-presidential candidate, who peppered the campaign with religious references and nods to her evangelical beliefs, definitely distanced the PPa’s candidacy from the most progressive part of the society on these issues, which, in turn, flocked massively to Ricardo Lombana’s candidacy. Without openly declaring himself in favour of same-sex marriage, Saúl Méndez includes in his program human rights policies for “all people and human groups victims of discrimination because of their sexual preferences” and affirms that “the Panamanian State must fulfill its commitments to the international community on human rights”. The issue of abortion, on the other hand, remains taboo in Panama and no important political figure openly defends this topic. The presentation of the parties and the positions of the candidates in the presidential elections makes it possible to understand the homogeneity of the electoral offer. Despite some more radical positions (reactionary or, on the contrary, very leftist), they represent testimonial candidacies rather than electoral alternatives. Among the governing parties, the positions are conservative and very similar on most issues. The renewal heralded by the emergence of “independent” candidacies has had real effects. In particular, it has allowed the candidacy of the only woman in the campaign, the deputy Ana Matilde Gómez, who also brought ideas that we can qualify as social democrats, absent from electoral campaigns until then. The arrival of independents also brought more reactionary speeches (Marco Ameglio) and a new, more populist style of politics (Ricardo Lombana and Marco Ameglio).

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9.2 Explanatory Elements of an Announced Alternation 9.2.1

Institutional Factors

In addition to the fact that elections are competitive (Organization of American States, n.d.), which is naturally a necessary condition for alternation, the Panamanian Constitution does not allow for the immediate reelection of presidents. Persons holding the presidency and vice-presidency of the Republic cannot run for the same office for the next two terms. This means that a former president must wait ten years, the equivalent of two presidential terms, to run again. This rule comes from 1928. Except for the period of the authoritarian regime, when real power was wielded by the military and presidents were only secondary figures, the rule of no presidential re-election seems to enjoy institutional legitimacy within Panamanian public opinion. Indeed, the only serious attempt to modify this rule confirmed the population’s preference for the impossibility of re-election. In 1998, Ernesto Pérez Balladares tried to promote a constitutional reform that would allow his own re-election. The referendum on the issue obtained the highest participation among the three referendums held since the democratic transition, with 65.4% of votes cast, and a result of 67.3% of the votes cast against the modification of the Constitution. Since then, Article 178 has not been discussed again. The impossibility of the president running for office does not, of course, prevent the governing party from remaining in power, but it certainly makes continuity much more difficult. We must admit, however, that previous presidents can have an influence on the election. In 2019, the previous president, Ricardo Martinelli (2009–2014), at that time imprisoned for illegal wiretapping, had a considerable impact on the campaign. Being at that time a candidate for the municipality of the capital and an MP seat, the former president, whom polls considered as the favourite, notably campaigned through audio messages that began as follows: “Dear Panamanian people, this is Ricardo Martinelli speaking to you from the Renacer penitentiary, where I am imprisoned because Juan Carlos Varela and the economic powers of the country want to bring me to my knees”. The Electoral Tribunal rejected the candidacy of the former president, who remains very popular, less than a month before the election. This has led to a defensive reaction from his supporters,

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who responded in large numbers to his call to vote for Rómulo Roux, the president of the party he had founded. 9.2.2

Public Opinion

Like the rest of Latin America, the legitimacy of democracy has collapsed over the last few decades, to the benefit of indifference to the form of government, which has almost tripled between 1996 (12% of respondents stated that a democratic or non-democratic regime did not matter to them) and 2018 (34%). During this period, the percentage of the population that considered democracy to always be preferable to any other form of government dropped from 75 to 42% (Latinobarómetro) (Fig. 9.3). Not only is democratic legitimacy collapsing, but satisfaction with democracy has also dropped significantly: while 63.13% of the population said they were satisfied or very satisfied with democracy in 2014, this was only the case for 37.48% in 2016 and 25.53% in 2018. This decline of democratic legitimacy was combined during the May 2019 elections with an unfavourable public opinion of the outgoing government, particularly when related to economic performance, which was considered poor, even if the GDP growth ranged from 5.7% to 3.7% between 2014 and 2018, and the unemployment of 6% of the labor force remained close to full employment. However, the government was suffering from a comparative effect with the previous period. 80 70 60 50 40 30 20 10 0 19961997199820002001200220032004200520062007200820092010201120132015201620172018

Fig. 9.3 “Democracy is preferable to any other form of government”: Panama (Source Authors’ elaboration with data from Latinobarómetro)

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90 81 80 70 60 50

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Fig. 9.4 Panama: percentage who considered President Varela’s administration as “good” or “very good” (Source Dichter and Neira)

The economic slowdown, related to the completion of the construction of the Panama Canal expansion project and the Panama Papers scandal (2016), consequently had a significant impact on public opinion regarding President Varela’s administration. At the beginning of his term, his predecessor, Ricardo Martinelli, labelled him with the nickname Tortugón (Big Turtle), which summed up a certain torpor that followed him throughout his term (Fig. 9.4). The last opinion surveys date from September 2017, since the firm Dichter and Neira suspended them, but the curve of public opinion for the first three years of the mandate clearly shows a drop in President Varela’s popularity. It was difficult under these conditions to see the election of a PPa presidential candidate. 9.2.3

Electoral Offer: Strong Convergence of Programs

We have already mentioned the ideological positions of the different parties and candidates, which are almost all on the centre right, except for an independent candidate from the extreme right and the candidacy of a trade unionist who could be placed on the extreme left, with no real possibility of winning. The lexicometric analysis of the candidates’ electoral programs confirms this convergence, especially among the candidates of the governing parties. We subjected the electoral programs to a specificity analysis using the textual data analysis software Iramuteq, version 0.7 alpha 2 (Pierre

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Ratinaud) to observe the specific textual characteristics of each of these programs. The three governing parties used very similar words and concepts, ultimately having very similar programs, as can be seen in the following correlation factor analysis. The first factor (33.1% of the corpus mass) clearly separates the program of Saúl Méndez and Ana Matilde Gómez (on the positive side of the abscissa) from the other programs (on the negative side of the axis). The lexicometric analysis thus finds a separation between right and left programs. We have already said that Ana Matilde Gómez had more progressive positions than other candidates on certain social or economic issues. This is reflected in the lexicometric analysis of her program, which is on the same side as Saúl Méndez, although much closer to the central axis. The second factor (19.4%) separates the programs of party candidates (on the negative side of the ordinate axis) from the programs of independent candidates (on the positive side). The combination of these two factors clearly reveals three zones in this two-dimensional projection of the textual corpus: a very small zone containing the electoral programs of the three governing parties, a larger zone containing the programs of the three independent candidates, and a zone distant from the first two containing the program of the leftist candidate, far from all the others (Fig. 9.5). If we look at the words that obtain the highest specificity score in each of the programs, it is revealing that in the programs of Laurentino Cortizo and Rómulo Roux we find the names of the candidates. This confirms the idea detailed above that their differences are based more on their person rather than on their proposals or project. Also revealing is the fact that the words “logistics” and “port” are among the words strongly linked (chi2) to Ricardo Lombana’s electoral program, showing an alignment with the transitist or transit-based model of development, despite the rhetoric of “renovation” and change, which in the end is mainly a change of person and non-partisan structure. As for Saúl Méndez’s program, the words with the highest specificity scores are “right” and “proposal”. The lexicometric study of the electoral programs confirms our hypothesis that even though there are many systematic alternations in Panama, these are similar, which can be appreciated even from the point of view of the lexical proximity of the candidates’ programs.

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Fig. 9.5 Panama: factor analysis mapping the lexical proximity between the electoral programs of the 7 presidential candidates

9.2.4

Volatility of Voting Behavior

After the democratic transition, Panama had a short period of low volatility during which electoral contests reflected the fracture of the authoritarian regime between democracy and authoritarianism. On this functional basis, two medium-sized parties, the PRD and the Partido Panameñista (PPa), led the system and formed the two main alliances. They garnered the majority of the votes until 2004.

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Fig. 9.6 Panama: evolution of electoral volatility (Source Author’s elaboration with data provided by Brown Araúz [2020])

This brief period of stability was broken in the 1999–2004 period, when volatility rose to 43 and was repeated in the 2004–2009 period with the emergence of third parties. The 2009–2014 period saw the lowest volatility since the democratic transition, leading to the 2014 elections being described as the “realignment” of the system (Brown Araúz, 2015). However, the new pattern of competition was short-lived, as the last elections in 2019 again resulted in greater volatility, which was tentatively labelled as a gap (Brown Araúz, 2020) and could indicate the beginning of a new critical phase in the Panamanian party system (Fig. 9.6). In the case of Panama, volatility is only a partial explanation for the systemic alternation, which has taken place both in periods of high volatility and in periods of lower volatility. Furthermore, Panama is a country with relatively low and stable electoral abstention (turnout has ranged between 73 and 77% over the last thirty years, which is high for a country where voting is not compulsory), so it is also a factor that seems marginal in explaining alternation.

9.3 Is It a Political Homogeneity That Seems to Avoid Radicalization? Panamanian political life is characterized by ideological homogeneity. However, several elements seem to bring a radicalization of Panamanian

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political life. Public opinion, on the one hand, seems to be radicalizing since a large part of the population identifies itself to the extreme left or even more to the extreme right. The emergence of social media and some very effective political campaigns are also able to disrupt the hitherto known moderation. However, we will see that the primary system has so far allowed a certain status quo to be maintained at the level of the governing parties, while the most extreme candidates have finally entered the elections without being registered in parties. 9.3.1

Evolution of the Radicalization of the Electorate

From the Latinobarómetro figures, we can see that the number of people scoring 1 or 10 on a scale of 0 to 10 (0 being the extreme left and 10 the extreme right) has undergone two quite evident evolutions. Between 1996 and 2007, the radicality of the electorate gradually decreased until its lowest level in 2007, when only 4% of the population was on the extreme right or extreme left. The new makeup of the Panamanian party system and increasing fragmentation of the electorate, including the introduction of a third party and the emergence of non-party registered electoral forces, has been accompanied by a resurgence of radicalism, reaching record numbers of 30% or more of the population since 2016 (Fig. 9.7). 35 30 25 20 15 10 5 0

Far left

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Fig. 9.7 Evolution of radicalism in Panamanian public opinion (Source Authors’ elaboration with data provided Latinobarómetro)

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35 30 25 20 15 10 5 0 1996 1997 1998 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2013 2015 2016 2017 2018 Far left

Far right

Poly. (Far left)

Poly. (Far right)

Fig. 9.8 Panama: comparison of the evolution of the extreme right and the extreme left in public opinion (Source Authors’ elaboration with data provided Latinobarómetro)

On the other hand, Fig. 9.8 shows that radicalism in Panama has been driven mainly by the extreme right, which averaged 12% of the population during the period, peaking at 32% in 1998, while the extreme left averaged 7% of the population, peaking at 22% in 1996. It also shows that radicalism on the far left and far right followed a similar downward trend in the mid-2000s, before eventually increasing again since then. It seems clear that the apparent homogeneity and moderation of the political system actually hides a more polarized public opinion. 9.3.2

The Emergence of a Greater Polarization Based on a New Division of Power

Panamanian politics has been defined throughout the republican period by the structural division between two models of development, which has been reflected since the last third of the twentieth century by a division between authoritarianism and democracy. Once the authoritarian regime was overcome, the elites committed themselves jointly to transitism. This opened the possibility for the emergence of new fragmentations. According to Brown Araúz (2018), conservatism has gained so much space in the country and its organizations have become political actors

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(Nevache, 2017) that we could see a new conservatism/progressivism split. This can be seen, for example, in the recurrent debates around samesex marriage or sex education in schools. These issues have generated the most important political manifestations in recent years. 9.3.3

The Role of Social Media in the 2019 Elections

Due to the enormous financing of Panamanian electoral campaigns, made easier by lax legislation, social media had not been an important part of the campaigns until 2019. Although there were no significant antecedents, the Electoral Tribunal anticipated the possibility that social media would play an important role in the campaign and proposed that the candidates, the different actors involved in the campaign, and the citizenry in general sign a “Digital Ethics Pact”. With this instrument, social media users symbolically committed themselves to respect the time-based constraints of the campaign, to not use false accounts or “bots” and to not spread “fake news”. However, the Electoral Tribunal was not satisfied with this symbolic measure: several decrees regulating the competence and procedures to sanction the improper use of social media during the campaign and the electoral blackout periods were added to the pact. However, the general uneasiness of the population towards politics, bolstered during the 2014–2019 period due to numerous scandals, particularly corruption, but also the deterioration of the country’s international image following the Panama Papers scandal, gave rise to an extremely active anti-corruption movement. This movement was reflected electorally in the hashtag #NoALaReelección (“No to Re-election”) (Brown Araúz & Acosta, 2022). 9.3.4

Mechanisms to Filter Radical Candidacies: Closed Primaries and Signatures for Candidates Not Registered in a Party

Since 2014, when the possibility of having candidates who weren’t registered in a party was introduced, also known as “free nomination” or sometimes flatteringly as “independent candidacies”, two mechanisms have coexisted to define candidates: the party primaries (introduced in 1998) and the collection of signatures. This process has sometimes been called firmarias (a word composed of firma or signature, and primary)

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(Brown Araúz, 2020: 397). In 2019, both processes showed some peculiarities: the partisan primaries had very low participation, but prevented the appearance of “polarizing” candidates, favouring the most “electable” ones; on the other hand, the number of signatures collected by non-party candidates far exceeded expectations and, instead, gave the possibility of presenting very “polarizing” candidates. The PRD and CD elections featured polarizing and conservative candidates with important political trajectories. Congresswoman Zulay Rodríguez, known for her anti-immigration stance, populist tendencies, and accusations of possible links to drug trafficking, came in second place in the PRD primaries with 20.9% of the votes. In the CD primaries, former Security Minister José Raúl Mulino, responsible for episodes of repression that caused several deaths and many serious injuries during demonstrations under the Martinelli administration, also came in second place with 29.1% of the votes. Despite these good results of the more “extreme” candidates, the militants were inclined towards the candidates considered to have a better chance of being elected. For non-party candidates, the criterion was to collect 18,542 signatures (1% of the votes cast in the previous election), but only the three candidates with the most adherents could run, resulting in an open competition with many irregularities. The candidate with the most signatures collected 131,415, 708% more than the minimum required. Although the primaries prevented a radicalization of the partisan candidacies, the non-party candidacies through the gathering-of-signatures mechanism introduced a certain radicalization of the political discourse through the candidacy of Marco Ameglio, whose positions we have already described. Despite these significant rates of radicalism, higher than those of other countries in the region that have experienced major political upheavals in recent years (Brazil, Chile, and Colombia), the introduction of social media and the emergence of new factions linked to debates on gender issues, Panamanian politics remains immutably moderate. Thus, the two candidates with the lowest results in the 2019 elections are the two most polarized, Saúl Méndez, from the left, with 0.69% of the votes, and Marco Ameglio, from the right, with 0.58%. This can be explained by the absence of a second round, which encourages voters to vote for a candidate with a chance of winning in the first round, by the convergence of the three governing parties and by the institutional processes of primaries, which acted as a “filter” for extremist candidates within these parties.

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9.3.5

Conclusion

In Panama, the results of the presidential elections have been characterized by a systematic party alternation for the last thirty years. Between 1990 and 2009, this alternation was between the Democratic Revolutionary Party (PRD) and the Panameñista Party (Ppa), and to which Democratic Change Party (CD) has been added since 2009. The purpose of this chapter was to understand the dynamics of this alternation phenomenon, by analysing in greater detail the factors that contribute to its systematization. The results of this analysis, first of all, revealed the impact of structural factors, such as the prohibition of re-election, a strong ideological convergence between programs and candidates, and a relatively important but equally conjunctural volatility, as well as the low popularity level of the outgoing president that enabled the alternation in the 2019 election. This analysis also revealed the existence of a significant continuity behind this apparent systematic partisan alternation in the Panamanian presidency. This continuity is evidenced through two findings: on the one hand, the great ideological and pragmatic proximity between the three governing parties, all located in the centre right of the political spectrum, and on the other hand, the fact that the PRD remains the dominant party at the legislative level despite the presidential alternation. Thus, electoral politics remains very moderate and consensual; although a certain radicalism is emerging within public opinion: on the one hand, around a new division linked to social issues and, on the other hand, around the generalized discontent, reflected in social media, of the population with politics.

References Alcántara, M. (2019). Proyecto Élites Latinoamericanas (PELA-USAL). Universidad de Salamanca. Alvarado de León, J. D. (2020). ¿Crisis o malestar?: La representación política y el sistema de partidos ante el surgimiento de las candidaturas por libre postulación. Instituto de Estudios Democráticos, PNUD, Tribunal Electoral. Brown Araúz, H. (2015). Elecciones 2014: El realineamiento del sistema de partidos panameño. Revista Panameña de Política, 20, 55–82. Brown Araúz, H. (2018). El vencedor no aparece en la papeleta: El voto y los partidos políticos en Panamá. Descarriada.

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Brown Araúz, H. (2020). Elecciones Panamá 2019: Un nuevo desvío. In M. Alcántara Sáez (Ed.), América Latina vota (pp. 391–428). Brown Araúz, H., & Acosta, M. (2022). La Comunidad virtual y su actor político: El hashtag #NoALaReeleccion en las elecciones panameñas de 2019. Sociology and Technoscience, 12(1), 187–215. Brown Araúz, H., & Sonnleitner, W. (2016). La dinámica dual, entre cambio y continuidad, en el sistema de partidos de Panamá. In F. Freidenberg (Éd.), Los sistemas de partidos de América Latina (1978–2015). Vol. 1: México, América Central y República Dominicana (pp. 339–398). Instituto de Investigaciones Jurídicas, UNAM, Instituto Nacional Electoral. Castillero Calvo, A. (1995). Conquista, evangelización y resistencia: Triunfo o fracaso de la política indigenista. Ed. Mariano Arosemena. Chacón, D. A. (2019, mars 25). Candidatos presidenciales de Panamá opinaron sobre Venezuela. El Venezolano de Panamá. http://elvenezolano.com.pa/can didatos-presidenciales-de-panama-opinaron-sobre-venezuela/ Colomer, J. M., & Escatel, L. E. (2005). La dimensión izquierda-derecha en América Latina. Desarrollo Económico, 45(177), 123–136. https://doi.org/ 10.2307/3655894 Méndez, S. (2019, avril 15). ‘Panamá no está subordinado a nadie’, Saúl Méndez (A. Coriat) [El siglo]. http://elsiglo.com.pa/panama/panama-estasubordinado-nadie-saul-mendez/24116329 Nevache, C. (2017). Las Iglesias Evangélicas en Panamá: Análisis de la emergencia de un nuevo actor político. Anuario Centro de Investigación y Estudios Políticos, 8, 77–114. Organization of American States. (s.d.). Misión de Observación Electoral, Elecciones Generales. República de Panamá. 5 de Mayo de 2019. Informe final. Organisation des Etats Américains. Otero Felipe, P. (2006). Partidos y sistemas de partidos en Panamá: Un estudio de estructuración ideológica y competencia partidista. Revista Panameña de Política, 1, 47–118. Panebianco, A. (1990). Modelos de partido. Organización y poder en los partidos políticos. Alianza Universidad. Pérez, O. J. (2017). Panamá: Democracia bajo la sombra de la corrupción. Revista de ciencia política (Santiago), 37 (2), 519–542. https://doi.org/10. 4067/s0718-090x2017000200519 Sonnleitner, W. (2010). Desproporcionalidad y malporcionamiento en Panamá. In H. Brown Araúz (Éd.), Las reformas electorales en Panamá: Claves de desarrollo humano para la toma de decisiones. PNUD! Stanziola, J. (2019, April 16). Planes de gobierno: ¿qué hay de la economía? CIEPS. https://cieps.org.pa/planes-de-gobierno-que-hay-de-la-economia/ Wintgens, S., & Nevache, C. (2020). Panamá 2019: ¿Mucho ruido y pocas nueces? En O. Dabène, América latina. El año político 2019/Les Etudes du CERI (pp. 68–70). CERI-Sciences Po.

PART III

Conservative Alternations Following a Destitution

CHAPTER 10

Brazil 2016–2018: A Double Political Alternation Margaux De Barros, Kevin Kermoal, and Frédéric Louault

This chapter analyses the conditions of the double alternation that marked Brazil between 2016 and 2018, a period that starts with the opening of the impeachment proceedings of D. Rousseff in December 2015 and ends with the accession to power of Jair Bolsonaro in January 2019. We propose to examine the articulation between these two political sequences

M. De Barros (B) · K. Kermoal · F. Louault Free University of Brussels (ULB), Brussels, Belgium e-mail: [email protected] K. Kermoal e-mail: [email protected] F. Louault e-mail: [email protected]

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023, corrected publication 2023 O. Dabène (ed.), Latin America’s Pendular Politics, Studies of the Americas, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-26761-1_10

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in order to understand how Brazil was able to swing, in less than three years, from a progressive centre-left alliance to a reactionary far-right government. The first sequence leads to a non-electoral political alternation: the impeachment of Dilma Rousseff (2016). It was characterized by a breakdown in political loyalties and an implosion of the governmental base (2015–2016), which exposed the flaws of the Brazilian political system (coalition presidentialism). This political sequence contributed to the public’s distrust of democratic institutions (parties, Congress, the presidency, the electoral system, etc.) and of political personnel. The second sequence led to an electoral changeover (2018), which marked the advent—unprecedented in Brazil—of the extreme right to power through the ballot box. It finds its roots in the discredit of the political system and in a particularly favourable context for the emergence of candidates who present themselves as anti-system. This sequence is typified by a growing polarization of society, the advent of a reactionary Zeitgeist, and the emergence of a political figure proposing to break the codes and political practices that governed political competition under the New Republic (1986–2014). The recomposition of political and electoral power relations is taking place in a context that appears to be critical in several respects: an economic crisis that the transitional government has not been able to contain (2016–2018), new corruption scandals, the poor performance of public policies (especially in terms of security). The political parties in government are discredited (PMDB, PSDB, PT). The working classes are worried, the middle classes feel frustrated, and the conservative sectors fear more than anything else a return of the Workers’ Party to power. All these factors help us understand the evolution of electoral behaviour and the unexpected shift of Brazil to the extreme right. The primary objective of this chapter is to understand the logics that led to the electoral alternation of 2018 and the election of the far-right candidate Bolsonaro. However, a more detailed analysis of the 2014– 2018 political sequence shows us that this alternation is part of a broader process of decomposition of the political system, characterized by a first— non-electoral—alternation in 2016. We observe an atypical case of double alternation: first from the centre left to the right (2016), then from the right to the extreme right. In this chapter we return to this process, considering the 2018 alternation as intrinsically linked to the 2016 one, further deepening the

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erosion of Brazilian democracy. We also propose a focus on the influence exerted in this sequence, by two groups of discrete yet powerful actors: the evangelicals and the military. Our reflections are therefore focused on the first two factors mentioned in the general introduction to analyse alternations: temporality and degree. The last factor, the content of the alternations (transformations of public action), is not directly considered in this chapter, but has been discussed in other works (Hunter and Power 2019; Louault 2022).

10.1 The Impeachment of Dilma Rousseff: Non-electoral Alternation and Democratic Backsliding When President Rousseff began her second term in office in January 2015 (after the PT’s fourth consecutive presidential election victory), few observers considered the possibility of a short-term government change. However, the signs of fragility of the party in power had multiplied: a slowdown in growth starting in 2011, a major social movement in June 2013, radicalization of protests against the PT, and increasing corruption scandals (including the Lava Jato affair, revealed in March 2014). In October 2014, after the second round of the presidential election, the opposition candidate Aécio Neves even refused to acknowledge his defeat—the fourth consecutive one for the PSDB, denouncing fraud and calling on his supporters to demonstrate in the streets to weaken the reelected president. Since the beginning of her mandate, Rousseff faced growing tensions within her own legislative base (notably the PMDB, which had emerged as the government’s main ally but was becoming Dilma Rousseff’s peeve). An internal political crisis, in the context of intensifying protests in the public arena, accelerated the reconfiguration of power and the fall of the PT. The impeachment process against Rousseff began on December 2, 2015, after several months of deteriorating relations between the executive and legislative branches, when the Speaker of the Chamber of Deputies, Eduardo Cunha (PMDB), decided to follow up on a request for impeachment that had been filed by other parliamentarians a few weeks

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earlier.1 It ended on August 31, 2016, when Rousseff’s dismissal was voted by the Senate. The very reason for the procedure was, however, questionable. Although the legal framework was respected, the essence of the accusation—interpretating the public accounts’ manipulation by president Rousseff as a “crime of responsibility”—was completely abusive. The democratic tool of impeachment has in fact been diverted from its original sense—to allow Congress to punish a president who has committed a serious crime—to be used as a weapon of political destruction. For nine months, the President also suffered a political and media lynching aimed at destroying both her internal (among elites) and external (among the population) legitimacy. Rousseff’s blunders, her inability to engage in dialogue, and her powerlessness against the deteriorating economic activity facilitated her detractors’ task. Loyalty breaches multiplied and her already fragmented legislative base gradually disintegrated. At the time of her re-election in October 2014, her allied base in Congress comprised 304 of the 513 congressmen (59%) and 40 of the 81 senators (49%). During the vote on the impeachment procedure’s admissibility, held in the federal House on April 17, 2016, only 137 deputies supported Rousseff (27%). Then merely 20 senators voted against her removal from office on August 31, 2016 (25%). Following this impeachment, Michel Temer (PMDB), who had been Rousseff’s vice president since 2011, took the lead of the country. A new legislative majority was formed around the main political formations that caused the impeachment, including the PMDB and PSDB. The PT and the other left-wing parties were brutally sent back to the opposition. Beyond the head of the executive’s substitution, the institutions experienced deep changes, marked by a reversal of the balance of power between the executive and legislative branches. This political sequence was subject to intense interpretive struggles. Two main conceptions of legitimacy were opposed: electoral legitimacy (mobilized by the anti-impeachment) and performance legitimacy (mobilized by the pro-impeachment).2 For Rousseff’s defenders, the

1 This decision was clearly an act of retaliation: a few hours before, the deputies of the PT group in the Chamber of Deputies had decided to support the opening of a procedure against Eduardo Cunha, in order to have his mandate overturned. Cunha had already broken with the government and joined the opposition on July 17, 2015, one day after being implicated in the Lava Jato case. 2 This distinction refers to the two sources of legitimacy enunciated by the political scientist Fritz Scharpf: input legitimacy and output legitimacy (Scharpf 1999).

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impeachment procedure was a “coup” (golpe). Unable to regain power through the ballot box, the opponents of the PT would have found in impeachment an alternative means to provoke an anticipated alternation, in defiance of procedural democracy. Behind these interpretative struggles, the removal of Rousseff reminds us that, although throughout its history Brazil has developed a culture of alternation of power, it has rarely been associated with the electoral dimension. Between the 1930 Revolution, which brought Getúlio Vargas to power, and the 1964 coup d’état, which established a military regime, alternations of power were often associated with military interventions (Rouquié 2006). The return of civilians to power in 1985, after 21 years of military rule, opened a new political cycle in which elections became the central procedure for distributing power. The 2016 changeover thus challenged a quartercentury of democratic consolidation and electoral resolution of political issues (Perez-Liñan 2018). As in most periods of crisis in Brazil’s history, political conflicts were resolved outside of the electoral arena, in a closed circle of elites. In this case, the outcome was imposed through the misuse of a democratic instrument (the impeachment procedure). By doing so, the representatives corrupted Brazilian democracy, in the etymological sense of the Latin word corrumpere, which means “to break totally”. This moral corruption of the constitutional regime was added to the moral and financial corruption of the political system, reinforcing the discredit of democracy. Support for democracy fell in Brazil from 54 to 32% between 2015 and 2016, a drop of 22 points.3 No other Latin American country has experienced such a decline. In the very short term, however, the municipal elections held in October 2016 reinforced the trends that had emerged during the impeachment process. The PT literally collapsed in the polls, registering its worst outcome in two decades. It lost nearly two thirds of its footprint, both in terms of the number of municipalities it was controlling (256 in 2016 compared to 644 in 2012) and in terms of electorate (6.8 million votes in the first round in 2016 compared to 17.2 million in 2012). The PT also lost key cities, such as São Paulo (where the incumbent mayor Fernando Haddad was defeated in the first round), and iconic cities, such as São Bernardo do Campo, the political birthplace of Lula. This setback is partly due to national factors, in particular the poor management of 3 Deutsche Welle, 2016/09/05, “Em um ano, apoio à democracia no Brasil cai de 54% para 32%”.

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the economic crisis, the role of the PT in the Lava Jato affair and the media’s treatment of the impeachment process. But this context should not make us forget about more local issues, and the PT’s inability to regenerate itself from the bottom. In the country’s 26 capitals, rightwing parties got boosted. The left did not make it to the second round in most of the major cities, winning only six of them. The other left-wing political parties did not benefit from the weakening of the PT, whose electorate was dispersed among blank or invalid votes, abstentions, and transfers to small political groups. The PSDB was the main beneficiary of the PT’s collapse: it gained nearly four million voters and a hundred municipalities compared to 2012 (808 compared to 701), winning seven of the twenty-five state capitals (including São Paulo) and eighteen of the ninety-three cities with more than 200,000 inhabitants. The PMDB remained the leading party at the local level. It grew in the number of municipalities controlled (1,038 in 2016, up from 1,017 in 2012) but lost nearly two million voters between 2012 and 2016. Brazil was thus a case of non-electoral alternation at the national level amplified by a local election. The Temer government saw the results of these local elections as legitimising the impeachment, ignoring the specific characteristics of intermediate elections in Brazil. No one can deny that the voters punished the PT’s record in a very specific context. But this electoral response to the impeachment, which reinforced the magnitude of the changeover, did not mean support for Temer (who had only 14% of positive opinions at the time of the elections), nor did it mean a blank check for his government. Temer was quickly brought back to his own instability. While his “establishment legitimacy” is openly contested, his efforts to reap performance legitimacy were unsuccessful.

10.2 The 2018 Electoral Changeover: A Rejection of the Political System Far from solving Brazil’s governability issues, the dismissal of Rousseff opened a new period of instability, marked by a deep division of society and increased distrust of representative institutions. Fairly unpopular and accused of treachery by a part of the public, the new president is a man in the shadows, discreet and pragmatic, who combines political conservatism and economic liberalism.

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With the support of the PSDB, Temer’s government immediately took an austerity turn, justified by the urgency of reviving economic growth, and proceeded to budget cuts in flagship social programs that had been developed by the PT (Minha Casa Minha Vida, Bolsa Família, ProUni). The first significant reform approved in December 2016 was the PEC do teto de gastos (PEC 55/2016), which caped public investments, limiting its growth to the annual inflation for the next twenty years. The spending freeze in key sectors such as health and education lead to structural deficits and paved the way for accelerated privatization of schools and hospitals. The other flagship measure of Temer’s government, the labour law reform, passed in 2017, allowed for a flexibilization of labour legislation and weakened workers’ social rights acquired since the Consolidation of Labor Rights decreed by Vargas in 1943. It also put an end to the compulsory system of union dues, the main source of income for unions (Barreto Lisboa and Caruso Macdonald 2019). The dismantling of public policies and the rollback of constitutional rights, which had been consolidated over the past 30 years, did not lead to a significant reduction in unemployment, another of the government’s stated objectives, nor to a resumption of economic growth, but severely weakened the working class. The precariousness of working conditions and public services, in a context of economic recession, contributed to Michel Temer’s unpopularity record, which collapsed to 3% in September 2017. A questioning of his “establishment legitimacy” due to the context of his accession to power, was grafted a contestation of his performance legitimacy fuelled by the poor economic results of his government. Beyond the growing resentment caused by these measures, the whole political class faced public distrust. In addition to anti-petismo, the discredit of the traditional parties grew as revelations of corruption scandals involved important personalities from major traditional parties, such as Aécio Neves, the PSDB candidate defeated by Rousseff in 2014 and then the party’s national president, or President Temer himself, personally involved in several political-financial scandals. In addition, various events related to the 2018 electoral campaign contributed to creating the conditions for the emergence of an outsider candidate. These elections were held in a particularly tense context. Marked by a sixth consecutive year of economic hardship, stunned by the magnitude of corruption scandals, disgusted by their political elites’ behaviour and drowning in streams of fake news, Brazilians voted without a compass. According to the Latinobarometro report, in 2018 Brazil was the Latin

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American country with the lowest level of satisfaction with democracy (9%, compared to 49% in 2010, at the end of Lula’s second term), behind Venezuela (12%), Peru and El Salvador (11%).4 It is also the South American country with the lowest support for democracy (34%, down from 54% in 2015), behind Paraguay (40%).5 In such a context of mistrust and dissatisfaction of the population toward their representatives and democratic institutions, the electoral emergence of a political figure presenting himself as anti-system was not surprising. At the beginning of the year, however, former President Lula was the favourite for the election, far ahead of the far-right candidate, Bolsonaro (Social Liberal Party, PSL). But his imprisonment on April 7, followed by the invalidation of his candidacy on September 1st, a few weeks before the election, dampened the hopes of the Workers’ Party (PT) to regain power through the ballot box, two years after the impeachment of Rousseff. Deprived of its charismatic leader, the PT (in power between 2003 and 2016) counted on Fernando Haddad to take up the torch of reconquest. If the latter was able to qualify without wavering for the second round, he did not manage to contain the PT’s rejection and the wave of hatred orchestrated by his opponents. This rejection went in favour of Bolsonaro, who not only catalysed anti-petismo, but above all succeeded in presenting himself as an outsider and embodying a break with the current political system. This was a fantastic pitch for a man who has been in the federal House since 1991. Victim of a knife attack (September 6), Bolsonaro campaigned for three weeks from a hospital bed, benefiting from exceptional media exposure and further strengthening his communication strategy via social networks. In the first round, he stripped the traditional political parties— the Brazilian Social Democracy Party (PSDB), the Brazilian Democratic Movement (MDB) and the Democrats (DEM)—of their right-wing electorates: the PSDB, which had embodied the opposition to the PT since 2003, was literally crushed (4.8% compared to 33.6% in 2014), as was former PT dissident Marina Silva (1% against 21.3% in 2014). Between

4 Latinobarómetro, Report 2018: www.latinobarometro.org/lat.jsp. 5 Support for democracy refers to the share of respondents who consider democracy

preferable to any other form of government. The index of satisfaction with democracy measures the share of respondents who say they are satisfied with the way democracy works. The difference between the two reveals the share of “dissatisfied democrats”.

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the PT and Bolsonaro, only Lula’s former minister Ciro Gomes (Democratic Labour Party, PDT) managed to embody a third way (12.5%). After receiving 46% of the valid votes in the first round, Bolsonaro won the second round without forcing his way through against Fernando Haddad (55.1% of the valid votes against 44.9%), without having to develop his program and without having participated in any debate against his opponent. The hypothesis of a republican front to prevent him from taking power was not borne out. Conversely, traditional sectors rallied behind Bolsonaro—by default or by pragmatism—just as they had supported Fernando Collor against Lula in the second round of the 1989 presidential election. An anti-republican front was formed, bringing together an electorate that recognized itself in the “values” embodied by Bolsonaro and the supporters of a surprising “useful vote” in favour of the extreme right (Fig. 10.1). From an electoral geography and sociology stance, it is necessary to emphasize the hardening of political polarization, already perceptible in previous elections. Rather than a rupture, this 2018 changeover amplifies evolution visible in the medium term. Bolsonaro’s electoral bases are concentrated in the south, southeast, and west of the country, the richest 60 50

Lula

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Fig. 10.1 Brazil: electoral erosion of the two main political parties (PT and PSDB) between 2006 and 2018 (first round of the presidential election, in millions of votes) (Table prepared by the authors. Data Superior Electoral Tribunal of Brazil [TSE])

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and most dynamic regions of the country, where the PT has experienced significant electoral erosion since 2010. These regions are home to sectors of the bourgeoisie, viscerally opposed to the PT, and above all to the urban middle classes disappointed by Lula and Rousseff’s governments, as well as to groups of vulnerable people who were temporarily lifted out of poverty under Lula, but who bore the burden of the economic crisis since 2011. These areas already concentrated the PSDB’s best results in 2014. Bolsonaro reinforced this trend and even shifted the balance of power in the states of Rio de Janeiro and Minas Gerais (where Rousseff had come out victorious in 2014). Conversely, the PT’s electoral strongholds are concentrated in the northeast and north of the country, the poorest regions, where the highest share of people dependent on social programs developed by the PT is to be found. It would be more accurate, however, to speak of a division between three Brazils rather than two. Indeed, 42.1 million voters (30.9% of the electorate) did not choose either Bolsonaro or Haddad in the second round of the presidential election (7.4% invalid votes, 2.2% blank votes and 21.3% abstention) (Map 10.1). As for the other elections, the evolution of the Congress’s composition confirms the extent of this alternation. After the 2014 elections,

Map 10.1 Brazil: electoral geography of the first and second round of the presidential election (Red: Electoral areas won by Haddad/Green: Electoral areas won by Bolsonaro/Blue: Electoral areas won by Ciro Gomes. Source O Globo/Eleições 2018)

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it had been portrayed as the most conservative in the history of democratic Brazil: 238 of the 530 deputies were identified as conservative (46%). It was also the most fragmented Congress in the world (twenty-six parties represented). This double record has been shattered in 2018: 301 deputies are identified as right-wing or far-right (59%), compared to 75 positioned in the centre (14%) and 137 on the left or far left (27%). In addition, the four main parties of the traditional right (PSDB, MDB, PP, DEM) saw their parliamentary representation fall by 66% between 2014 and 2018, a gross loss of 64 seats. This erosion, which benefited small radical and extreme right-wing political enterprises, reflects a strengthening of political polarization and reinforces the extent of the alternation (Fig. 10.2). Of course, conservative congressmen are a heterogeneous group with diverse interests. They are far from sharing all of Bolsonaro’s positions, whose party won only 52 seats in the federal House and four in the Senate. Bolsonaro could, however, count on the specific support of specific sectors, through the thematic interest groups (bancadas suprapartidárias ). Two of them, closely linked to Bolsonaro, experienced a historic growth in the 2018 legislative elections: the pro-gun group, called bancada da bala, gathers 61 deputies—compared to 35 in 2014—and supports Bolsonaro’s security project (reduction of the criminal majority, revision of the Statute of Disarmament, etc.); the group representing the

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Fig. 10.2 Brazil: ideological positioning of deputies (simple majority is 257 seats and qualified majority is 308 seats) (Graph produced by the authors. Data Superior Electoral Tribunal of Brazil [TSE] & Gazeta do Povo)

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interests of the evangelical churches, called bancada da bíblia, with 84 deputies elected in 2018 compared to 75 in 2014. Finally, the group representing the agribusiness lobby, called bancada do boi, also declared its support for Bolsonaro and referred Tereza Cristina for the Minister of Agriculture. While it lost weight compared to 2014 (104 deputies versus 160), this group remains an important element in the articulation of executive-legislative relations.

10.3 The Consolidation of Evangelicals and Military Actors Conservative evangelicals have gradually succeeded in imposing their worldviews in the Brazilian political arena and public sphere. This little heard and sometimes despised community (Burity 2021) has become a key player in political life. If the reactionary rhetoric used by evangelicals is not new, it is rather the high visibility and effective dissemination of their discourse within society that is innovative (Cunha 2020). It should be noted that their breakthrough on the political scene reflects the religious reconfiguration that has taken place in Brazil since the 2000s.6 The radicalization of evangelical discourse is taking place in a political and social climate characterized by partisan polarization and the strengthening of ultra-conservative positions, both on the national and international scenes. Thus, in order to grasp the strings of the changeover and better understand the election of Bolsonaro, it seems important to highlight the role played by certain evangelical religious actors in promoting ultra-conservative values. Although Lula received the support of evangelical pastors from Pentecostal and neo-Pentecostal churches in 2002 and 2006, they then turned their backs on the PT and adopted a reactionary rhetoric. The social advances and the promotion of sexual minorities’ rights under the Rousseff government caused an outcry from conservative evangelical segments (Machado 2012). In 2013, during the wave of protests that shook Brazilian metropolises, conservative pastors reaffirmed their 6 In 2020, according to a Datafolha survey, the evangelical faithful represented 31% of the population, or 64 million people. In 2000, according to the IBGE census, they represented 15% of the population. The number of evangelicals increased by 61% between 2000 and 2010. In 2010, 60% of evangelicals were affiliated with Pentecostal churches (IBGE, 2010 Census).

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commitment to conservative values. Right-wing and far-right groups railed against corruption, gender ideology, cultural Marxism, highlighting them as threats to traditional moral values. The rise of these protest groups and their strong media coverage has conditioned the political expression of conservative evangelical pastors. The post-2013 political context, marked by a visceral rejection of the PT and the left, provided an opportunity for Pentecostals and neo-Pentecostals to extend their presence in the protest and on the political scene. Activism, alongside right-wing groups, gave them greater autonomy and allowed them to break out of the logic of a minority and despised group, to claim hegemony within the religious field (Burity 2020). In 2014, the electoral successes of evangelical conservatives established their authority in the public sphere. The accession of 72 of them to the National Congress (R. de Almeida 2017), alongside the support of ruralist and military congressmen, lead to the abandonment of bills in favour of LGBTQ+ communities and women. Their goal was not only to prevent the extension of minority and women’s rights, but to restrict them, submitting bills such as the banning of gay civil unions, the toughening of the criminalization of abortion, and the abandonment of homophobia prevention and gender discussions in schools. Thus, by attacking the rights of sexual minorities and promoting tight control over bodies, evangelical pastors presented themselves as the guardians of the traditional family. They mobilized this discourse focused on family values, considered as the pillar of a threatened moral order, to support Rousseff’s dismissal. The impeachment initiated by federal House President Eduardo Cunha, Assembleia de Deus’ member, lead to a radicalization of antipetismo among conservative evangelical groups (Mariano and Gerardi 2019). Engaged in the formulation and implementation of public policies, they also strived to shape public debates and steered them toward ultraconservative positions. The post-impeachment period represented an opportunity in the promotion of their political opinions, eased by the acquisition of numerous communication channels over the last twenty years. The high visibility of conservative positions attained by evangelicals has been built on intensive use of digital tools, which contribute to the propagation of their ideas, beyond the faithful. The presence of evangelical pastors is most noticeable in working-class neighbourhoods on the outskirts of cities. Strongly embedded in the social fabric of these areas, they contribute to alleviating the living conditions of the most vulnerable,

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marked by violence and precariousness (Spyer 2020). The dissemination of entrepreneurial values, particularly in neo-Pentecostal churches, has popularized neoliberal theses and appealed to both working- and middle-class people. The prosperity theology, which sees faith as a vector for enrichment, advocates an individualistic and meritocratic ethic that opposes social programs—mainly Bolsa Familia—that would maintain a “logic of assistance” of the poor. In a context of economic crisis, this entrepreneurial ethic, widely relayed by the media and in the churches, enjoys great and popular success. In 2018, conservative mediatic pastors or congressmen found a spokesperson for their cause in the figure of Bolsonaro. They aligned themselves with the values defended by the candidate and adhered to his economic project. This synergy between the pastors and Bolsonaro took place several years before his election. The staging of his baptism in the waters of the Jordan River in 2016, the title of his campaign slogan “Brasil acima de todos, Deus acima de tudo” and his government program called “Caminho para a prosperidade” demonstrated his intention to seduce evangelicals. Using faith to serve political interests, several pastors encouraged the faithful to vote7 for him and demonized the PT candidate (Mariano and Gerardi 2019). Some researchers (R. de Almeida 2019; Alencar 2020) suggest that the vote of “evangelicals” was decisive in the election of the ex-captain. The Datafolha survey below, on the religious distribution of the vote, highlights their decisive role, in absolute numbers of votes (Table 10.1). The “evangelicals”, however, cannot be made responsible for the election of the ultra-conservative candidate. The imposition of conservative and reactionary values with which they identify was the result of the convergence of right-wing and far-right protest groups, other religious actors (notably Catholics), and the military. All of them relied on the economic, political, and security crises that the country was going through to defend their vision of the world and support Bolsonaro’s candidacy. Bolsonaro’s election was also marked by the return of the military’s hard line to the forefront of the public scene. In retreat since redemocratization, conservative circles have seen their power and the spread of their radical theses among public opinion increase since Rousseff’s 7 It is important to specify that many of the believers are aware of the attempts of instrumentalization to which they are subjected.

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Table 10.1 Brazil: religious distribution of the vote before the 2nd round of the 2018 presidential election Religion Catholic Evangelical Afro-Brazilian Spiritualist Other religions No religion Atheist or agnostic Total

Votes for Bolsonaro

Votes for Haddad

29,795,232 21,595,284 312,975 1,721,363 709,410 3,286,239 375,570 57,796,074

29,630,786 10,042,504 755,887 1,457,783 345,549 4,157,381 691,097 47,080,987

Difference 164,446 11,552,780 −442,912 236,580 −363,862 −871,142 315,527 10,715,087

Source Datafolha’s election survey on October 25, 2018, three days before elections

impeachment. Although their pressure on the judiciary and the legislative powers increased, feeding the rising popular threat of military intervention, the military ended up supporting Bolsonaro’s candidacy in the 2018 elections. The victory of the former captain symbolizes the permeability of Brazilian society to the imaginary and values carried by the dictatorship’s nostalgic branch. While being more of a return to prominence than the emergence of a minority group as in the case of conservative evangelicals, the extent to which their ideas have spread to civil society and its influence on the ideological dimension of the vote is again what constitutes an innovation. This return to favour requires considering the long history of the military’s relationship to democracy and the incompleteness of the democratic transition. This transition took place despite the “obvious absence of an aggiornamento of the dictatorial past” and at the cost of a strict control on the interpretation of the regime’s responsibilities and the construction of a positive image of the 1964 coup and the dictatorship (Chirio and Noûs 2020). In the context of the protests against Rousseff government in June 2013, the survival of conservative theses favoured the mobilization of groups opposed to the democratic regime and nostalgic of the military dictatorship, such as the “Intervençao já” movement since 2013. Ultra-conservative military groups have also been active in the shadows since 2015, with General Mourão, a convinced nostalgia of the dictatorship and defender of the impeachment, as a key figure (Chirio 2018). Although accusations of interference in the impeachment process have been made since then, it is especially under Temer’s government and

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subsequent downfall, that the military has asserted a more radical position on the public scene. The militarization of power extends to the public sphere, materialized by the increase in the Defence budget and the appointment of several generals to administrative and political positions that had been occupied by civilians since the re-democratization. The massive use of the Guarantee of Law and Order operations increased the instances of police operations being placed under military control. Despite strong opposition, the spectacular character and media coverage of the militarization of policing contributed to reviving nostalgic images of the dictatorship and radical theses, thus breaking the taboo of a military takeover. Disenchantment with politics, associated with corruption and inefficiency, is opposed by the stainless image of the military, “disinterested, patriotic, at least as competent as politicians”, and of the dictatorship, as a model of efficiency and incorruptibility (Chirio 2018). Supported by a minority movement since 2013, the hypothesis of military intervention became increasingly popular in the public opinion. In September 2017, while Temer’s popularity was plummeting, a survey conducted by the Instituto Paraná Pesquisas claimed that 43% of Brazilians were in favour (46% among 16–24-year-olds). Building upon a growing audience, the radicalization of the general Staff is concretized by the pressure exerted on the powers in place, the most important episode being the tweet published by Commander Villas Bôas on April 3, 2018, the day before the STF’s decision to reject exPresident Lula’s habeas corpus demand. By exerting direct pressure on the ongoing judicial process, posing a barely disguised threat to democracy by concluding that the military “remains attentive to its constitutional missions”, the head of the armed forces fuelled the narrative of military intervention. This threat hung over the institutions until the elections, with the Commander reiterating it while stating that the presidentelect could see his “legitimacy questioned”. Far from being unanimously supported, Bolsonaro gradually emerged as a serious candidate to defend the conservative military’s interests, a priori favouring an intervention, and embodied the possibility of a takeover through the electoral system. He multiplied appearances in military barracks and attendance at official ceremonies, promising to entrust many key ministries to senior officers, thereby increasing the political power of the military. Bolsonaro’s speech denoted the “ashamed” right-wing (Quadros and Madeira 2018), as an

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unabashed representative of the nostalgic fringe of the military dictatorship. Boasting of his political independence and incorruptibility, to position himself as anti-system, he nourished the illusion of a return to the old authorities and traditional norms, as guarantors of the moral order of society and the values of the “traditional Brazilian family” (Hunter and Power 2019). The ideological dimension of the 2018 changeover bears the imprint of the theses inherited from the dictatorship and which Bolsonaro tried to embody, he who had constantly justified the necessary and “democratic” character of the regime in the face of the Left’s project of “dictatorship of the proletariat”. Applying the divisions and cleavages of the Cold War to contemporary political disputes, he declared a war of resistance against the revolution of “cultural Marxism” and appointed the communist left and its corrupt and immoral leaders as a common enemy of the nation (Goldstein 2019). This interpretive framework, rooted in conservative theories held by some branches of the military and increasingly popular among public opinion, was mobilized to promote a conservative agenda on several key issues during the campaign. On educational issues, gender ideology and the sexualization of children, also pointed out by conservative evangelicals, are evidence of their ideological indoctrination by communist teachers. This indoctrination followed in the universities, which are considered factories of marginals destined to feed the ranks of the communist enemy, at taxpayers’ expense. On security issues, he adopted the rhetoric of a strong and hard man against crime, as opposed to the laxity and idleness of the progressives, guilty of the degradation of Brazilian society. The penetration of positive images of the dictatorship in the public opinion allowed him to legitimize the repression of left-wing activists, as he always defended the use of repression and abuses committed by the regime, purportedly reserved for criminals and exaggerated by the opposition (Goldstein 2019). The defence of human rights by social movements was considered an instrument to maintain the impunity of criminals. In conclusion, the alternation can be broken down into two main sequences. The first is a non-electoral changeover, implemented by and benefiting traditional parties. The transition between both sequences is characterized by the deterioration of democratic institutions, the unpopularity of Temer’s government, and the collapse of traditional parties. The second changeover, electoral in this case, is marked by the victory of an extreme right-wing candidate that deepens the democratic crisis. As we

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demonstrated, the 2018 changeover, can be attributed to the strategic (sanctioning of the PT and the traditional parties) and ideological dimensions of the vote, conservative forces succeeding in popularizing their ideas and winning over a wider electorate.

References Albuquerque, Afonso de. 2021. “The Two Sources of the Illiberal Turn in Brazil”. Brown Journal of World Affairs 27 (2) (Spring/Summer): 127–144. Alencar, Gedeon Freire de. 2020. “Jair Messias Bolsonaro: o “eleito” de Deus?”. Revista Brasileira de História das Religiões 13 (37). Almeida, Ronaldo de. 2017. “A onda quebrada - evangélicos e conservadorismo”. Cadernos Pagu, n° 50. Almeida, Ronaldo de. 2019. “Bolsonaro presidente: conservadorismo, evangeliso e a crise brasileira”. Novos estudos CEBRAP 38 (May): 185–213. Bankowicz. Marek. 2012. Coup d’État: A Critical Theoretical Synthesis. Frankfort: Peter Lang. Barreto Lisboa, Wladimir, and Paulo Baptista Caruso Macdonald. 2019. “Brésil: l’élection de Jair Bolsonaro ou le pacte des élites avec l’extrême droite”. Cités 2 (78): 187–205. Bringel, Breno. 2016. “The Long June: The 2013 Mobilizations and the Future of Social Movements in Brazil”. In Simin Fadaee (ed). Understanding Southern Social Movements. London and New York: Routledge, pp. 153–167. Bringel, Breno, and Geoffrey Pleyers. 2019. “June 2013, Five Years Later: Polarization, Reconfiguration of Activism, and Challenges for the Brazilian Left”. In Vladimir Puzone and Luis Felipe Miguel (eds). The Brazilian Left in the 21st Century. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, pp. 237–257. Burity, Joanildo. 2020. “El pueblo evangélico. Construcción hegemónica, disputas minoritarias y reaccion conservadora”. Encartes 3 (6): 1–35. Burity, Joanildo. 2021. “The Brazilian Conservative Wave, the Bolsonaro Administration, and Religious Actors”. Brazilian Political Science Review 15 (3). Chirio, Maud. 2018. “Le rôle des militaires dans la déstabilisation de la démocratie brésilienne (2015–2018)”. Brésil(s). Sciences humaines et sociales 1: 1–13. Chirio, Maud, and Noûs Camille. 2020. “La victoire de Bolsonaro à la lumière de l’histoire brésilienne”. Sens Public: 1–18. Cunha, Magali do Nascimento. 2020. “Religião e política no Brasil nas primeiras décadas dos anos 2000: o protagonismo dos evangélicos”. Fronteiras - Revista de Teologia da Unicap 3 (1): 40–65. Goldstein, Ariel Alejandro. 2019. “The New Far-Right in Brazil and the Construction of a Right-Wing Order”. Latin American Perspectives 46 (4): 245–262.

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Hunter, Wendy, and Timothy Power. 2019. “Bolsonaro and Brazil’s Illiberal Backlash”. Journal of Democracy 30 (1): 68–82. Louault, Frédéric. 2022. “Populism and Authoritarian Drift: The Presidency of Jair Bolsonaro in Brazil”. In Alain Dieckhoff, Christophe Jaffrelot and Élise Massicard (eds). Contemporary Populists in Power. New York: Palgrave Macmillan. Machado, Maria das Dores Campos. 2012. “Aborto e ativismo religioso nas eleições de 2010”. Revista Brasileira de Ciência Política, avril, 25–54. Mariano, Ricardo, and Dirceu André Gerardi. 2019. “Eleições presidenciais na América Latina em 2018 e ativismo político de evangélicos conservadores”. Revista USP, n° 120j, 61–76. Perez-Liñan, Aníbal. 2028. “Impeachment or Backsliding? Threats to Democracy in the Twenty-First Century”. Revista Brasileira de Ciências Sociais 33 (98) [online]. Quadros, Marcos Paulo dos Reis, and Rafael Machado Madeira. 2018. “Fim da direita envergonhada? Atuação da bancada evangélica e da bancada da bala e os caminhos da representação do conservadorismo no Brasil”. Opinião Pública 24 (3): 486–522. Rouquié, A. (2006). Le Brésil au 21e siècle. Naissance d’un nouveau grand. Paris: Fayard. Scharpf, Fritz. 1999. Governing in Europe. Effective and Democratic? Oxford: Oxford University Press. Spyer, Juliano. 2020. Povo de Deus: quem são os evangélicos e por que eles importam. 1a edição. Rio de Janeiro: Geração.

CHAPTER 11

The 2019 Elections in Bolivia Sebastian Urioste

A cursory reading of the election of Luis Arce as president of Bolivia in October 2020 might suggest that the continuum of “left-wing” governments that had succeeded one another in that country since 2005 was hindered only for a year. Thus, the 55% of votes that Evo Morales’ former minister obtained in the first round would have offered the Movement towards Socialism (MAS) a new electoral victory and the possibility of continuing and consolidating the “Proceso de cambio”,1 interrupted by the brief and controversial “right-wing” government of Yanine Añez.

1 The “Proceso de cambio” [“Process of change”] is the name given to the three

successive presidential mandates of former President Evo Morales, between January 22, 2006 and November 10, 2019. It is associated with a “diversity of experiences” of “leftist governments” in Latin America that followed the victory of Hugo Chavez in Venezuela in 1998, constituting a “pink wave” that, in the 2000s, benefited more from a “sanction vote against neo-liberal experiences than from a vote of adhesion to his project”

S. Urioste (B) University of La Rochelle, La Rochelle, France e-mail: [email protected] © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023, corrected publication 2023 O. Dabène (ed.), Latin America’s Pendular Politics, Studies of the Americas, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-26761-1_11

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However, in search of factors of electoral alternation in the 2016– 2019 electoral cycle in Latin America, this collective work proposes to go beyond the left/right swing perspective. Therefore, this chapter problematizes the phenomena and events in Bolivia in a different way: rather than simply renewing a left-wing government, did the triumphant return of the MAS close a crisis of presidential succession produced by an unfulfilled alternation? To answer this question, we first address the unmet social and political conditions for a peaceful electoral changeover in 2019. In the second part, we look at the electoral offer of the main candidates and the results of a survey conducted at a polling station on October 21, 2019. Finally, we will consider how the post-electoral crisis of 2019 became a political and institutional crisis that led to the electoral success of Luis Arce.

11.1 The “Proceso de cambio ” and the 2019 Elections In 2005, the election of Evo Morales in the first round with 53.74% of the vote and a gap of more than twenty-five points with the candidate who came in second signed the definitive end of the 1985–2005 “pacted democracy” period and the beginning of the “Proceso de cambio”. The magnitude and consolidation of this electoral victory, together with the alliances that the MAS was able to establish with traditional and new trade unions and corporatist organizations, allowed the construction of a political hegemony that had serious consequences for the nature of the October 2019 elections. Indeed, as noted in the introduction to this book, during the 2000s, many constitutional reforms in Latin America allowed for an extension of successive terms in office, in a favourable economic context that seemed to guarantee the re-election of incumbents. However, the case of Evo Morales’ third attempt at continuous re-election in Bolivia was characterized by very low electoral integrity and provoked protests of such

(O. Dabène, “Introduction. The Latin American Left in Action”. The Left in Latin America (1998–2012). Paris: Presses de Sciences Po, 2012, pp. 15–18). Olivier Dabène points out that, like the case of Hugo Chavez, the figure of Evo Morales emerged “on the ruins of a party system” and constituted a “charismatic and plebiscitary leadership” that compensated for “the absence of solidly institutionalized political parties” (Olivier, Dabène, ibid., pp. 20 and 25).

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magnitude that, in a single day, the incumbent president proposed to cancel the elections (while recomposing the body in charge of organizing the elections) and, finally, to resign from office. This was followed by the resignation of the other five authorities in the line of succession provided for in the 2009 constitution. Such a decision led to a power vacuum that allowed senator Yanine Añez to proclaim herself president of the Plurinational State. It must be noted that analysing these phenomena in light of an alternation between “progressivism” and “conservatism” requires broadening the temporal horizon of the 2017–2019 cycle, as some aspects of this period align with common variables of Bolivian political life of the last 40 years, while others are unusual. In effect, the interruption of President elected Hernan Siles Zuaso’s term in 1985 was one of the most important events in the transition to democracy and constituted the first episode of a series of precluded presidencies where presidents, be they championing economic nationalism or free market policies, were forced to shorten their term of office under pressure from social mobilizations. Hence, as a result of the erosion of the president’s authority, the strength of congress and, above all, the mobilization of public opinion, alternations in Bolivia have already occurred in a not fully electoral manner.2 11.1.1

The End of Compromise and the 2019 Referendum

Evo Morales was triumphantly elected in 2005 with a mandate to nationalize hydrocarbons and to convene a Constituent Assembly to decolonize the state. He had captured the rural and inner-city vote, as well as “a significant part of the middle class and even the upper middle class” who were looking for a change in political practices and bet that Morales would be a guarantee of “stability” in the face of street mobilizations.3 The nationalization was decreed on May 1, 2006. The Constituent Assembly met between July 2006 and December 2007.

2 A section devoted to understanding the antecedents comprised between 1982 and 2005, the features of the “Pacted democracy” period, fand the recurrence of unfinished presidential terms since the return to democracy in Bolivia are available online (OPALC’s website). 3 S. Romero Ballivián, “Análisis de la elección presidencial de 2005 en Bolivia.” América Latina Hoy 43, 2006, pp. 49–50.

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After a long and bitter conflict with elected governors who advocated regional autonomy to counterbalance the power of the national government, the MAS managed to establish a balance of power and a national network that allowed it to impose an electoral and governmental hegemony that was totally different from the “pacted democracy” period that followed Hernan Siles Suazo’s precluded presidency. In 2009 and 2014, Evo Morales was re-elected in the first round with more than 60% of the vote and an average of 37 points more than the second-place candidate (see Table 11.1). The 2014 results were all the more significant as the electoral law of June 30, 2010, provided for the first time for a second round of direct elections for the president, who had previously been appointed by Congress when an absolute majority was not achieved. To be elected in the first round, the candidate must obtain an absolute majority or pass the 40% threshold and have at least a ten-point lead over the second most popular candidate. On the governmental front, the overpowering victories of 2009 and 2014 gave the MAS two-thirds of the seats in both houses of parliament and prevented any compromise with opposition parties, which were relegated to departmental or municipal governments. In the absence of checks and balances in the legislative branch, presidentialism was reaffirmed and the MAS gradually extended its influence over the other institutions of the state; mainly the Plurinational Constitutional Court (PCC) and the Supreme Electoral Tribunal (SET), especially through the appointment of members of these two bodies by the President or by Congress. This growing influence led to a notable lack of trust in these two institutions and resulted in the major event that affected the rest of Evo Morales’ term. Indeed, as early as 2013, the PCC reinterpreted a discreet but nonetheless crucial provision in the 2009 Constitution.4 Indeed, as a result of an agreement between the MAS and the opposition during the approval of the constitutional text, which was submitted to and approved by referendum, this provision determined that terms of office prior to the new constitution would be taken into account in future elections.5 However, unlike the 1967 text, the 2009 constitution stipulates that the President

4 V. Audubert, Plurinationalité et vivre bien en Bolivie: le droit au temps d’Evo Morales. Editions L’Harmattan, 2021, p. 280. 5 Constitution of the Plurinational State of Bolivia, Transitory Provisions, I, paragraph

II.

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and Vice President can only be re-elected “once continuously”.6 Therefore, Evo Morales was only supposed to be able to stand for re-election immediately in 2009. However, when the MAS parliamentary group referred the matter to the PCC, it argued that there was a “new legalpolitical era based on the rebuilding of the state” in 2009 and concluded that the terms of office of the President and Vice President should be “calculated” from that pivotal year.7 Despite this reinterpretation, which allowed Evo Morales to be reelected for the second time in 2014, the 2009 Constitution still prevented the President from running again immediately. Therefore, in 2016, Evo Morales organized a referendum to change the constitution to run for a third time. This decision and its consequences are key to understanding the 2019 crisis. Indeed, on February 21, 2016, the results of the referendum were a setback for the head of state: 51.3% of voters voted against a constitutional reform that would have allowed the reelection of a President and Vice President “twice consecutively”. This result implied not only that a majority of voting-age Bolivians opposed a change in the constitution, but also that many voters who had opted for Evo Morales in previous presidential elections did not want him to run again. However, far from accepting the result of this consultation, the MAS denounced that the campaign had been deviated by lies made with the help of the United States.8 Disregarding the result of the referendum, the MAS parliamentary group once again referred the matter to the PCC. In November 2017, the court ruled that article 256 of the 2009 Constitution required the Bolivian state to apply international treaties as

6 Constitution of the Plurinational State of Bolivia, Article 168. 7 Plurinational Constitutional Court, Plurinational Constitutional Award No. 003/2013

of April 25, 2013. In so doing, the TCP affirmed that the 2009 Constitution was drafted by the Constituent Assembly, without considering that the final text that was submitted to a referendum had actually been revised and modified by Congress, a constituted power. The transitional provision limiting a consecutive re-election of Evo Morales was precisely the result of negotiations in Parliament. For a history of the Constituent Assembly, see S. Schavelzon, El nacimiento del Estado Plurinacional de Bolivia, etnografía de una asamblea constituyente. Fondo de las Naciones Unidas para la Democracia, Plural editores, 2012. 8 A scandal between a “telenovela” and favoritism had affected the image of the President. See: J. Lafuente and F. Molina, “Bolivia le dice no a la intención de Evo Morales de buscar otra reelección,” El País, February 24, 2016.

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a matter of priority.9 However, the court continued, the Inter-American Convention on Human Rights recognizes “more favorable human rights” than a series of articles in the 2009 Constitution, including term limits; these were “unconstitutional” insofar as they threatened and denied “the fundamental political rights contained in the Costa Rican Pact of San José”.10 As a result, Evo Morales and Alvaro García Linera could stand for re-election indefinitely. This PCC sentence was seen by traditional and new critics of Evo Morales as a direct attack on democracy: according to them, for the first time since the end of the military dictatorships, the will of the people had not been respected. In addition, the possibility of endless re-election was perceived as akin to a desire to perpetuate oneself in power without allowing any other alternation to the MAS. It was in this context that the “Plataformas ciudadanas ” [“Citizens’ Platforms”], that is a heterogeneous group of civil society groups (mostly urban, often composed of young people with no obvious party affiliation, and even critical of traditional political and trade union organizations) emerged. Articulated by social networks and driven by very diverse concrete interests (such as environmental issues, animal rights, or the fight against domestic violence), they had as a common denominator defending the results of the referendum. They were disqualified by the MAS as being subservient to “right-wing” parties.11 On the other hand, as these groups became more coordinated, their discourse turned increasingly political: according to them, there was now a divide between those who defended democracy (by opposing the re-election of the president) and those who defended

9 Plurinational Constitutional Tribunal, N°0084/2017 of November 28, 2017.

Plurinational

Constitutional

Sentence

10 It should be noted that in 2021 the Inter-American Court of Human Rights, an autonomous judicial institution whose purpose is to apply and interpret the American Convention, contradicted this constitutional sentence by stating that “Allowing indefinite presidential re-election is contrary to the principles of a representative democracy and thus to the obligations set forth in the American Convention on Human Rights and the American Declaration of the Rights and Duties of Man.” See: Inter-American Court of Human Rights, Advisory Opinion OC-28/21 of June 7, 2021 requested by the Republic of Colombia. 11 A. Quispe, «‘Plataformas ciudadanas’, reflejo de la crisis política», La Razón, July 18, 2018.

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the “dictatorship” of Evo Morales.12 They publicly demonstrated that they would not accept the sentence of the PCC.13 The passionate nature of these demonstrations is to be inserted in a broader perspective. In 2018, the Latinobarometro had revealed notable opinion trends.14 To the government’s credit, surveyed Bolivians stood out from other Latin Americans regarding the satisfactory quality of their economic situation (26% vs. an average of 16%), especially since they were the first in the list of all countries in the region to consider that their country was governed “for the good of all” (27% vs. an average of 16%). Nevertheless, their support for democracy was the lowest since 2006 and had been steadily declining since then. The quality of democracy was seriously undermined, although without any desire for authoritarianism: only 24% of those polled preferred a non-democratic regime and 12% an authoritarian government. 11.1.2

Such a Long Campaign

Losing popularity, the government retook the initiative15 and in September 2018, the MAS used its two-thirds majority in the Legislative Assembly to hastily approve a “law on political organizations” imposing early primary elections in political parties as a prerequisite for participating in elections.16 All parties were given scarce months to participate, on the very same day, in elections organized and supervised by the Supreme Electoral Tribunal (SET) to designate their presidential ticket candidates. Noticeably, before these primaries were held the same tribunal made a crucial decision, despite dissenting votes: by virtue of the PCC’s ruling in favour of the indefinite re-election of the president and vice president, it allowed their participation in the internal elections. This sequence momentarily demobilized street protests, forced the opposition political 12 «Plataformas ciudadanas del 21F declaran “dictador” a Evo Morales», Opinión, June 2018. 13 «Plataformas ciudadanas se organizan en defensa del 21F para evitar repostulación de Evo», ANF, September, 1st, 2018. 14 Latinobarómetro Report 2018. 15 F. Flores Castro, «Ley de organizaciones políticas en Bolivia. ¿Necesidad o instru-

mentalización?», Política Exterior, Accessed on December 10, 2021. https://www.politi caexterior.com/ley-organizaciones-politicas-bolivia-necesidad-instrumentalizacion/. 16 E. Morales Ayma, Law of Political Organizations No. 1096, September 1, 2019.

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parties to focus on preparing their respective candidacies a year in advance and, above all, placed in orbit the candidacies of Evo Morales and Alvaro Garcia Linera, who were widely elected as MAS candidates to participate in the presidential elections. In institutional terms, this acceleration of the electoral calendar had the major consequence of discrediting the upcoming elections, as they seemed to be irregular. It also deepened the internal instability within the SET, which was divided between “institutionalists” and those considered as “close” to the MAS, resulting in the third resignation of one of its members three days after the primaries.17 The partiality and integrity of this institution became a matter of controversy, with the electoral authority suspected of engaging in electoral fraud in the following elections, in collusion with the party in government. A month before the elections scheduled for October 20, a poll stated that 68% of the people surveyed believed that the election would be tainted by fraud.18 The data from this poll should be seen in the context of the feverish campaign year that began with the primaries. Indeed, the opinion polls detected a significant difference with the previous elections: this time the outcome seemed to be open insofar as a crushing victory of Evo Morales in the first round was no longer assured. An alternative to the MAS was seen as possible if an opposition candidate were to be qualified for the second round. However, three weeks before the elections, the two main candidates (Evo Morales and ex-president Carlos Mesa) were stagnating or losing voters, and in March a quarter of those polled had not yet decided for whom to vote or did not answer.19 In sum, neither the MAS campaign, based on the stability and economic performance of Evo Morales’s continued government, nor the opponents, mainly claiming the respect of the 2016 referendum results, seemed to sway the choice of new voters.

17 Rubén Ariñez, “Dunia Sandóval renuncia al TSE: dice que la entidad toma decisiones que van contra su ‘ética democrática’,” La Razón, January 30, 2019. This resignation followed that of the President of the TSE who, before the primaries, declared that the plenary chamber of the court was blocked in making decisions on “fundamental issues for the safeguarding of the institutionality.” See: “Katia Uriona renuncia al TSE,” Página Siete, October 22, 2018. 18 F. Chávez, «Según la encuesta, 68% cree que habrá fraude electoral», Pagina Siete, September, 29, 2019. 19 Los Tiempos, September 30, 2019.

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It is in this context that the vehemence of the declarations and warnings made a few days before the vote must be considered. Indeed, between October 4 and October 16, imposing rallies pronounced themselves against the candidacy of the president, particularly in the city of La Paz. Taking the form of cabildos, one of the forms of “direct and participatory” democracy recognized in the 2009 Constitution,20 the speakers got the crowd to agree by acclamation that a possible victory for the MAS candidates would not be recognized and that the members of the SET should resign. In response, the Confederation of Peasant Women Bartolina Sisa, one of the main social organizations that had helped MAS come to power, warned that it would defend the “proceso de cambio” by the means of “armed struggle” if the incumbent president did not win the elections.21 A few days before the elections, Evo Morales warned that “civilians and ex-militaries” were planning to “set fire” to the Casa Grande del Pueblo (the new presidential palace) and to “carry out a coup”.22 11.1.3

Contested Elections

On election night, the SET announced a quick, preliminary count based on 83% of the minutes from the polling stations. This operation was supposed to give an overview of the counts before the official results, and thus guarantee the transparency of the electoral process. The last count disclosed suggested a second round: 45.71% of the votes for Evo Morales and 37.84% of the votes for Carlos Mesa, candidate of the Comunidad Ciudadana [Citizen Community] (CC), that is a difference of 7.87 points. To everyone’s surprise, this count was interrupted early in the evening. The next day, the SET published official results with 95% of the votes officially counted. This time, the trend had been reversed in favour of Evo Morales: he was credited with 46.85% of the votes, with a 10.12 point gap over Carlos Mesa (36.73%).

20 Constitution of the Plurinational State of Bolivia, Art. 11, II. 21 «Bartolinas advierten con “lucha armada” en defensa de Evo», Página Siete, October,

8 2019. 22 C. Sánchez, «Evo advierte que cívicos y exmilitares planean quemar la Casa Grande del Pueblo y dar golpe de Estado», Oxigeno.bo, October, 14, 2019 (http://oxigeno.bo/ pol%C3%ADtica/38959).

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Following this reversal, Carlos Mesa, who had called for a vote for his candidacy in the second round as soon as the preliminary count was first released, announced that he would not recognize the results communicated by the SET. For its part, the Organization of American States (OAS) observation mission in Bolivia issued a press release expressing its “deep concern and surprise at the radical and hardly justifiable change in the trend of the preliminary results.”23 ,24 From that moment on, events began to accelerate and, as we will see in the third section, the post-electoral crisis became a crisis of succession. Given the political earthquake caused by the resignation of Evo Morales, the analysis of the results published by the SET could seem imprudent. However, it proves fruitful to appreciate the tectonic plates that had collided. Indeed, in October 2019, the MAS recorded its lowest score since the end of the “Pacted democracy”: it had not obtained an absolute majority in the first round. Furthermore, compared to 2009 and 2014, it had lost a quarter of its voters. In addition, the abysmal gap that Evo Morales could claim after each election had narrowed significantly. This year, the second-place candidate had passed the fateful 30% mark and was almost ten points behind the president. In parliament, the MAS would have had a majority, but it would no longer have been able to control two-thirds of the seats. With a loss of legitimacy and control of the state apparatus, the President would have faced many more challenges in governing than he had in the past decade. Conversely, in 2019 more than

23 OAS, «Declaración de la misión de observación electoral de la OEA en Bolivia», October, 21st, 2019. Consulted on December, 10, 2021: https://www. oas.org/es/centro_noticias/comunicado_prensa.asp?sCodigo=C-085/19). In their final report, the OAS experts stated that “the manipulations and irregularities indicated do not allow us to be certain of the margin of victory of candidate Morales over candidate Mesa. On the contrary, based on some overwhelming evidence, it can be said that there was a series of deliberate operations aimed at altering the will expressed in the ballot box” (OAS, “Análisis de integridad electoral, elecciones generales en el Estado Plurinacional de Bolivia - 20 de octubre de 2019,” December 4, 2019, https://www.oas.org/es/sap/deco/informe-bolivia-2019/0.1%20Informe%20F inal%20-%20Analisis%20de%20Integridad%20Electoral%20Bolivia%202019%20(OSG).pdf). 24 In its final report, the European Union’s electoral expert mission found “numerous

errors and irregularities in the protocols” and stated that the counting process was “chaotic and appeared to be due to the TSE’s effort to announce the results as soon as possible. See: Unión Europea—Misión de Expertos. Bolivia 2019, Informe Final, December 20, 2019 (https://www.uetrabajandojuntos.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/ 12/EU-EEM-BOL-2019-FR-ES.pdf).

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40% of the voting-age population was willing to give or restore confidence in a president who had governed for fourteen consecutive years. In sum, it is important to note that, even before the October 2019 elections, a basic principle of democracy had been progressively challenged: that of “peaceful competition for the office of government”.25 Indeed, defined from an institutional point of view, democracy is a regime created to defend individuals from the excesses of power; it therefore presupposes “an organization of peaceful competition for the exercise of power” established in a constitution that sets out rules and assumes, on the part of all competitors, a commitment to respect them.26 However, as soon as he was re-elected for the second time, Evo Morales used his colossal majority in Parliament to stop working with the opposition, with whom he had negotiated the drafting of a constitutional text that was approved by referendum; an agreement that was precisely sealed around a limit to his immediate re-election. With 2/3 of the votes in Congress, the president extended his control over the institution responsible for constitutional review and then over the institution in charge of organizing elections. In so doing, the rules of representative democracy were modified, allowing him to run for a third and then a fourth consecutive term, thus neutralizing the possibility that his competitors would ever come to power. Such a strategy also implied overriding the results of a referendum, i.e. going against the will of the people expressed at the national level through a form of direct democracy. In turn, various components of the opposition to the MAS could quickly spill over into the political parties and seek to establish a correlation of forces in the streets, even advocating civil disobedience and the refusal of authority. The uncertainty of the choice of the undecided and the delegitimization of the institutions that prevailed produced a strange contradiction: as the outcome of the elections seemed to open, the possibilities of accepting the results closed.

25 R. Aron, «Introduction à la philosophie politique», Editions de Fallois, 1997, pp. 38–

39. 26 Ibid., 50–53.

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An Unfinished Alternation: Understanding the Stakes of the October 2019 Elections

The deflagration ensuing the resignation of Evo Morales and the electoral triumph of Luis Arce in 2020 have obscured the understanding of the general elections of October 2019, especially as, even today, part of Bolivian public opinion considers that they were marred by fraud. It is therefore appropriate to analyse the electoral offer and some trends of the results of these elections, without participating in the narratives that clash on their nature or outcome. 11.2.1

The Electoral Offer

It is important to note that from a strictly programmatic point of view, the two leading candidates in the polls shared a broad common base: none of them questioned the nationalizations or the 2009 Constitution, which had transformed Bolivia into a plurinational state. Moreover, both had as a priority the fight against poverty. However, there was visible dissonance about the best way to pursue these goals.27 Throughout his campaign, Evo Morales sought to reiterate the strategy that had been highly successful in 2014: to present himself as a “good manager” of the hydrocarbon nationalization, allowing the state to allocate significant investments in infrastructure and social policies,28 the latter of which had significantly reduced poverty indicators in Bolivia thanks to public transfers in the form of bonds. The MAS electoral program29 emphasized that by virtue of “redistributive economic growth”, 1.8 million people had been lifted out of extreme poverty and another 1.8 million had been lifted out of moderate poverty. Accordingly, the next phase of the “process of change” should be aimed at “selective 27 According to the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean, between 2008 and 2018 the Gini index fell from 0.513 to 0.438. In the same period, poverty had fallen from 46.5 to 33.2% of the population and extreme poverty from 21.4% to 14.7%. In fact, between 2017 and 2018, Bolivia had experienced the largest decrease in extreme poverty in the entire region (minus 1.7 points). See: CEPAL, Panorama social de América latina 2019. 28 H. Do Alto, «Bolivie: la réélection d’Evo Morales, le triomphe d’un protestataire devenu gestionnaire», in O. Compagnon et M. L. Geoffray, Amérique latine – Edition 2015-2016, IHEAL-Université Paris 3, La Documentation française, p. 36. 29 MAS-IPSP, Programa de gobierno – Agenda del Pueblo para el bicentenario, 2019.

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industrialization”, especially of hydrocarbons and lithium, to consolidate the “economic, social and productive community model” established in 2005. Indeed, according to the MAS electoral program, this “model” would have allowed what had never been achieved in 180 years of history: to multiply GDP by four and allow GDP per capita to rise from US$1,037 in 2005 to US$3,000 in 2018, that is, the most significant increase in the region which, in turn, had earned the country “constant praise from most international organizations”. It was therefore necessary to continue in this direction to ensure the “sovereignty” and “stability” of the economy to generate access to employment and education. The development of an industry around the lithium reserves was particularly envisaged, especially since “the state, in conjunction with private capital” had initiated their exploitation. The main target of the MAS attacks was Carlos Mesa: voting for him, warned one of the most polemical television ads of the campaign, meant adopting the same “economic model” as that of Mauricio Macri in Argentina, that is, the road to an “economic disaster” characterized by inflation, unemployment, and increased poverty.30 Carlos Mesa, on the other hand, insisted that he would not abolish the bonds and would not implement privatizations; however, he promised to reduce the fiscal deficit and external debt as well as establish “clear rules” to boost private investment.31 The opposition candidate questioned the MAS’ claim to poverty reduction: economic income improvements could not hide the fact that in terms of social indicators, such as infant mortality or access to services, 61% of Bolivians experienced “multidimensional poverty” that could not be solved without “focused policies” and an increase in the budget for education and health.32 In the spot most associated with his campaign, Carlos Mesa acknowledged that “things have changed” but that “¡Ya es demasiado!” [“That’s enough!”]: in the face of “injustice”, “corruption”, “economic stagnation”, and “abuse of power”, it was time to “take a new direction”. The first of the accusations was related to the “inexistence of a credible justice system” that, subject to the executive, persecuted political opponents.33 The second alluded to 30 MAS-IPSP, «Mesa es igual a Macri», October 2019. 31 Cuarto intermedio N°123, Elecciones generales 2019 – Lo que los candidatos dicen,

entrevista y análisis a profundidad, Agencia de Noticias Fides, Editora Presencia S.R.L, September 2019, pp. 73–74, 87–88. 32 Idem. 33 Ibid., p. 61.

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the same influence-peddling scandal that emerged shortly before the 2016 referendum and affected the president.34 The third referred to the end of the commodity export boom that, starting in 2014, had led the government to push public expenses, causing the depletion of international reserves and increasing the external debt. Finally, the fourth mentioned the fact that his competitor had not respected essential principles of the constitution, namely the “alternation of power” and the impossibility of “being president more than once consecutively”. The comparison of the programs and the main ideas of the campaigns of Evo Morales and Carlos Mesa leads us to observe a lesser ideological distance between the main candidates than would be assumed by a clearcut dichotomy between “progressivism” and “conservatism”. Indeed, the former presented himself as the historical leader of the “proceso de cambio” and as the guarantor of economic stability, particularly concerned about inflation and growth; the latter featured himself as a virtuous and austere alternative, committed to the rule of law and the separation of powers. Despite nationalizations and a significant expansion of state enterprises and a policy of redistribution, MAS did not propose the abolition of private property nor the collectivization of the means of production, which was a traditional and historical referent of Bolivian revolutionary organizations based on a class warfare reading of society; conversely, it opened the door to international private investment. For its part, CC did not mention the closure of public enterprises, the liberalization of labour market nor the abolition of the welfare state, all of which were associated with “neoliberalism”. As matter of fact, in search of voters, both parties agreed on maintaining social transfers and fighting poverty through a proactive public policy to correct social inequalities. On the other hand, Evo Morales seemed more in tune with the classic ISI (Industrialization by Substitution of Imports) model and the regulatory role of the state, while Carlos Mesa was more explicitly open to public policies that would also be market-friendly. Ultimately, the greatest divergence was over regional integration partners: Evo Morales committed to keeping Bolivia in UNASUR and ALBA, while Carlos Mesa saw these institutions as ideologized mechanisms and was betting on reviving the IIRSA project. Furthermore, the CC candidate was concerned about Bolivia’s

34 F. Molina, «Evo Morales, implicado en un escándalo por tráfico de influencias», El País, March 1st, 2016.

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dependence on credits granted by China yet did not explicitly a diplomatic alignment with the United States, especially since he was opposed to a return of the Drugs Enforcement Agency (DEA) to Bolivian territory or to the total eradication of coca leaf plantations; he declared to open to debate on the “decriminalization or legalization of drugs”. In 2019, neither in the writings nor in the speeches of Carlos Mesa could be detected as an unapologetic criticism of the MAS’s record, camouflaging as a purpose to annihilate all that had been undertaken since 2005; moreover, he had not been an unconditional opponent35 and during the campaign, he publicly praised the policies of the fight against racism and discriminations undertaken by the government.36 This study of the electoral offer makes it possible to put the campaign themes in context, as well as the positioning of the two main candidates before the post-electoral crisis broke out. If a second round had taken place and the “useful vote” for Carlos Mesa in the first round had been consolidated, allowing him to succeed Evo Morales, his ability to maneuver would have been limited: as the assignment of parliamentary seats was based on the results of the first round, the CC candidate would not have had a majority in either chamber37 and would have lacked support from the trade unions. Hence, based on the theoretical framework of this book, far from being able to be labelled a “shift to the right”, such a turn would have marked a negative alternation between an “incumbent” president who, having become concerned about economic stability after 14 continuous years in power, was sliding towards “conservatism” and the arrival of an ‘incoming” president, deprived of majority in parliament and moving towards “progressivism”. Judging by the collapse of the vote for Evo Morales in October 2019, such a shift was not impossible: many of his previous electors had turned away from the outgoing president in favour of Carlos Mesa. An electoral survey can help to understand some of the reasons for this choice.38

35 In fact, Carlos Mesa had been mandated by Evo Morales to be the spokesperson for Bolivia’s maritime claim at the International Court of Justice in The Hague, between 2016 and 2018. 36 Cuarto intermedio, ibid., p. 90. 37 L. Mealla, «Ni Morales ni Mesa llegan a dos tercios», La Razon, October 21, 2019. 38 See the data collected and their analysis on OPALC’s website.

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11.3 From the Post-election Crisis to the Return of the MAS Accusing the government of electoral fraud, on Monday, October 22, large numbers of demonstrators took to the streets of the country’s main cities. As the most radical and conservative component of the opposition, led by Luis Fernando Camacho, president of the Santa Cruz Civic Committee, grew in popularity and reports of anomalies in the vote count emerged, the demonstrators shifted their focus from calling for a runoff election to demanding the cancellation of the election and finally the outright resignation of the president. Carlos Mesa, who had been the catalyst for a “sanction vote” against Evo Morales, was gradually marginalized. This was the breeding ground for a post-election crisis that would become a presidential succession crisis, leading to an unelected alternation and then, a year later, to the return of the MAS to the presidency. 11.3.1

From a Post-election Crisis to a Succession Crisis

Evo Morales publicly invited the trade unions affiliated with the MAS to establish a balance of power with the demonstrators to ensure a victory in the first round and to thwart what he described as “a coup process fomented by the right wing with international support”, inciting his followers to block the cities. Clashes between civilians quickly multiplied, punctuated by humiliations and attacks with racist overtones, and reached their climax with the death of three anti-MAS demonstrators.39 On November 7, the presidential palace had to be secured by a police cordon, itself surrounded by a cordon of trade unionists armed with dynamite. After the mutiny of the national police on November 8, the OAS, invited by the government to evaluate the results of the first round, declared at dawn on November 10 that it could not validate the elections because of the “irregularities” observed.40 Evo Morales immediately proposed that new elections be held and the TSE renewed but was 39 «Enfrentamientos en Santa Cruz dejan 2 muertos y 6 heridos de bala», Los Tiempos, October 31, 2019; «Jornada violenta en Cochabamba deja un muerto y 90 heridos», Opinión, November 6, 2019. 40 OEA, «Comunicado del Grupo de auditores proceso electoral en Bolivia», November 10, 2019.

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immediately rejected by the opposition parties. Worse, loyal allies of the government, who had mobilized in the streets to “defend democracy”, ended up joining the calls for resignation, including the Central Obrera Boliviana (C.O.B.), the historic union confederation.41 In addition to this reversal, many members of the government and MAS parliamentarians resigned (some voluntarily, others under duress); among those was the president of the Lower House. It was at this critical moment that, in a press conference held at 3:20 p.m. that day, the military high command, headed by General Williams Kalliman, suggested that the president resign.42 Evo Morales was now in a vulnerable position (since neither the police nor the army could guarantee his security) and had been abandoned by his previously unconditional supporters. The alliance with the “social movements” had disintegrated. He addressed the country at 4:50 p.m. from Chapare, his strongest stronghold, announcing that he was giving up the presidency so that the “persecutions” and “violence” exercised by the “civic committees” and the “parties” would cease. On this occasion, Evo Morales did not mention the military.43 His resignation was followed by those of the vice president of Bolivia, the president of the Senate and the vice presidents of both houses of parliament (all members of the MAS), so that the presidential succession was no longer

41 M. Campos Vélez, «La COB se abre a la renuncia del presidente Evo Morales», El Deber, November 10, 2019. 42 Article 245 of the 2009 Constitution of the Plurinational State of Bolivia states that ‘the organisation of the armed forces’ is “essentially obedient, does not deliberate and is subject to military laws and regulations. As an institutional body, it does not carry out political action”. The Bolivian army is therefore not supposed to intervene in the politics. However, in an interview conducted after the events (L. Nuñez, ‘Williams Kaliman, Excomandante de las Fuerzas Armadas: “No ha habido un golpe de Estado en Bolivia”’, El Mundo, December 5, 2019), the former commander-in-chief of the armed forces declared he acted in this way because of ‘the escalation of the conflict, which could reach a point of no return’. He would therefore have followed Article 20 of the Armed Forces Organization Act, which gives the military high command the responsibility to ‘analyse situations of internal and external conflict, in order to suggest appropriate solutions to the appropriate person’. It should be noted that although Article 19 of said law indicates that the military high command is composed of the commander-in-chief, the chief of staff and the commanders of the three branches (army, air force and navy), the president and the minister of defense are also part of it. See: Organic Law of the Armed Forces of the Nation, Law 1405 of 30 December 1992. 43 «Golpe de estado en Bolivia. Mensaje de Evo Morales», La Jornada, November 11, 2019.

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assured, and the country experienced a “power vacuum”44 for 48 hours. During this period, the Armed Forces did not suspend the Constitution nor occupy the Presidential Palace. They were confined to their barracks throughout the crisis, but on the evening of Monday, November 11, they began to patrol the streets of La Paz, together with the police, to neutralize the acts of public vandalism and retaliation against MAS opponents following the presidential resignation.45 On November 12, the MAS did not sit in Parliament46 ; due to the lack of a quorum, the president’s resignation, which had to be presented to the chambers to be accepted or rejected, could not be processed. However, Evo Morales had just officially obtained asylum in Mexico on the same day and was therefore absent from Bolivian territory for an indefinite period. This was the opportunity taken by the second vice president of the Senate, Jeanine Añez, to assume the presidency of the Upper House47 and then the interim presidency of Bolivia. Faced with the power vacuum caused by the five resignations in a row, this senator from a minority conservative party used the internal rules of the upper house to declare herself its president and then, invoking the constitutional mechanisms of presidential succession, assumed the Presidency of the Plurinational State. During her self-proclamation in the Parliament, she alluded to the content of a

44 Amnesty International, «Para sanar la pandemia de la impunidad», 2020, p. 4 and

7. 45 «El Ejército de Bolivia se une a la Policía para contener el vandalismo», El Mundo,

November 12, 2019. 46 According to the Bolivian Bishops’ Conference, at a dialogue meeting held on the morning of 12 November, attended by the ambassadors of Brazil, the European Union and Spain, civic committees and opposition parties, Senator Adriana Salvatierra, who the day before had given up the presidency of the Senate, agreed to sit in the Assembly in order to acknowledge Jeanine Añez as the President of the Senate and therefore President of Bolivia. She repeated, however, that she would have to consult Evo Morales on the matter. This meeting was the result of a request for mediation made on 7 November by the Minister of Communications, Manuel Canelas. On 11 November, the discussions had focused on the MAS’ demand that Evo Morales be guaranteed to leave for Mexico before any discussions could take place. See: Conferencia Episcopal de Bolivia, Memoria del proceso de facilitación de dialogo 2019–2020. 47 The Second Vice President has the power to “replace the President or Vice-President when they are absent for any reason”. Plurinational State of Bolivia, National Legislative Assembly, Chamber of Senators, General Regulations, R. No. 008/2012–2013, Art. 41, a. Such regulations do not specify whether such a replacement requires a vote of the Senate members.

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communiqué freshly issued by the magistrates of the TCP, which gave reason for immediate succession.48 The next day, she appointed a new military high command, replacing Gral. Kalliman.49 As soon as the president resigned, the mobilizations denouncing wiphala 50 attacks and then rejecting the new government multiplied, while the armed forces engaged in law enforcement operations were exempted by decree from criminal prosecution “in cases of self-defense and necessity”.51 A preliminary report by the Inter-American Court of Human Rights reported thirty-six deaths among demonstrators opposed to the government of Jeanine Añez and described the interventions of the police and the army as “massacres”.52 To “pacify” the country, on November 24, 2019, the MAS gave two-thirds of the votes it still controlled to Parliament to unanimously pass a law annulling the October 20 election, recomposing the SET and calling for a new election in 2020.53 Despite fraud accusations, the MAS was allowed to take part in the electoral process, but for the 48 This communiqué referred to the jurisprudence contained in a Constitutional Declaration issued in 2001. This had provided that in the event of a vacancy caused by the Head of State and not by a proclamation, “the Vice-President shall ipso facto assume the Presidency of the Republic until the end of the constitutional period” (See: Plurinational Constitutional Tribunal of Bolivia, Constitutional Declaration No. 0003/01, 31 July 2001). In its 2019 communiqué, the PCC established that while this declaration was based on a now repealed constitution, the similarity of the articles of the latter with those of the 2009 text relating to succession—apart from the fact that the President of the Supreme Court of Justice is no longer provided for as a possible replacement— was relevant (See: ‘El Tribunal Constitucional respalda la sucesión presidencial’, Correo del Sur, November 12, 2019). The cited article referred to cases of “impediment” or “definitive absence” (Art. 169.I) and not to a resignation presented to Parliament (Art. 169.II). It should be stressed that a communiqué is not binding. However, in 2021, the TCP declared that it could not find any record of a sentence or declaration or under which the magistrates had pronounced on the constitutionality or unconstitutionality of the presidential succession (See: ‘Comunicado’ o aval: compara la respuesta del TCP con el documento de 2019’, Pagina Siete, August 4, 2021). 49 «Presidenta cambia Alto Mando militar», Correo del sur, November 14, 2019. 50 The emblem of Bolivia’s indigenous peoples, the wiphala, is considered as a “symbol”

of the State in the 2009 Constitution (Art. 6II). 51 J. Añez, Supreme Decree nº 4078 of 14 November 2019. 52 OAS, «CIDH presenta sus observaciones preliminares tras su visita a Bolivia, y urge

una investigación internacional para las graves violaciones de derechos humanos ocurridas en el marco del proceso electoral desde octubre de 2019», December 10, 2019. 53 J. Añez, Law No. 1266, November 24, 2019.

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first time in 18 years, Evo Morales would not participate in the presidential campaign. On January 20, 2020, when the parliamentarians and the president elected in the 2019 elections were supposed to take up their new mandates soon, the parliament elected in 2014 passed a law to “exceptionally extend the constitutional mandate of the President of the Plurinational State, the members of the Plurinational Legislative Assembly and the elected authorities of the autonomous territorial entities, in order to restore constitutional normalcy”.54 In so doing, the MAS parliamentarians recognized that Jeanine Añez was exercising presidential functions and renewed her mandate. The next day, the Legislative Assembly accepted Evo Morales’ letter of resignation.55 With the acceptance of this resignation, the legislature concluded a new version of a fact that has been observed since the return to democracy in 1982,56 a precluded presidency. Indeed, a series of common features are identifiable, mainly the pressure of social mobilizations and that of a sector that imposes a balance of power in the streets and demands an immediate resignation. Even though the president had a majority in Parliament, his legitimacy and capacity to govern were significantly reduced and he gradually lost the support of his allies and then that of the forces of law and order as public opinion turned against him. Finally, despite the turmoil, the parliament remained open, and the constitution was not suspended. However, regarding 2019, there are five new developments to consider. First, unlike previous shortened mandates, this impediment came after an accumulation of mobilizations demanding respect for the results of a constitutional referendum and a presidential election, not for the implementation of a specific public policy. Second, the impediment occurred in a post-election period and its outcome was the resignation and subsequent departure of a president who was up for re-election. Third, an external actor played a prominent role in the events of October and November 2019: the OAS missions and reports were decisive in the erosion of the incumbent’s authority, as its observations on the electoral process were interpreted as confirming a fraud that, according to part of

54 J. Añez, Law No. 1270 of 20 January 2020. 55 J. R. Alanoca Paco, «En bochonorsa sesión legisladores aprueban las renuncias de

Evo Morales y Álvaro García Linera», El Deber, January 21, 2020. 56 See OPALC’s website.

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public opinion, was taken for granted as inevitable even before the election. Fourth, unlike in October 2003, the Army did not abandon the President because it refused to continue the repression of social mobilizations like the one ordered by Gonzalo Sanchez de Lozada. In 2019, it publicly joined the demands for the resignation of Evo Morales without taking the opportunity to govern during the two-day power vacuum. Fifth, the impeded presidency of 2019 was not closed by the succession of a mandated authority insofar as the resignation of the president was preceded or followed by that of the authorities in place. Such a power vacuum had not occurred since 1982. The same is true for the self-proclamation of Jeanine Añez based on the rules of debate of the Senate and a constitutional sentence issued under a different constitution, well before the Parliament accepted the resignation of Evo Morales. This fifth element is unprecedented, even though it is a new example of a questionable constitutional interpretation that has emerged as a crisis exit mechanism since the return to democracy. 11.3.2

The Government of Jeanine Añez

One explanation for the MAS’s return to power in 2020 lies in the nature and evolution of the government of Jeanine Añez. While it initially presented itself as the guarantor of the new election, its objectives quickly changed even though it was not elected and lacked a majority in Parliament. Internationally, Bolivia abruptly turned away from the regional integration process that had been spurred by the South American “left turn” at the beginning of the twenty-first century, severing diplomatic relations with the government of Nicolás Maduro and withdrawing from the Bolivarian Alliance for the Americas (Alba) and the Union of South American Nations (Unasur). In the same spirit, the president re-established diplomatic relations between Bolivia and the United States and in return received the explicit support of Donald Trump.57 Aligning itself with US foreign policy, the Bolivian state joined the Lima Group and recognized Juan Guaidó as president of Venezuela. These decisions seemed to vindicate those in Bolivia and internationally who believed that the self-proclamation of Jeanine Añez as president was a coup orchestrated by the United States. The transitional government was 57 «Trump respalda a Añez y denuncia que hay una violencia en curso en contra de Bolivia», Urgente, December 17, 2019.

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quick to mobilize the judiciary to initiate prosecutions and arrests against the authorities or people associated with the MAS, accused of fraud, abuse of public resources, and even sedition and terrorism. These two charges were brought against Evo Morales, a refugee in Argentina. Considered a social and institutional “block”58 driven by a desire for revenge and fundamentally racist, the transitional government began to be disavowed by a large part of public opinion when, in January 2020, Jeanine Añez announced her candidacy for the elections scheduled for May,59 confirming the reversal of the objectives of her mandate. From then on, her government was presented less as a transitional body and more as an alternative to the “Proceso de cambio”. The blame this time also came from the other two main anti-MAS candidates. Both Carlos Mesa and Luis Fernando Camacho accused Jeanine Añez of breaking her commitments and falling into the pattern of presidents who use the state apparatus to perpetuate themselves in power. It was in this context that the Covid-19 crisis occurred. Following the lead of most of its Latin American counterparts, the government resorted to compulsory confinement and exceptional social transfers. However, the state of health emergency60 imposed was particularly restrictive of public freedoms.61 After questioning its own transitional nature, the government of Añez settled into health crisis management, while being mired in corruption scandals62 and government instability.63 The executive branch had lost its credibility and its ability to negotiate with Parliament, to the

58 F. Molina, «Bolivia: un nuevo bloque de poder», Nueva Sociedad, January 2020. 59 In a survey carried out by CiesMori, 65% of those questioned did not approve of

the president’s candidacy, two points more than those who disapproved of Evo Morales’ candidacy for the Senate. See: P. Ortiz, ‘La huella del 21-F marcó el camino para el cambio de la política boliviana’, El Deber, February 21, 2020. 60 J. Añez, Decree No. 4146, March 16, 2020. 61 A complementary decree stipulated that those inciting non-compliance with the

quarantine rules in force, disseminating misinformation or creating “uncertainty in the population” would be liable to criminal prosecution for “crimes against public health” (Art. 7). J. Añez, Decree No. 4199, March 21, 2020. 62 In May 2020, the Minister of Health was arrested for purchasing overpriced respirators. “Arrestan y echan al ministro de Salud boliviano por presuntos sobreprecios en respiradores”, Telam, May 25, 2020. 63 During her term of office, the President made eighteen cabinet shuffles. See: ‘18 cambios de ministros en 11 meses’, Opinión, September 29, 2020.

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point that the legislature refused to approve a loan from the International Monetary Fund to finance the response to the epidemic.64 The “collapse” of healthcare system65 and the economic crisis66 that accompanied the spread of the virus, which, as in the rest of Latin America, hit informal workers hard, were eventually blamed on Jeanine Añez. In August, the third postponement of the election, motivated by the persistence of the virus, was interpreted by her detractors as a maneuver to extend her mandate. It provoked mobilizations of such magnitude that the MAS could hardly control.67 The interim administration of Jeanine Añez could largely be seen as a brief episode during which Bolivia experienced a “conservative turn”. The Bible-in-hand entry into the presidential palace, the constant diatribes against Evo Morales, the opprobrium cast on the 14 years of the “proceso de cambio” and the security rhetoric of the president are all part of the conservative radicalization that, according to the theoretical framework of this book, has been emerging in a series of Latin American countries since the mid-2010s. These features outline a willingness to dismantle many of the public policies that have been undertaken since 2005 and such rhetoric was put into practice in the use of judicial power to repress MAS supporters. However, in contrast to conservative experiences in other countries, Jeanine Añez declared 2020 as the “year of struggle against feminicide and infanticide in Bolivia”68 and announced, on International Women’s Day, the launch of a program financed by the Corporación Andina de Fomento to counteract this type of violence.69 This positioning reinforces the theoretical framework of this book as it confirms that conservatism can be a posture as moving as progressivism; in this

64 «Bolivia decreta estado de “calamidad pública” por coronavirus», El Clarín, July 27, 2020. 65 «La presidenta Áñez contagiada, récord de casos y hospitales en emergencia en Bolivia», Telam, July 9, 2020. 66 «Bolivia flexibiliza la cuarentena para evitar una situación de “coronahambre”», Telam, August 28, 2020. 67 «Evo insta a movilizados a considerar el Acta de entendimiento que ratifica elecciones para el 18 de octubre», ANF, August 10, 2020. 68 «Añez le declara guerra frontal al feminicidio y el infanticidio», Página Siete, January 13, 2020. 69 «Gobierno presenta el programa “Bolivia mujer” con una inversión de $us 100 millones», Los Tiempos, March 9, 2020.

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precise case, progressivism to the social plan. Crucially, it is paramount to remember that Jeanine Añez’s rise to power was not the product of an electoral victory of a conservative party (she was not elected president) nor was it the result of a defeat of a progressive party (the 2019 elections were cancelled). As matter of fact, Jeanine Añez had no majority in Parliament. In this case, the categories of positive or negative alternation proposed in this book are inadequate; instead, the category of non-electoral alternation, when discussing prevented presidencies, seems more appropriate.70 11.3.3

The Return of MAS

As the only political party with supporters and relays throughout the country, the MAS reorganized itself despite numerous conflicts between the cadres who had remained in Bolivia and Evo Morales. It quickly launched its campaign and united around a presidential ticket designed to attract a rural vote attached to indigenous markers, with former foreign minister David Choquehuanca as its vice-presidential candidate. The presidential candidate was Luis Arce, a former Minister of Economy associated with the boom years of the “proceso de cambio”, with the aim of reassuring the middle classes. The campaign strategy focused on messages promising a return to the “stability” and prosperity that the country had experienced under the government of Evo Morales, while taking care to distance itself from the latter. In fact, a public self-criticism began to emerge, especially from Choquehuanca, who did not hesitate to call overruling the 2016 referendum results a “mistake”; he also acknowledged that the last period of Morales’ government had been affected by “corruption” and “bureaucracy”.71 In contrast, the six presidential candidates opposing the MAS were unable to join forces and were misled by their reading of the polls, which, since February, have given the MAS a third of the vote. According to their calculations, this “hard” base of voters should put the ArceChuquehuanca ticket in first place in the first round, but it would not be enough for the MAS to win the second round. They concluded that

70 See OPALC’s website for further development. 71 «Choquehuanca: “Insistir en reelección a pesar de que hubo un referéndum ha sido

un error”», Opinión, October 13, 2020.

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almost two-thirds of the voters shared a distrust, even an aversion to the MAS and therefore worked to discredit it and to frighten the electorate with the consequences of its possible return. According to their estimates, the candidate who came second in the first round was supposed to renew a “useful vote” against the MAS. However, as election day approached, this certainty evaporated, leading to the withdrawal of some candidates, including that of Jeanine Añez, who was at the bottom of the polls, to find a unity candidate. On October 18, 2020, the first unofficial results, soon to be confirmed by the SET, gave a standing victory to MAS in the first round. With 55.11% of the votes and a difference of 26.28 points with Carlos Mesa, Luis Arce was elected president with results akin to those obtained by Evo Morales in 2005, that is, significantly better than those of 2019. However, as in the previous year, the results of the vote confirmed that the MAS had lost 2/3 of the seats in Parliament. One of the first findings was that even united, the opposition to MAS could not have won in the second round. The disappointment and hostility generated by the government of Jeanine Añez seemed to have comforted voters who had turned away from Evo Morales in 2019, some because of his inflexible desire to run again, others out of pragmatism or disappointment. Some voters still felt close to, or even adhered to, the program and the past and future promises of the “proceso de cambio”. Others still remembered the “stability” guaranteed by the MAS. Is the triumph of 2020 to be classified as an illustration of the “resilience of the left”? There was certainly a discontinuity, in that for a year Bolivia’s largest political party did not hold the executive branch and Jeanine Añez had significantly reversed Bolivia’s foreign policy. However, the reading of a shift between “right” and “left” is incomplete, as it does not take into consideration the causes, circumstances and nature of the government of Jeanine Añez, nor does it take into account the control of Parliament that the MAS kept and fully exercised during this period. Similarly, such an explanatory scheme hardly captures the programmatic nuances that separated the two main candidates in 2019 or the motivations of voters in 2019 and 2020. Finally, unlike the historic MAS leader, President Luis Arce will not have such a comfortable majority in Parliament. In fact, the possibility remains that the new president will stand for re-election in 2025, as the constitution allows, and compete with Evo Morales, who will also be eligible to run. Before that time, the content of

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what can be defined as “progressivism” or “conservatism” could change significantly within the MAS itself.

11.4

Conclusion

To demonstrate how the election of Luis Arce does not imply the simple renewal of a “turn to the left” but rather constitutes the outcome of an unfulfilled alternation in 2019 and of a presidential succession crisis, plugged by a conservative, unelected and transitional government, this chapter required going to the depths of the Bolivian democratic transition. Along the way, through streets occupied by trade unions, besieged parliaments, and police mutinies, it has been possible to identify precluded presidencies, characterized by exhausted and isolated presidents who, faced with popular discontent and the disaffection of their allies, or even the abandonment of the forces of law and order, submit their resignation. The theoretical framework proposed in this book is very relevant, as it allows us to identify the importance of non-electoral alternations, especially in 2019 with the government of Jeanine Añez. Our study also highlights the importance of the content of the alternations, in particular, the evolution towards “conservatism” or “progressivism” between candidates (if not within one of those poles) as well as the expectations of public opinion. The comparative study of the programs of Evo Morales and Carlos Mesa confirms that the weakness of the ideological distance between two candidates can make the vote more volatile. Especially, as in October 2019, when a part of the modest or middle-class electorate that had supported Evo Morales until then was dissatisfied or disillusioned by the management of the outgoing president and wished for a renewal. This wish was expressed as much in the form of a “useful vote” as a “sanction vote”. In search of the factors of alternation, the theoretical framework of this book gives pride of place to the study of institutions and examines reelections. This issue was the keystone of the unfulfilled 2019 alternation. The fact that the entities responsible for ensuring the constitutionality of laws and the organization of elections allowed the incumbent president to run for a third consecutive election did not favour an alternation. On the other hand, such alternation was possible as part of public opinion had lost confidence in public institutions and felt dissatisfied with the quality of democracy. This is where the prerequisite presented in the introduction to this book takes on its full meaning: to modify the limits to presidential

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re-election, to allow an incumbent president to run again or a challenger to defy a president who controls the state apparatus, the conditions for peaceful competition and the compromises sealed around the rules of the game must be respected. This was not the case from the 2013 interpretation of the constitution and the 2016 referendum results. Conflict and polarization increased, and even before the 2019 elections, large sections of the population and political and trade union organizations were ready to disavow the outcome of the elections if they did not agree with it. Accusations of fraud, which had already been made before October 21, 2019, were widely echoed and led to a challenge to the first-round victory claimed by Evo Morales. Street politics had already overflowed the ballot box before the first OAS report led the president to propose the cancellation of the elections and the renovation of the electoral body. This proposal came too late for the most radical mobilizers. Let us conclude with three phenomena observed in this study that indicate the extent of what remains to be examined and thought about in the analysis of alternations. First, the theoretical framework of this book is concerned with electoral cycles in the region and offers an international comparison encompassing simultaneous or close alternations. The 2019 post-election crisis in Bolivia illustrates the need to analyse not only the political game between national actors and the alliances or adversities between Latin American presidents: one area of research deserves to delve into the role of international organizations, such as the OAS. Second, the November 2019 power vacuum has so far been a blind spot in the study of alternations. Was it a ploy by the MAS to hinder a changeover? Was it an obstacle orchestrated by the opposition to accelerate the transition? Was it both? The fact remains that the serial resignations of the authorities who were supposed to succeed the outgoing president was a totally unprecedented event in the history of precluded presidencies in Bolivia. The ensuing succession crisis allowed the arrival in power of a senator whose electoral platform was neither the first nor the second choice of the voters in the first round (i.e. more than 80% of the electorate) and meant the establishment of a divide between “conservatism” and “progressivism” that was much more vehement than the result of the ballot had given. Finally, the self-proclamation of Jeanine Añez, when she had no majority in Parliament, poses a major conceptual challenge to understanding the non-electoral modalities of an alternation. The erosion of a president’s authority, social discontent that turns into mobilization, or the arbitration of the armed forces cannot be the only compass to the trail

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of impe achment or forced resignation. The study of alternations cannot avoid questioning the constitutional interpretations made by the ‘outgoing’ or ‘incoming’ members when they emerge from a crisis (Tables 11.1, 11.2, 11.3, and 11.4). Table 11.1 Presidential elections in Bolivia (national and foreign voting) Year

MAS results in the first round (%)

Results of the second-place political party (%)

Gap between the first two parties (points)

2005 2009 2014 2019 2020

53.74 64.2 61.36 47.08 55.11

28.59 26.5 24.23 36.51 28.83

25.15 37.7 37.13 10.57 26.28

Source Plurinational Electoral Body

Table 11.2 MAS results in the 2014 Presidential elections (%)

MAS

Bolivia (National territory)

Department of La Paz

Municipality of La Paz

«Club de Leones» voting station

61.01

68.92

41.92

62.34

Source Plurinational Electoral Body

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Table 11.3 Bolivia: 2019 and 2020 presidential elections 2019 (%)—MAS and CC results year

Political parties

2019

MAS CC MAS CC

2020

Bolivia (National territory)

Department of La Paz

District 9

«Club de leones» voting station

46.64 36.83 54.73 29.16

53.16 29.83 68.36 28.58

42.46 44.14 49.64 43.31

46.21 38.8 56.46 39.5

Source Plurinational Electoral Body

Table 11.4 Bolivia 2016: constitutional referendum results (%)

Yes No

Bolivia (National territory)

Department of La Paz

Municipality of La Paz

«Club de leones» Voting station

48.7 51.3

55.83 44.17

41.92 58.08

50.92 49.08

Source Plurinational Electoral Body

PART IV

Partial Alternations

CHAPTER 12

Colombia: The Country Where Peace Allowed Political Alternation Luisa Cajamarca

Latin America has experienced alternations from left to right or vice versa. In fact, there have been more cases of alternation than continuity. But yet Colombia, unlike the rest of the countries in the region, had never experienced any major alternation until the 2018–2019 electoral cycle, when it was marked by a conservative shift from the right to the extreme right in the presidential elections. This is the closest Colombia had been to an alternation of power in recent electoral history. However, despite all forecasts and electoral polls, a leftist president was elected in the recent elections of 2022. This unprecedented event in Colombian political history, sets Colombia apart as the only country in the region where there had never been an

L. Cajamarca (B) Free University of Brussels, Brussels, Belgium e-mail: [email protected]

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023, corrected publication 2023 O. Dabène (ed.), Latin America’s Pendular Politics, Studies of the Americas, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-26761-1_12

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alternation of power before, and could allow it to start a new political cycle where alternations can be trivialized and seen as a component of democracy. This chapter seeks to identify the types of alternation that have occurred in Colombia, as well as the main characteristics that have forged these two moments: the first one moving from a conservative government to even more conservative positions; and the second moment an alternation from right to left, as in most classic typologies of alternation. For this, it is of great importance to understand the context and Colombia’s recent political-electoral history. The first section aims to explain the nature of the political forces and parties that have been in power, in order to understand why Colombia was for many years a country where alternations were impossible. Following this, an electoral analysis of the elections since 2010 will be made, to track electoral behaviours, and then make a territorial analysis of the historical and electoral components. Finally, we will describe and analyze what happened in the elections of 2022.

12.1

Colombian Political-Electoral Context 12.1.1

Uribismo as an Electoral Resource

Talking about the recent electoral political history of Colombia necessarily leads us to talk about this political and ideological current called “Uribismo”. Since 2002, Álvaro Uribe Vélez has represented an important electoral flow at the national level, and has become an important part of the Colombian political culture. In August 2002, Álvaro Uribe Vélez was elected President of the Republic after holding some regional positions of popular election in the department of Antioquia. It was at this moment when he began his national campaign. His political campaign was strongly marked by the use of the “mano dura” against the guerrillas, especially against the Farc.1 He managed to capitalize the national discontent due to the failure of the peace process of his predecessor Andrés Pastrana (1998–2002). This “mano dura” was a central element of his political campaign and then a key orientation of his governments. Democratic Security

1 The Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, once the oldest and strongest guerrilla group in Latin America, became a legally constituted political party in 2016 as a result of a peace process.

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(Seguridad Democratica) went from being a slogan to become the main axis of the public policies of his government. The main objective was to establish order and state authority in all territories of Colombia. A “terrorist threat” was identified as a threat to the Colombian state and social order, and therefore the insurgency had to be confronted (Kajsiu, 2020). Returning to Rodríguez (2014), who quotes Fabio López de la Roche, the ideological and communicative purpose of Uribismo consisted of an affective redefinition of the nation through a fictionalization of the present and the past, in an ideological monolithism that favored authoritarianism, the militarization of society, the stigmatization of dissident thought and the rewriting of Colombian history in an anti-terrorist key. This redefinition of the nation’s history and creation of a “terrorist” enclave led to the construction of a narrative on identity, where the starting point was to identify an enemy. Uribist politics was conceived as the conjunction of five referential elements; (i) an interpretation of the world and of reality that will allow a model of society and future; (ii) a way of thinking specific to a social group or a historical period with certain permanence in time, (iii) a high degree of institutionalization; (iv) dogmas, or “groups of beliefs and values more or less coherent that, besides expressing the set of ideas and values, also indicate how such political change can and should be made” (Fajardo, 2010, p. 47). Analysts and political scientists have indicated that since the rise of Álvaro Uribe, there has been a “right-wingization” in the way of doing politics in Colombia (Fajardo, 2010; Kajsiu, 2020; Rodriguez, 2014), and in the way society is conceived. Indeed, there is an association between Uribe’s voters and the adoption of a more conservative position. According to studies conducted by Fajardo (2010), the probabilities of being an uribista voter and being right-wing are higher than being of another ideological tendency.2 The right-wing, or promotion of conservative policies of uribismo (Table 12.1), is related to what was described in the introduction of this book. This political current uses in its discourse and its political execution, concepts close to conservatism, since it emphasizes the need for authority, order, respect for hierarchies, and the valuation of existing social structures (Kajsiu, 2020).

2 See analysis article on voters and ideologues of Uribismo (Fajardo, 2010).

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Table 12.1 Colombia: uribismo vs conservatism Subject

Positioning

Uribismo

Conservatism

Venezuela Economy Security Individual freedoms (same-sex marriage, abortion, etc.)

Aligned to the U.S Market-friendly policies Priority unfavourable

x x x x

x x x x

Source Author’s elaboration

This rhetoric is established from two perspectives; the first under the notion of authority, very much in line with the patriotic rhetoric of the United States, around the fight against the FARC, who will be “the great enemy” of society. The Democratic Security policy was implemented under the idea of offering a broad and systematic military offensive against the guerrilla groups. Secondly, there is the notion of order, and it is based precisely on the extent to which the country is “ordered” territorially, providing security and stability throughout the territory. The constant idea is to be able to recover the reins of the country, no matter when the political campaign is being carried out (Rodriguez, 2014; Fajardo, 2010; Kajsiu, 2020). Mariana Fajardo (2010), analyses the elements that constitute the dogma of uribistas voters, finding that their beliefs and values reflect their conservative character with respect to the social and political order in which they seek subordination to authority in order to protect certain freedoms (Fajardo, 2010, p. 48). They associate security issues as the most serious problems facing the country, placing them above values such as individual liberties, equality, and welfare. Likewise, it suggests that uribista voters have respect for political institutions and the division of powers, in order to sustain democracy.

12.2

Electoral Behaviour 2002–2018

In 2002, Álvaro Uribe was elected president in the first round with 53% of the vote, against his opponent Horacio Serpa who obtained 32% of the votes. At the end of his first presidential term (2002–2006), and after

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reforming the Constitution, he was elected for the second time (2006– 2010), also in the first round, becoming the first president to repeat his term in office. In the 2010 presidential elections, Juan Manuel Santos, former Minister of Defence during the second Uribe administration, was elected president with the direct support of Álvaro Uribe and uribismo, among others.3 In 2018, Ivan Duque, the candidate supported by Álvaro Uribe and his political current, won the presidency. This trend, which began in the early 2000s, has characterized the Colombian electoral processes until 2018. Although the objective of this chapter is not to analyze the elections since 2002, it is necessary to take up again the trend that has marked the electoral behaviour in the country since then. As can be seen in Fig. 12.1, uribismo, either through its representative Álvaro Uribe or with his political support, has been present in all elections, only losing in 2014, when his political party split.

12.3

Break Between Santos and Uribe

This distancing has also occurred in countries such as Ecuador or Bolivia, where presidents were elected with the support of the outgoing president, but once in power they took their distance themselves. Juan Manuel Santos, who was Minister of Defence in Uribe’s second term, was elected President for the first time in 2010. He was supported by the Uribismo party (at that time Partido de la U), as well as by various sectors of the right and centre right. In his victory speech, once the electoral results were known, he denoted certain positions far from the positions of his predecessor.4 It should be noted that his political campaign, his electoral support, and his background in traditional Colombian politics, led to believe that he would be a continuation of the Democratic Security policies. It would be a continuation tout court of the Álvaro Uribe agenda, who by constitutional mandate5 could not hold the office of president for a third time (Rodriguez, 2014). 3 As will be explained below, there was a break between these two politicians. Juan Manuel Santos manages to be reelected in 2014 with the banner of the peace process, facing the candidate of uribismo. 4 See Juan Manuel Santos’ speech upon winning the 2012 presidential election. 5 Through the C-230–16 Constitutional Court of Colombia returned to the original

design of the 1991 Constitution and approved the prohibition of presidential reelection.

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Fig. 12.1 Colombia: presidential elections 2002–2018 (Note In 2002 and 2006 there was only one presidential first round. Source Author’s elaboration using data taken from the Registraduría General del Estado Civil)

Thus, after two years of the Santos administration, the natural differences that arise between rulers of the same political party began to deepen. In 2012, rumours about possible peace dialogues with the oldest guerrilla in the continent, the one that for 8 years had been the “great enemy” and fought hard under the Democratic Security policies, was being recognized as a political actor. This led to a repositioning of the political forces, of the political parties, especially the governing political party. Former President Álvaro Uribe did not opt for diplomatic action, which is common among former presidents. He decided to declare himself in political opposition to the government, and formed the political party that today is known as the Centro Democratico. Some authors have pointed out that, in historical bipartisan systems, as Colombia has been, the structural cleavages of political competition are born precisely as a result of “inter-oligarchic” divisions, organized in a vertical way where the electorate is relatively undifferentiated (Albala and Parra, 2011).

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Although there were more points of estrangement between Juan Manuel Santos and Álvaro Uribe (relations with neighbouring countries, Venezuela, Ecuador, Bolivia; discourse on drug management, etc.) the issue that marked the national political agenda was the peace process with the Farc.

12.4

“Third Way” for Peace

Once Santos distanced himself from his predecessor, a new political landscape opened up. Santos began a campaign to reconcile the country with its neighbours in the region, who had not maintained good relations with the previous government. Especially the relationship with Venezuela, and the intention of returning to be part of the regional integration organization UNASUR. This moderate shift also included a new way of presenting himself to the world as a more prudent, conciliatory, and moderate president. These two politicians are distinguished by the factions of the dominant bloc they represent (Rodriguez, 2014; Kajsiu, 2020; Batlle and Duncan, 2013) where Santos wanted to place himself in the representation of this new, modern current of opinion, focusing on the market as far as possible, and the State as far as necessary.6 This premise placed Santos in the right-left measurement, on the right. He has had great coincidences with the implementation of neoliberal policies, trying to reduce the State, expanding the market with deregulation and privatization practices (Estrada, 2006). Although he tried, at the time, to maintain good relations with the Latin American left, he embodied a radically different political project (Rodriguez, 2014). In his “third way” government, the extractivist model was promoted, which began to be implemented with the well-known “locomotora minera”, achieving that this sector went from 2.7% to more than 7% of the GDP in his first period of government (DANE). A constant call was made to the industrial business sector, which was to be boosted and placed at the centre of the national economy. In the idea of exploiting resources such as oil or coal, large investment companies and investments in technology were also strengthened, which would allow the extraction and 6 See: https://nuso.org/articulo/alvaro-uribe-y-juan-manuel-santos-una-misma-der echa/ and Alberto Acosta Ortega: “La Tercera Vía: una alternativa para Colombia con Santos” in Restauración Nacional, 28 January 2010.

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transportation of natural resources to world markets (Batlle and Duncan, 2013). This logic of natural resource extraction would go against the concept of an end to conflict and territorial peace, since it would exacerbate the environmental and social conflicts that communities have been denouncing for so many years, even in the peace agreement itself. By 2014, the president Juan Manuel Santos was seeking reelection. The peace agreement was the central focus of the campaigns of the candidates at the time (Table 12.2). Polarization was increasing, and the political environment became even more tense. It was a campaign supporting or rejecting the peace process in Havana, the negotiated solution to the conflict of more than 50 years. Uribismo, headed by Oscar Zuluaga, repeatedly stated that for them the FARC was a rebel guerrilla that should not have concessions such as political participation. . In the first presidential round in 2014, the Democratic Center won the elections by a very close margin. For the second round, Santos obtained support from leftist sectors, who, despite going against many of his proposals, especially economic ones, having peace as a banner, decided to support his reelection. Santos, or the class traitor (Hernandez, 2013) as uribismo called him, was reelected president for the 2014–2018 period. The percentage difference in the second round between Juan Manuel Santos was 53.10% to Oscar Zuluaga’s 46.90%.

Table 12.2 Colombia 2014 presidential elections (first round) Candidate

Political Party

Political Trend

Peace agreements

Juan Manuel Santos Oscar Iván Zuluaga Marta Lucia Ramírez Clara López Enrique Peñalosa

U Party

Centre Right

Yes

25,69

Democratic Center Conservative Party Democratic Pole Green Alliance

Right

No

29,25

Right

No

15,52

Left centre

Yes Yes

15,23 8,28

Source Own elaboration based on data from the Registraduría General del Estado Civil

%vote first round

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12.5 2018 Elections and Plebiscite: Polarization and Venezuelizacion of Politics From this presidential campaign onwards, the country in general became polarized around the dialogues that were taking place in Havana between the government and the Farc. The country was divided between those who agreed with the peace process and those who did not. Simultaneously, the idea that the peace process could lead Colombia to become a Venezuela, that “Castrochavismo” would rule once peace was signed, and that defeating the peace agreement would defeat communism in the Latin American region, was incorporated into the political campaign, generating a tense, polarized and divided environment. Juan Manual Santos, decided to give citizens the opportunity to show their opinion through a plebiscite. On October of 2016, two years after the presidential elections, the plebiscite for peace was held, which sought the popular endorsement of the peace agreement that had already been in conversations for more than 4 years. The uribista current, with various sectors of society, such as the Christian churches and the traditionally right-wing political parties, joined forces to campaign for the NO, more specifically to respond negatively to the question: Do you support the “Final Agreement for the termination of the conflict and the construction of a stable and lasting peace”? For the plebiscite elections, the electoral rules also worked as in an ordinary electoral campaign. Thus, both campaigns had the opportunity to present their ideas and arguments through political propaganda. This campaign was characterized for having been permeated by “fake news ”7 which circulated virally through social media. As well as phrases or slogans already used in other countries of the region: the entry of CastroChavism, the Venezuelanization of Colombia, the gender ideology8 as national policy, among many others, a phenomenon similar to the one

7 See: The lies that spread by whatsapp. Semana Magazine 2016. https://www.semana. com/tecnologia/articulo/plebiscito-por-la-paz-mentiras-que-se-propagaron-porwhatsapp/ 495972/. 8 The so-called “gender ideology” has been “full” of variable contents: in 2016 it has a profile farther away from the religious and closer to the discourse of rights: religious freedom, conscience, local culture, etc. As Beltrán and Creely (2008) quoted by Gil Hernández (2020) rightly expose, this new conservative discourse using the language of human rights represents a secular strategy adopted by religious actors to enter a debate

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described by Erika Guevara in relation to the electoral process in Costa Rica. The plebiscite was won by the NO, by a minimal margin of difference. The Yes obtained 49.78%, and the No 50.21%. As can be seen in Fig. 12.2, the periphery of the country plus Bogotá, the capital, faced the No of the centre of the country. This electoral defeat meant a very strong blow for the government, since its major and most important public policy, peace, was rejected at the ballot box by the Colombian people. Although the difference was very small, uribismo emerged victorious from this electoral process, and had the opportunity to modify certain aspects of the peace agreement that was already in an advanced stage of discussion. One of the particularities of the 2018 presidential elections was the political polarization inherited, in part, from the subsequent context of the plebiscite. There were some characteristics that should be highlighted, such as the arrival of a candidate that many described as an outsider, as he did not belong to the families or political parties that have historically exercised power in Colombia. Gustavo Petro, candidate of the left, ran in the presidential elections and obtained an important vote. Unlike previous years, the ideological and political contrast between Gustavo Petro and Iván Duque, candidate of uribismo, was notorious and explicit. The debates between these candidates and the political campaigns were characterized by a constant distortion with false rhetoric about the influence of “Castro-Chavism”, the “gender ideology” or the submission of the country to the Farc. These issues emerged from the political debate to appeal directly to the moral values of the electorate regarding the defence of the family or private property. From this point of view, the elections in Colombia in 2018 resembled those held in Brazil or in Costa Rica. The presidential candidate for the Democratic Center, Ivan Duque, won the presidency in the second round, with a total of 10,398,689 votes, against 8,047,449 for Gustavo Petro, former guerrilla leader of the extinct M19 guerrilla. The campaigns for both presidency and Congress deepened the polarization, and were framed in a logic of political confrontation, with misleading messages spread especially in social media, as it happened in England with the Brexit, in the United States

that is defined as modern and secular. It was more associated with sexuality and constructionist theories about gender and family; at this moment the transgender experience embodies the greatest anxiety of this moral panic (Hernández, 2020, p. 34).

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Fig. 12.2 Colombia: electoral map of the 2016 plebiscite (Source Registraduría General del Estado Civil)

with Trump’s election, or those of the “no” campaign in the plebiscite held in 2016 (Abitbol, 2019). The 2018 legislative elections were the first to count with the participation of the extinct Farc guerrilla, as a political party. The political party (Fuerza Alternativa Revolucionaria del Común (FARC)), as a result of the peace process, had the right to participate in politics legally and openly, to campaign and to reach out for voters, like any other political party. The Peace Agreement established a transitional regime in which, for two consecutive legislative periods, 10 seats would be reserved for this political group. Thus, those members of the FARC that submitted to the peace

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agreement had the opportunity to occupy 5 seats in the Senate of the Republic and 5 in the House of Representatives.

12.6

Electoral Competition: Values and Ideology

The conflict has been the mainspring of the 2018 elections in Colombia. The analyses carried out by the Electoral Observation Mission (MOE) have focused on identifying the routes of violence and their relationship with election days and electoral campaigns. Although, today the conflict persists to some extent, in the 2018 elections no violent actions were recorded in any polling station, and the election day was the most calm and peaceful that the MOE has been able to record.9 However, the conflict was the main topic in political campaigns. The country’s “friend-enemy” divide was further intensified by three discourses: (i) Colombia will surrender to the Farc, (ii) Colombia will be a new Venezuela (negative component), and (iii) The implementation of a “Castro-Chavist” doctrine. These three arguments, even more salient in the context of the peace negotiations, were key in the electoral campaigns of 2014, the plebiscite and 2018. These expressions and ways of doing politics were being used repeatedly to refer to the political opponent, especially by the right, when referring to the left, to Petro, or even to Juan Manuel Santos.10 It was propagated that once the peace agreement was signed, or once Petro won the presidency, Castro-Chavism was going to impose itself as an ideology, installing itself in all areas of society, expropriating companies, and nationalizing all the private sector (El Pais, 2018). This fear generated on private property, questioned the middle and upper social class, who had small or large businesses (Uniandes, 2018). In addition to this, a precedent of great relevance was the distribution of a document by the then Minister of Education, Gina Parody, in 2016, through which tolerance towards diverse sexual orientations was promoted. This caused commotion among the most traditional sectors, who see the traditional family as the fundamental basis of society. Millions

9 See: Informe electoral elecciones 2018. MOE. https://www.moe.org.co/informe-deobservacion-elecciones-presidencia-2018/. 10 As seen above, he is a right-wing candidate.

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of people took to the streets to demonstrate against the government, the minister of education and for the immediate eradication of the document, because it “endangered traditional family values”. This was only the precedent for a much broader discussion on women’s and LGBTI rights, individual liberties, and social rights. As the Peace Accords were the electoral springboard, a nexus was immediately created between the document, the peace process, and the elections.

12.7 Territorial Electoral Cleavage Tending to Conservatism? Numerous scholars have chosen to use the territorial dimension to explain Colombia’s internal conflict, electoral dynamics, and national political development (Velásquez, 2016; Gonzalez, 2014; Gutiérrez Sanín, 2020). Based on this approach, attempts have been made to understand land grabbing, the agrarian problem, displacement, and violence, among other issues (Gonzalez, 2009). It has been a terminology used by academics, politicians from different political camps, and analysts. In the attempt to implement the Peace Accords, it has been called “territorial peace” (Jaramillo, 2016). Following the idea that Colombia experienced a partial alternation towards the extreme right in 2018 and that the electoral results before and after the plebiscite only make sense taking into account the territorial perspective, I build on Yann Basset (2018)’s research to suggest that the results of the plebiscite reflect a territorial “cleavage” that is revealed, according to the author, in the 2014 elections, to which in this research I add the 2018 elections, and which is largely determined by the internal conflict. The electoral map of Colombia in 2018 shows few alterations compared to the 2016 plebiscite. The polarization of public opinion, perceptible since the election of Juan Manuel Santos in 2014, was still very present. The maps reveal (Fig. 12.3) a country moderately divided between the centre and the periphery. Rural areas prone to conflict voted “yes” in the referendum, while urban areas in the centre of the country voted “no”. The vote in 2018 does not follow exactly the same lines of division, but the map shows that Gustavo Petro’s voters are mainly located in the peripheral regions that defended the Peace Accord. The large cities that

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Fig. 12.3 Colombia: electoral maps: (1) 2014 Presidential runoff elections; (2) 2016 Plebiscite; (3) 2018 Presidential runoff elections (Source Registraduría Nacional del Estado Civil)

voted “no” to plebiscite opted for Iván Duque, who opposed the Peace Accords. Since the 2014 elections, when this territorial cleavage was unveiled, the pattern was repeated during the plebiscite and the 2018 elections. These three elections are marked, to a great extent, by the dynamics of the conflict, not only because of the experiences of the conflict, but also

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because it has become the main campaign issue during these three elections, although in 2018 a little less because the Peace Agreements were already signed. Most of the “no” vote was concentraded in the centre of the country, while the “no” vote has been dominant in areas less affected by the conflict (Basset, 2018). Some important cities such as Medellín, Cúcuta, Ibagué, and Villavicencio leaned massively towards the “no”. This cleavage, based on the internal conflict, in the words of Basset (2018) has persisted over time. It is the territorial expression of the great social conflicts that exist in the country. The similarities between the territorial configuration in these three elections, two presidential and referendum, become clearer when observing the voting distribution maps and the electoral expression of a true cleavage in the sense of Seymour Lipset and Stein Rokkan (1967). There are strong similarities between the “no” vote and the pro-Uribe vote.

12.8

The Unprecedented Left Turn

After being the only country where there had been no political alternation, Colombia chose a leftist president for the first time. On August 2022, Gustavo Petro, a candidate who for the third time aspired to the highest political leadership of the country, was sworn in as President. This event had been almost unlikely a few years ago, not only because of the violent repression suffered by the Colombian left, but also because of the narrowness of the Colombian political-electoral system. As analysed above, since 2002 it has been the uribista current that has dominated in almost all elections. Before this period, Colombia had an explicit and implicit bipartisanship, where the Conservative and Liberal parties alternated power every four years. One of the closest possibilities that the left had to reach the Presidency of the Republic and represent a political alternative to the established status quo was at the end of the 80s. Before that, five presidential candidates had been assassinated in Colombia since 1948. The attempt to make politics from a leftist perspective was turned into a “red dance”, where an entire political party, the Patriotic Union, was exterminated, and with it, presidential candidates such as Bernardo Jaramillo Ossa and Jaime Pardo Leal. More than 5,000 militants and sympathizers were assassinated.

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Although political violence has prevented the development of political alternatives, it was peace that, in part, has allowed the rise of Gustavo Petro and Francia Marques (his vice-presidential ticket). The recent peace process has meant that political discussions are no longer focused on the fight against the Farc guerrilla. This has allowed and enhanced the qualification and expansion of the national political agenda. The peace agreement had an unnoticed force that today has made Colombia take a turn to the left, where it is expected that political alternations can be trivialized, without generating so much shock and resistance from the social classes. Gustavo Petro’s victory also reflects widespread discontent in Colombia, where poverty and inequality have increased dramatically in recent years, Colombia is now the second most unequal country on the continent, behind Brazil (OECD, 2022). The pandemic has led to a decade-long setback in the fight against poverty, with 3.6 million new poor. By identifying the structuring elements of political action and the party system, it can be established that the so-called “social explosion”, the fracture of this movement with the legislative and executive actions, and the irruption of the forces that supported Gustavo Petro’s candidacy, were factors that led to his winning the presidency. A decrease in voter turnout may penalize all parties, especially when voters wish to express their rejection of the entire “system” and, therefore, relatively disregard the main parties or candidates. On the other hand, there may be an increase in turnout due to the rise of an outsider who has been able to mobilize different sectors of the population. Such is the case of Gustavo Petro, who had previously run in the presidential elections. The turnout during the second round in 2022 amounted to 22.5 million voters, that is, approximately 58% of the country’s electorate. The MOE praised the increase in voter turnout during the election day, being the highest in the last two decades (MOE, 2022). Likewise, the Registraduria registered the lowest abstention of the last 24 years, with a participation percentage of 58.17%, the highest since 1998, with a decrease of 4.24% compared to 2018 (Registraduría Nacional del Estado Civil, 2022). Continuing with the territorial cleavage, we find that the electoral map for the presidential elections in the second round does not vary with respect to previous years. As can be seen in Fig. 12.4, the Colombian periphery continues with the behaviour tending towards the alternative

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Fig. 12.4 Colombia: map of 2022 presidential runoff election (Source National Registry of Civil Status)

or progressive vote, and the centre of the country, with the exception of Bogota, tends more towards conservative policies.11 Since the first presidential round, Gustavo Petro and Francia Márquez, managed to increase 2' 753.245 million votes. Regions such as the Caribbean and Pacific Coast, where the vice president comes from, voted massively in support of the Historical Pact formula. In the South and Southwest of the country, regions with less State presence, Petro won. On the other hand, in the regions of Santander, East and Central zone, the winner was Rodolfo Hernandez. This does not include Bogotá, where the left has its largest electoral base (Fig. 12.5). Although the electoral map since the 2010 elections continues to be aligned in terms of trends, it is clear that the peripheral regions voted massively in the 2022 elections. As can be seen in Fig. 13.5, the historical number of voters in the departments where Gustavo Petro won, there is a significant increase in the number of voters. Although the plebiscite was held in 2016, with a difference of 6 years with respect to the 2022 elections, it is important to see how in some departments the voting is progressively increasing, with respect to the growth of the electoral census, which evidently increases in each electoral process. 11 In this opportunity, although Rodolfo Hernandez was also a candidate who called himself an outsider, his political proposals and political support revolved around the parties that have historically governed the country (El Tiempo, 2022).

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Número de votantes/Departamentos 4500000 4000000 3500000 3000000 2500000 2000000 1500000 1000000 500000 0

Plebiscito

2018

2022

Fig. 12.5 Colombia: voter history in regions where Gustavo Petro won the 2022 elections (Source Prepared by the authors with data from the Registraduria Nacional del Estado Civil)

12.9

Conclusions

The electoral maps since 2014 show how the territorial cleavage has been differentiated between the centre and the periphery, and between conservatism and progressivism. The periphery has preferred and leaned towards progressivism, when the centre has leaned towards more conservative proposals. The Plebiscite held in 2016 was no exception to this pattern, where the peripheral regions affected by the conflict voted rejecting the peace agreements. Until 2018 Colombia had never before experienced an alternation of power, in 2018 there was a moderate shift towards conservatism policies and proposals. It could be said that Colombia went from right to the extreme right in the 2018 presidential elections. This shift can be compared to other alternations such as in Brazil. Four years after this moderate alternation, as a result of the peace process, Colombia experienced the first alternation of power as it is classically known, going from a right-wing president to a left-wing president. This alternation could be a relevant event, since it could be the beginning of the trivialization or

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normalization of political alternations, without representing trauma or episodes of political violence.

References Albala, A. and E. Parra (2011), ¿Nuevos actores, nuevas prácticas? Los casos de reordenamiento de los bipartidismos en Argentina, Colombia y Uruguay desde la década de los años de los años ochenta, http://www.scielo.org.mx/sci elo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S0185-16162011000300008 (accessed on 10 July 2022). Abitbol, P. (2019), Why are they protesting in Colombia? Movilizaciones, reclamos de paz y crisis de la derecha | Nueva Sociedad, https://nuso.org/articulo/porque-protestan-en-colombia/ (accessed on 10 July 2022). Basset, Y. (2018), “Claves del rechazo del plebiscito para la paz en Colombia”, Estudios Políticos 52, pp. 241–265, https://doi.org/10.17533/UDEA. ESPO.N52A12. Batlle, M. and G. Duncan (2013), “Colombia: A clearer scenery”, Revista de ciencia política (Santiago), Vol. 33/1, pp. 101–116, https://doi.org/10. 4067/S0718-090X2013000100005. El Pais (2018), La palabra expropiación no está en nuestro vocabulario: Petro, https://www.elpais.com.co/elecciones/elecciones-presidenciales/la-pal abra-expropiacion-no-esta-en-nuestro-vocabulario-petro.html (accessed on 10 July 2022). El Tiempo (2022), Gustavo Petro and Rodolfo Hernández: Who supports them in the second round? Presidency—Elections 2022. Eltiempo.com, https:// www.eltiempo.com/elecciones-2022/presidencia/gustavo-petro-y-rodolfohernandez-quienes-los-apoyan-en-segunda-vuelta-676696 (accessed on 5 July 2022). Estrada, J. (2006), “Las reformas estructurales y la construcción del orden neoliberal en Colombia”, in CLACSO, Los desafíos de las emancipaciones en un contexto militarizado, pp. 247–284. Fajardo, M. (2010), Las cosas como son: cómo puede ser el uribismo una ideología, si no hay homogeneidad coherente dentro de los uribistas? https://repositorio. uniandes.edu.co/bitstream/handle/1992/7582/u407230.pdf?sequence=1& isAllowed=y (accessed on 10 July 2022). Gil Hernández, F.l. (2020), “POLÍTICAS ANTIGÉNERO EN AMÉRICA LATINA: COLOMBIA-AGENTES CONSERVADORES CONTRA LOS DERECHOS SEXUALES Y REPRODUCTIVOS”, http://www.fw2.digital (accessed on 10 July 2022). Gonzalez, Fernan Enrique (2009), Espacio, conflicto y poder: las dimensiones territoriales de la violencia y la construcción del Estado en Colombia, https://www. redalyc.org/articulo.oa?id=99612495009 (accessed on 10 July 2022).

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Gonzalez, Fernan E. (2014), Power and violence in Colombia—CINEP/PPP, https://www.cinep.org.co/publicaciones/es/producto/poder-y-violencia-encolombia/ (accessed on 10 July 2022). Gutiérrez Sanín, F. (2020), “A new cycle of war in Colombia?” p. 215. Hernandez, J. (2013), Juan Manuel Santos: ¿history of a class betrayal? Razón Pública, https://razonpublica.com/juan-manuel-santos-ihistoria-deuna-traicion-de-clase/ (accessed on 10 July 2022). Jaramillo, S. (2016), “LA PAZ TERRITORIAL”. Kajsiu, B. (2020), “Las ideologías y movilizaciones políticas del Uribismo y Petrismo: dos Colombias distintas”, Análisis Político, Vol. 33/98, pp. 191– 209, https://doi.org/10.15446/ANPOL.V33N98.89417. MOE (2022), “INFORME DE CIERRE MISIÓN DE OBSERVACIÓN ELECTORAL-Observación Electoral-MOE-Elecciones a Presidencia de la República. Segunda Vuelta”, http://www.pilasconelvoto.com (accessed on 5 July 2022). OECD (2022), “OECD Economic Surveys Colombia”. Registraduría Nacional del Estado Civil (2022), En la segunda vuelta presidencial del 2022 se registró la abstención más baja de los últimos 24 años- Registraduría Nacional del Estado Civil, https://www.registraduria.gov.co/En-la-segundavuelta-presidencial-del-2022-se-registro-la-abstencion-mas-baja.html (accessed on 5 July 2022). Rodriguez, G. (2014), Álvaro Uribe y Juan Manuel Santos: ¿una misma derecha? | Nueva Sociedad, https://nuso.org/articulo/alvaro-uribe-y-juan-manuel-san tos-una-misma-derecha/ (accessed on 10 July 2022). Velásquez, Alejo Vargas (2016), “Transición, democracia y paz”, Nuevo mundo mundos nuevos, https://doi.org/10.4000/NUEVOMUNDO.69010. Uniandes (2018), Castrochavismo, Mitos y Realidades | Uniandes, https://uni andes.edu.co/es/noticias/en-el-campus/castrochavismo-mitos-y-realidades (accessed on 10 July 2022).

CHAPTER 13

Paraguay 2018. A Country of Electoral “Intralternation”? Damien Larrouqué

In the introduction to this book, Olivier Dabène presents Paraguay as one of the rare cases that deviates from the explanatory model of electoral shift that he has developed on the basis of five factors. Let us recontextualize them here. Firstly, since the 1992 constitution prohibits the incumbent president from seeking re-election, the election should be highly competitive (Institution). Moreover, after the attempt to legislatively force the presidential re-election that resulted, on March 31, 2017, in the burning of Congress by an angry mob (Carrizosa, 2018), the Colorado Party (or National Republican Association-ANR) of incumbent President Horacio Cartes (2013–2018) became deeply divided. Meanwhile, the opposition

D. Larrouqué (B) Paris Institute of Political Studies (Sciences Po), Paris, France e-mail: [email protected]

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023, corrected publication 2023 O. Dabène (ed.), Latin America’s Pendular Politics, Studies of the Americas, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-26761-1_13

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gathered in an alliance called “Ganar” (Win) chose to form a common front behind the candidacy of the leader of the Authentic Liberal Radical Party (PLRA), Efraín Alegre, and his centre-left running mate, Leonardo Rubín. This contradictory situation between a divided government party and a united opposition front should have led to alternation (Electoral Offer). As for abstentionism, it has been certainly noteworthy, but it has never exceeded 40%. And even though voting is compulsory, sanctions are never applied. Consequently, the decision not to go to the polls is, above all, a sign of a structural disinterest in public affairs, linked to a fairly low level of political capital and an evanescent feeling of partisan belonging (Lachi, 2009). Electoral volatility is thus considered non-negligible in Paraguay: scholar analysis has shown that an average of one in four voters changed their partisan preference between two presidential elections in the period 1993–2013 (Solís Delgadillo, Cerna Villagra, 2018: 366) (Electoral Behavior). While these first three factors should have favoured the electoral shift, it is true that the other two, identified by Olivier Dabène, work in the opposite direction and fuel resistance to change and even a form of political-electoral apathy. On the one hand, confidence in democracy is much more precarious than in the rest of Latin America: during the second half of the 1990s and the mid-2000s, it fluctuates according to the Latinobarómetro between 24 and 7%. It means about 10–15 points lower than the average for the whole region (Barreda, Bou, 2010: 151) (Public Opinion). On the other hand, it must be recognized that Paraguayans are not accustomed to political and electoral upheavals. With the exception of the mandate of leftist leader Fernando Lugo (2008– 2012) which was shortened by an expeditious impeachment process (Duarte Ricaldo, 2013), the Guaraní nation has been uninterruptedly governed by the Colorado Party since the middle of the twentieth century (Context/History). In the April 2018 general elections, the ANR again came out on top in all four contested polls: presidential (by 46.42% of the vote), legislative (obtaining an absolute majority with 42 out of 80 deputies in the lower house), senatorial (retaining 17 out of 45 seats), and departmental (sweeping 14 out of 17 governorships). Conservative realignment in Paraguay is blatant (Solís Delgadillo, Cerna Villagra, 2019). However, should we see in this apparent triumph only an irreducible politicalelectoral continuity?

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In contrast to the empirical findings, we hypothesize that there is (and has been) a form of alternation in Paraguay, but that it is played out (or has been played out in the past) within the parties, and more precisely within the hegemonic party, the ANR. This internal alternation would have as its component a very strong partisan fragmentation, from which it would derive. Traditionally divided into factions, the Colorado Party is now torn between two antagonistic and almost irreconcilable currents: that of the camp dominated by outgoing president Horacio Cartes (Honor Colorado) on the one hand and that embodied by president-elect Mario Abdo Benítez (Colorado Añeteté) on the other. Under these conditions and in a country reputed to be socially very conservative, an ersatz alternation would be expressed (and would already have been expressed) in the ballot box under a confusing “right-right” modality. We called it: “intralternation”. To defend our hypothesis empirically, we will review the characteristics and evolution of the Paraguayan political-electoral system over the last thirty years, before looking in more details at the general elections of April 2018. In conclusion, we will try to assess whether we are witnessing a simple strengthening or rather a reconfiguration of the Colorado Party hegemony. More fundamentally, we will thus be led to highlight the contradictions and limitations of Paraguayan democracy.

13.1

Between Permanence and Transformation of the Political-Electoral System

Since 1989, the effective party number (EPN) has varied between 2 and 5, but only the Colorado Party and the Liberal Party can claim deep roots throughout the country. For both, their Party Nationalization Score is greater than 0.85, according to the scale proposed by Jones y Mainwaring (2003, Solís Delgadillo, Cerna Villagra, 2020: 445–446). Notwithstanding this, Paraguay’s party system is a historically asymmetrical two-party system, dominated by the Colorado Party. Furthermore, elections are still subject to unorthodox functional logics.

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13.1.1

The Resilience of a Dominant Asymmetrical Two-Party System

The traditional “asymmetrical two-party system” (Larrouqué, 2018) that has characterized Paraguayan political life since the end of the nineteenth century has been transformed into a “moderate pluralism” with the democratic transition (Solís and Cerna, 2018). Reckoned by Sartori as “ultra-dominant” (Sartori, 2011: 285) during the dictatorship (1954– 1989), the ANR has been the historical representative of the landed elites. It remains by far the largest party in Paraguay: in 2017, it claimed to have over 2,300,000 members compared to the Liberal Party’s 1,250,000 (out of a population of 6 million) (Abente Brun, 2021: 135). With the exception of the 2008 elections, in which Lugo became the first elected left-wing president in the country’s history, the Colorado Party has never received less than 35% of the vote (López 2014). Its strength comes from its broad national extension and its ability to remain the leading electoral force in the vast majority of the country’s departments (Solís Delgadillo, Cerna Villagra, 2017). Its electoral supremacy has only been challenged by the PLRA, but at the cost of short-lived coalitions with small left-wing or centre-right parties in the last three presidential elections. In the last 30 years, however, the liberal party managed to gain a foothold in three to four of the country’s most populous departments. Although not as heavy as Party Colorado’s one, its political weight is still therefore meaningful (Pérez Talia, 2019). From the mid-1980s, the regime’s famous “granite unity’ (Nickson, 2011: 279), formed around the figure of dictator Alfredo Stroessner between the military and the Colorado Party, began to crack. Several cliques emerged. Although it can be numbered about six, two main dominant tendencies bunched them (Arditi, 1990: 88). The principal, the “orthodox” one, brought together members of the hardest bloc and was essentially made up of military officers: those were divided between two irreconcilable factions: the traditionalists (tradicionalistas ) and the militants (militantes ). The other, called “democratic”, gathered members which claimed to be in favour of a peaceful transfer of power to the civilian elites: those fellows were essentially part of some popular movements linked to the coloradism or inner opponents forced to exile. At the time of the advent of democracy, the internal division was such that the term “partisan archipelago” has been used to describe the fragmentation of the Colorado Party (Arditi, 1993).

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In February 1989, following the coup d’état orchestrated by Andrés Rodríguez against the dictator Stroessner, power passed into the hands of the militants’ branch. To sum up, the government elected in May 1989 remained dominated by former dictatorship cadres affiliated with the ANR (Palau Viladesau, 2008; Riquelme, 2008). In the elections of May 1993, the engineer and businessman Juan Carlos Wasmosy won. This supporter of an economic liberalization of the country was presented as “the man of Rodríguez”, which implied the military was maintaining a stranglehold at the top of the State. Moreover, in the person of General Lino Oviedo, the traditionalist faction attempted to regain power through a new coup in 1996. Consequently, Paraguayan political life became convulsive for at least one decade (Lambert, 2000). Oviedo’s liegeman, Raúl Cubas Gras was elected president in 1998. Barely a year later, VicePresident Luis María Argaña was assassinated. A popular uprising followed (the famous Marzo Paraguayo), which forced the destitution and exile of the serving president. The rifts within the Colorado Party between rival factions had never been so great (Abente Brun, 2009: 147–148). Despite those shocking events, the Colorado Party retained the confidence of a majority of the Paraguayan voters. Although polls were still subject to questionable practices—as we will see in the next section, the coloradism remained fiercely the leading political force in the country. In 2003, Colorado candidate, Nicanor Duarte Frutos, became once again the newly elected president. He could be described as the first authentically “civilian”, in so far as he didn’t belong to no one of the two main military factions, neither traditionalist nor militant. However, as a proponent of a neoliberal program, he arouses the ire of many sectors and, in particular, those who benefited of the largesse of the bureaucratic apparatus. His attempt to stay in power by changing the constitution generated a lasting social protest, from which emerged the figure of a former bishop, Fernando Lugo (Boidin, Fregosi, 2009). Finally, it took almost 20 years for the first changeover to break the political and electoral hegemony of the ANR (López, 2010a). Inaugurated by Lugo’s victory in April 2008, this new “democratic equation” (Uharte Pozas, 2009) was short-lived. In a country characterized by its “attenuated presidentialism”1 (López, 2010b), this mandate introduced 1 It means that the balance of power is very unfavourable to the president compared to the Congress. For more details, see: Cano Radil (2012).

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“many new features, but little change” (Turner, 2010). Ultimately, in June 2012, the express impeachment initiated against the first leftist president in the country’s history was analyzed as a rupture in this fragile process of democratic consolidation (Duarte Recalde, 2013; Llanos et al., 2012; Soler, 2014; Szcus, 2014). Barely ten months later, the Colorado Party returned to power in the person of the wealthy ultra-conservative outsider Horacio Cartes (Turner, 2014). Never elected or even registered to vote until his victory, Cartes used the Colorado Party for what it is: a powerful electoral vehicle (Abente Brun, 2021: 129). Furthermore, his conquest of power illustrates the permeability of the Paraguayan electoral system to corruption and other arrangements with probity. 13.1.2

Rules and Tricks of the Paraguayan Elections

Insofar as the two traditional parties were dominating Congress, they had no interest in modifying a legal framework that was favourable to them (Duarte, 2017; Filártiga Callizo, 2018; López, 2016). Nonetheless, facing the pressure of youth and social networks, they approved the end of “closed electoral lists” (listas sábana) in June 2019. In other words, they decided to introduce the “preferential vote” (voto preferencial ). Until the June 2019 reform, the proportional voting system was based on blocked lists.2 The link between citizens and elected officials was weakened, since intra-party bargaining and partisan dealings were more decisive than the citizen act of voting. Concretely, for the candidate, the main issue was not to convince electors, but to appear in good places on the list. In the congressional elections, at least the first ten candidates of the two traditional parties in both the upper and lower houses were guaranteed to be elected. Henceforth, the voter chooses his or her best candidate from the list of the party, political movement, coalition, or alliance of his preference. The vote obtained for the candidate of his or her preference, and the order that he will occupy within the list of the party, is established according to the rules of a simple majority. This new modality is supposed

2 We must add that Paraguayan electoral code does not recognize the possibility of a

run-off. From the president to the departmental governors or the Mercosur representatives, the elections are held on the same day and in a single round. Parliamentary seats are allocated in a proportional way, according to the D’Hont method. As for the primary elections, they are mandatory. For more information, cf. Filártiga Callizo (2018) and López (2016).

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to be more democratic and better reflect the diversity of electoral preferences. It also raises concerns about increased partisan fragmentation, so much so that some parliamentarians use this fear as an excuse to return to the old system. Moreover, the contemporary Paraguayan political party financing framework does not limit the ceiling of authorized individual payments in a restrictive manner, to the point where it has been accused of facilitating dirty money laundering (Filártiga Callizo, 2018: 11–12). Besides, political competition is further restricted by the fact that parties without parliamentary representation do not have access to public funds. Thanks to their control of the state apparatus for a long time, the traditional parties are able to use public resources discretionally for proselytizing purposes (Villaba, 2017: 13). The commodification of the vote is thus well rooted in Paraguay: weaving and maintaining clientelist networks is the key to electoral success (Setrini, 2011; Lachi, 2008). In addition, the traditional parties have developed numerous subterfuges to win elections. They used to simply purchase ballots in cash or in kind (drinks, meals, etc.). Most recently, in a country where a part of the electorate is considered to be significatively captive,3 they prevent electors from voting for the opposing candidate by renting, for one day, the identity cards necessary to fulfil one’s electoral duty. Well identified by international organizations such as the OAS (2013: 39–43), this practice is popularly known as “ID card withholding” (retención de cédula). Another practice denounced by the electoral observation missions consists of gathering and holding captive, on the eve of the vote, some families, peasants, or indigenous people, in order to force them to vote as a single man (Villalba, 2018). This ignominious practice is called “lockup” (encerrona or corralón). In principle, these questionable practices should be systematically denounced by the Superior Tribunal of Electoral Justice (Tribunal Superior de Justicia Electoral, TSJE). But, as long as this body was filled with party-appointed members, its role was mainly limited to the logistic organization of the elections. In 2013, its level of politicization had been 3 In Paraguay, partisan affiliations are known to be very strong. It still prevails a form of hereditary transmission of partisan attachments (Boidin, Fregosi, 2009: 72-73): sometimes people continue to vote the way their grandparents did, and in the countryside particularly, it is still common to paint the family grave in the colours of the party (red for the ANR and blue for the PLRA). According to Abente Brun (2009: 148), barely a fifth of the electorate is considered unaffiliated with any party. It concerns members of the middle and urban classes, but also independent leftist voters.

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observed with concern by the OAS (2013: 42). Following the recommendations, meritocratic selection mechanisms has been introduced (López, 2016: 23). Nonetheless, the institution lacks the technical and human resources to properly exercise its control and certification functions. In such a context, the informal influence of traditional parties on electoral dynamics still remains important. Beyond the doubts about the impartiality of the electoral court, one of the major problems in Paraguay electoral process stems from the very high concentration of media. They are “actors of references and power in Paraguay” (Juste de Ancos et al., 2014). They form economic oligopolies, with which the traditional parties maintain incestuous relations (Nikolajzcuk, 2018). Not only is media pluralism limited, but the content is also oriented in a very conservative way. There is thus a real “reactionary consensus” whose peak was visible in the impeachment process against Lugo in 2012 and, more generally, in the relentless undermining campaign against the Lugo government since 2008 (Segovia, 2013). These media wars were exacerbated during the events of March 2017, which culminated in the burning of the Congress and formed the backdrop for the April 2018 general elections.

13.2 The April 2018 General Elections in Perspective Paraguayan democracy has long been characterized as “vulnerable” (Mendonca, 2010). It still remains characterized if not by “authoritarian features” (Larrouqué, 2019a; Sondrol, 2007), then at least by some “negative political behaviors” (Bourscheid, Stumpf González, 2019). The 2018 general elections have concluded a rather dull campaign, which contrasted with a politically turbulent year. Accusations of electoral fraud raised by international organizations were dismissed by the judiciary. During these elections, the Colorado Party has shown its capacity to fortify its political dominance, in spite of its internal divisions. 13.2.1

An Apathetic Campaign After a Politically Explosive year

The polarization within the Colorado party reinforced and came to light as early as October 2016. At the party convention, two irreconcilable camps clashed. On the one hand, supporters of President Horacio Cartes,

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defended his will to revise the constitution in order to introduce the right to presidential re-election. They gathered under the banner called “Honor Colorado”. On the other, partisans of Mario Abdo Benítez, the leader of the Colorado hardliners, presented themselves as adamantly opposed to this project of constitutional amendment, to the point where they decided to leave the convention. In the absence of the dissident faction named “Colorado Añeteté” (Colorado for real in Guarani language), the controversial presidential project was approved by the party. This resolution has caused an “internal seism” (Solís Delgadillo, Cerna Villagra, 2018: 373). At the same time, the clash has favoured the media emergence of the internal opponent Abdo Benítez, then aged about forty years and who has been president of the Senate (2015–2016). Thanks to the crisis, he could forge his presidential stature. Entered politics as a young man, Abdo Benítez is the son of the private secretary of the dictator Stroessner, to whom he owes his affluence. On human rights and cultural issues, he embodies the reactionary wing of coloradism. Nonetheless, he appears much more legalistic and closer to the people than Horacio Cartes, one of the country’s richest tycoons, who had never voted in his life before taking over the party. Paraguay’s political climate became explosive in March 2017. A group of senators close to Cartes tried to change the internal rules of the Parliament, by removing the prerogatives of the President of the Senate, and at the same time, introducing modifications to the National Constitution without calling for a conventional Assembly. In other words, they tried to modify article 229 which prohibits presidential re-election. This legislative attempt to bypass one of the most fundamental principles of the Paraguayan Constitution provoked a popular insurrection. The protests resulted in several injuries, one fatal casualty (a young member of the Liberal Party), and the burning of the Congress (Carrizosa, 2018: 340– 341). Several ministers were forced to resign and, under pressure from international institutions, president Cartes eventually decided to withdraw his controversial reform. Despite this catastrophic media coverage, the Colorado Party remained at the top of the polls. In the primary elections, Abdo Benítez defeated Cartes’ candidate, Santiago Peña, former minister of the Economy (2015–2017) and was therefore able to impose his somewhat evasive and fundamentally conservative campaign themes: fighting corruption, strengthening public institutions, expanding tax base, reinforcing boarder

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control, restructuring the penitentiary system, maintaining the ban on abortion and protecting the institution of marriage (Cerna Villagra, 2019: 208–209). After the primary elections, the electoral campaign took place in a rather dull atmosphere, opposing. However, it seems interesting to add that in the months prior to the 2018 general elections, different media filed two actions against the articles of the electoral code that prohibit the broadcasting of election exit polls. In response, the Supreme Court of Justice (SCJ) issued a moratorium by which it temporarily suspended the effects of the challenged limitations, until it resolved the merits of the case. But since the SCJ has not judged it in time, some media were able to freely publish surveys on the election day, violating electoral principles and undermining the integrity of the democratic process. 13.2.2

Election Day on April 22, 2018: Victory or Setback of Democracy?

The Paraguayan general elections of April 2018 mobilized 61% of registered voters compared to 68% in 2013. The participation rate was slightly lower. In general, popular enthusiasm prevailed. The day was placed under the sign of democratic celebration. But several problems may have tarnished the party. Across the country, the final decisions on the composition of the voting tables (scrutineers, and others electoral officers) were not yet closed on the election day. Several requests about the potential partiality of members due to the high degree of partisan affiliation and the lack of independent civilians were still pending, which led to some conflicts. Besides, in spite of the existence of the transmission of the preliminary electoral results system (transmisión de resultados electorales preliminares 4 ), the TSJE was only able to report on the same night of April 22, the results of the elections for the unipersonal offices (president, vice-president and governors), but not for the seats to Congress (deputies and senators). This delay has been likely to fuel partisan disputes and even cast doubt on the reliability of the whole electoral process. 4 The TPER is an informal and non-binding information system shaped by the Superior Tribunal of Electoral Justice (TSJE). It supposes to improve the transparency of electoral process, making known, in the shortest possible time, the preliminary results of the voting. For more information, see TSJE’s website.

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Worse yet, as we mentioned, the fact that some conservative media were able to broadcast preliminary results through exit polls may have negatively influenced, if not the general outcomes, at least the electoral participation. Concretely, since January 2018, the daily newspaper ABC Color has systematically placed the candidacy of Abdo Benitez at the top of the polls by more than 20 points of difference with his main challenger, reinforcing among citizens the misconception that presidential election was already won and its results irreversible (Gómez, Cerna Villagra, 2019). The fact is the difference in votes between the two main presidential candidates, Abdo Benítez for the ANR and Efraín Alegre for the PLRA, was only three and a half points, which represented just over 80 000 votes for the first contender (Larrouqué, 2019b). Such an instrumentalization of surveys by conservative media put into question the credibility of the whole electoral process and jeopardizes the democracy. A number of shortcomings and others loopholes have been pointed out by the reports of international electoral observers, such as those of the OAS. Let’s make a small review of it. As noted above, the TSJE does not have effective verification and auditing mechanisms. The OAS recommends to strengthen TSJE’s capacity to produce independent information. It also encourages the development of mechanisms able to better monitor compliance with the electoral expenditure ceiling, the limit on purchasing electoral advertising in the media and the restrictions on individual donations. Not only the sanctions regime should be hardened, but this financial monitoring should also be exercised during the campaign in order to foster transparency on the one hand, and to circumscribe as much as possible the clientelist logics on the other. Under the current financing scheme, public funds for campaigns are delivered after the elections, which affects the competitive conditions of minor parties that have limited access to credit. The electoral subsidies should be delivered prior to the election. Additionally, as there is neither oversight of the expenditures that feed the primary campaigns or municipal elections, the OAS recommends establishing the obligation for candidates in internal and local elections to register their incomes and expenses, and to make their financial reports public. Surprisingly, political parties are not subject to the law on Free Citizen Access to Public Information and Government

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Transparency (Law 5282/14) and there is no clarity as to what information they must publish about their operations.5 With such a flaw, it would be sane to expressly regulate by law what type of information political groups must, at a minimum, publish on their websites, including the detailed use of state contributions. Moreover, it appears that the possibility of appealing to jurisdictional instances to promote challenges in electoral matters is restricted to the parties, political movements, and electoral alliances that participate in the elections and for their candidates. In order to ensure that all citizens can defend their electoral rights, the OAS recommends expanding this right of appeal for single citizen or NGO. It would be a manner to legitimately accompany the rise and strong activism of Paraguayan civil society over the past 20 years, as it has been revaluated by some scholars, including the author of this chapter (Capdevila, Larrouqué, 2020; Demelenne, Larrouqué, 2020; Larrouqué et al. 2020). 13.2.3

Conclusion: Reinforcement or Reconfiguration of Party Colorado Hegemony?

In view of the electoral results since the mid-2010s, we can assert that the Colorado party remains the main dominant party in Paraguay. Its hegemony is such that it could be written that what some researchers have called the “pax colorada” is once again reactivated (Solís Delgadillo, Cerna Villagra, 2018: 367). Since the death of the factious leader, General Lino Oviedo, in 2013, the independent political movement (UNACE) that he formed around his figure and was able to attract up to 22% of the electorate in 2008 has faltered. Voters seduced by his populist and militarist rhetoric have gently returned their ballots in favour of the Colorado party, proving its renewed appeal (Solís Delgadillo, Cerna Villagra, 2019: 270). Not only did the conservative party confirm its strong positions in the 2015 municipal elections (Došek et al., 2016), but it even managed the following year to destabilize the PLRA, dislodging it from the Central department, its traditional stronghold where the liberal party drew its local roots since the end of the’90 s (Cerna Villagra, 2019: 214; López, 2019: 337). However, at the presidential level, his victory in the 2018 election turns out to be much shorter than the polls had predicted. Its narrow victory 5 For more information about the citizen and legal struggle for the approval of this law, see Costa (2019).

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suggests that the Colorado party is not invincible or immovable. He owes his vitality not so much to the quality or originality of his programmatic proposals as to the weakness of his opponents (especially the left, which is still residual in Paraguay), the prevalence of its patronage networks (above all, across the countryside) as well as the survival of contested electoral practices. It is also important to remember that its control over the state apparatus gives it undue advantages. In a very pragmatic way, the Colorado Party, even more than the Liberal Party, allows and enshrines the victories of those who campaign under its label. As Abente Brun (2021: 129) declares: “in Paraguay there is no politically viable way to access power except through one of these two electoral vehicles”. In the introduction to this chapter, we raised the hypothesis of an electoral “intralternation” in Paraguay, which would be played out in a “right-right” modality. It is a fact that the internal division has always been a deep characteristic of the Colorado party since the end of the dictatorship. But, over the past five years, the polarization between the two main blocs is such that one can almost speak of two distinct parties rather than two factions (Solís Delgadillo, Cerna Villagra, 2020: 451). Indeed, Benitez’s attempt to reconcile the two camps through a fortuitous alliance called the “republican hug” (abrazo republicano) has failed (López, 2019: 314). Since the general elections of April 2018, Cartes’ bench represents almost half of the Colorado deputies (Solís Delgadillo, Cerna Villagra, 2020: 446). With their fellow senators led by Cartes, those 20 out of 42 parliamentarians have declared an unformal war against the president. In July 2019, Benítez came close to being subjected to an impeachment process. Without a providential agreement with his former rival who has become a kingmaker (Abente Brun, 2020: 462), the president would have been knocked over. It will be interesting to analyze how and to what extent these partisan divisions will structure the future electoral campaign of the Colorado Party and affect the results of the next general elections of April 2023. It is also hoped that electoral fairness will improve. Without budgetary equity among parties and greater independent control over the electoral system, Paraguay’s democracy could still be described as imperfect (Barreda, Mou, 2010; Mendonca, 2010; Szcus, 2014).

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Duarte Recalde, L. (2013). Paraguay: interrupción al proceso de consolidación de la democracia. Revista de Ciencia Política, 33 (1), 303–324. Došek, T., Pérez Talia, M., Duarte Recalde, L. R. (2016). Elecciones municipales de 2015 en Paraguay: Cambios simbólicos y continuidades sustanciales. Revista Uruguaya de Ciencia Política, 25 (1), 137–156. Filártiga Callizo, C. (2018). Sistema electoral paraguayo: consideraciones para una reforma constitucional. Asuncion: Centro de Estudios Judiciales. Gómez, A., Cerna Villagra, S. P. (2019). El rol de las encuestas de opinión en las elecciones de 2018 en Paraguay. Revista Internacional de Comunicación y Desarrollo, 10, 95–104. Jones, M., Mainwaring, S. (2003). The Nationalization of Parties and Party Systems. An empirical Measure and an Application to the Americas. Party Politics, 9 (2), 139–166. Juste de Ancos, R., Soler, L., Ortí Mata, M. (2014). Media, Actors of References and Power in Paraguay. Revista Latinoamericana de Comunicación Social, 69, 229–247. Lachi, M. (2008). Construir clientela. Llave del éxito electoral en Paraguay. Revista Paraguaya de Sociología, 132/133,191–202. Lachi, M. (2009). Abstencionismo electoral en Paraguay. Germinal. Documento de Trabajo, 3, 1–126. Lambert, P. (2000). Decade of Electoral Democracy: Continuity, Change and Crisis in Paraguay. Bulletin of Latin American Research, 19 (3), 379–396. Larrouqué, D. (2018).1887–2017 : cent trente ans de bipartisme asymétrique au Paraguay. Les Études du CERI , 233–234, 43–47. Larrouqué, D. (2019a). Introduction. Le Paraguay peut-il encore être qualifié de « semi-autoritaire » ? Cahiers des Amériques Latines, 90, 21–38. Larrouqué, D. (2019b). Victoire en demi-teinte pour le Parti colorado et opposition en embuscade. Les Études du CERI , 239–240, 79–80. Larrouqué, D., Mereles Pintos, R., Tamayo Belda, E. (2020). Les organisations paysannes au Paraguay: acteurs oubliés de la transition démocratique. Revue internationale des études du développement, 244, 97–119. Llanos, M., Nolte, D., Tibi Weber, C. (2012). Paraguai: golpe ou voto de desconfiança? Conjuntura Austral, 3 (14), 4–17. López, M. (2010a). La restauración del orden democrático en Paraguay. Apuntes para entender el triunfo de Fernando Lugo dentro de una transición incompleta. Desafíos, 22 (2), 71–107. López, M. (2010b). La democracia en Paraguay. Un breve repaso sobre los partidos políticos tradicionales, el sistema electoral y el triunfo de Fernando Lugo Méndez. Revista Enfoques, 8 (13), 98–102. López, M. (2014). Elecciones generales y votos en el Paraguay de 1989–2013. Develando algunos mitos. Diálogos de Saberes, 40, 159–182.

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López, M. (2016). “Access to Electoral Rights—Paraguay”, EUDO Cintizenship Observatory, 1–31. López M. (2019). Paraguay en un año electoral (2018): trayectorias económicas, políticas y sociales en la transición entre el gobierno colorado saliente y el entrante. Revista de Ciencia Política, 39 (2), 313–340. Mendonca, D. (2010). Democracia vulnerable. Un estudio sobre el sistema político paraguayo. Asunción: Intercontinental Editora. Nickson, A. (2011). El régimen de Stroessner (1954–1989). In I. Telesca (dir.), Historia del Paraguay (pp. 265–274). Asuncion: Santillana. Nikolajzcuk, M. (2018). Élites económicas, poder político y medios de comunicación en Paraguay. Novapolis, 13, 93–109. OAS (2013), Informe de la Misión de Observación Electoral. Elecciones generales del 21 de abril 2013 en la República del Paraguay. Washington DC: MOE/OEA. Palau Viladesau, T., (2008). Transición a la “democracia” y hegemonía militar en el Paraguay [1991]. Revista Paraguaya de Sociología, n 132/133, 75–90. Pérez Talia, M. (2019). El partido liberal en la transición. Asuncion: Editorial El Lector. Riquelme, M. (2008). Desde el stronismo hacia la transición: el papel del actor militar [1993]. Revista Paraguaya de Sociología, 132/133, 43–73. Sartori, G. (2011). Partis et systèmes de partis: un cadre d’analyse [1976]. Bruxelles: Éditions de l’université de Bruxelles. Segovia, D. (2013). Paraguay 2013: Los medios y el consenso reaccionario. FES Comunicación Perspectivas, 13, 1–10. Setrini, G. (2011). Veinte años de democracia electoral en Paraguay: del clientelismo monolítico al clientelismo plural, CADEP-Working Paper, 3, 1–47. Soler, L. (2014). Golpe de Estado y derechas en Paraguay: transiciones circulares y restauración conservadora. Nueva Sociedad, 254,73–83 Solís Delgadillo, J. M., Cerna Villagra, S. P. (2017). Los resortes colorados del poder: nacionalización de los partidos y el sistema de partidos paraguayos (1998–2013). Colombia Internacional, 91, 151–184. Solís Delgadillo, J. M., Cerna Villagra, S. P. (2018). Paraguay: entre el pluralismo moderado y el predominio de los actores tradicionales. In M. Alcántara Sáez et al. (eds.), Elecciones y partidos en América Latina en el cambio de ciclo (pp.353–376). Madrid: Tecnos. Solís Delgadillo, J. M., Cerna Villagra, S. P. (2019). Fricción, (re)construcción y afianzamiento conservador tras las elecciones de 2018 en Paraguay. Estudios políticos, 54, 259–285. Solís Delgadillo, J. M., Cerna Villagra, S. P. (2020). Paraguay: realineamiento electoral y profundización conservadora tras el proceso electoral de 2018. In

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CHAPTER 14

Costa Rica’s 2018 and 2020 Elections: A Partial Alternation and a Conservative Turn Erica Guevara

In the 2018 presidential runoff election in Costa Rica, the Citizen’s Action Party (PAC) was re-elected with 60.6% of the vote, giving the impression of an easy success for this party, and thus the absence of any form of alternation. The hypotheses on the factors favouring alternation set out in the introduction to this book lead us to estimate a rather low degree of alternation (1.5). However, the very atypical way in which the election campaign unfolded, with the first round won by a candidate from the evangelical National Restoration party (PREN), shows that voters finally made the choice in the second round to rule out a change that

E. Guevara (B) Paris 8 University, Paris, France e-mail: [email protected]

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023, corrected publication 2023 O. Dabène (ed.), Latin America’s Pendular Politics, Studies of the Americas, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-26761-1_14

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would have been radical, given the country’s political history. This election also marks a major political turning point, as it is the first time since 1953 that the National Liberation Party is not among the finalists. Finally, the results of the elections to the National Assembly, as well as the partial renewal of political personnel at various levels, lead us to consider that Costa Rica belongs to the category of partial alternations, essentially of a post-electoral nature. Portrait of a threatened democracy (Alfaro and Alpizar, 2020), Anatomy of a fracture (Rodríguez, Herrero-Acosta, Chacón, 2019), Crossing Times (Rojas and Treminio, 2019): as evidenced by the titles of several books published by research centres in the country on the 2018 elections, their conduct is perceived in Costa Rica as a warning of impending danger: the breakthrough of a candidate at the extremes of the electoral spectrum, whose platform is essentially centred on values and morality, with populist tendencies, is analyzed as further evidence of the collapse of democracy. This is not new, however: social and economic fracture, crisis of party representation, electoral volatility, and increasing abstention are regularly pointed out by these centres as symptoms of a disease that needs to be treated before it is too late. The influential research centre of the State of the Nation Program, for example, emphasized as early as 2011 the erosion of social progress in Costa Rica, despite the country’s economic and political stability (PEN, 2014). Important productive, fiscal, environmental, but also social and political adjustments would be necessary to avoid social and political tensions. The 2018 election should rather be interpreted as a sign confirming the existing tensions in the country, which could lead to the appearance of new candidates from the extremes if they are not resolved quickly. This chapter therefore raises several questions: why did the presidential alternation not take place in Costa Rica, when all the factors seemed to be present for it to happen? What were the consequences of this situation, and to what extent did it lead to a partial changeover of the legislative and executive branches? What is the place of the question of “political change” in this context of high tension? After studying the relevance in the Costa Rican case of the different variables proposed by this book to explain alternations, we show the effects of the 2018 election on the recomposition of the political staff and on the functioning of the government, leading to a partial alternation. Finally, by exploring the articulation of

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“progressive” and “conservative” dimensions in the discourses expressed during the campaign, we argue that, despite the absence of alternation, it is indeed possible to speak of a conservative turn.

14.1

An Alternation that Almost Happened

A few months before the first round of the 2018 presidential election, an alternation seemed inevitable in Costa Rica. First, because the immediate re-election of an incumbent president is prohibited (he must wait at least four years to be able to run again), the configuration of the institutional system favours alternation. Moreover, the country has been used to competitive elections for more than 60 years and has never seen the same party hold the presidency for more than two successive terms. This was the first government of the centre-left Citizens’ Action party (formed in 2000), but despite a fairly good economic and social record, it was a particularly weakened party. The context thus seemed rather favourable for the return of one of the two parties characteristic of the traditional two-party system, the National Liberation Party (PLN) or the Christian Social Unity Party (PUSC). 14.1.1

The PAC Faces Its First Assessment

Criticized throughout the 2014–2018 period for its lack of experience and the instability of its cabinet, which was initially composed mainly of academics, the PAC often found itself in difficulty during its first term. Expectations were high that the new party would come to power, as it was hoped that many of the institutional blockages would be resolved with the end of the two-party system, and that several inclusive policies for different types of underrepresented social groups could be quickly implemented. Four years later, some people, including his own constituency, criticized him for not having gone as far as he had hoped in implementing this agenda. He has not succeeded in starting a process of state reforms, considered necessary by various sectors, including tax reform (intended to better collect taxes to reduce the public debt, which reached 6.2% of GDP in 2017), public employment, and the functioning of the justice system. Thus, while growth was stable (3.2% in 2017, 2.6% in 2018) and GDP per capita was increasingly important, unemployment was clearly increasing (12% in 2018), and the gaps between the richest and the poorest continued to grow (Table 14.1).

3.5% 5.13% 0.516 9.2% 5.7% of GDP 22.4% 6.7%

3.7% −0.8% 0.516 9.6% 5.9% of GDP 21.7% 7.2%

2015

Source Author based on reports from the Programa Estado de la Nación

GDP Growth Inflation Gini Index Unemployment Tax deficit Population in poverty Extreme poverty

2014

Table 14.1 Costa Rica’s socio-economic indicators, 2014–2018

4.3% 0.8% 0.521 9.5% 5.2% of GDP 20.5% 6.35%

2016

3.2% 2.7% 0.514 9.3% 6.2% of GDP 20% 5.7%

2017

2.6% 2% 0.514 12% 5.9% of GDP 21.2% 6.3%

2018

296 E. GUEVARA

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The PAC publicly demonstrated its internal divisions, through the repeated criticism of the party’s founder, Ottón Solís, a member of congress between 2014 and 2018, towards the work of President Luis Guillermo Solís. The former did not hesitate to openly oppose the President, despite coming from his own party (Urcuyo, 2015). These internal tensions complicated the work of the government and were difficult for the public to understand. Interparty oppositions were also exacerbated in the National Assembly, especially with the recurrent and virulent clashes between the PAC and PLN fractions. Finally, and most importantly, the image of the party, but also that of the president, had been particularly damaged by the corruption scandal known as “Cementazo”, which led the press to reveal a series of bribes paid to public officials to grant credits from one of the country’s main banks to a contractor who imported cement for infrastructure projects. The climate was therefore one of disappointment with a party that was supposed to embody renewal, with sections of the population rejecting it very strongly, but also of a weakening of democratic institutions in general. Although the officials involved were from several parties, and the responsibility of the President has not been proven, it was the PAC that was most affected by the scandal, since transparency, integrity and the fight against corruption have been the leitmotifs of the party since its creation. This paradox permanently affected the image of the political formation, which became “a party like any other”. In October 2017, the president’s popularity rating was one of the lowest of his entire term. Institutional factors, as well as those related to the state of public opinion, suggested that an electoral alternation was on the way. The context therefore seemed rather favourable for the triumphant return of the PLN, which is the most solid and experienced party in Costa Rican history. The other historical party, the PUSC, although in the process of recovering from its various crises,1 did not yet seem strong enough to compete with the PLN. However, undermined by their own internal divisions, neither party managed to capitalize on the window of opportunity opened by the weakness of the PAC. First, the PLN candidate, Antonio Alvarez Desanti, was far from unanimous among 1 The PUSC has been in crisis for the past 20 years, because of the large-scale mobilization against the privatization of the Costa Rican Electricity Institute, led by a PUSC president in 1998, and because of the imprisonment of two former PUSC presidents in 2002 for corruption.

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supporters. The party primaries once again highlighted the oppositions between the three families of the PLN (embodied by Oscar Arias Sanchez, José Figueres Olsen and Johnny Araya). Alvarez Desanti’s candidacy thus represented a minimal compromise between the different fractions of the party. Second, the two traditional parties were competing respectively with the Party of National Integration (PIN) and the Party of the Christian Social Republic (PRSC), two former minority parties rehabilitated by defectors from the PLN and PUSC. Thus, throughout the election, the PLN candidate clashed via the media with the PIN candidate, Juan Diego Castro, who had long been perceived as having a real chance of winning, and who came in first or second in the polls between November and December 2017. For his part, the PRSC candidate took advantage of each televised debate to directly and personally attack the PUSC candidate. These attacks concentrated media attention and led the candidates to often neglect other issues and rival candidates. These four parties competed for the centre and left/right classifications were not particularly relevant to defining them. However, the “populist” label was often attributed to candidate Juan Diego Castro, who also spoke to the “anti-system” electorate, “disappointed with the two-party system and especially with the PLN”.2 The electoral offer was thus particularly fragmented, with thirteen candidates in the first round of the presidential election, which had already happened in 2014. Among the other parties in the race was the far-left Frente Amplio (FA), which had done very well in the 2014 elections (17.25%), but whose 2018 candidate was struggling to attract voters. The far-right Libertarian Movement Party, which had garnered 11.3% of the vote in 2014, was also finding it difficult to find a place during this election. Finally, the other six candidates were from existing minority parties. Three carried an overtly religious program (Costa Rican Renewal Party, Christian Democratic Alliance Party and PREN), until then seemingly not very promising. The electoral campaign therefore started in October 2017 in a gloomy context, with apathy dominating among the population. According to CIEP surveys (2017), although 79% of voters said they would go to the polls in February 2018, 40% said they were undecided about their choice of candidate. While Alvarez Desanti made the fight against unemployment his campaign focus, the PUSC candidate’s slogan reflected the crisis of

2 https://semanariouniversidad.com/pais/juan-diego-castro-temor-la-furia/

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party representation: “Vote for something”. Carlos Alvarado, the former labour minister of President Solís, took the issue of tax reform in stride, but he found it difficult to be attractive on a highly technical issue that his own government had failed to implement. Far from the top of the polls, the private television stations that organized the televised debates were even reluctant to invite him.3 Fabricio Alvarado was also in fifth or sixth place in the polls, with a conservative program in which issues related to values and morals (opposition to abortion, gay marriage, sex education, secularism) were central. The main issues of the campaign were economic and technical, and only weakly mobilized the electorate. It was thus difficult to speak of the ideological distance between the main candidates, who differed according to their approach to the same issues. But it was not possible to speak of much programmatic convergence either, as the programs of the different candidates were rather thin. Polarization, understood as the degree and virulence of clashes between supporters of different candidates or positions, was nevertheless strong, but it was rather expressed according to “affective identities” (Iyengar, Sood, Lelkes, 2012) and not ideological ones. In this sense, polarization is not defined solely in terms of the positive feelings one feels for one’s own group, but more importantly in terms of the negative feelings felt towards those perceived to belong to opposing groups. Although more than 65,76% of voters said they did not identify with any party in 2017 (according to the CIEP), “anti PLN” and “anti PAC” camps could be clearly identified. No candidate, other than Juan Diego Castro, seemed to emerge, although his success was very relative, as the PLN candidate remained in the lead throughout December. CIEP polls conducted at regular intervals with the same panel of respondents highlighted the very high volatility of the electorate, which constantly changed its mind and in which the proportion of undecideds was very high right up to the end (Alfaro Redondo, 2020; Table 14.2).4

3 Interview conducted with the director of a survey house, San Jose, March 2018. 4 See Fig. 14.1 on OPALC’s website.

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Table 14.2 Costa Rica. Percentage of votes obtained by each party in presidential elections 2002–2018 Party

2002

PAC

26.19%

PREN

–

PLN

1st round: 31.05% 2nd round: 42.04% 1st round: 38.58% 2nd round: 57.95% 0.41% – 1.69% – – – 1.07% 1.1%

PUSC

PIN PRSC PML FA PNG PASE PRC Others

2006 39.8%

–

2010

2014

2018

25.06%

1st round: 30.64% 2nd round: 77.76% 1.35%

1st round: 21.66% 2nd round: 60.59% 1st round: 24.91% 2nd round: 39.41% 18.67%

–

40.92% 46.91%

3.67% 3.88%

1st round 29.71% 2nd round: 22.24% 6.02%

0.3% – 8.76% – – – 0.95% 5.6%

0.15% – 11.34% 17.25% 0.29% 0.5% 0.81% 1.94

– – 20.92% 0.6% – 1% 0.72% 0.1%

16.02%

9.52% 4.95% 1.02% 0.8 0.8 0.3% 0.6% 0.75%

Source Author based on data of the TSE

14.1.2

The IACHR’s Advisory Opinion on Same-Sex Marriage: An External Variable

An entirely different electoral campaign began on January 9, 2018, after the Inter-American Court of Human Rights (IACHR) advised Costa Rica to pass a law legalizing gay marriage. The next day, PREN candidate Fabricio Alvarado declared in the media that he would take the country out of the IACHR if elected. Using anti-globalization rhetoric, he insisted on national sovereignty as a central argument, the objective of his position being to prevent an international organization from forcing the Costa Rican state’s hand. Two weeks later, he was ahead in several polls, making him the “outsider” in the election. A journalist, former singer, and evangelical pastor, he was until then the only deputy of his party, whose score had never exceeded 1.35% of the vote in the presidential elections. The presence of representatives from minority parties with an openly religious agenda in the National Assembly since 1998 shows, however, the growing

Fig. 14.1 Change in electoral preferences between October 2017 and April 2018. (Source CIEP-ECP Public Opinion Survey, University of Costa Rica, April 25, 2018)

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importance of the issues raised by these parties and puts the candidate’s outsider position into perspective. According to IDESPO (2019), 52% of the Costa Rican population is Catholic, and 27% is evangelical. Compared to the rest of Central America, the growth of evangelical churches in Costa Rica has been relatively slow (Boas, 2020), but evangelical parties were formed very early in the country (in 1981 and 1995). The issue of gay marriage, morality, and values is not new either. The IACHR opinion was issued at the request of President Solís and Vice President Ana Helena Chacón, who, faced with the blocking of the project by the National Assembly and the Constitutional Court, decided to appeal to the IACHR to try to obtain approval for the legalization of gay marriage. Similarly, the subject of legalizing abortion in cases of danger to the health of the mother, but also contraception, in vitro fertilization, sex education in schools, and women’s rights in general, provoke recurrent controversy in the country and have been discussed several times in the National Assembly. However, although they were indeed on the agenda and had been mentioned from time to time during the campaign, these topics had only been addressed by the candidates in a very cautious manner up to that point, and they were not major campaign issues until January 9, 2018. The different studies that have appeared on the 2018 elections in Costa Rica therefore agree in considering the announcement of the IACHR as an external variable causing a shift in the campaign, which takes a completely different turn from that moment on. A real “media event” (Siles, 2020), the announcement of the IACHR led to a crystallization of the candidates’ and public opinion’s positions on the issue. Carlos Alvarado, who until then had struggled to give a coherent image of his campaign, managed to position himself at the opposite extreme of the evangelical candidate, capitalizing on the pro-gay marriage line of the PAC, but also on his own personal positions on this subject. The results observed in the polls were confirmed by those of the first round of the election, in which Fabricio Alvarado won with 24.1% of the votes, followed by Carlos Alvarado with 21.66%. The slap was especially bitter for the PLN (18.62%), excluded from the presidential race. It also marks a historic moment, because two parties created in the 2000s were finalists. It was already a clear shift from the logic of the traditional two-party system. The campaign of the second round lead to a very intense polarization, always around religious issues. While Fabricio Alvarado tried to nuance

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his positions to attract a wider electorate, Carlos Alvarado adopted a campaign strategy in the colours of the national flag, centred on saving the values and institutions of the country (with the slogan “It’s for Costa Rica”). A shift to an option located at one of the extremes of the political spectrum was thus presented as a danger to the foundations of the Costa Rican Republic and democracy. This positioning was reinforced by a strong mobilization of civil society groups, which are organizing against Fabricio Alvarado—but not necessarily for Carlos Alvarado –, especially through social networks (the Facebook group of the Coalición Costa Rica reached more than 300,000 members in a few weeks, which is a very high number in a country of 5 million inhabitants). An important campaign of call to the vote was set up. In a rare occurrence in Costa Rica, the campaign for the second round, as well as the first round, was also characterized by repeated attacks on the Supreme Electoral Tribunal, not only by the pro-Fabricio Alvarado camp, but also by other parties (such as the PIN), who accused it of bias in favour of the PAC and of promoting electoral fraud. Created in 1949, this autonomous public institution responsible for organizing elections is one of the pillars of the Costa Rican political system, and its legitimacy is traditionally undisputed in the country. Very quickly after the announcement of the results of the second round by the TSE, accusations of fraud were made by supporters of PREN. These attacks on the TSE were also perceived by the population as an attack on the foundations of democracy. But above all, the period between the two elections led to alliances and partisan recompositions. Carlos Alvarado called for a union against the extremes. This strategy was only partially successful, as the PLN refused to give clear voting instructions. Some of the party’s leaders met with the evangelical candidate. Other minority parties also joined the PREN. However, an alliance was formalized between Rodolfo Piza, the PUSC candidate, and Carlos Alvarado on March 8, 2018, who agreed to form a government of “national unity” with a common agenda. The vote carryover, measured by CIEP after the second round, clearly shows that this alliance with the PUSC largely benefited Carlos Alvarado, with 83% of those interviewed who had voted for the PUSC in the first round voting for the PAC in the second round. The call to block the road to the extremes also led Frente Amplio voters to choose the PAC (94%, according to the CIEP). It is thus possible to argue that the main reason

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why the alternation did not occur in Costa Rica in 2018 was because of the alliances made by the PAC in the period between the two rounds, the terms of which paradoxically opened the door to a form of partial alternation.

14.2 A Partial Renewal of the Political Staff, or the Implementation of a Partial Alternation? 14.2.1

Renewal of the Legislative and Executive Branches of Government

Although the PAC was reappointed as head of the executive branch, a form of alternation occurred in the National Assembly, which was also elected on February 4, 2018. Despite its defeat in the second round a month later, the evangelical PREN became the second largest force in the National Assembly, with 14 seats (out of 57), not far from the PLN, which obtained 17 seats. Although PLN came out on top, this was also a failure for the party, whose numbers in the Assembly have been halved in less than a decade. For its part, the PAC, which came third (10 seats), found itself in a particularly difficult position, especially since the PUSC had a good score (9 seats). The arrival of the PREN members of congress represents an upheaval for the National Assembly, because their profiles were atypical: several were evangelical pastors, but there were also psychologists and social workers. Almost all of them had little or no political experience, which subsequently lead to a series of changes, as well as to blunders or the encroachment of the Assembly on the perimeters of other powers or other public institutions. The National Assembly was considerably rejuvenated in this election, with many of the elected representatives (from all parties) being less than 40 years old on election day. To govern, President Carlos Alvarado was forced to make alliances and important compromises, which were clearly visible in his first government. The alternation occurred in the different cabinets of the executive branch, both at the level of ministers and vice-ministers, and in the autonomous public institutions and public banks, which are central to policy making in Costa Rica. As part of his “unity government” and because of the alliance with the PUSC between the two rounds of voting, the President appointed six ministers (out of 20) from that party, on the assumption that this would enable him to win a majority in the Assembly. More

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important than the number of ministers is the weight of the ministries given to the PUSC: former presidential candidate Rodolfo Piza became Minister of the Presidency, while other important figures from the party took over the ministries of Public Administration, Public Works and Transport, and Environment and Energy. Two political figures associated with the PUSC, whose entrepreneurial and private sector careers are well known, André Garnier and Edna Camacho, were appointed to head two ministries, the Ministry of coordination with the private sector and the Ministry of coordination with the economic sector. This represented a clear change from the PAC’s economic and social agenda of the 2014– 2018 period, as the liberal orientation of the PUSC became very present and was felt in the tone that the different reforms took throughout Carlos Alvarado’s term, such as on tax reform. Even though the PAC had already included members of other parties in the government of Solís, this was a change because the government opened to social sectors and interest groups previously absent from PAC governments, such as the UCCAEP (Union of Chambers and Associations of the Private Enterprise Sector) and the private bank. Other ministries were also given to members of other parties, such as the Ministry of economy, industry and trade and the Ministry of foreign trade, which were headed by PLN members. The presidency of the National Institute for Women, an autonomous institution central to public policies for equality and women’s rights, was given to Patricia Mora of the far-left Frente Amplio party, in order to send a strong signal about the government’s commitment to gender policies. Finally, in a gesture that represented a break with his political “father”, Luis Guillermo Solís, and a rapprochement with the founding branch of the PAC, the new president appointed Epsy Campbell as vice president of the Republic, and Ottón Solís as head of the Central American Bank for Economic Integration. The latter position, although very important, is quite distant from the executive branch, and imposed a right of reserve on the founder of the PAC. Nevertheless, it is possible to speak of the entry of the traditional branch of the PAC into the government, which had been very opposed to the previous government and had been kept out of the executive branch. Although this “unity government” lasted only one year, and Carlos Alvarado’s cabinet of ministers was one of the most unstable in Costa Rican history, it is possible to speak of an alternation from the government of Solís. The new president renewed almost all the political staff in the executive branch, including party loyalists and employees who had worked

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in the previous government. This caused him many difficulties, on the one hand because there is a certain amount of resentment among those ousted, who regret the turn away from the social policies of the previous Solís government,5 and on the other because the government had thus deprived itself of the only experienced workforce it really had (the PAC having only governed between 2014 and 2018). 14.2.2

Weakened and Fragmented Parties

If we return to the National Assembly, it is important to note that the behaviour of the representatives between 2018 and 2021 does not allow us to speak of an alternation that would have led one party to dominate over the others. Indeed, first, part of the evangelical PREN splits from January 2019, leading to the creation of a new party named “New Republic”, headed by former candidate Fabricio Alvarado. The parliamentary group was thus divided in two, as seven deputies claimed to be from this new party. Similarly, some of the representatives who represented other parties declared themselves independent between 2018 and 2020, for different reasons, reinforcing the fragmentation of the Assembly. However, the importance of PREN in the legislative machinery was undeniable: the party was represented in all four offices of the National Assembly. The two religious parties also had a strong presence in debates, and alliances with their representatives were often essential to get bills approved. However, it is not possible to say that these parties set the agenda in the Assembly, as their role was more akin to being the linchpins of the decisions made by the other parties. The alliances of PREN members have also varied according to the issues at stake, with Eduardo Cruickshank, then president of the Assembly not hesitating to publicly support the government’s action during the Covid crisis in 2020–2021. But the alignment that occurred between members of the evangelical parties, the unions, the far-left party, and a certain amount of PLN and PUSC representatives, during the important strike of 2018–2019 against the Law of strengthening public finances, also highlights the lack of internal coherence of the parties, and to what extent their boundaries became variable depending on the issues.

5 Interview with a former vice-minister of the government of Luis Guillermo Solís, April 2021.

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Nor does the context allowed the PUSC or the PLN to have a permanent advantage in the Assembly. The alliance at the executive level between the PAC and the PUSC did not translate into systematic support by the latter for PAC projects in the Assembly, and the agreement between the two parties was short-lived. The PUSC managed to impose a certain direction on many pieces of legislation, but its action, both at the executive and legislative levels, consisted mainly of avoiding some of the PAC’s projects, rather than being a real force of proposal. This was illustrated by the tax reform project, which was less extensive than the government had planned (Table 14.3). The results of the February 2020 municipal elections also do not indicate that one political trend was winning out over the others. Although the PLN won a majority of mayoralties, its numbers have been in sharp decline for the past twenty years. Much more surprisingly, the PREN and the PNR, which had a stronger local base and proposed candidates in 79 and 75 municipalities respectively (out of 82), did not win any of them, and were often among the lowest scorers. This shows that they have not succeeded in imposing the evangelical parties as political forces at the local level. Unsurprisingly, the results of the PAC, which does not have a strong territorial base, were weak at the municipal level. The results of the PUSC have been steadily increasing since 2006, but they were far behind the Table 14.3 Costa Rica. Number of deputies per party elected to the National Assembly (out of a total of 57) Party

2002

2006

2010

2014

2018

PLN PUSC PAC PRC FA PML PREN PASE ADC PRSC PIN PUN

17 19 14 1 – 6 – – – – – –

25 5 17 0 1 6 1 1 0 – – 1

24 5 11 1 1 9 1 4 0 – – –

18 8 13 2 9 4 1 1 1 – – –

17 9 10 0 1 0 14 0 0 1 4 –

Source Author based on data of the TSE

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Table 14.4 Costa Rica. Number of Mayors elected by party in municipal elections Party

2002

2006

2010

2016

2020

PLN PUSC PAC PNG PRSC ADC PNR PREN PIN FA PASE PRC PML Other (with local parties)

27 48 1 – – – – – – – – 1 – 4

59 11 5 – – – – – – – – – 1 3

58 9 6 – – – – – – – 2 1 2 2

50 14 7 3 1 – – – – 1 1 0 – 4

42 16 4 4 2 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 – 11

Source Author based on data of the TSE

PLN and far from what the party could have done twenty years ago. The result is that local parties tended to do well, when national parties were unable to unite at the local level. The abstention rate for these municipal elections, 62.19%, also showed the little interest of the population in this election. Thus, although the changeover was only partial, it is also difficult to speak of continuity in the Costa Rican case, as the political landscape is becoming increasingly unstable, fragmented, and unpredictable (Table 14.4).

14.3

Why Did the Presidential Alternation not Occur?

As evidenced by the exploration of each of the factors usually favouring alternation, it is not simple to explain why this one did not ultimately occur in 2018 in Costa Rica, because most of the conditions were present: an institutional system that favours competition, a partially shaken legitimacy of democracy, demobilized electoral bases of the incumbent parties, high volatility of the electorate, and a conjuncture in which were present at least two very salient events that posed important obstacles for the incumbent party, a corruption scandal and the advisory opinion of

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the IACHR on an issue that polarized public opinion. The weight of economic factors is more difficult to analyze, since the economic and social record of the government of Solís was relatively good, except for some very thorny issues such as unemployment or tax reform. Among the hypotheses proposed in this book, the only one that is not validated in the Costa Rican case is that of the state of the opposition: it was particularly fragmented, and the programmatic convergence, or rather, the very content of the programs, was thin. The most logical alternation was towards one of the two traditional parties. It is rather the scenario of alternation towards a radical party, with a candidate playing the role of an “outsider” that took shape in the first round. We have shown that if the alternation did not occur in the end, it was mainly because an alliance was established between the two rounds of the election between the PAC and the PUSC, which led to a form of partial alternation, due to the renewal of political personnel that this alliance, but also the election of representatives, implied at the level of the legislative and executive powers. However, this alliance does not fully explain the behaviour of voters, as the shift of votes from the PUSC to the PAC was not automatic and did not, on its own, allow the PAC to win the election. How can we explain that the PAC then managed to do so well in the second round, even though it started from a distance? In the next section, we explore two other explanations, by insisting first on the importance of the socioeconomic divide that runs through the territory. We continue with a reflection on the “progressive” and “conservative” content of the choice during this election, and finally we conclude that a conservative shift did occur in 2018. 14.3.1

The Territorial Divide and Its Electoral Translation

One hypothesis, developed by several works, to explain the success of the PAC, leads to explore the territorial variable. Indeed, if the PAC wins the elections in 2018, it is mainly because it manages to capture the electorate of strategic cantons, mainly located in the Central Valley, which have a better level of socio-economic development, a high population density, and a high level of voter turnout (Cascante, Gómez Campos, Camacho Sánchez, 2020: 55). Thus, although PREN managed to win in more territories than the PAC (PREN came first in 46% of the cantons in the first round), these represent a much smaller mass of voters, and the abstention rate is much higher. The electoral geography of the 2018 election clearly

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highlights an important divide between the electoral behaviour of the central (urban) territories and those of the periphery (coastal and border regions). This seems at first glance to be consistent with the expression of the religious vote, as it is in the border and coastal territories that the religious parties have obtained their best scores since 2014.6 However, the comparison of the mapping of the electoral results of the 2014 and 2018 elections also leads to qualify the importance of religious parties. The PAC also won the 2014 election thanks to the support of voters in the cantons of the Greater Metropolitan Area, with only 44% of the cantons in the national territory, while it was largely overtaken by other parties in the border or coastal territories. On the other hand, these were won in the first round by the PLN (which won 53% of the cantons), and by the far-left FA and far-right ML parties. In this sense, the comparison of the two electoral maps of 2014 and 2018 allows us to draw several conclusions: first, the PAC had not managed in four years to increase its electoral base, it remained an “urban” party, with little territorial anchorage at the national and rural levels. Second, the coastal and border areas are much more volatile and tend to vote for the extremes of the Costa Rican political spectrum, but these seem to be replaceable. Some cantons won by the far left in 2014 voted overwhelmingly for the evangelical party in 2018 in the provinces of Limón, Puntarenas, and Guanacaste. Finally, these results above all demonstrate once again the weakening of the PLN at the national level, as both the FA and ML in 2014, and PREN in 2018, win cantons that were previously held by the PLN. If the alternation almost happened, it was mainly because the PLN was displaced by other parties (Fig. 14.3). The centre/periphery divide corresponds to a socio-economic divide, as the poorest cantons in the country that had voted mostly for the FA, ML, or PLN in 2014, largely voted for PREN in 2018. This phenomenon occurred even in the poorest territories of the Central Valley, where the PAC almost systematically scores lower than the parties of the extremes in the first round. Among these are municipalities with more than 100,000 voters, which weigh very heavily in the result. The PAC benefited from the transfer of votes from other parties in the second round in these municipalities and managed to recover most of them. In this sense, Cascante, Gómez Camacho and Sánchez (2020: 65) conclude

6 See Fig. 14.2 on line (OPALC’s website).

Fig. 14.2 Map and cartogram (by amount of voters) of the cantons won by each party in the first round of the 2018 presidential election. (2018) (Source Estado de la Nación Program)

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Fig. 14.3 Map and cartogram (by quantity of voters) of the cantons won by each party in the first round of the 2014 presidential election (Source Estado de la Nación Program, 2014)

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Table 14.5 Voting behavior of strategic municipalities with over 100,000 voters (29% of the electorate) in both rounds of the 2018 election Party

1st Round

2nd Round

PREN PAC PLN PUSC Province of San José San José 27% Desamparados 27% Pérez Zeledon 29% Province of Alajuela Alajuela 27% San Carlos 34% Province of Cartago Cartago 12%

Abstention

PREN

PAC

Abstention

22% 22% 16%

18% 18% 16%

17% 14% 22%

33.43% 31.78% 35.04%

40.44% 59.56% 41.18% 58.82% 45.72% 54.28%

32.96% 31.78% 36%

22% 16%

18% 17%

15% 14%

32.85% 31.54%

39.63% 60.37% 51.1% 48.9%

31.21% 32.64%

28%

21%

16%

25.32%

21.39% 78.61%

23.36%

Source Author based on data of the TSE

that, contrary to what the literature on the strength of “national parties” (Caramani, 2004; Jones and Mainwaring, 2003) tends to show, it is not always parties with strong national coverage (such as the PLN) that win elections. In the Costa Rican case, the fragmentation of support favours parties that specialize in territories with the largest number of voters and the lowest abstention rate. Nevertheless, the results show a significant social and economic divide, which does not fit the ideological divisions of the parties. Some of the poorest territories (such as the cantons of Limón) preferred to vote for the evangelical party, whose orientation towards the market economy was stronger, rather than for the centre-left and far-left parties, which are supposed to have a much stronger social orientation (Table 14.5). The analysis of the electoral map finally leads to relativizing the weight of the religious variable, insofar as some of the most Catholic municipalities in the country voted very largely for the PAC, and this from the first round. These results are certainly indicative of the tensions between Catholics and Evangelicals, whose relations fluctuate and are closer to those of allies-rivals, depending on the political issues at stake, but they do not allow us to draw any clear-cut conclusions about the weight of religion on electoral behaviour. Also, the most “progressive” groups in the educated urban municipalities (in favor of same-sex marriage) and the most “conservative” in the religious municipalities of Cartago gave victory to Carlos Alvarado.

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14.3.2

Preserving Institutions, or the Conservative Turn

“Costa Ricans are, by chance, like mules at night on bad roads, who seem to feel the precipices. It is instinct that saves them. Wary, they don’t rush; calculating, they gently measure the possibilities; discreet and stubborn, they know the way to their home. The Costa Ricans gradually ruminate on things, adopting what suits them and discarding what they do not understand very well, where they feel the danger”. This excerpt, attributed to former president Ricardo Jiménez, one of the country’s most important political figures before World War II, circulated widely on Costa Rican social medias in the aftermath of the 2018 presidential runoff, proposing a simple interpretation of the electoral result: by not electing the candidate of the Evangelical Party, Costa Ricans would have avoided the precipice of the unknown and the extremes of the political spectrum. The constant mention of Ricardo Jiménez by politicians of all stripes is analyzed by historian Manuel Solís Avendaño (2008: XV) in his work on Costa Rican political culture since the 1940s: symbol of the “liberal patriarch”, wise grandfather of Costa Rican history, true statesman, this former president embodies a past that is supposed to provide Costa Ricans with the certainty of having the necessary tools to face an uncertain future. Based on a sociohistorical analysis, Solís Avendaño also shows how a discourse is imposed in the different public arenas from the 2000s onwards that insists on the economic, political, and social “stagnation” of Costa Rica. Imbued with a form of nostalgia for a “glorious” past, this discourse on the country’s stagnation is carried by different types of actors from across the political spectrum, who mobilize sometimes diametrically opposed arguments. On the one hand, for the liberal side, well represented in the two traditional parties, Costa Rica is stagnating because it is opening up too slowly and insufficiently to the international market and has a public sector that is too large and rigid. On the other hand, for the more socialist faction, little represented in the National Assembly, Costa Rica’s stagnation is mainly social: insisting on the interruption of social progress over the past 20 years, as well as on the weak integration of many citizens into the political and economic system, this tendency shows a strong attachment to the public institutions established by the welfare state. This last form of criticism also highlights a paradox: the deep conviction of Costa Ricans that they live in a “real” democracy and enjoy a privileged position in the region, despite the weakness of a citizenry that

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participates little in political life and large sections of which are excluded from decision-making, and the attraction of the patriarchal and vertical exercise of power, with its potentially authoritarian overtones, which puts society at risk of the entry of undemocratic values. Although this type of debate is found in other countries of the world, in Costa Rica it takes the form of an arduous negotiation with the legacy of the political model built in the 1940s by the founding “fathers” of the Republic, some of whose elements are “to be preserved” and others are to be transformed in order to be able to “move forward”. To what extent is political change necessary to “preserve” the gains of the past? The 2018 elections addressed this issue, as the articulation of these different discourses questioned the possibilities of “political change” and the extent of “alternation” in Costa Rica, as well as its “conservative” or “progressive” content. During this election, there were two camps defending, on the one hand, the preservation of traditional values enshrined in the 1948 Constitution (according to Article 75 of the Constitution, Costa Rica is a confessional state), and on the other hand, the preservation of public institutions (the defence of the TSE of 1949) and democratic values of inclusion of all inhabitants (undermined by the proposed refusal to legalize homosexual marriage) and of peace (endangered by the polarization of the speeches). Between the two, the legacy of bipartisanship, and the role of the party of the founder of the Republic, the PLN, was put on the balance. In this sense, the 2018 election is paradoxically a sign of a conservative turn in Costa Rica: voters, but especially parties, are choosing to “preserve” the existing model and “protect” their institutions, electoral, but also partisan and religious. The electoral campaign was characterized by virulent attacks on evangelical groups, not only for the extremism of their positions, but also in opposition to Catholicism, which is the majority in the population. According to CIEP (2016), for over 90% of the population, religion is important. A majority of the population wants the state to remain confessional and Catholic. Even if same-sex marriage was finally legalized in 2020, the women’s rights agenda is moving forward very slowly in the country. From an institutional point of view, the fragmentation of the National Assembly and the government’s need to constantly compromise with parties prevent it from carrying out its reforms to the end, reinforcing the hypothesis of the country’s “stagnation” and “immobility”. Finally, the interpretation of the 2018 election as that of a “republican victory over religious fundamentalism” prevents the recognition of the country’s economic and social fractures, with the

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vote for PREN reflecting above all the frustration of social groups that do not benefit from the city’s economic successes and feel left out of a process of modernization and opening of the country to globalization that is too rapid.

14.4

Conclusion

The results of the 2022 presidential election confirm the trends mentioned in this chapter. This time, a complete alternation seems to have taken place, with the victory of Rodrigo Chaves, head of a recently created party (2018), the Social Democratic Progress Party (PPSD). Adopting a populist style, this candidate, who was briefly Minister of Public Administration in the government of President Alvarado, paradoxically acts as an outsider, campaigning with an anti-system program against the immobility of traditional parties, including the PAC. The PPSD also became the second force in the National Assembly, with 10 representatives with little experience in politics and with very diverse profiles (journalists, business leaders, engineers). Caught in its alliances, having failed to respond clearly to the social demands expressed by the above-mentioned cleavage, in a difficult context of management of the Covid-19 crisis, the PAC suffered a hard defeat, obtaining no seat and only 0.66% of the votes in the presidential elections. But even though the PLN remained the leading force in the National Assembly, it was another bitter failure for this party, whose presidential candidate, former president and son of the founder of the Republican model, José María Figueres Olsen, was defeated in the second round by a newcomer with no electoral machine. With almost 15% of the vote and seven seats, and with some of its ideas taken up by the president-elect, the conservative current led by Fabricio Alvarado has become a permanent fixture in the political landscape. The good results of the far-left party (FA) and the new Liberal Progressive Party, with a very right-wing economic agenda, confirm the confrontation between two political projects that seek to overcome the country’s apparent “stagnation”. The electoral map of 2022 confirms once again the cleavage between the cities and the coastal and border areas. The study of the factors that did not lead to presidential alternation in the 2018 elections in Costa Rica highlight the central role of the dynamics played out between internally fragmented parties that have less national reach and correspond less to the cleavages of the population. Nevertheless, these parties remain strong enough to form alliances, implement

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winning strategies (such as campaigning in territories with high population and turnout) and make moves that help steer the direction of elections or government actions in the short term. The result of these partisan dynamics is the establishment of a form of partial alternation in the country between 2018 and 2022, which is unsatisfactory for all parties because it does not allow the issues of territorial, economic, and social fragmentation expressed during the election to be taken into account. In a context where citizens nevertheless have a strong attachment to democracy and strong opinions on certain political, economic, and social issues, but an increasingly weak and unstable partisan identity, polarization takes shape according to “affective” identities, not ideological ones. Citizens position themselves primarily based on the negative feelings they have against those they identify as belonging to opposing groups, and express their emotions and dislikes intensely, without feeling the need to belong to partisan structures that only partially and variably match their positions. This gives the undecided a decisive role in any election, whose behaviour is often subject to the vagaries of the campaign. Finally, the lack of deep reflection on the meaning of the “legacy of the 1940s model” and on the elements to be “preserved” to “progress” in relation to it, visible in the various failures experienced by the PLN, leads the parties to reproduce fault lines that no longer correspond to those of the population, and to the emergence of issues that are expressed in rather radical forms.

References Alfaro, R., 2020, «Identidades políticas, participación electoral e (in)decisión en 2018», in R. Alfaro et F. Alpizar (eds.), Elecciones 2018. Retrato de una democracia amenazada, San José: CONARE–PEN, 87–108. Alfaro, R. et Alpizar, F., 2020, Elecciones 2018. Retrato de una democracia amenazada, San José: CONARE–PEN. Boas, T.C., 2020, The electoral representation of Evangelicals in Latin America, in Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Politics. Caramani, D. 2004, The nationalization of politics. The formation of national electorates and party systems in Western Europe, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Cascante, M-J., Gómez Campos, S., Camacho Sánchez, S., «Perspectivas territoriales de la competencia partidista», in R. Alfaro et F. Alpizar (eds.), Elecciones 2018. Retrato de una democracia amenazada, San José: CONARE–PEN, 48–66

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Centro de Investigación y de Estudios Políticos (2014–2018), Encuesta de opinión política, CIEP, Escuela de Ciencias Políticas, San José: UCR: https:// ciep.ucr.ac.cr/estudios-de-opinion/ IDESPO, 2019, Percepción de la población costarricense sobre valores y prácticas religiosas, UNA. Iyengar, S., Sood, G. et Lelkes, Y., 2012, «Affect, not ideology. A social identity perspective on polarization», Public Opinion Quarterly, Vo 76, No 3, 405– 431. Jones, M., Mainwaring, S., 2003, «The nationalization of parties and party systems: an empirical measure and application to the Americas», Party Politics, Vol 9 No 2: 139–166 Pineda, A, 2019, Religión, conservadurismo y progresismo en las elecciones del 2018: de las desigualdades socioexistenciales a las diferencias políticas y morales, in M. Rojas y I. Treminio (Eds.), Tiempos de travesía: Análisis de las elecciones del 2018 en Costa Rica, FLACSO, 147–173. Programa Estado de la Nación, 2018, 2017, 2016, 2015 et 2014 Informe Estado de la Nación, San José: PEN CONARE. Rodríguez, F., Herrero Acosta F., Chacón, W., 2019, Anatomía de una fractura. Desintegración social y elecciones del 2018 en Costa Rica, Flacso, Konrad Adenauer Stiftung. Rojas, M., Treminio, I. (Eds.), 2019, Tiempos de travesía: Análisis de las elecciones del 2018 en Costa Rica, San José: FLACSO. Siles, I. (Ed.), 2020, Democracia en digital: Facebook, comunicación y política en Costa Rica, San José, Costa Rica: CICOM–UCR. Solís Avendaño, M., 2008, La institucionalidad ajena. Los años cuarenta y el fin de siglo, San José, Costa Rica: Editorial UCR. Urcuyo, Constantino, 2015, «De la alegría a la decepción?», Revista de derecho electoral, No 20, 179–205

PART V

Electoral Authoritarianism

CHAPTER 15

The Sandinista Order: Changes in Voting Procedures and Authoritarianism in Nicaragua Maya Collombon

It may seem surprising to talk about Nicaragua in a book on alternations in Latin America, when the country has been governed by the same man (and party) since 2007: Daniel Ortega, a major figure of early 2000s Latin America’s turn to the left, a former revolutionary, anti-imperialist and willingly populist. However, in a somewhat paradoxical way, Nicaragua under Ortega’s last presidencies is a rather good illustration of how conservative values and norms, or maybe even more a conservation order, tend to be imposed within regional executives and are mobilized to cover and

M. Collombon (B) Center of Mexican and Central American Studies (CEMCA), Mexico City, Mexico e-mail: [email protected]

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023, corrected publication 2023 O. Dabène (ed.), Latin America’s Pendular Politics, Studies of the Americas, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-26761-1_15

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legitimize authoritarian practices. Since its return to power, the FSLN consolidate its power not fighting against imperialism or even against poverty, but rather defending Christian values (above all the fight against abortion), family and the return of an order, certainly specific to Ortega’s conceptions. Contemporary Nicaragua illustrates a dynamic of authoritarian turn (Collombon and Mathieu 2021), rather than a shift to the left. The political change here is internal, not the result of an electoral alternation (Przeworski 2015) but occurs while the same party is in power and wins all the elections of the period. Indeed, the political change here occurs at the very heart of Sandinism: it makes it evolve from a revolutionary posture (in the 1980s, the FSLN was then a space of internal struggles—relatively open—to define the course of the revolutionary process) to a populist left-wing posture (from 2007 to 2014, the FSLN’s “orteguista” line imposed itself on the others, meanwhile Nicaraguan institutions politicisation was accelerated), and finally led to an authoritarian conception of power in which a Sandinista political order was imposed (since the Constitution reform in 2014), exclusive of any other political positions, and in which the values of conservation of a Sandinista system, called “Christian, socialist and in solidarity”, were affirmed. If it does not move Sandinism from the left to the right, this internal evolution profoundly transforms it into an instrument—clearly no longer of social transformation—of preservation of a power concentrated in the hands of a small circle of people, close to Ortega’s clan. This evolution, which could be compared to that of other revolutionary parties that have progressively become institutionalized—like the Mexican PRI— and/or have opted for more conservative positions, is characterized in the case of Nicaragua by its closure: the evolution of the Sandinista party can be resumed in the accentuation of its authoritarian dimension and its frequent and widespread use of political violence to govern. In other words, it is a political dynamic that tends to modify the nature of the regime, as it moves from a democracy that is certainly young and fragile, but nevertheless built on institutions and procedures that promote it, to an authoritarian situation in which elections are no more than the facade—hardly preserved—, of a regime that governs through fear and discipline. This chapter aims to trace some elements of this evolution that has gradually moved Nicaragua from a democratic to an authoritarian regime, through Sandinism evolving from revolutionary to authoritarian, using electoral procedures as a place to observe the practices of government.

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15.1 Electoral Procedures to Guarantee Nicaragua’s Young Democracy (1990–2006) The 1990 presidential elections in Nicaragua were historic: the Sandinista government, which came to power after the fall of the dictator Somoza on 19 July 1979, stepped down to make way to Violetta Chamorro, the candidate of the Unión Nacional de Oposición (UNO). This election also signified Nicaragua’s entry into electoral democracy and its procedures. Although 1990 remains a reference year for many analysts who continue to consider it as the “most democratic1 ” election the country has ever seen. A detached look at the history of the transformations of the voting act shows that the instrumentation of the vote in Nicaragua is not stabilized—having not achieved its “character of objectivity2 ” (Garrigou 1993)—and that the country’s democratic institutions (and voting procedures) are fragile enough to be easily usurped. Indeed, the complex technologies of universal suffrage change slightly from one election to the next (types of ballots, polling booths, counting methods, observation methods, etc.) and make it difficult to establish a legitimate conception of the political order based exclusively on verbal ideological confrontation, especially as cases of electoral violence remain common.3 Even if the voting act as such has not been called into question until 2016 (shown by the high rates of electoral participation), technical fluctuations have slowed down the “definitive” learning of universal suffrage and made precarious the “double obligation” of expressing one’s political preferences only through the voting act by choosing between the terms of the political offer. From 2007, when it returned to power, the FSLN embedded electoral procedures in a multitude of other procedures, practices, and political institutions that gradually consolidated the hegemony of Sandinism in the country, following the example of the Consejo Supremo Electoral (CSE). A particular focus on the CSE can help to better understand these developments in Nicaragua.

1 Interview with Shelley McConnell, American political scientist sent as OAS expert to

observe the 2011 presidential elections, Managua, October 2011. 2 By “caracter of objectivity” (caractère d’objectivité in french), Garrigou (1993) means the result of an historical evolution and a legitimacy process where all the political actors as the voters considers the electoral procedures as rather stabilized and acceptable. 3 European Union Electoral Observation Mission, Final Report. General Elections and PARLACEN 2011, November 2011.

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15.1.1

The Consejo Supremo Electoral, an Electoral Institution Short History

Nicaragua became an independent Republic in 1854, after separating from the United Provinces of Central America, of which it had been a part since 1821.4 Electoral laws and procedures evolved in four main stages: from independence to 1893, voting was based on censal; from 1893 to the 1980s, the various changes in electoral procedures reinforced the two-party system (conservatives versus liberals); during the 1980s, a new electoral system was put in place which lasted for some twenty years and was organized around an electoral body, the Supreme Electoral Council; finally, the 2000s brought about a new transformation of procedures starting with the reform of the electoral law in 2000, and then of the voting procedures during 2011 general elections. After Somoza’s dynastic dictatorship fall in 1979, the government emerging from the Sandinista Revolution began an electoral law reform process. It annulled the 1974 Somozist Constitution and its electoral law and promulgated a Basic Statute in 1979 that gave rise to the 1983 Political Parties Law and the 1984 Electoral Law. Both have as their legal principle political pluralism defence. The 1984 Electoral Law gave birth to the Consejo Supremo Electoral (CSE), which replaced the 1936 electoral body as the fourth power. The same year, under US pressure, the Sandinista government organized general elections supposed to oppose Daniel Ortega and Arturo Cruz. After Cruz boycott, denouncing nontransparent elections and opposition intimidation, the FSLN won the presidential elections with a large margin. With the National Assembly majority, the Sandinista government put in place the 1987 National Constitution, still in force, and the 1988 Electoral Law, which governed the elections from 1990 to 2000. The 1990 elections were organized by the Consejo Supremo Electoral (CSE), which had been established in the 1984 election and had achieved a significant degree of autonomy in subsequent elections. Following the Esquipulas II Peace Accords,5 the Sandinista government committed itself

4 The first electoral laws and the first elections to be held in Nicaragua took place in 1821 when it was part of the United Provinces of Central America. 5 The Esquipulas II peace agreement was signed on 7 August 1987 in Guatemala City by five Central American presidents. With this agreement, the presidents committed themselves to end the civil wars in Guatemala, Salvador, and Nicaragua.

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to free and competitive elections. As this election attracted international attention, the Consejo Supremo Electoral was entrusted with a closely watched task: to demonstrate publicly that the Sandinistas were ready to face a real political competition and, to do so, to implement a transparent democratic election system. The voting material procedures introduced at that time were to continue for the next sixteen years: written procedures, electoral cards that were used as identity cards, a new division of voting districts, single ballots on which the voter ticked his or her choice, ballot boxes, and polling booths, etc. The 1990 election inaugurated the Nicaraguan democratic era. From 1990 to 2006, there were three liberal presidencies. All of them were based on the same procedures put in place by the CSE in 1990. 15.1.2

Before and After “the Pact”, from Electoral Reform to the Transformation of the Voting System

The year 2000 marks a new break in the history of Nicaraguan electoral procedures. In 1999 was signed “El Pacto” (the Pact) between Arnoldo Aleman’s Liberal Constitutionalist Party6 (PLC) and Daniel Ortega’s FSLN, which led the following year to the Constitution and Electoral Law (Law 331) reforms. Through this pact, the two main political parties shared out the main national administration appointments, including one of Nicaragua’s political space central institutions, the Consejo Supremo Electoral. Indeed, this institution has been gradually strengthened to become the executive right arm, facing a legislative branch highly dependent on the executive and a very weakened judicial branch. The CSE combines all the electoral functions at national, departmental, and municipal level. It alone holds the electoral authority: responsibility for registering voters on the electoral roll, for defining electoral districts and polling stations, the Juntas receptoras de votos (JRV), drawing up electoral rolls, distributing responsibilities within the polling stations, counting votes, etc. The CSE is then headed by a president and 9 magistrates appointed jointly by the National Assembly and the executive. Through the Pact, the two parties managed to appoint all CSE’s magistrates, resulting clearly affiliated. As early as 2000, Ortega had managed 6 Arnoldo Aleman was president from 1996 to 2001. He is the leader of the Liberal Constitutional Party (PLC), the main right-wing party in the 1990s and 2000s.

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to have one of his relatives, Roberto Rivas,7 appointed as CSE president. Since then, Rivas has been able to marginalize the PLC judges, gradually replaced by FSLN members. While in 1990 the CSE was run by relatively independent magistrates, its control became increasingly politicized during the liberal period, which was significantly reinforced following the Pact. In addition, the control of the CSE allowed the Pact signatories to pass in 2000 a new electoral law that largely modified the electoral game. According to this law, from the 2006 general elections onwards, the first party to obtain more than 35% of the votes, with a 5% lead over its first competitor, wins the presidential elections in the first round.8 The law also modifies the rules for financing political parties (by obliging parties to make an advance on their expenses) and for the candidacies (by multiplying acceptance criteria’s). All these reforms aim at strengthening the two-party system.9 Finally, the CSE was behind the authorization given by its magistrates and those of the Supreme Court of Justice to Daniel Ortega so that he could run in the 2011 presidential elections despite the double constitutional ban. A final set of electoral procedures changes occur in the 2011 elections, although these changes are less significant than those of 2000, they are more visible for many voters: changes in voter cards or the organization of the election within the polling stations produce strong, sometimes violent, reactions among Nicaraguan voters. Since 2007, the CSE has been the institution through which changes to the rules of the electoral game become possible, and thanks to which the FSLN was able to strengthen itself and win the 2006 elections. The Sandinista party, once again in control, had as its subsequent strategy the control of institutions, first the CSE, then the Supreme Council of Justice, and finally all other State administrations.

7 Roberto Rivas is CSE president from 2000 to 2018. He is accused by the opposition of being a notorious Sandinista, very close to the Ortega clan. He is accused of corruption, unlawful enrichment, and influence peddling, and has been sanctioned by the US Congress under the Magnistky Act, which provides for the banning of entry into the United States and the freezing of assets of any foreigner accused of serious human rights violations. 8 Consejo Supremo Electoral, Ley electoral, Managua, 2000. 9 The 2000 reform increased the number of requirements for the formation of new

political parties.

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15.2 Voting Systems and Sandinista Electoral Authoritarianism (2007–2018) If electoral changes are at the centre of Sandinista transformation, it is a set of long-term sectorial reconfigurations that allowed the FSLN to assert its hegemony during the decade 2007–2017,10 and then of the innermost circle of power since 2018. Among the sectors that had closely accompany these transformations, it is worth highlighting the support of the most conservative sector of the Catholic Church, embodied in the figure of Cardinal Ovando y Bravo, a former opponent of Ortega during the revolutionary period who became the religious guarantor of Sandinista government between 2007 and 2018. Thus, the voting arrangements changes occurred when the FSLN had regained support among the country most conservative sectors: in addition to Catholic Church, the army, and the police, most of the business elite who benefited from the country’s good economic health. This chapter does not intend to describe all sectoral reconfigurations, but rather emphasize the role played by the elections in this dynamic. After the 2006 elections, the FSLN’s victory did not imply total control neither of the National Assembly or the FSLN, still divided and heterogeneous. Daniel Ortega’s first post-electoral task was to regain control of his party and turn it into a disciplined and orderly governing party. To do this, the Consejos de poder ciudadano (CPC),11 under the leadership of his wife Rosario Murillo, played a key role in building party loyalty through the distribution of clientelistic social aid (with financial support of Venezuela).12 During the first term (2007–2011), in a country severely constrained by endemic poverty, these social policies and the Ortega government’s proclamations for greater social justice were strong enough to significantly expand the FSLN’s membership and help it win the 2011 presidential elections. However, an analysis of the 2011 election’s transformations of voting mechanisms also shows that it already

10 Cardinal Ovando y Bravo died in June 2018, when Nicaragua was experiencing a

serious political crisis. In the previous decade, he had largely supported his former enemies. 11 The Consejos de Poder Ciudadano (CPCs) are the FSLN’s local structures. Their development is very important from 2007 onwards and is done under Rosario Murillo’s close control. 12 Sandinista Nicaragua, especially during its first term (2007–2011), benefited greatly from Hugo Chávez and his petrodollars support.

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implies a control of the electoral process by a Sandinista-controlled CSE. From then on, the 2011 election appears to be a first step in an electoral authoritarianism under construction, made more evident by the constitutional reform of 2014 and the presidential elections of 2016. Thus, from a Sandinista electoral hegemony of the 2000s, Nicaragua moves in the 2010s to a Sandinista political order, tightly controlled by the “centre”, where elections, institutions, anti-poverty discourse, mixed with conservative Catholic values, concur to consolidate Ortega’s power. 15.2.1

Transforming Voting Arrangements to Consolidate a “Sandinista State”: A Review of the 2011 Presidential Election

The Pact, the 2000 Electoral Law reform and the CSE politicization have produced a high degree of polarisation on electoral procedures issues, being more evident during the 2011 presidential election. During the electoral campaign, the opposition denounced the “unconstitutional” procedure allowing the president to run. Indeed, Daniel Ortega was running for a second consecutive term, even though the Constitution authorizes a maximum of two terms, with a mandatory interval of at least one term. For this election, the opposition reorganized itself around their opposition to Ortega. As a result, the new PLI-UNE alliance unites a heterogeneous group of right-wing parties, former contras,13 former Sandinistas and Movimiento de renovación Sandinista (MRS)14 supporters. Each of the three main political alliances in opposition to the FSLN presented a candidate at the general elections: the Nicaraguan Liberal Alliance (ALN) allowed the return to politics of the deposed president, Arnoldo Aleman, and his party, the PLC; the Alliance for the Republic (APRE) presented a newcomer to the national political scene, Roger Guevara Mena15 ; and the Alliance of the Independent Liberal

13 The Contras are the counterrevolutionaries who opposed the Sandinista government during the 1980s civil war. 14 The Movimiento de Renovacion Sandinista (MRS) is a left-wing political party that emerged from a FSLN split in 1995. It was founded by major historical figures of the revolutionary period, such as former vice president (and writer) Sergio Ramirez and commander Dora Maria Tellez. 15 Roger Guevara is running with the popular Nicaraguan evangelist leader Elizabeth Rojas as his vice president.

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Party (PLI-UNE) presented the candidacy of Fabio Gadea Mantilla.16 Apart from the PLC, which was in power from 1996 to 2006, the other two formations, new in their 2011 configuration, barely conceal their very weak institutionalization. However, it is the PLI-UNE alliance that emerged during the campaign as the main FSLN opponent. The 2011 election also distinguished from previous elections by the conflict over electoral procedures, which had undergone major changes: the voting centres included a larger number of polling stations, the constituencies changed, the counting was computerized and centralized in the capital, etc. All these changes produced a high degree of tension between the CSE and the opposition parties, denouncing last-minute changes that favoured the FSLN at all levels. The electoral campaign was thus marked by opposition calls for fraud. The national press published daily on voting procedures “obstacles”, systematically taking the 1990 election as a reference. A real “chronicle of a fraud announced” unfolded, at the centre of which the CSE, the main instigator of the controversial reforms, was denounced.17 During the campaign, the opposition has in fact rushed into the legal register, its main mobilization device in the face of an omnipresent government party playing the register of mass mobilization (Collombon 2016). Extremely visible in the physical space, the FSLN plays with the confusion of genres between party and state. The various state administrations are gradually painted in the party’s colours, which then merge with the state’s colours: fuchsia pink dominates, accompanied by a range of complementary rainbow colours (yellow, cobalt blue). Posters, leaflets, and other instruments of the Sandinista campaign blend in with the state administration visibility, whose colours and spatial omnipresence it shares. The red and black flags of historical Sandinism are in turn affixed to the fronts of activists’ houses, to the fronts of cars, in front of administration offices… The opposition primarily denounces the opacity of the procedural changes, which are not presented as reforms but as innovations that facilitate voting. At the centre of the conflict is the electoral card: since 1990 it has been issued by the CSE based on birth certificate presentation. However, for this election, the CSE, which declares itself incapable of

16 The presidential candidate, Fabio Gadea Mantilla, is a former Contra leader, conservative. 17 Etica y Transparencia, Informe final 2011, Managua, Nicaragua.

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producing and distributing all the cards in time (in a country where many voters are between 16 and 25 years old and are voting for the first time), entrusts the electoral cards distribution to the CPCs, the Sandinista party’s local bodies. This partisan distribution is daily denounced by the opposition parties and the press (La Prensa, El nuevo Diario), mainly linked to the opposition, as this MRS activist recalled: Several packets containing electoral cards were found in rubbish bins or buried in the backyards of Sandinista activists. Obviously, when we look closely at the voters who did not receive their cards, guess what: they are systematically non-Sandinistas! So, in the north, you can imagine, a lot of cards have disappeared…18

In the northern departments, the multiplication of conflicts over electoral cards regularly leads to violent clashes. Throughout the electoral campaign, several demonstrations were organized and supervised by the PLI, the PLC and contra leaders. Behind these mobilisations and demands is always the same question of the electoral procedure’s politicization favouring exclusively the party in power. On the day of the election, 6 November 2011, the conflicts increased and focused once again on voting procedures issue. As an example, inside the polling station, a new scenography is proposed. For some fiscales, this new arrangement is problematic: Last time, the voting booths were put in the most discreet place for voting so that nobody could see anything. Here the CSE observers can see everything, but we are set up on tables too far away from the lists and from the ballot box to really control what is going on.19

For opposition observers, the day was punctuated by rights reminders. The monitoring function, until the 2011 elections relatively uncontroversial, was then the subject of acute political stakes. All election day long, the fiscales were promoting the legal register maintenance. In each polling station, they drew up a day list of the law various violations: by establishing and collecting “evidence”, the opposition succeeded in

18 Interview with an MRS activist, former Sandinista, and PLI-UNE alliance member. 19 Interview with César, PLI fiscal, Managua, November 2011.

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demonstrating the 2008 electoral fraud during the municipal elections.20 Thus, they carefully wrote down in a small notebook all the irregularities observed, including: the arrangement of the polling booth and the tables for the observers, the acceptance of a voter with a voter’s card cut by more than a third (a sign that the card had been renewed), voters registered in other offices… In addition, other voting modalities were considered to transgress the norm established since the 1990 election: a centre supervisor presence announced by the CSE on the election day, the absence of ballot counting before the opening of the polling stations, and the security number, predetermined and sent in the form of a stamp whereas it was previously decided on the election day by all the polling station members. In the early evening, after the polling stations closed, new tensions arose between opposition fiscales and the ballot packs buses drivers as they were to transport all the ballots to the Managua counting centre, for the first time centralized in the capital for the whole country. At the Santo Domingo voting centre, a wealthy capital district, they were instructed to transport only ballots and CSE representatives. This early evening rule reinforces fiscales discontent: We have been negotiating for more than two hours to get into the bus, we really don’t want to lose sight of the ballots. But there is nothing to do, they have orders! And by force, we would lose, there are too many of them. We will follow the bus to the counting centre with our cars, but inside the bus they will do what they want.21

During the previous election, Josefina was already a MRS fiscal, so the rights abuses checked in the 2011 election were based on her previous experience: There were less violations, we filled in legible voting forms, we got on the bus, independent national and international observers were present... This election marks a setback for Nicaraguan democracy.22

20 For many observers, the 2008 election is the first election to accumulate irregularities. The opposition considers it the first fraudulent election of the Ortega era (Martí i Puig and Close 2009). 21 Interview with Josefina, PLI fiscal, Managua, November 2011. 22 Ibidem.

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The evolutions described by the opposition fiscales between the accepted 1990 norm and the modalities of the 2011 suffrage underline that the electoral sequence is not stabilized and that it can (and will) evolve in favour of the governing party. This dynamic of heteronomisation becomes even more pronounced in the aftermath of the 2011 election. 15.2.2

Modalities of Electoral Authoritarianism

The 2011 general election was not only a large victory for President Ortega (62.4%) but also profoundly altered the balance of power, as the FSLN held an absolute majority in the National Assembly. As a result, in 2014, President Ortega obtained from the National Assembly a constitutional reform.23 The latter allows indefinite re-election, and Ortega to run for the next presidential elections in 2016, and again in 2021. The 2016 elections were very different from the previous ones. While the voting arrangements (as modified in 2011) remained, for the most part, the same, the conduct of the campaign and the election day have been largely modified. The expression of Sandinista hegemony in the streets through mass mobilizations (2011 campaign) was replaced by a more discreet and less costly presence of Sandinista activists (2016 campaign). The very announcement of the electoral process was delayed: usually announced a year before, in 2016 the CSE only called the elections 6 months before, making the participation of the opposition more limited and not allowing the international observers presence. It must be said that the stakes were different and the FSLN victory seemed to have little doubt. Indeed, the opposition had been laminated: some parties were banned,24 the most important opposition figures have been prohibited,25 and could not run, many opposition deputies have lost

23 https://reformaspoliticas.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/nicaraguaconstitucion alreforma2014.pdf. 24 This is notably the case of the Movimiento de renovacion sandinista (MRS), which became Unamos. 25 With sentence no. 299 of 8 June 2016, the Supreme Court of Justice stripped Eduardo Montealegre of the PLI representation, the main opposition party. Subsequently, Luis Callejas and Violeta Granera, respectively presidential and vice-presidential candidates, were prevented from participating as candidates, before the PLI was simply intervened by the State. https://www.cenidh.org/noticias/959/.

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their access to the NA.26 The government also managed to create microopposition parties under its control and, by the same, split the remaining opposition. Apart from the press and social networks, the opposition had very limited access to media. In such conditions, there was no real political campaign, neither debate, and many political opponents called for abstention. Only the CPCs continued their fieldwork: during the campaign, they distributed a ten-page leaflet published by the government to explain in a very simple way the voting procedures. Although the leaflet did not explicitly ask for a FSLN vote, it had a fuchsia pink cover (in the colours of the Sandinista party) and was decorated with logos that mix government and party. On the election day, the atmosphere in polling stations was very different from the usual ones, mostly shunned by the Nicaraguan population. The voting arrangements were completely transformed in the sense of the evolution that had begun during the previous election: the majority of fiscales, even those from the “opposition”, were in fact militants of the Sandinista party local offices. The CPCs were placed at the heart of the polling stations organization: they were monitoring the surroundings of the polling stations, they fetched and accompanied voters to the ballot box (the elderly, the handicapped, but also voters who were expected to vote for the Sandinista party and would not have come…). The CPCs were everywhere: when the FSLN took control of the elections, the CSE Sandinista magistrates entrusted them with the implementation of the voting procedures in the field: Sandinista militants, CPCs members, installed the ballot boxes and supervised the voting centres (Pérez Baltodano 2012), they also transported all the ballot boxes to the Managua counting centre. As a result, the entire electoral process was totally controlled by the CSE, through the CPC, whose Sandinista politicization was no longer in doubt. The last innovation of 2016 voting arrangements was somewhat disturbing: a secrecy culture about the procedures was strongly developed during this election, none of the procedures in place being previously explained, the latter being characterized by their instability, all of which favouring the interpretation of the one with control power, in this case the CSE.

26 On 29 July 2016, 28 PLI deputies were removed from office by the CSE, the National Assembly Presidency and the Supreme Court of Justice.

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Despite the Nicaraguan population demobilization, participating little27 to the electoral process, the result, which is even better for the FSLN than 2016 (72% of the votes), left a laminated opposition having great difficulties to remobilize during the years following this election. Moreover, the transformations of the voting system had destroyed the fragile institutional gains of Nicaraguan democracy, with elections becoming even more the façade of an authoritarianism that still wishes—for some time at least—to keep the forms (Schedler 2022).

15.3 Preserving the Sandinista Order. Political Violence, Legal Developments, and What Remains of Elections (Since 2018) On 18 April 2018, Nicaragua entered a major political and social crisis. A demonstration of pensioners, soon joined on 19 April by that of students, is violently repressed: young students are killed by armed men— the turbas —, the repression images are broadcast and go around the country, Nicaraguans protest massively into the streets demanding the end of repression and the departure of the Ortega clan from power. What followed was a long series of repressive acts that made the following weeks and months the most violent in the country’s recent history. In December 2018, a negotiation process began between the government and the opposition, gathered around the Unidad Azul y Blanco. The latter brings together a heterogeneous group of representatives from the most active movements during the protest period: pensioners, students, peasants, but also figures from the political opposition, all under the protection of the Catholic Church, which presents itself as the guarantor of the dialogue. However, this dialogue quickly reached an impasse, as the meetings continued without any apparent results and the repression continued. To the request of early elections in March 2019, the government replied by a negative. To the demand for political prisoner’s release, the regime gave in, but only partially: on the one hand, releasing prisoners who had been locked up for a few weeks and, on the other hand, carrying out new raids leading to further incarcerations.

27 The official figures do not allow for an accurate estimate of the number of voters who came to the polling stations.

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The dialogue process, interrupted for a few months, then resumed the following year, finally ended in failure. The opposition had only to wait until November 2021 to hope for an alternative in the next general elections. During this time, the repression continues: activists, students, peasants, or others, were threatened, imprisoned, released, and sometimes re-incarcerated. Many had to flee the country; in neighbouring Costa Rica alone, more than 80,000 Nicaraguans went into exile.28 Demonstrations were forbidden, as well as the right to associate. The 2020 Pandemic crisis only increases the pressure that the government put on the Nicaraguan population: the political and social crisis deepened as the health crisis drags down the country’s economy. In this context, the electoral procedures were more than ever a government matter. The CSE announced in April 2021 that the November 2021 elections would be held six months later (as in 2016). During the preceding period, within six months, a set of legal reforms was put in place to reinforce the electoral authoritarianism that is now coupled with authoritarian legality. The NA approved laws and reforms that were quickly used to limit opponents’ work and the press, such as the “Law for the Regulation of External Agents”,29 the first of the Serie, and the “Law for the Rights of the People Defence to Independence, Sovereignty and Self-Determination for Peace” (1055 Law),30 commonly referred to as the “National Sovereignty Law” (or “Guillotine Law” by the Opposition), which introduced a “treason to the fatherland” offence. In addition, the Special Cybercrimes Law regulates internet content and criminalizes journalistic practice.31 A constitutional amendment imposes life imprisonment for “hate crimes”.32 Finally, a reform of the penal code allows the extension of police custody from 48 hours to 90 days.

28 These are the official UNHCR figures, probably underestimated. 29 Passed on 15 October 2020, this law distinguishes Nicaraguans into two categories:

“real” and “external agents”, the latter category losing their political rights. 30 http://legislacion.asamblea.gob.ni/Normaweb.nsf/164aa15ba012e567062568a2

005b564b/9b31a065de57fb94062586450070ce59?OpenDocument&Highlight=2,1055. 31 Daniel Ortega, through the presidential decree of 29 September 2020, approves the National Ciber-security Strategy, followed on 29 January 2021 by the regulation of the Special Cybercrime Law, known as “Mordaza Law”. 32 On January 18, 2021, a constitutional amendment was passed to include life imprisonment for “hate crimes”.

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15.3.1

The Electoral Process Under Arrest

In 2021 spring, Daniel Ortega is running for his own re-election and fifth term as president. If the result of the political manoeuvring that began six months earlier resembles that of the previous election—removing political opponents from the presidential race—the method changes significantly. It is no longer a question of removing them by political or legal manoeuvres, more or less convincing, but rather by the use of force. The political violence that was imposed in the aftermath of the 2018 crisis is now the norm of political domination, which is exercised by threat and then execution: journalists are prosecuted, opponents are threatened and imprisoned… At the beginning of June 2021, in the space of few days, the threat to opponents was carried out: on 2 June, the pre-candidate for the presidency, Cristiana Chamorro,33 was kept under house arrest, stripped of her political rights, on a judge orders, accusing her of money laundering; on 5 June, the pre-candidate, Arturo Cruz, was arrested at the airport, accused of violating the “National Sovereignty Law”, by which he was designated as a “traitor to the country”. Using the same law, on 8 June, the police imprisoned the pre-candidates, Felix Maradiaga,34 as he left the Fiscalia where he had been called, Arturo Cruz,35 and Juan Sebastián Chamorro,36 in the middle of the night at his home. All three are precandidates for the Alianza Cuidadanos por la Libertad (ACxL) party, which in March 2021 is the only legal opposition (new) party authorized to present a candidate in the November elections.

33 Cristiana Chamorro is former president Violetta Chamorro’s and journalist Pedro Joaquin Chamorro’s daughter. She is a journalist and politician. 34 From 2002 to 2006, Félix Maradiaga was the Ministry of Defence General Secretary under Enrique Bolaños Presidency. He is a representative of the opposition group Unidad Nacional Azul y Blanco. 35 A diplomat, former Nicaraguan ambassador in Washington (2007–2009), Arturo Cruz is also an academic and international consultant. 36 Juan Sebastián Chamorro is a Nicaraguan economist, entrepreneur and politician, brother of the journalist Pedro Joaquin Chamorro. He is a representative of Alianza Cívica por la Justicia y la Democracia (ACJD).

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For similar reasons, in the following days, based on the same texts, several political opponents were also arrested: activist Violeta Granera37 of the Unidad nacional Azul y Blanco; former COSEP president José Adán Aguerri,38 member of the Alianza Cuidadana; former guerrilla Hugo Torres Jiménez, vice president of Unamos, former MRS deputy Victor Hugo Tinoco, former guerrilla and minister Dora Maria Tellez, activists Ana Margarita Vigil and Tamara Dávila, all members of the political organization Unamos (former MRS), to mention only the main arrests out of about twenty at that time.39 A variety of opposition sectors were targeted: the left-wing opposition (around Unamos ) and historical—and critical— figures of Sandinism (including former revolutionaries), the economic and banking sector, the liberal right, the media… The opponents were accused of committing acts “undermining the independence, sovereignty and selfdetermination of the peoples and inciting foreign interference”, according to the police statements published for each of the arrests. Some of them are now in the Chipote prison, famous for its record of torture during the Somoza dictatorship, and under the Ortega government since the 2018 political crisis. For each of these arrests, the government, through the Public Prosecutor’s Office and the national police, refers to Law 1055 and proceeds in the same way: arrest in the name of the “Sovereignty Law”, then presentation before a judge to request an extension of three months to “carry out investigations” on the basis of the Law 406 reform of the Penal Code, which extends the length of time a citizen can be held in custody. These arrests, which take place months before the election day, have a specific temporality: they occur in a context where pre-candidates have until the end of July 2021 for the CSE to receive the final registration of presidential candidates, before the official publication of candidate names mid-August. Under such conditions, it seems difficult to organize primaries to decide between the largely imprisoned pre-candidates or even to ensure that there is an opposition candidate able to register by the end of July. The electoral campaign begins after the official announcement of 37 The Frente Amplio por la Democracia (FAD) is a coalition of parties founded in 2016, by the MRS and other parties, after the National Coalition for Democracy dissolution. 38 José Adán Aguerri was COSEP president for 13 years, until September 2020. 39 These twenty or so arrests only concern the most visible arrests in June 2021. In

2022 summer, there were nearly 190 political prisoners in Nicaraguan jails.

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the candidates, where only the Ortega-Murillo duo remains, running for re-election. The international pressure for a transparent and democratic election had very little impact. On 7 November 2022, the election day took place under similar appearances to that of 2016, with procedures completely supervised by the Sandinista party, the banning of national and international observation, and voters not going to the polls, but the difference was fundamental: where in 2016 candidates were prevented from taking part in the electoral process, this time they were incarcerated and often tortured. If in November 2021 Ortega officially wins the elections with 75.9% of the votes and the entire National Assembly, the electoral procedures have been transformed to the point of only serving a Sandinista order that became a violent political one, imposing itself exclusively through its terror mechanisms. Clearly, since 2021 in Nicaragua, the legitimacy acquired through the ballot box that elections allow in many authoritarian regimes is no longer a survival strategy for the Ortega government. The long-term description over voting rules material transformations in Nicaragua gives a more precise idea of what “electoral” authoritarianism can be in practice. It shows that the rules of the electoral game do not change in a short period of time, even if they may undergo sufficient modifications from one election to the next to radically transform their meaning. In 2011, the procedures for registering on the lists, distributing electoral cards, arranging polling stations, etc. allowed the balance of power within the political arena to be frozen in favour of the Sandinista party. Their instability, acquired through changes in the voting system, allowed the CSE (and through it the Ortega government) to control the electoral process in 2016, as it was the only party to have an overview and precise knowledge of the game rules. But after more than a decade of playing with the electoral rules, in the aftermath of the 2018 political crisis and the June 2021 arrests, there is little left of the electoral procedures in the November 2021 presidential elections, in a Nicaraguan authoritarian regime that no longer needs an adjective or a particle, as “electoral” authoritarianism, to be define. Nicaragua’s authoritarian regime is now a regime stabilized—at least for the time being—by the mechanisms of terror that underpin it: the danger of participation, the risks to political opponents and voters alike, the uncertainty of the future, make the Sandinista order more powerful and conservative than it has ever been, even though the portion of loyal supporters is probably the smallest in the FSLN history.

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References Collombon Maya (2016), “Le rose au front”, in Baamara L., Floderer C., Poirier M. (dir.), Faire campagne, éditions Khartala, Paris. Collombon Maya, Mathieu Lilian (dir.) (2021), Dynamiques des tournants autoritaires, Paris, Éditions du Croquant. Garrigou Alain (1993), “La construction sociale du vote. Fétichisme et raison instrumentale”, Politix, 6 (22). Salvador Martí i Puig, David Close (eds.) (2009), Nicaragua y el FSLN (1979– 2009) ¿Qué queda de la revolución?, Barcelona, edicions Bellaterra. Pérez Baltodano A. (2012), “Nicaragua: Democracia electoral sin consenso social”, Revista de Ciencia Política, 32 (1). Przeworski Adam (2015), “Acquiring the Habit of Changing Governments Through Elections”, Comparative Political Studies, 48 (1), 101–129. Schedler Andrés (2002), “Elections Without Democracy: The Menu of Manipulation”, Journal of Democracy, 13 (2).

CHAPTER 16

The Authoritarian and Conservative Turn of Nicolás Maduro Thomas Posado

Venezuela is an example that runs counter to all the contributions in this book. On the face of it, there has been no change of government since 1999, and the current head of state, Nicolás Maduro, continues to develop a socialist and revolutionary rhetoric in the tradition of his predecessor Hugo Chávez. Governing a country for more than two decades, now in a context of economic collapse, is a challenge and Nicolás Maduro’s continued rule may thus be an enigma. As political scientist Javier Corrales writes, “the most obvious answer (to this question) is that Maduro has survived because he has turned more authoritarian” (Corrales 2020: 40).

T. Posado (B) Casa de Velazquez, Madrid, Spain e-mail: [email protected]

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023, corrected publication 2023 O. Dabène (ed.), Latin America’s Pendular Politics, Studies of the Americas, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-26761-1_16

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Hugo Chávez was elected in the December 1998 presidential elections, inaugurated in 1999, re-elected in 2000, 2006, and 2012 before dying of cancer in March 2013. Nicolás Maduro is clearly asserting the legacy of his policies, even if we will see that they have evolved in many aspects. He succeeded him, elected, with difficulty, as head of the country in April 2013 and re-elected in May 2018 under contested conditions that we will detail. However, behind this apparent continuity, we can question Venezuela’s alleged exceptionality based on the evolution of the practice of those in power, which has notably changed towards a conservative horizon. We will begin by outlining the conditions that have prevented electoral alternations before explaining this diffuse non-electoral alternation.

16.1

How to Explain the Absence of Alternation?

After the overthrow of the authoritarian regime of Marcos Pérez Jiménez in 1958, Venezuela was governed under a representative democracy dominated by two parties, the Democratic Action (AD, of social-democratic orientation) and the Committee of Independent Electoral Political Organization (COPEI, of social-Christian orientation), which shared power under the Puntofijo Pact.1 The regime was not free of human rights abuses at the time: brutal repression of the guerrillas in the 1960s, massacres such as those of Cantaura or Caracazo in the 1980s …2 This political system entered in crisis in the 1980s and 1990s. Venezuela is a federal but historically centralized state. The first regional elections were only held in 1989. These elections were an opportunity for marginal left-wing parties to emerge in the political arena. They won 2 out of 21 states in this first election, 4 out of 23 in 1992 and 5 out of 23 in 1995. Hugo Chávez gained notoriety in 1992 with an aborted military coup attempt. After two years of incarceration, he opted 1 The Puntofijo Pact was a political agreement concluded in 1958 between the three main Venezuelan parties (AD, COPEI, the anti-imperialist nationalist Republican Democratic Union [URD]), excluding the Venezuelan Communist Party, to ensure the stability of the country and the sharing of power. 2 The Cantaura massacre of October 1982 refers to the assassination of 23 unarmed young people, suspected of participating in a guerrilla war, by a military detachment. The Caracazo was a spontaneous revolt in February 1989 in the main Venezuelan cities that was repressed by the government at the cost of between one thousand and three thousand deaths (according to different estimates).

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for the electoral path and prepared his presidential candidacy for the 1998 elections. In May 1998, AD and COPEI used their parliamentary majority to separate the parliamentary and regional elections (anticipated in November) from the presidential one (in December, in which they were promised defeat). Hugo Chávez’s coalition, the Patriotic Pole, won a substantial minority of a fragmented National Assembly (70 out of 207 deputies) and Senate (17 out of 57 senators) and governed 8 of the 24 federal states. Hugo Chávez’s victory in the December presidential elections capitalized on a vote punishing the governments of the previous two decades that had failed to stem the economic, social and political crisis. This election opens a positive level 4 alternation cycle, i.e. in a few months, the Patriotic Pole obtained a majority in the presidential, legislative and local elections, overtaking not only the incumbents but also those who were their main opponents. It called a referendum for a Constituent Assembly, which was subsequently elected, and a few months later promulgated a new Constitution, which was validated by another referendum. New “mega-elections” were called in July 2000 and all presidential, legislative and local mandates were up for grabs. This new majority has won all the elections since then, for the presidency (2000, 2006, 2012, 2013, 2018), for the National Assembly (2000, 2005, 2010, 2020) and for local governments (2000, 2004, 2008, 2012, 2013, 2017) with the exception of the 2007 constitutional referendum and the 2015 legislative election. Venezuela was the first country to have a progressive government and has since been blessed by apparent stability, whereas most other Latin American countries are characterized by a few conservative alternations. However, this description masks an authoritarian evolution. Freedom House data allow us to understand the de-democratization of Venezuela over the long term, starting in the 1990s and accelerating since the late 2000s (see Table 16.1). The end of the Puntofijo Pact was marked by increasing repression of social movements and growing abstention. During its first three decades (1958–1987), participation in presidential elections was very high, always above 87.5%. With the development of the crisis, participation fell sharply, from 81.9% in the 1988 presidential elections, to 60.2% in the 1993 elections and 63.5% in the first election of Hugo Chávez in 1998. The beginning of his presidency seems to correspond to the model of delegative democracy (O’Donnell 1994): strengthening of the executive power

3

1

1

1989– 1991

2

1977– 1978

3

3

1992– 1995

2

3

1996– 1998

4

4

3

5

1999 2000– 2002

3

4

2003– 2005

4

4

2006– 2009

5

4

5

5

2010 2011– 2016

6

5

2017– 2018

7

6

2019–2020

assigning two scores from 1 (total respect for rights and freedoms) to 7 (no respect for rights and freedoms).

3 Freedom House has rated all the countries in the world every year since 1972 on the basis of uniform questions,

Source Freedom House

Civil 2 Liberties Political 2 Rights

1973– 1976

Table 16.1 Evolution of the Venezuelan political system ratings (1973–2018)3

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at the expense of the legislature and the use of direct-democratic mechanisms (such as the introduction of a revocatory referendum, introduced by the 1999 Constitution, held against the President in 2004). Voter turnout increased again, from 56.3% in 2000 to 74.7% in 2006. The presidential majority then won each election thanks to an electoral base that was mobilized during each ballot but also during pro-government demonstrations in moments of acute political polarization (the aborted military coup in April 2002 and the blocking of the economy between December 2002 and February 2003 by the opposition). After the death of Hugo Chávez, authoritarian mechanisms were strengthened, and the use of state resources for electoral purposes was increasingly evident. Voter turnout continued to be high (reaching 80.5% of registered voters in the 2012 presidential elections, the highest level in two decades) and elections remained respectful of the will of the majority expressed. The presidential majority won most of the local elected positions, the opposition retained 7 out of 23 federal states, half of the country’s 10 largest municipalities, 180 out of 335 municipalities, in the 2000 elections. These local positions would erode over the terms of office without disappearing during the following local elections: the opposition won two regional governors in 2004, then 3 in 2008 and 2012; 67 municipalities in 2004, then 38 in 2008 and 78 in 2013, winning one of the ten largest municipalities in 2004, then 2 in 2008 and 5 in 2013. The challenge to democratic forms of government turned much more widespread during the presidency of Nicolás Maduro. Hugo Chávez managed to obtain comfortable re-elections (22.24 points of votes cast ahead of his main competitor in 2000, 25.96 in 2006, 10.76 in 2012) thanks to a charismatic leadership fueled by the oil boom of 2004 to 2014 which allowed the creation of numerous social programs. Venezuela is no exception: the re-election of an incumbent president is easier than the election of a new candidate; the closest presidential election of the six in our corpus is the one where the presidential majority candidate changed (Hugo Chávez; Nicolás Maduro). However, these elections are hard to compare because they were held under different conditions. In the December 2015 legislative elections, most polls predicted a victory of the opposition coalition grouped around the Mesa de Unidad Democrática (MUD, Table of Democratic Unity). In an economic context already marked by recession (−3.9% in 2014; −

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6.2% in 2015 according to IMF data), a monetary collapse,4 and rising inflation,5 the economic vote enabled the MUD to obtain 56% of the votes cast and a qualified majority of two-thirds of the seats (112 out of 167). If the democratic rules had been respected, this election would have resulted in an alternation (at least at the legislative level). The opposition’s victory in the 2015 legislative elections was gutted by the Nicolás Maduro-friendly Supreme Court of Justice: firstly, by annulling the election of three congressman in the state of Amazonas and not calling new elections; secondly, by declaring the National Assembly in desacato (contempt) and thus invalidating legislative texts; and finally, the executive adopted a decree of “state of exception and economic emergency” that allowed it to legislate bypassing the National Assembly, this decree would later be renewed on many occasions. This event is decisive for understanding the authoritarian turn. The intensity of polarization leads to an exchange of coups and counter-coups in which the government of Nicolás Maduro uses state institutions to stay in power despite being outvoted. During 2016, the opposition to Nicolás Maduro then attempted to call a recall referendum against him. The National Electoral Council, which also supported the executive, changed the rules, postponed the procedure, and then cancelled it on the pretext of increasingly draconian conditions for the collection of signatures. During the four months of mobilizations from April to July 2017, Nicolás Maduro convened a new body, the National Constituent Assembly (ANC). The ANC’s voting system was highly inequitable, with a very strong over-representation of rural areas deemed to be more favourable to the presidential majority, leading to a boycott by the entire opposition. The ANC completed its work in December 2020 when the presidential majority regained control of the National Assembly, without proposing a new constitution, demonstrating that it was essentially a subterfuge to bypass an opposition-led legislature. The following elections (the regional elections in October 2017, the municipal elections in December 2017, the presidential elections in May 4 While it takes 9 bolívars to get a dollar in the summer of 2012, it already takes 921 bolívars on the day of the December 2015 legislative elections (source: dolartoday.com). 5 Annual inflation in Venezuela has been above 10% since the second half of the 1980s. However, from 2012 onwards, the rate has been increasing, reaching 40.6% in 2013, 62.2% in 2014 and 121.7% in 2015 according to IMF data.

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2018 and the legislative elections in December 2020) resulted in large victories for the presidential majority.6 Various manipulations prevented these elections from being considered democratic: manipulation of the calendar according to electoral opportunities, legal invalidation of major candidacies, voting under the threat of suspension of social programs or layoffs in the public sector for abstainers… The unlikelihood of a changeover and the institutional manoeuvres of the executive encouraged a growing abstention (38.6% in the regional elections, 52.7% in the municipal elections, 54% in the presidential elections, 69.5% in the legislative elections). The irregularities surrounding the presidential election were used to legitimize the self-proclamation of the President of the National Assembly, Juan Guaidó, on 23 January 2019 based on an abusive interpretation of Article 233 of the Constitution, which would have allowed him to act as interim head of state in the event of a power vacuum. Nicolás Maduro’s government maintained democratic appearances with limited pluralism and regular negotiations with the opposition to obtain international recognition. At the same time he used the judicial and electoral institutions to prevent any alternation. Hugo Chávez and then Nicolás Maduro have often justified their authoritarian practices referring to the undemocratic actions of the opposition, such as the aborted coup attempt of April 2002, arguing that it was necessary to engage the insurrectionary tendencies of a disloyal opposition in a configuration characterized by a high level of polarization, in an exchange of blow and counter-blow. The conditions for an alternation depend not only on free and fair elections but also on the electoral offer, even if the processes are unfair. The failure of the insurrectionary attempts of 2002–2004 created tensions among the opposition political forces, leading to a boycott of the 2005 legislative elections, which gave the presidential majority more room for manoeuvre without delegitimizing Hugo Chávez. A unitary dynamic took shape in 2009 with the creation of the MUD. This coalition managed to hold on until 2017, competing with the presidential majority. It obtained only one point less than their competitors in the 2010 legislative elections (47.22% against 48.13%). Then they organized a primary for the 2012 presidential elections that would allow the designated candidate, 6 Nicolás Maduro’s partisans won 18 states out of 23, 308 municipalities out of 335, 67.8% of the votes cast in the presidential elections and 256 seats out of 277.

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Henrique Capriles, to obtain 44.31% and come close to victory in 2013 against Nicolás Maduro with 49.12% of the votes cast, and then finally winning the 2015 legislative elections. As Javier Corrales writes, “regardless of the type of regime, these electoral irregularities, accompanied by repression, can have two opposite effects. Either the opposition is outraged and mobilizes, or it becomes discouraged, divided, and weakened. In Maduro’s Venezuela, the first reaction dominated during the years 2013–2017, the second took over in the second half of 2017” (2018: 30–31). This trend is currently ongoing. Some wish to participate in electoral events despite their unfairness to capitalize on the discontent against the government of Nicolás Maduro. In the 2018 presidential elections, Henri Falcón participated against the advice of most of the opposition in a process that he himself considered “fraudulent” but in which he wanted to “fight for the results to be respected” (2018), citing a Brookings Institute study that found that electoral boycotts fail in 96% of the 171 cases studied (Frankel 2010). In the same logic, Henrique Capriles initially wanted to participate in the December 2020 legislative elections to confront the government at the ballot box. Other political forces are becoming more radical in the face of the impotence of the solution within a flawed institutional framework. Leaders such as María Corina Machado reject any electoral participation as a concession to legitimize the regime and call for external military intervention to ‘liberate’ the country. Between these two poles, it seems difficult to imagine a unitary electoral offer that could present a credible alternative to Nicolás Maduro. If, despite the economic collapse and the minority nature of support for Nicolás Maduro, no alternation has occurred in Venezuela, it is because of a strong political polarization stabilizing the electorate of the presidential majority,7 divisions in the opposition but also because of the authoritarian practices of the executive. This continuity in power cannot, however, hide a clear evolution of the discourse within the presidential majority.

7 Since Hugo Chávez came to power, the two leading candidates in the presidential

elections have received more than 95% of the votes cast (more than 99% in the 2006, 2012 and 2013 elections). In 2018, Nicolás Maduro and Henri Falcón together received ‘only’ 88.8% of the votes cast, a decrease that mainly reflects the fragmentation of the opposition. The first-past-the-post voting system is one of the factors explaining this polarization.

16

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Is Madurism Still Progressive?

Indeed, the absence of alternation does not imply the status quo in terms of political discourse and practice. Chavism was undoubtedly progressive. Its national-popular project articulated with the mobilization of the popular classes is clearly part of the history of Latin American progressivism. The election of Hugo Chávez in 1998 was the first in a cycle of progressive leaders. But what about today? The labels of “left” or “right”, “progressive” or “conservative”, are relative in time and space, depending on the evolution of the rulers, often in relation to the competing political forces in the electoral market. Even in contemporary Venezuela, where the democratic nature of elections is largely questionable, the government must position itself in relation to the opposition and vice versa. In this second part, inspired by the method of the Manifesto Project, I analyze the positions of the various parties through three cleavages8 : around international issues, economic issues, and political issues. 16.2.1

The Maintenance of a Strong Cleavage on International Issues

The Manifesto Project defines as “progressive” the valorisation of internationalism, the call for anti-imperialism and peace. Chavism resolutely fits into this category from its earliest years. Before his investiture, in January 1999, Hugo Chávez visited Cuba. Even though until 2003, Venezuela’s relations with Cuba were neither exclusive nor distinct from those of other countries. Relations with the United States were not immediately strained: the January 1999 visit to Havana was extended in Washington, where Hugo Chávez assured Bill Clinton that he wished to maintain “a close relationship” with his country and that Venezuela continued to be a “very important and secure” supplier of oil to its powerful neighbour. Several aspects mark this progressive position from the first years of Hugo Chávez’s presidency: neutrality in the Colombian conflict and initiatives to mediate, condemnation of NATO air strikes in Yugoslavia… 8 We have deliberately left out issues of morality (recognition of same-sex couples,

legalization of abortion) which have never been high on the political agenda in Venezuela, either before the presidency of Hugo Chávez, or by the presidential majority since, or by the opposition. Javier Corrales’ LGBT Rights Index places Venezuela in fifteenth place out of 17 Latin American countries surveyed, ahead of Panama and Paraguay (Corrales 2015).

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The Clinton administration, however, maintained a moderate attitude towards it (Ellner 2011: 252). The Bush administration hardened its policy towards Venezuela by strongly criticizing its positions. After September 11, 2001, Chávez was opposed to the US intervention in Afghanistan. The United States was one of only two states in the world to recognize the short-lived Carmona government during the abortive coup of April 2002. As a result, Hugo Chávez started to refer to Uncle Sam as his main adversary. This shift allowed him to overshadow his internal opponents and to reorient the collective action of his supporters towards an anti-imperialist narrative with mass demonstrations attended by hundreds of thousands of people. Beyond these controversies, it is the long-term objectives of the Venezuelan government, the promotion of a multipolar world and its policies of pressure to increase oil prices within OPEC, that caused divergences between the two states (Ellner 2011: 257). As part of his opposition to the United States, he used the discrediting of George W. Bush on the international scene to disqualify him personally. He described his US counterpart as “the devil” in his speech at the UN General Assembly in September 2006. This attack became a campaign argument during the presidential election for his re-election three months later. This cleavage persisted with a recurrent call for anti-imperialism and internationalism among the supporters of the presidential majority. Hugo Chávez was one of the architects of the creation of institutions claiming diplomatic autonomy from the United States: Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC) for the whole of Latin America and the Caribbean, Union of South American Nations (UNASUR) for the South American states and Bolivarian Alliance for the Peoples of Our America - Peoples’ Trade Treaty (ALBA-TCP) for the governments engaged in an anti-imperialist struggle. He participated in the failure of the Free Trade Area of the Americas in 2005 and even briefly called for the creation of a Fifth International in 2009. While tensions have persisted between Venezuela and the United States, until recently the trade link has been maintained. In 2018, the United States is still Venezuela’s largest supplier and customer. Conversely, Venezuela remains the third largest supplier of oil to the North American power. The first economic sanctions arrived in August 2017 with the prohibition of US companies and citizens from contracting new obligations towards the Venezuelan state and PDVSA, the state oil company. These had a major effect especially in early 2019, after Juan

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Guaidó was recognized as interim president. Venezuela was still exporting 587,000 barrels a day to its powerful neighbour across the Caribbean Sea at the end of January. That figure fell to zero in the space of two months. Venezuela’s trade paralysis is further compounded by the introduction in April 2019 of an embargo prohibiting any entity from using US currency to buy oil from PDVSA. They contribute to consolidating a strong divide between the “anti-imperialist” supporters of the presidential majority and those of Juan Guaidó who are demanding new sanctions. These coercive measures make Nicolás Maduro’s government increasingly dependent on Russia and China. Rosneft, the Russian state oil company, already held 49.9% of CITGO, a company owned by the Venezuelan state but operating in the United States, as a loan guarantee to PDVSA. For its part, China lent Venezuela $67.2 billion between 2007 and 2018, making the country the top destination for Chinese funds in Latin America. While the fight against imperialism is a central feature of the Nicolás Maduro government’s discourse, its calls for the defence of national sovereignty and the fight against interference may seem paradoxical in light of the indebtedness and dependence on these great powers (Posado 2019). The opposition is isolated within the country and has as its main resource the international recognition of just over fifty states in the world. Thus, both are now increasingly dependent on their respective geopolitical partners. The international issues are undoubtedly the most divisive in Venezuelan politics. The country is becoming the theatre of confrontation between rival powers: on the one hand, Russia and China; on the other, mainly the United States and the European Union. The valorization of anti-imperialism by the presidential majority has not wavered in more than two decades, a true continuity that undeniably links it to the history of Latin American progressivism. However, the innovative initiatives of the early years have given way to a following of alternative great powers that could constitute a new imperialism in a context where national sovereignty is increasingly limited. 16.2.2 A Conservative Economic Turn Against a Background of Drastic Budgetary Restrictions The economic divide is often the most structuring in the different political systems, with some favoring economic planning, market regulation, valuing the world of work, extending the welfare state and possible

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nationalization, and others favoring free market, the call for investment and the restriction of the welfare state. During his first presidential campaign in 1998, Hugo Chávez claimed to be a member of the Third Way, which was embodied by Tony Blair. When he was elected, the economic elite was not immediately hostile to him. The Caracas stock market welcomed his accession to power with a rise of 22.22% and 19.34% the next day and the day after that. In his inaugural speech, he declared: “our project is not a statist project”. The decisive moment in Chávez’s alignment with the progressive economic orientation was the publication of 49 decree laws in November 2001. The most important provided for the takeover of the state-owned oil company PDVSA, which was in the process of becoming autonomous. The mobilization against these texts led to the attempted coup d’état in April 2002 and gave a lasting structure to the Venezuelan political field. On the one hand, the presidential majority consolidated its popular social base, which enabled it to thwart attempts to overthrow it by implementing massive social programs ($650 billion between 1999 and 2013 according to the calculations of former planning minister Jorge Giordani) financed by abundant oil revenues. On the other hand, the opposition would continue to fight the influence of the state in the economic sphere. In January 2005, Hugo Chávez called his project “socialist”. If we analyze the share of the public sector in GDP, we can see the effects of these rhetorical developments in full measure. According to data from the Venezuelan Central Bank, this proportion fell sharply between the first quarter of 1999, when Hugo Chávez was inaugurated, and the second half of 2007, from 31.9% to 24.5%. From 2007 onwards, the government nationalized many companies and the public sector produced 30.9% of GDP in the first quarter of 2013 when Nicolás Maduro was elected. This increase continued and reached 47% in the first quarter of 2019, the latest interval for which we have this information. The increase in recent years should not be understood as an offensive statist policy of the government but, in the context of the brutal recession from which Venezuela is suffering, of a fall of the private sector (−66.9%) faster than that of the public sector (−35.5%) (Banco central de Venezuela 2020). While the ‘socialist’ character of Chavism is questionable, it has represented an undeniable return of the state and the social question to Venezuelan society.

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In times of abundant oil revenues, the idea of wealth redistribution was even hegemonic in the Venezuelan political field. During the 2006 presidential campaign, the opposition candidate, Manuel Rosales, proposed the introduction of the Tarjeta Mi Negra, a credit card that would have allowed the poorest people to receive part of the country’s oil revenues directly into this new account. The alternative was certainly more individualistic than the public policies of the presidential majority, but it was in line with the paradigm of redistributing the rent. During the 2012 and 2013 presidential campaigns, Henrique Capriles promised to maintain the ‘missions’, the social programs put in place by Hugo Chávez. Conversely, in times of recession, the government of Nicolás Maduro is also pragmatic. One example is the Orinoco Mining Arc decree, issued in 2016, which declares 12% of the country’s territory an “Economic Zone of National Development”, derogating from taxes, labour laws, environmental laws, and the preservation of the habitat of indigenous communities in order to attract investors to exploit gold, diamonds, iron, coltan, bauxite and other minerals (Teran Mantovani 2017). With the monetary collapse, wages are being rolled back: since 2017, the monthly minimum wage has been less than 5% of the average household food basket (except for a two-month period in autumn 2018). Since autumn 2019, the country has been de facto dollarized by executive decisions. In October 2020, an anti-blockade law was passed to encourage private investment despite US sanctions, even if it meant violating constitutional principles that reaffirm state ownership of the country’s subsoil. This does not mean that the opposition has become progressive either: the Plan País proposed by Juan Guaidó in January 2019 is still liberal in orientation, based on a resizing of the role of the state in the economy and the privatization of public services. The unfavourable economic situation favours orthodox perspectives based on budgetary restrictions. Between 2004 and 2013, the various studies of electoral sociology show very clearly that the voters with the lowest incomes were aligned with Chavism, while the wealthy were aligned with the opposition (Lupu 2010). Since 2015, the discontent in the ranks of the supporters of the presidential majority, the boycotts of part or all of the opposition, the neither fair nor free nature of the various elections and the growing abstention make such an analysis difficult. Chavism was undoubtedly progressive in this respect, Madurism is much less so. The economic collapse of the country is contributing to the fact that all the political forces are proposing less statist solutions.

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16.2.3

From “Participatory and Protagonist Democracy” to the Army as Arbiter

The clearest break with progressivism was political. While progressives defend democracy and a reduction in the powers of the military, the dynamic of Nicolás Maduro’s government is the opposite, with growing authoritarianism, the maintenance of order as a leitmotif and sectors of the army that have accumulated power unprecedented in decades. Although data from Freedom House and the V-Dem Institute show an erosion of democracy, the new Constitution of 1999 theoretically enshrines the establishment of a “participatory and protagonistic democracy”. In practice, several democratic experiments appeared during the first years of Hugo Chávez’ presidency. The structuring of these participatory democracy bodies is not free of contradictions between real empowerment at the grassroots and funding dependent on the presidency of the Republic. Over the years, the erosion of participation marks a return to a verticality of power, more ambivalent at the beginning of the Chávez years. Citizen participation has now practically disappeared. According to Margarita López Maya, the municipalities, which bring together and institutionalize all the participatory bodies, “are currently facing insurmountable obstacles and are even tending to disintegrate or become mere distribution belts for goods granted by the government in exchange for political loyalty” (2018: 60). It is estimated that only a limited number of communal experiments are still in operation, the majority of which in rural areas. The most emblematic case of this dismantling of neighborhood organizations is the municipality of El Maizal in the state of Lara, one of the few examples that is still dynamic and functioning. Its leader, Ángel Prado, was elected to the ANC and then ran in the elections for his municipality. In December 2017, supported by parties allied to the government but not by the president’s party, he won the election by a wide margin with 57.5% of the votes cast, but the victory went to the government candidate (Azzellini 2020). Another aspect of this conservative shift is the rise of the military sector. Hugo Chávez, who came from the military, had theorized and claimed a “civic-military” strategy, combining, as its name suggests, civilian population and military support in the process of change. The opponents also used the army to try to foment the coup attempt of April 2002 and thus,

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by revealing themselves, allowed the government to oust the coup plotters and gain political control over it. As Michael Shifter explains, the April 2002 coup attempt “not only questions the democratic authenticity of the opposition but also gave Chávez the perfect pretext to take total control of the armed forces, purging all dissidents” (2006: 49). Paradoxically, the influence of the military grew after the death of Chávez, the charismatic leader from the army. Nicolás Maduro, who embodied the civilian side of the Bolivarian process as a former trade union leader, granted more privileges to the armed forces than his predecessor whose authority was less contested. Indeed, the armed forces are one of his last assets. A former defence minister, Carmen Meléndez, spoke in 2014 of the army as the “backbone of the government”. More than a third of the governorates, a quarter of the ministries, including those with an economic role, and at least sixty public companies, are entrusted to them. During the 2019 presidential crisis, in which Juan Guaidó and Nicolás Maduro faced each other to be recognized as the legitimate president of Venezuela, both relied on the military as the arbiter of the political crisis, consecrating the victory of the latter by the primacy he gave it during his presidency. This centrality granted to the army by both sides increased the tensions within it. While the top brass was interested in maintaining the Maduro government, the rank and file were suffering from the collapse of the Venezuelan economy. Significantly, the military was the first contingent of “political prisoners” whose release the NGO Foro Penal was demanding. The conservative turn is more advanced in this aspect in Venezuela than in many countries where electoral alternation has actually occurred. While the continuity of the presidential majority has been ensured, the exercise of power has notably evolved towards a more authoritarian practice, less participatory, and offering more power to the military.

16.3

Conclusion

The continuity of the presidential majority in power for more than two decades masks changes in political discourse and the exercise of power. An undeniable authoritarian turn and a conservative turn have been made. One reinforces the other and vice versa. The authoritarian turn demobilized the grassroots organizations and moved the centre of gravity of

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Chavism away from progressivism. Conversely, the conservative turn paralyzes the potential counter-powers (opening up to the private sector, marginalization of neighborhood organizations, co-option of the military high command) that could force the executive to share power. While the cleavages in terms of international relations still polarize the Venezuelan political field, the progressive characteristics on the economic and political levels have been abandoned during the presidency of Nicolás Maduro. No electoral alternation has changed the political personnel in power, but a non-electoral alternation has significantly transformed the practice of power. This did not take the form of an abrupt change of direction, but rather a gradual pragmatic (or opportunistic, depending on one’s point of view) adaptation to the unfavourable evolution of the economic situation, the loss of regional allies, and international pressure. In this respect, Venezuela is not so exceptional in contemporary Latin America. The country went through a highly progressive phase during the 2000s in a phase of economic abundance and is now experiencing a reversal of this political positioning as it goes through the worst economic, social, and political crisis in its history. The main difference with most of the other cases mentioned in the book is that these changes have taken place within the continuity of the presidential majority in power.

References Dario Azzellini, «6 Communes in Venezuela in times of crisis», in Henry Veltmeyer, Edgar Zayago Lau (dir.), Buen Vivir and the Challenges to Capitalism in Latin America, London, Routledge, 2020, pp. 113–132. Banco central de Venezuela, «Información Estadística. PIB por sector institucional», accessed 5 October 2020, available on line on: http://www.bcv.org. ve/estadisticas/producto-interno-bruto Javier Corrales, LGBT Rights and Representation in Latin America and the Caribbean: The Influence of Structure, Movements, Institutions, and Culture, Chapel Hill, University of North Carolina Press, 2015. Javier Corrales, «La crise électorale au Venezuela», Les Études du CERI. Amérique latine. L’année politique 2017, n°233–234, January 2018, pp. 23– 31. Javier Corrales, «Authoritarian Survival: Why Maduro Hasn’t Fallen», Journal of Democracy, vol. 31, n°3, July 2020, pp. 39–53. Steve Ellner, El fenómeno Chávez : sus orígenes y su impacto, Caracas, Ed. Tropykos – Centro Nacional de Historia, 2011.

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Henri Falcón, «Why I Am Running for President of Venezuela», The New York Times, 7 March 2018. Matthew Frankel, «Threaten but Participate: Why Election Boycotts Are a Bad Idea», Policy Paper, Brookings Institution, n°19, March 2010. Margarita López Maya, «Socialismo y comunas en Venezuela», Nueva Sociedad, n°274, March–April 2018, pp. 59–70. Noam Lupu, «Who votes for chavismo? Class voting in Hugo Chávez’s Venezuela», Latin American Research Review, vol. 45, n°1, 2010, pp. 7–32. Guillermo O’Donnell, «Delegative Democracy», Journal of Democracy, 1994, vol. 5, n°1, pp. 55–69. Thomas Posado, «Venezuela: un objet de politique internationale», RAMSES 2020, IFRI, 2019, pp. 180–185. Michael Shifter, «In Search of Hugo Chávez», Foreign Affairs, vol. 85, n°3, May–June 2006, pp. 45–59. Emiliano Teran Mantovani, «Orinoco al extremo: la Faja Petrolífera y el Arco Minero, extractivismos de alto riesgo», in Hernán Scandizzo (dir.), Extremas. Nuevas fronteras del extractivismo energético en Latinoamérica, Oilwatch Latinoamérica, 2017, pp. 74–81.

CHAPTER 17

From Competitive Authoritarianism to State Capture: A Contested Re-Election in Honduras (2017) Kevin Parthenay

The Honduran election of November 2017 saw the surge of a competitive authoritarianism in the country. In this chapter, we look back at this election and the dynamics of profound political change at work. With a low turnout (59.52%), which has been steadily declining since 1997 (72.2%), Honduras illustrates the ills of a dysfunctional electoral democracy and what Terry Lynn Karl called in the early 1990s “electoral fallacy” (Karl 1990) insofar as the organization of regular electoral events did

K. Parthenay (B) University of Tours, Tours, France e-mail: [email protected] University Institute of France (IUF), Paris, France

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023, corrected publication 2023 O. Dabène (ed.), Latin America’s Pendular Politics, Studies of the Americas, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-26761-1_17

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not contribute to the democratization of the country. This 2017 election was actually organized without democracy (Levitsky and Way 2020) and embodies the fatigue of the Honduran electoral system and, through it, of its democracy. On the Central American and Latin American scale, Honduras stands out for its centennial bipartite system (bipartidismo centenario). The Partido Nacional de Honduras (PNH), with a territorial conservative tendency (more rural), and the Partido Liberal de Honduras (PLH), with a liberal tendency (more urban), have shared power successively since 1902. However, the 2009 coup d’Etat had a number of unanticipated effects on the historical structure of the political spectrum. Thus, the 2017 election is historic in two ways: it saw the first re-election of an incumbent president, which is per se a violation of fundamental constitutional rules (defeating the artículos pétreos ), and it saw the confirmation of the electoral collapse of one of the country’s two traditional parties, the PLH, which occupies a third place with only 14.74% of the vote. The 2017 election took place in a context of unprecedented political and social tension, both in the pre-election and post-election phases. After the election, the foreign observation missions present in the country even adopted dissonant positions on the events, which precipitated the country into a generalized political uncertainty and further consolidated the fall of legitimacy of the executive (Parthenay 2020). Thus, while the Honduran election provides a suitable framework for an investigation into the consolidation of conservatism in power (by strengthening its hold on power after three consecutive terms), it should not obscure the fact that this conservative consolidation is accompanied by an authoritarian turn. To better understand the dynamics and functioning of this consolidation, this chapter reviews the characteristics of the Honduran political system (I), the foundations of competitive authoritarianism (II), and the subsequent collapse of Honduran democracy through the consolidation of state capture (III).

17.1 The Honduran Political System: Balance and Rupture In this first section, we provide a historical overview of the functioning of the Honduran political system to better understand its contemporary

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Table 17.1 Honduras: seats won in Congress in the general elections

PLH PNH PDC PINU UD LIBRE PAC APH

1989

1993

1997

2001

2005

2009

2013

2017

71 55 1

67 55

67 55 2 3 1

55 61 4 3 5

62 55 5 2 4

45 71

27 48 1 1 1 37 13

26 67 1 4 1 30 1 1

2

Source Author’s elaboration based on official data

dysfunctions. On the one hand, we discuss the historical roots of the twoparty system (1) and, on the other, the political rupture orchestrated by the coup d’état against Manuel Zelaya (PLH) in July 2009 (2). 17.1.1

A Century-Old Two-Party System

Since 1902, Honduran political competition has been characterized by a confrontation between two traditional parties with strong territorial roots, the PLH and the PNH. In the contemporary period, that is, since the end of the Central American armed civil conflict, the presidency has alternated between these two parties. At the legislative level, the (unicameral) parliament is largely dominated by one or other of these same parties, who share the seats. From 1989 to the 2013 election, the other parties never had more than 12 MPs (2001) in the Assembly, which is less than 10% (cumulatively) of the national representation. As Tables 17.1 and 17.2 show, political polarization in Honduras is extremely strong until 2009, when there is a break in the fragmentation of the party system (see 2013 and 2017 legislative elections) and increased volatility (see 2013 and 2017 presidential elections). To understand this break, it is necessary to briefly review the events of 2009. 17.1.2

The 2009 Coup: A Breakdown

The 2005 election was a “tight election in a polarized context” (Sonnleitner 2007) with a political alternation despite a growing abstention. Honduran electoral democracy was already showing signs of fatigue.

44.3 52.03 1.9 96.33

Source Author’s elaboration based on official data

PLH PNH Party in third postion Aggregated scores (PLH+PNH)

1989 53 43 2.8 96

1993 52.65 42.76 2.11 95.41

1997 44.26 52.21 1.45 96.47

2001

Table 17.2 Honduras: results of the general elections for the presidency

49.9 46.17 1.51 96.07

2005

94.65

38.09 56.56

2009

20.3 36.89 28.78 57.19

2013

14.74 42.95 41.42 57.69

2017

362 K. PARTHENAY

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In this bleak context and based on weak programmatic content, Manuel Zelaya’s shift of political orientation during his term (rapprochement with the Bolivarian left and the trade unions), betraying his electoral base, and the desire to organize a popular consultation on the Constitution that everyone perceived as a consultation on the renewal of the presidential term, led to a situation of major political crisis. This crisis finally escalated to an orchestrated coup d’état against Zelaya on June 28th, 2009. After five months of unprecedented upheavals in the country, new elections were organized—only between the two main parties—and Porfirio Lobo (PNH’s unsuccessful candidate for 2005 presidential election) won the presidency. This was followed by a period of attempted normalization of political life after the coup d’état, which nonetheless produced the opposite effects, i.e. a splintering of the political spectrum and an impossible return to the status quo ante. Following the coup, a new political offer began to emerge in the country. This offer came from a strong polarization born of the constitutional rupture and the fight against the corruption of the political system. Thus, in the wake of the coup, a new party emerged—LIBRE—challenging the political normalization that had followed. This party, founded by the wife of the deposed president, Xiomara Castro, embodied a permanent message of anti-putschist revolt. Another party, the Honduran Anti-Corruption Party (PAC), was founded in 2011 and targeted corruption. The new political offer thus seemed to gradually challenge the age-old two-party balance of the Honduran political scene. In 2013, for the first time in the country’s history, a third party came second in the presidential elections. LIBRE, and its candidate Xiomara Castro, won 28.78% of the vote in the first round, more than 8 points ahead of the PLH. The PAC obtained 13.43% of the vote, enhancing its position and credibility in the national public debate. On the other hand, eight political parties competed in the Congress elections. This historical review is crucial for understanding the foundations of the 2017 election and the gradual rise of competitive authoritarianism, on the one hand, with regard to the events of 2009 and Zelaya’s desire to organize a consultation on the constitutional text (which dates from 1982) and the recomposition of the political spectrum, with the fall of the PLH and the consolidation of a “new” political offer insofar as it captures a corpus of ideas and political and social frustrations born of the coup (democracy, fight against corruption). These determinants are

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constitutive of the electoral conjuncture of 2017. We now turn to this context.

17.2

An Election Without Democracy

Before observing the functioning of Honduran democracy, it is necessary to underline the fragility of its state structure (weak state), as evidenced by the country’s membership of the International Development Association (IDA), a World Bank program for the poorest states in the world. Furthermore, Honduras is currently part of the IMF’s HIPC (Heavily Indebted Poor Countries) program and is therefore the subject of major financial support from international financial institutions, which gives it a profile of a state that is highly dependent on external aid. In social terms, all international rankings show that development is lagging far behind. The extent of existing inequalities in the country is at the root of a social frustration that pushes Honduran youth towards the informal economy, parallel networks, or migration (negative migration balance according to estimates for 2021, −1.35/1000 inhabitants1 ). In terms of education and health, the country remains one of the worst performers in the region. The State’s participation in social expenditure remains low (7.01% of GDP in 2018 compared to 9% in 20092 ; 0.6 hospital beds/1000h according to estimates for 2021). On a per capita basis, this state expenditure appears even lower in 2018 with $176/per capita (compared to $848 in Brazil or $909 in Costa Rica). This low investment effectively places the country (and its inhabitants) in the hands of international development workers to compensate for this regulatory impotence. As a result (and added to the circulation of large informal flows on Honduran territory—drugs, arms, migration), levels of violence have exploded since the early 2000s, with a homicide rate of 37.6/100,000 inhabitants in 2020 (compared to an average of 18.4 in Latin America) (InsightCrime 2021). Finally, the country is plagued by endemic corruption, which led to the implementation of an anticorruption plan for 2011–2014 following the coup d’état, and above all

1 Estimates and data taken from the CIA Factbook. 2 Latin American average: 7.95% (2018); EU average: 9.8% (2018). Data taken from

World Bank Data (2021).

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to the establishment of the “Mission of Support against Corruption and Impunity in Honduras” (MACCIH) for the period 2016–2020. It is in this context of state failure and abandonment of the Honduran population that electoral democracy is taking place. Moreover, the scope of the 2017 election was diverted from its function of channelling social demands. It was in fact diverted by an issue, formulated around the debate for or against the outgoing president, Juan Orlando Hernandez (JOH). We will first explain the reasons for this, before looking at its consequences for the political offer and electoral behaviour. 17.2.1

Issue Voting: ‘#FueraJOH’?

Since the return to democracy, the Honduran Constitution of 1982 specifies through its Article 239 that anyone who attempts to obtain a second term in the highest office of the state would be considered a “traitor to the nation”. In Latin America, the topic of reforming re-election procedures or third-termism has been omnipresent (Calvo and Negretto 2020; Parthenay 2020). In Honduras, this subject is also sensitive, especially since the 2009 coup d’état fuelled by suspicions that Manuel Zelaya wanted to modify these procedures. However, the President JOH reintroduced this issue very early on in his first mandate, which began in 2013. The Constitutional Chamber of the Supreme Court of Justice (CSJ, Spanish acronyms) made the re-election possible by declaring that article 330 of the penal code was unconstitutional and therefore declared article 42 paragraph 5 and article 239 of the 1982 Constitution inapplicable. This sentence was in response to an appeal for unconstitutionality lodged by deputies in Congress (15 from the PNH and 1 from Unification Democrática [UD]) and by former President of the Republic Rafael Callejas (PNH and JOH’s opponent in the party primary). On December 15th 2016, Manuel Zelaya (LIBRE), Salvador Nasralla, and Guillermo Valle (PINU) presented a contentious appeal against this sentence of the Constitutional Chamber of the CSJ that aimed at registering the candidacy of the incumbent President. A month later, on January 15th 2017, the court declared the appeal inadmissible and incompetent to judge it, arguing that the appeal should have been filed with the Supreme Electoral Tribunal (TSE, Spanish acronyms). Throughout this politico-constitutional debate, major demonstrations between April 2014 and May 2015 were organized to denounce the authorization of the re-election, with the slogans “No a la reelección”

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K. PARTHENAY

(“No to re-election”) and “JOH fuera” (“JOH out”). The possibility of remaining in power prefigured a twofold political rupture: by confirming the absence of political alternation with 12 consecutive years (three presidential terms) at the head of power by the PNH; by the exercise of two consecutive terms by the same person. This constitutional manoeuvre led to a massive rejection of the drift of power and the instrumentalization of Honduran political institutions. On this basis, Honduran citizens largely boycotted what was then considered to be an irregular election (59.52% turnout; falls to 54.3% when invalid and blank votes are considered). Furthermore, the entire electoral campaign was marked by support or rejection of the outgoing President. In the 2017 elections, there was a contraction of the partisan offer, especially for the presidential elections, which showed a recomposition of the Honduran bipartite system. Indeed, the opposition to JOH structured itself in a coalition, entitled “Alliance of Opposition against Dictatorship”. Initially, it brought together the LIBRE party, which was born after the coup and led by Manuel Zelaya, and the small PINU party. However, the invitation of Salvador Nasralla, former leader and candidate of the Anti-Corruption Party (PAC), upset the internal balance of the coalition, and Nasralla won the presidential ticket with Xiomora Castro (Zelaya’s wife and former LIBRE candidate for the 2013 election) as his running mate. While this alliance was intended to strengthen the chances of winning the presidential election, the political manoeuvre was mainly directed towards Congress to obtain a maximum number of seats. Indeed, in the Honduran political system, Congress is central insofar as the majority party can appoint the authorities in charge of the Fiscalía and the Supreme Electoral Tribunal (TSE). In essence, and as its name suggests, this “Alliance of Opposition against Dictatorship” focuses on the fight against corruption, impunity, and the capture of the country’s institutions since the 2009 coup. Faced with this coalition, JOH ran a lacklustre campaign under the slogan “Honduras avanza con paso firme” and focused his campaign themes on job creation and the fight against insecurity. However, the campaign was punctuated by the issue of reelection and the circumvention of the national Constitution, as well as the corruption surrounding the person and family of the outgoing president. In this poisonous climate, devoid of any programmatic background, the presidential election took the form of a referendum “for” or “against” JOH. The result of the election was a strong polarization between JOH

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(42.95%) and Nasralla (41.42%) and a sharp drop in the PLH led by Luis Zelaya (14.74%). As Levitsky and Way (2020) point out, competitive authoritarianism means that the standard criteria of democracy (free, open, and fair elections; voting rights; protection of civil liberties and political rights; elected authorities have the real authority to govern) are often not respected, creating an unequal game between government and opposition. Thus, in a competitive authoritarian regime, democratic institutions are perceived as means to obtain and exercise political authority. Following this definition by Levistky and Way, the Honduran case seems to belong to this category of regime in which electoral democracy is largely disguised for the purpose of power retention. The rules are modified by the political actors themselves, and the legitimacy of elections and political authority is thus permanently affected. These dysfunctions of democratic institutions are also accompanied by a necessary questioning of the exercise of political authority. In Honduras, the domination of social groups and the growing share of informality is calling into question the very idea of “government”. 17.2.2

The Capture of the State and Its Rejection

The history of Honduras has been marked by a multiform oligarchic domination (Torres-Rivas 2011). While one can no longer speak of the existence of a “traditional elite” (inherited from the colonial era) since the first half of the twentieth century, one can rather speak of a “transnational” elite, formed by successive waves of immigration (Schneider 2013). This contemporary elite exercises extensive control over national resources in the absence of a consolidated state. This Honduran economic elite is essentially concentrated around a few large families controlling the financial (Vinelli, Bueso, Bueso Arias, Rosenthal, Smith, Goldstein, Agurcia, Callejas, Lamas), communication (Ferrari, Villeda, Andonie, Larach, Rosenthal, Sikaffy), agro-industrial (Facussé, Kafatti, Kafie, Fasquelle, Rosenthal, Nasser) and commercial (Kafie, Sikaffy, Kattán, Canahuati, Atala). These families maintain close relations with political actors and the governmental sphere (when they do not mix fully3 ). In this way, they used their influence in the privatization processes 3 The close links between the Callejas and Facussé (or more recently Canahuati) families and political actors since the early 1990s should be seen.

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K. PARTHENAY

of the 1990s, which strengthened their dominant position and, indeed, their political influence. These families have flourished their businesses, enterprises, or capital throughout the state. They act as a network and meet in clubs (Coyolito Club, Group of ‘Turks’) and decide among themselves on the country’s direction. Entrepreneurs have thus replaced the military of the 1980s and operate through various mechanisms including co-optation through the financing of political campaigns and control of the media (Rockwell and Janus 2010). In addition, the business and employer organizations they control, such as the Honduran Council of Private Enterprises (COHEP), the National Association of Industrialists (ANDI), and the Federation of Chambers of Commerce of Honduras (FEDECAMARAS), allow them to exert a significant influence on political decisions. In Congress, it is traditional for laws with an economic impact to be discussed beforehand by these groups of entrepreneurs, thus substituting themselves for the national representation (Schneider 2013). Finally, the influence of these large entrepreneurs on politics is also achieved through networks of advisors and deputies who work to preserve their interests, moving from Congress to the company and from the company to Congress. As a result, the socio-economic structure of Honduras places the country under the control of an elite, a phenomenon that is resilient because of its long-term roots. It is in this context that we can understand the deep roots of the 2009 crisis and the coup d’état that removed Manuel Zelaya from power. In such a configuration, Zelaya’s distancing himself from the government provoked the ire of the business community and the destabilization of his presidency, leading to the coup d’état. In this sense, Roberto Micheletti’s interim rule and Porfirio Lobo’s return to power (2010–2014) were the means for a normalization and a return to the established order. In a similar vein, the ability of Juan Orlando Hernández (JOH) not only to modify the constitutional text but also to maintain power in controversial circumstances has given him the support of a large part of the Honduran elite. Faced with this structuring of society, which has distant roots, the Honduran population shows a profound disaffection with democracy. Little is at stake during the election, which marks the complete dysfunction of Honduran electoral democracy, which has become nothing more than a screen for the assertion of power by an oligarchy. The decline in support for democracy by the population is evident, from 51% in 2006 to

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34% in 2017 (Latinobarometro 2018). Regarding the Electoral Democracy Index (EDI), Honduras drops 23 places in the V-DEM ranking of the University of Gothenburg between 2017 and 2020, from 99th to 122nd (0.495 to 0.36).4 This citizen discontent corroborated by a decline in the performance of electoral democracy is creating a climate of heightened social tension that became apparent in the aftermath of the 2017 election. In summary, in 2017, different factors combined to characterize a pre-election scenario for political alternation: declining quality of democracy (V-DEM), declining government approval (41% in 2018; down from 47% in 20175 ); declining legitimacy of democracy (in 2018, 41% believe that a democratic regime produces the same results as a nondemocratic regime6 ; support for democracy in its Churchillian definition is 34% and drops 19 points between 2009 and 2018—from 53 to 34); strong polarization (albeit with increasing fragmentation after the coup: in 2013, NEP = 3.58; followed by a contraction in 2017, NEP = 3.07); low and steadily declining turnout since 2009; high electoral volatility (reaching 47.72% in 2017; 42.42 in 2013; 15.14 in 2009 and 6.1% in 2005); and trivialization of alternations due to the historical succession in power of the two traditional parties. Thus, eight of the nine indicators favouring the probability of an alternation are in conformity (see introduction). Hondurans were therefore expecting a political change. However, if this demand for change did not take place, it is precisely because the rules defining electoral democracy were circumvented. Thus, the gap between citizens’ expectations and the conduct of the 2017 election constituted a vector of instability that grew in a context of uncertainty and post-election tensions. The clashes that occurred reflect two emerging realities in Honduras: growing social and political frustration; and assertive competitive authoritarianism.

4 V-DEM Annual Reports, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020. 5 Data from Latinobarometro 2017 and 2018. 6 Data from Latinobarometro 2018.

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17.2.3

Post-election Tensions

On the evening of the elections, on November 26th, the first polls showed the opposition candidate Salvador Nasralla (head of a LIBRE-PINU coalition) as the winner. The next morning, his opponent, incumbent Juan Orlando Hernández (PNH) won the election. The gap was very small, 42.95% to 41.42%, or only 50,446 votes. With such a gap and following technical problems (in data transmission), suspicions of fraud increased and the situation in the country became tense, to such an extent that on November 27th, the military was deployed in the centre of Tegucigalpa, the Honduran capital. The suspicions are mainly related to the counting of the votes. Indeed, after two interruptions of the results transmission server, the first on the evening of the election on November 26th and the second on November 29th, the results went from a five-point difference in favour of Nasralla (i.e. 93,975 votes) to a 0.8-point disadvantage (i.e. 22,677 votes). On November 27th, Salvador Nasralla contested the results and asked for a recount, expressing distrust of the Supreme Electoral Tribunal (TSE) appointed by Congress—and therefore in the hands of the outgoing president—and calling for the mobilization of his supporters. A second computer incident took place when the count was resumed on November 29th, which for the opposition made the election, and therefore JOH’s alleged victory, invalid. The tension was all the greater as the constitutional amendments to obtain a second mandate raised fears about the authorities’ respect for democratic standards. In this context of mistrust, the winning candidate—whoever he was—would have been opposed to re-running the election. In this configuration, the loss of confidence in the efficiency and impartiality of the electoral institutions is complete. In the days following the election and until the end of January 2018, demonstrations multiplied, leading to violent protests, ransacking in various cities of the country, and the blocking of the main access roads to the major cities, notably by the University Student Movement. The Alliance of Opposition against Dictatorship brought together, beyond its simple sympathizers, opponents of the outgoing president from all sides who participated in contesting the election results. For this camp, the election was stolen. Faced with the increase in violence, the government decreed a state of emergency on December 1st 2017, suspending constitutional guarantees, particularly with regard to the free movement of people, as well as a curfew. In reaction, a “cacerolazo” was organized

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during this curfew, which triggered a violent repression by the authorities, leaving 7 dead, 20 injured, and more than 500 arrested. The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights reported 23 deaths in connection with this post-election violence (OHCHR 2019). After several days of tension, the TSE announced the results of the elections on December 17th, giving final victory to the incumbent president, Juan Orlando Hernández, who thus became the first president in the country’s history to serve two presidential terms in defiance of the country’s democracy.

17.3

A Radicalization of Conservatism

The 2017 election does offer a scenario of continuity. In the end, the incumbent president managed to win re-election, despite conditions that were controversial to say the least. From this point of view, the Honduran case is diametrically opposed to the patterns of alternation presented in this book. Indeed, the PNH has been in power since 2010. However, beyond the logic of alternation alone, the aim of this volume is also to understand a political variation described as a “conservative turn”. In this respect, although there is continuity at the top of the power structure, we cannot exclude the presence of a significant change in the practice of power and the functioning of democracy. In this respect, the Honduran case is a way of looking further into this conservative variation. Although there was no governmental alternation, there was a shift towards authoritarian practices through: (1) constitutional circumvention; (2) the exercise of power even though democratic legitimacy was at half-mast; (3) an intensification of the control and repression of opposition of all kinds (political or emanating from civil society). Does this shift reflect a “radical” conservatism? Measuring the extent and content of this conservatism is necessary to mark differences in a continental trend, as was the case under the pink wave where the “progressive turn” was itself highly heterogeneous (Dabène 2012). The radicalization of conservatism is not expressed through the idea of a rightwingization of the PNH. In the Honduran case, this tendency is expressed through three trends: (1) a weak attachment to the consolidation of democracy and its rules of operation; (2) a hardening of positions towards repression in the face of violence and social demands (climate change, rights, etc.); and (3) a denial of political ethics, particularly in terms of

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integrity (corruption and organized crime). Having dealt with the electoral aspect in the first sections, the last two aspects will be discussed here. 17.3.1

Multi-Faceted Repression

Honduras is the most violent country in Central America (37.6 homicides/100,000 inhabitants in 2020). In the face of this insecurity, which is fueled by the criminal activities of gangs in particular, repressive policies have been put in place, reinforcing the use of armed forces. Since 2014, the JOH administration has increased the use of the armed forces, resulting in an upsurge in human rights violations. This repression to fight insecurity has been extended beyond organized crime actors and to control and/or eradicate social protest. In June 2018, President Hernandez used the Honduran army and armed police forces in the capital against demonstrations (2 deaths). In April 2019, new anti-privatization and anti-corruption protests led by students at the Autonomous University of Honduras and by health workers were repressed by force (Insightcrime 2021). These repressions thus echo the progressive curtailment of freedom of expression and social activism, most notably illustrated by the murder of environmental activist Berta Caceres on March 3rd 2016. Human rights and indigenous peoples’ defenders are subject to constant attacks and threats. 17.3.2

Denial of Political Ethics

The dual Hernandez administration (2013–2017; 2017–2022) has been largely characterized by a denial of political ethics, resisting corruption cases and multiple accusations of direct linkage to transnational criminal activities (narco-trafficking). On the issue of corruption, the capture of state resources to conduct the 2017 electoral campaign has been documented by the main foreign observer missions present in the country. The European Union Observation Mission (EU-EOM) indicates that the imbalance in terms of publicity and visibility is in favour of the incumbent president and four times higher than the other candidates (64%, compared to 15% for Nasralla and 17% for Zelaya) (Rodriguez and Gonzalez Tule 2020). On the other hand, it has been shown by Meléndez (2020) that redistributive policies have been widely used to secure votes, especially in rural parts of the country. Social programs such as “Bono 10 mil”, “Bolsa

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solidaria”, “Techos dignos”, “Bono estudiantil” or “Bono de la tercera edad”, have been used as strategies for maintaining power (Meléndez 2020). More importantly, JOH himself confirmed that the resources of the Honduran Institute of Social Security (IHSS) had been diverted and used to indirectly finance (via a shadow company) the 2013 campaign. It was the outrage over this case that forced JOH to accept the creation by the Organization of American States (OAS) of the MACCIH-OEA (Misión de Apoyo contra la Corrupción y la Impunidad en Honduras) on January 19th 2016. However, in 2019, JOH tried to free himself from this constraint due to the indignation of the Honduran public opinion. The PNH-majority Congress dismantled MACCIH and the mission left the country in January 2020, burying with its disappearance many ongoing investigations related to corruption cases. Beyond the multiple corruption scandals that affected JOH without removing him from power, the direct and indirect accusations of criminal activities linked to drug trafficking did not get the better of his presidency either. In the field of drug trafficking, it is not only the president who is affected but also (and above all) his very close entourage, leaving the image and the suspicion of the progressive constitution of a narcostate. The President’s brother, Antonio Hernandez, was the first to be charged in a US court for his criminal activities. However, at the end of May 2019, the US District Court for the Southern District of New York published documents from 2015 that revealed that JOH himself was under investigation for drug trafficking and money laundering, together with his sister Hilda Hernandez. It should be recalled here that his sister, appointed to the post of Minister of Strategy and Communication, had to resign following a corruption case but officially to devote herself to her brother’s re-election campaign. In short, under the JOH administrations, nepotism and clientelism flourish and operate in close relation with organized crime.

17.4

Conclusion

Through the establishment of competitive authoritarianism between 2013 and 2021, the JOH administrations have managed to orchestrate a profound political change in Honduras: to assert a competitive authoritarian regime and accentuate state capture. Honduran democracy has been fragile since the end of the armed civil conflict and has not had the opportunity to consolidate itself due to the lockdown of the political

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system by a ruling oligarchy. To keep up appearances, a façade of electoral democracy has been installed. Honduras is a perfect example of an electoral fallacy (Karl 1990) in the transition to democracy. However, this smokescreen was dissipated by the 2009 coup d’état. The game of state capture and institutional locking became apparent because of the deviance of one of the members of the system itself. Once the artifice was widely known, the democratic illusion no longer held, and indignation grew accordingly. Electoral volatility echoed the recomposition of militant loyalties and commitments. However, to maintain the balance of one side’s interests, it was necessary to change the rules and alter the foundations of the illusion itself, political alternation. Continuity, re-election and staying in power became the strategy that allowed the system to protect itself (while recomposing itself) from a deeper questioning. However, this strategy is not necessarily a winning one. The uncertainty that remains in the face of social and citizen dissatisfaction offers a panorama of latent instability.

References Calvo Ernesto, Negretto Gabriel (2020), “When (Electoral) Opportunity Knocks: Weak Institutions, Political Shocks, and Electoral Reforms in Latin America”, Brinks Daniel et al. (eds.), The Politics of Institutional Weakness in Latin America, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, pp. 41–60. Dabène, O. (2012), “Consistency and Resilience Through Cycles of Repoliticization”, Pia Riggirozzi, Diana Tussie (eds.), The Rise of Post-Hegemonic Regionalism: The Case of Latin America, London, Springer, pp. 41–64. Insightcrime (2021), «Honduras Profile». https://insightcrime.org/hondurasorganized-crime-news/honduras/. Karl Terry Lynn (1990), «Dilemmas of Democratization in Latin America», Comparative Politics, 23 (1), octobre 1990. Latinobarometro (2018), Informe Latinobarometro, Corporación Latinobarómetro, Santiago de Chile. Levitsky Steve, Way Lucan (2020), “Elections Without Democracy: The Rise of Competitive Authoritarianism”. Journal of Democracy, Vol. 13 (2), National Endowment for Democracy and The Johns Hopkins University Press, pp. 51– 65. Meléndez Carlos (2019), «Evolución del clientelismo en Honduras (2009– 2017)», dans Castellanos, J. y Romero, S. (eds.), Encrucijadas de la democracia en Honduras y América Central, IUDPAZ, Honduras, pp. 367–380.

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OHCHR (2019), Situation of Human Rights in Honduras—Report of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights on the Situation of Human Rights in Honduras, A/HRC/40/3/Add.2, Geneva. Parthenay Kevin (2020), Crises en Amérique latine. Les démocraties déracinées (2009–2019), Paris, Armand Colin. Rockwell Rick, Janus Noreene (2010), Media Power in Central America, Chicago, University of Illinois Press. Rodriguez Cecilia, González Tule Luis (2020), «Elecciones en Honduras 2017: debilidad institucional e incertidumbre electoral», Alcántara Manuel (ed.), América Latina Vota (2017-2019), Madrid, Tecnos. Romero Ballivian Salvador (2020), «Democracia bajo tension, elecciones cuestionadas y quiebre del bipartidismo: Honduras (1980–2019)», dans Castellanos, J. y Romero, S. (eds.), Encrucijadas de la democracia en Honduras y América Central, Honduras, IUDPAZ, pp. 205–251. Schneider Aaron (2013), Construcción del Estado y regímenes fiscales en Centroamérica, Guatemala, ICEFI, F&G Editores, Flacso. Sonnleitner Willibald (2007), “Elections serrées dans des contextes polarisés”, dans Dabène Olivier (dir.), Amérique latine, les élections contre la démocratie?, Paris, Presses de Sciences Po. Torres-Rivas Ernesto (2011), Revoluciones sin cambios revolucionarios, Segunda edición, Guatemala, F&G Editores.

Correction to: Latin America’s Pendular Politics Olivier Dabène

Correction to: O. Dabène (ed.), Latin America’s Pendular Politics, Studies of the Americas, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-26761-1 The original version of this book was inadvertently published with volume editor as co-author for all the chapters except the first chapter, which has now been corrected. The book has been updated with the change.

The updated version of the book can be found at https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-26761-1

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 O. Dabène (ed.), Latin America’s Pendular Politics, Studies of the Americas, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-26761-1_18

C1

Index

A Alegre, Efrain, 276, 285 Alliance for Progress, 119, 127 Alternation, 2, 3, 5–7, 9–12, 15–17, 19, 20, 33, 35, 40, 44, 46, 53, 58, 59, 62, 72, 74, 75, 77–80, 84, 86, 89, 90, 93, 100–103, 106–108, 112, 117, 123, 128–130, 135–138, 145, 146, 148–151, 153–155, 159, 172, 175, 177, 178, 188, 193, 198, 203–205, 207, 208, 212, 213, 219, 224, 225, 228, 234, 236–238, 246, 248, 249, 255, 256, 267, 269, 272, 276, 277, 293–295, 297, 304–306, 308–310, 315–317, 322, 342, 343, 346–349, 355, 356, 361, 366, 369, 371, 374 Alvarado, Carlos, 299, 302–305, 313 Alvarado, Fabricio, 299, 300, 302, 303, 306, 316 Añez, Yanine, 223, 225, 240 Arce, Luis, 223, 234, 246–248

Argentina, 2, 4–6, 15–18, 22, 25, 29, 35, 64, 120, 135, 138, 139, 141, 146, 147, 151, 152, 235, 244 Authentic Liberal Radical Party (PLRA), 276, 278, 281, 285, 286 Aylwin, Patricio, 41, 42, 45

B Bachelet, Michelle, 41, 43, 44, 46–48, 50, 52, 53 Baldetti, Roxana, 89 Benítez, Abdo, 277, 283, 285, 287 Bolivarian alliance of the Americas (ALBA), 236, 243 Bolivarian alternative for the Americas (ALBA), 350 Bolivia, 10, 15–19, 22, 33, 136, 174, 223–227, 229, 231, 232, 234, 236–241, 243, 245–247, 249–251, 259, 261 Bolivian workers central (C.O.B.), 239

© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 O. Dabène (ed.), Latin America’s Pendular Politics, Studies of the Americas, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-26761-1

377

378

INDEX

Bolsonaro, Jair, 203, 204, 210–214, 216–219 Boric, Gabriel, 40, 41, 49–54 Brazilian Democratic movement (PMDB), 210 Brazilian Social Democracy Party (PSDB), 25, 210 Broad Front, 57–67 Bukele, Nayib, 71–73, 75–80, 82–86

C Cabildo Abierto, 57, 60, 61, 63, 66 Cambiemos (change), 139, 142 Cartes, Horacio, 275, 277, 280, 282, 283, 287 Castillo, Pedro, 130 Castro, Xiomara, 363, 366 Center and periphery, 310 Centro democrático (Democratic center), 262, 264 Chaves, Rodrigo, 316 Chávez, Hugo, 341–343, 345, 347, 349, 350, 352–355 Chile, 2, 15–20, 22, 25, 29, 33, 40–43, 45, 48, 50–53, 136, 197 Choquehuanca, David, 246 Christian democratic party (PDC), 74, 75 Christian Social Unity Party (PUSC), 295, 297, 298, 300, 303–309, 313 Christina Fernández de Kirchner (CFK), 140 Citizen action party (PAC), 293, 295, 297, 299, 300, 302–310, 313, 316 Citizen movement (MC), 156, 159, 162, 163, 167, 169, 173 Citizen power councils (CPC), 327, 333 Coalition presidentialism, 204

Colombia, 2, 3, 15–18, 28, 29, 33, 120, 136, 228, 256, 259 Colorado, 279, 283, 286, 287 Committee of Independent Electoral Political Organization (COPEI), 342 Community of Latin American and Caribbean states (CELAC), 350 Concertación, 41–48, 53 Conservative, 255–258, 263, 269, 271, 272 Constitution, 42, 46, 52 Corruption, 204, 205, 207, 209, 215, 218, 363–366, 372, 373 Costa Rica, 15, 17, 33, 264, 293–297, 300–304, 307–310, 313–316, 335, 364 Covid-19, 126, 128 Crime of responsibility, 206 Cunha, Eduardo, 206, 214, 215 D Degree of alternation, 5, 11, 16, 19, 33 Democracy, 1, 2, 10, 11, 19, 20, 33 Democratic action (AD), 342, 343 Democratic Change (CD), 74, 75, 177–180, 183, 197, 198 Democratic revolutionary party (PRD), 177–180, 192, 197, 198 Democrats (DEM), 210 Drugs Enforcement Agency (DEA), 237 Duque, Ivan, 259, 264, 268 E Economy, 3, 4, 25, 28 Ecuador, 2, 15–18, 33 Election, 1–8, 10–12, 15–20, 22, 25, 28, 29, 33 Electoral cycle, 1, 3, 5, 15

INDEX

Electoral monitoring mission (MOE), 266, 270 Evangelical(s), 205, 214–217, 219, 293, 300, 302–304, 306, 307, 310, 313, 315

F Farabundo Marti Front for National Liberation (FMLN), 72–75, 77, 78, 80, 82, 84 Fernández, Alberto, 135, 137, 141, 143, 145–149 Fragmentation, 154, 155, 158, 161–163, 172 Frente Amplio (Broad Front), 48–50, 52 Frente de todos (Everyone’s Front), 141, 150 Fujimori, Keiko, 117–119, 121, 124

G Ganar (Win), 276 Garcia, Alan, 121 Giammattei, Alejandro, 90, 92, 95, 96, 100, 106 Golpe, 207 Green party (PVEM), 156, 159, 162, 163, 167, 169 Guatemala, 17, 18 Gustavo Petro, 264, 267, 269–272

H Haddad, Fernando, 207, 210–212 Honduras, 10, 15, 17, 18

I Impeachment, 203–208, 210, 215, 217

379

Incumbent, 3–8, 10, 11, 15, 16, 18–20, 33 Initiative for the integration of infrastructures of south America (IIRSA), 236 Institutionalized revolutionary party (PRI), 154–164, 166, 167, 169, 172–175 International commission against impunity in Guatemala (CICIG), 91, 92 Intralternation, 277, 287

J José Isabel Blandón, 178, 183–187 Juan Orlando Hernández (JOH), 365, 366, 368, 370, 371–373 Juntos haremos historia (Together we will make history), 156, 158, 164, 167 Justicialist, 150

K Kast, José Antonio, 49, 52 Kirchnerism, 139, 141–143, 148 Kuczynski, Pedro Pablo, 116–119, 122, 123

L Large alliance for national unity (GANA), 72–78, 80, 83 Laurentino Cortizo, 177, 178, 183–186, 191 Lava Jato, 205, 206, 208 Left, 1–5, 7–9, 16, 22, 25, 28, 29, 33 Liberal, 269 Liberal constitutionalist party (PLC), 325 Liberal party of Honduras (PLH), 360–363, 367

380

INDEX

Lugo, Fernando, 276, 278, 279, 282 Luis Guillermo Solis, 297, 305 Luis Lacalle Pou, 57, 60 Lula, 3, 4, 18, 25, 207, 210–212, 214, 218 M Macri, Mauricio, 136–145, 147, 148 Maduro, Nicolás, 341, 342, 345–348, 351–356 Márquez, Francia, 271 Menem, 22 Mesa, Carlos, 230–232, 235–238, 244, 247, 248 Molina, Otto Pérez, 89, 91, 92, 96, 109 Morales, Evo, 223–234, 236–240, 242–249 Morales, Jimmy, 89–91, 96, 101, 111, 112 Movement of national regeneration (MORENA), 25, 28 Movement towards socialism (MAS), 223 Mujica, José ‘pepe’, 57, 59, 60, 62 N National Action Party (PAN), 25, 156, 157, 159–164, 166, 167, 169, 172–174 National Concertation party (PCN), 74, 75 National constitutional assembly (ANC), 346, 354 Nationalist republican alliance (ARENA), 73–75, 77–80, 82, 84, 85 National Liberation Party (PLN), 294, 295, 297–300, 302–308, 310, 313, 315–317 National Party, 57–60, 65, 66

National party of Honduras (PNH), 360–363, 365, 366, 370, 371, 373 National Regeneration Movement (MORENA), 155–162, 164, 166, 169, 172–174 National Republican Association (ANR), 275–279, 285 National Restoration party (PREN), 293, 298, 300, 303, 304, 306–310, 313, 316 National union of hope (UNE), 90, 93, 95, 96, 100–103, 106–109, 111, 113 New alliance party (PANAL), 156 New Majority (NM), 46–48, 50 Nicaragua, 10, 15, 17, 18, 33 Nieto, Enrique Peña, 154, 155, 157, 161, 162

O Obrador, Andres Manuel Lopez, 154, 157, 159, 161, 164, 166, 167, 169, 172, 174, 175 Obrador, Lopez, 4, 9 Odebrecht, 116, 120–122, 124 Organization of American States (OAS), 373 Ortega, Daniel, 321, 322, 324–328, 331, 332, 334–338

P Panama, 15–17 Panameñista party (PP), 177–179, 183, 198 Paraguay, 7, 15, 17 Party of institutionalized revolution (PRI), 25 Patriotic Union, 269 Pendular, 4, 7, 33

INDEX

Peronism, 139, 141, 142, 144, 149, 150 Peronist, 16, 25 Peru, 2, 7, 15–17, 29, 33 Peruvians for Change, 118, 119 Piñera, Sebastián, 20, 22, 41, 44, 45, 48, 53 Plurinational constitutional court (PCC), 226–229, 241 Plurinational state, 225–227, 231, 234, 239, 240, 242 Polarization, 179, 180, 195 Popular action, 119, 125, 127, 129 Popular agricultural front of Peru (FREPA), 126, 127 Popular force, 117, 118, 121, 122, 124, 130 Popular revolutionary alliance of the Americas (APRA), 119, 124, 125 Por México al frente (For Mexico to the front), 156, 163, 167 Primaries, 196, 197 Progressist, 33 Public opinion, 188–190, 194, 195, 198

R Radicalization, 193, 194, 197 Reforms, 42–44, 46–48, 51, 52 Revolutionary armed forces of Colombia, becoming Revolutionary alternative force for the commons (FARC), 258, 261–266, 270 Right, 1–5, 7, 8, 16, 19, 20, 22, 25, 28, 29, 33 Rousseff, Dilma, 203–210, 212, 214–217 Roux, Romulo, 178, 183–186, 189, 191

381

S Salvador, 10, 15, 17 Same-sex marriage, 300, 313, 315 Sanchez Ceren, Salvador, 78, 84, 85 Sandinist, 322–330, 332, 333, 338 Sandinist front of national liberation (FSLN), 322–329, 332–334, 338 Santos, Juan Manuel, 259, 261–263, 266 Social encounter party (PES), 156, 158, 159, 161, 164, 169 Social media, 194, 196–198 Somoza, 323, 324, 337 Supreme electoral council (CSE), 323–326, 328–333, 335, 337, 338 Supreme electoral tribunal (SET), 226, 229–232, 241, 247 T Table of democratic unity (MUD), 345 Temer, Michel, 206, 208, 209, 217–219 Todos por Mexico (Everyone for Mexico), 156 Torres, Sandra, 90, 93, 95, 96, 100–103, 106, 108, 109, 111–113 Torrijos, Omar, 179 Tsunami, 156, 159, 160, 167, 172, 175 U Union of South American Nations (UNASUR), 236, 243, 350 Uribe, Alvaro, 256–261 Uruguay, 3, 15, 17, 22 V Values, 3, 4, 8, 11, 15, 28

382

INDEX

Vázquez, Tabaré, 59–62 Venezuela, 9, 15, 18, 28 Vizcarra, Martin, 123–126, 128–130 Volatility, 192, 193, 198

W Workers party (PT), 25, 156, 158, 159, 161, 164, 169, 204–212, 214–216, 220 Z Zelaya, Manuel, 361, 363, 365, 366, 368