Politics and Political Elites in Latin America: Challenges and Trends [1st ed.] 9783030515836, 9783030515843

Citation preview

Latin American Societies Current Challenges in Social Sciences

Manuel Alcántara Mercedes García Montero Cristina Rivas Pérez Editors

Politics and Political Elites in Latin America Challenges and Trends

Latin American Societies Current Challenges in Social Sciences

Series Editors Adrian Albala, Instituto de Ciências Políticas (IPOL), University of Brasília, Brasilia, Brasília, Brazil Maria Jose Álvarez Rivadulla, Edificio Franco, Oficina GB 620, Universidad de los Andes, Bogota, Colombia Alejandro Natal, Department of Social Processes, Universidad Autónoma Metropolitana, Lerma de Villada, Estado de México, Mexico

​ his series aims at presenting to the international community original contributions T by scholars working on Latin America. Such contributions will address the challenges that Latin American societies currently face as well as the ways they deal with these challenges. The series will be methodologically agnostic, that is: it welcomes case studies, small-N comparative studies or studies covering the whole region, as well as studies using qualitative or quantitative data (or a mix of both), as long as they are empirically rigorous and based on high-quality research. Besides exploring Latin American challenges, the series attempts to provide concepts, findings and theories that may shed light on other regions. The series will focus on seven axes of challenges: 1) Classes and inequalities 2) Crime, security and violence 3) Environmental threats 4) Collective action 5) Cultural change and resistance 6) Migrations 7) Political inclusion and representation Both solicited and unsolicited proposals will be considered for publication in the series. More information about this series at http://www.springer.com/series/16592

Manuel Alcántara  •  Mercedes García Montero Cristina Rivas Pérez Editors

Politics and Political Elites in Latin America Challenges and Trends

Editors Manuel Alcántara Instituto de Iberoamérica University of Salamanca Salamanca, Spain

Mercedes García Montero Instituto de Iberoamérica University of Salamanca Salamanca, Spain

Cristina Rivas Pérez Instituto de Iberoamérica University of Salamanca Salamanca, Spain

ISSN 2730-5538     ISSN 2730-5546 (electronic) Latin American Societies ISBN 978-3-030-51583-6    ISBN 978-3-030-51584-3 (eBook) https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-51584-3 © The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020 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 Springer imprint is published by the registered company Springer Nature Switzerland AG The registered company address is: Gewerbestrasse 11, 6330 Cham, Switzerland

Preface

After more than three decades of continuous democratic life, most Latin American countries have achieved political standards as never before. Governments are now adopted through free, competitive, periodic, and reasonably egalitarian elections. Opposition forces have the chance to come peaceably to power, and divisions of power and the rule of law are operating effectively under presidential systems. The result is that Latin American countries have expanded their democratic procedures in positive ways, albeit with obvious differences among them. Studies on the quality of democracy (as from the Intelligence Economist Unit [IEU] or Bertelsmann Transformation Index [BTI]) and on varieties of democracy (V-Dem) reveal both advances and setbacks, but always accompanied by undisputed performance. This book approaches a range of issues relevant to Latin American politics from the perspective of national legislators, based on the conviction that the roles played by parliamentarians—themselves a rich source of knowledge on regional and national political life—deserve to be studied. This is an original study founded on empirical support from the Political Elites of Latin America (PELA) research project conducted at the University of Salamanca. PELA was launched in 1994 and has since developed without interruption, conducting some 9000 personal interviews with representative samples of legislators from 18 Latin American countries. These interviews have been guided by closed questionnaires of about 100 questions each (the academic material produced can be accessed at https://oir.org.es/pela/). The introductory chapter of this book by Mélany Barragán, José Manuel Rivas, and Cristina Rivas speaks to the potential of the rich PELA database. The book is structured into two parts. The first eight chapters address important aspects of representative democracy including political ambition, political trust and trustworthiness, satisfaction with democracy, clientelism, and the quality of democracy. Also discussed in this first section are three salient issues in contemporary Latin American political dynamics: executive-legislative relations, participation by women as representatives, and the significance of both China and the United States to national politics throughout the region. The chapter by Theresa Kernecker looks at the main explanations behind political ambition and the value associated with top offices in Latin America, by way of v

vi

Preface

a descriptive analysis of the office-seeking ambitions of incumbent parliamentarians. The consensus in the literature is that, as compared to US Congresspeople, politicians in Latin America are “progressively ambitious.” But actual results—the offices that politicians successfully attain—raise the question of whether these national deputies are really as progressively ambitious as their career moves may suggest. The author asks whether deputies of the region might not in fact be “statically ambitious,” even when not reelected. The objective of Cristina Rivas and Manuel Alcántara in Chap. 3 is to examine the different levels of trust expressed by parliamentary elites in Latin America in the main political institutions (the parliament, the president of the government, the judiciary, and political parties) through development of a simple index of political confidence (IPC). This permits observation of the evolution of trust across two decades, encompassing a period in which the region has witnessed many diverse scenarios. Analysis is given to whether political confidence has remained relatively stable over the period, or whether it has shifted depending on the political and economic performance of governments. The chapter by Mar Martínez Rosón and Araceli Mateos focuses on satisfaction with democracy, comparing data from PELA and the AmericasBarometer project to better identify similarities and differences between citizens and representatives, and contributing to a broader understanding of the Latin American context, still comparatively understudied. Results show that variables linked to institutional performance influence the degree of satisfaction for both groups, even if notable differences between citizens and their representatives emerge in other variables. For legislators, trust is more relevant to satisfaction than to the existence of corruption, while for citizens, the benefits and performance of public policies (health, infrastructure, education) have a substantial effect. Margarita Corral and Mar Martínez Rosón in Chap. 5 use ordered logistic models to assess the effects of structural, institutional, and political variables on vote buying. In particular, they analyze the impact of the size and level of socioeconomic development of districts, and the political experience and access to resources of legislators, on the use of clientelistic practices, patronage, and pork-barrel projects in exchange for electoral support. Results show that without regard to socioeconomic variables, representatives of more populous districts will offer fewer consumer goods, jobs, or projects to their communities in exchange for votes. Moreover, legislators with prior political experience are more likely to offer all such incentives when running for office, especially when they belong to the political party of the incumbent president. When testing for the effects of a district’s socioeconomic development, a significant inverse relationship with the offer of any of these incentives is revealed. Chapter 6 by Asbel Bohigues and Manuel Alcántara questions whether a link exists between political elites and democracy. Combining the PELA and V-Dem datasets, they examine the stated thoughts and opinions of elites to assess for possible impacts on (or relationships with) the distinct varieties of democracy. This may be of great importance in a region now widely experiencing “democracy fatigue.” Taking the main indexes from V-Dem as dependent variables, the authors

Preface

vii

explore whether questions related to democracy from the perspective of political elites have an impact on such outcomes as satisfaction with democracy, stability of and trust in electoral processes, and ideology as measured on the left/right scale. In their chapter, Ignacio Arana and Carolina Guerrero address the factors that explain trust by legislators in sitting presidents. They go beyond conventional explanations of executive-legislative conflict to investigate whether the personal characteristics of presidents may be associated with the levels of trust assigned them by legislators. An exploratory panel analysis is conducted to examine the causes of trust in presidents by legislators, using survey data from PELA. The authors find that factors capturing the interbranch distribution of power, the political context in which executive relations take place, and the personal (biographical and psychological) characteristics of presidents are all relevant to degrees of trust, and they argue that their findings support the need for a holistic approach to understanding interpersonal trust, both among political elites and in executive-legislative relations. Mercedes García Montero and Cecilia Rodríguez in their chapter seek to empirically prove whether certain theoretical arguments around political careers, as held by gender institutionalism, provide an explanatory framework for the diverse profiles of legislators in the region. To this end, they address variables relating to political and legislative careers, political experience, levels of dedication to politics, and sufficiency of remuneration, as expressed by female and male parliamentarians. Asbel Bohigues and Scott Morgenstern in Chap. 9 look to deepen our understanding of attitudes toward the United States and China by Latin American political elites, with a focus on the predictors of support for these two powers. They rely on data from PELA in analyzing two dimensions: opinions on the influence wielded in the region by the United States and China, and the perceived trustworthiness of their respective governments. The question is raised of whether views on these two global powers, as held by Latin American political elites, are in any way related, and whether the reasons behind rejection of (or support for) either or both of these powers can be seen as complementary. The second part of this book presents more particularized studies of national cases that highlight regional heterogeneity. These five chapters aim to examine the attitudes of parliamentarians in no less than seven distinct political systems, with regard to relevant issues including institutional trust, satisfaction with democracy, executive-legislative relations, clientelism, and questions of gender. All these chapters seek to help clarify the evolution of these attitudes over the course of the past two decades. Chapter 10, by Carlos Ranulfo Melo, Manoel Leornardo Santos, and Rafael Câmara, compares elected deputies from Brazil, Chile, and Uruguay according to their positioning on the left/right scale. Whatever the structural and historical differences between these three countries, their trajectories following military dictatorships make them comparable; these are cases of evident democratic stability and institutional robustness, with relatively low levels of street protest. All have party systems whose degree of structuring is far above the average for the region, where left and right positions are discernible, and all have experienced left-wing governments of similar characteristic. Furthermore, the simplified context of the left/right

viii

Preface

scale can be assumed in all three—even in Chile, where the religious question assumes certain relevance, but not to the point where competition revolves around it. The objective of the chapter by Cristian Márquez and Patricia Marenghi is to offer a comprehensive study of the variability of democratic support and development in Mexico, from the perspective of the political elite, using survey data from PELA-USAL. An empirical-descriptive long-term analysis of the evolution of democratic support and satisfaction with democracy addresses the coherence (or divergence) between citizens and elites in this respect, observing patterns of change and stability after two decades of democratization and comparing the conception of democracy by Mexican elites with that of other Latin American countries. Chapter 12, by Adriana Ramírez Baracaldo and José Manuel Rivas Otero, focuses on the parliamentary opposition in Colombia, with the aim of identifying the determinants that influence parliamentarians to declare themselves part of the opposition. The central argument is that, in addition to party affiliation, the ideology of representatives and their degree of confidence in the president are the main determinants in this regard. Finally, the two chapters by Daniel Chasquetti and Lucía Selios and by Mélany Barragán describe the results of applying the PELA survey to Uruguay and to Panama and Guatemala, respectively, from a comparative perspective. The authors examine issues related to evaluation of these democratic regimes and their political institutions, as well as issues of patronage, gender, and the ideological situation of political actors. The target audiences for this book will be scholars and students of comparative politics in general, and especially those interested in problems relating to representative democracy and the opinions of political elites in Latin America. This book is integrated into the research project “El rol representativo de mujeres y hombres en los parlamentos latinoamericanos,” supported by the Spanish Ministerio de Ciencia Innovación y Universidades. Ref.: RTI2018-094972-B-I00. Salamanca, Spain Manuel Alcántara   Mercedes García Montero   Cristina Rivas Pérez

Contents

Part I Democracy and Institutions 1 PELA-USAL: A Methodological Tool for the Study of Elites��������������    3 Mélany Barragán, Cristina Rivas Pérez, and José Manuel Rivas Otero 2 Political Ambition in Latin America������������������������������������������������������   27 Theresa Kernecker 3 Political Trust of Parliamentary Elites in Latin America��������������������   51 Cristina Rivas Pérez and Manuel Alcántara 4 Satisfaction with Democracy in Latin America: Perspectives from Political Elites and Citizens ����������������������������������������������������������   77 Mar Martínez Rosón and Araceli Mateos Díaz 5 Shopping for Votes in Latin America: When Do Legislators Engage in Vote-­Buying Practices?����������������������������������������������������������   97 Margarita Corral and Mar Martínez Rosón 6 Political Elites and Democratic Fatigue in Latin America ������������������  129 Asbel Bohigues and Manuel Alcántara 7 Executive-Legislative Relations: When Do Legislators Trust the President?��������������������������������������������������������������������������������  151 Ignacio Arana Araya and Carolina Guerrero Valencia 8 Political Paths and Gender in Latin America. An Analysis of the Trajectories of Legislative Elites��������������������������������������������������  173 Mercedes García Montero and Cecilia Graciela Rodríguez 9 Covariance of Latin American Elite Attitudes Towards the USA and China����������������������������������������������������������������������������������  201 Asbel Bohigues and Scott Morgenstern

ix

x

Contents

Part II Case Studies 10 What Can Ideology Tell Us? An Analysis of Deputies and Parties in the Brazilian, Chilean, and Uruguayan Legislatures ������������������������������������������������������������������  221 Carlos Ranulfo Melo, Manoel Leonardo Santos, and Rafael Câmara 11 Democracy and Political Institutions in Mexico from the Perspective of Parliamentary Elites����������������������������������������  247 Cristian Márquez and Patricia Marenghi 12 Parliamentary Opposition: An Explanatory Analysis of Ideological and Evaluative Elements in the Congress of Colombia (2006–2022)���������������������������������������������  277 Adriana Ramírez Baracaldo and José Manuel Rivas Otero 13 Parliamentary Elites in Uruguay������������������������������������������������������������  295 Daniel Chasquetti and Lucía Selios 14 Two Cases from Central America: Attitudes of Political Elites in Panama and Guatemala����������������������������������������  327 Mélany Barragán Index������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������  345

Part I

Democracy and Institutions

Chapter 1

PELA-USAL: A Methodological Tool for the Study of Elites Mélany Barragán, Cristina Rivas Pérez, and José Manuel Rivas Otero

1.1  Introduction This introductory chapter presents the Parliamentary Elites of Latin America (PELA-USAL) project, which has conducted interviews with Latin American legislators in the lower chambers of political representation for more than 20 years. The following emphasizes the PELA-USAL project’s methodology, as well as its most important inputs and future challenges. Based on the experience of researchers from the project, our aim here is to re-think several issues (such as data mining) that arise during the research process, taking into account the wealth of available information (after two decades of development) and the particularities that parliamentary elites present as an object of study. First we consider the main issues inherent in the study of elites from a theoretical-­ methodological perspective. Second, the principles treated in the first section are related directly to the PELA-USAL project. Finally, discussion of the main challenges and future agenda for the project is provided. All of this is supported by the specialized bibliography, as well as by data from the project itself.

M. Barragán (*) University of Valencia, Valencia, Spain e-mail: [email protected] C. Rivas Pérez Instituto de Iberoamérica, University of Salamanca, Salamanca, Spain e-mail: [email protected] J. M. Rivas Otero Sergio Arboleda University, Bogotá, Colombia e-mail: [email protected] © The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020 M. Alcántara et al. (eds.), Politics and Political Elites in Latin America, Latin American Societies, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-51584-3_1

3

4

M. Barragán et al.

1.2  T  he Study of Parliamentary Elites: A Theoretical Approach Interest in the study of elites derives from the centrality of the figure of the professional politician in Political Science. Alongside a general consensus around the importance of institutions, the influence of the human dimension also requires analysis. Although politicians were perhaps initially conceived as one component within institutions, their capacity to influence the rules of the game has since been assumed (Anduiza 1999). The logic here is that, although political actions are clearly influenced by institutional frames, numerous cooperative interactions among distinct actors can produce different strategies, which can in turn modify the political landscape. Politicians are significant because without them, we would have no politics.1 This affirmation allows one to approach to the study of elites from a substantive outlook, in that without representation, it would not be possible to speak of political life (Schmitt 1982: 208; Bourdieu 1990). In this sense, political class is a fundamental component of the political system in every society, insofar as politicians can be a reflection of the sociopolitical context in which they act, the dynamics of power, and the aggregate demands and interaction guidelines among political actors. Various systems have been adopted to approach the study of political careers. Alcántara and Llamazares (1997) and Barragán (2016) have gathered the main theoretical approaches applied to the study of the political class, as follows. Firstly, structural studies put emphasis on politicians’ origins, social ties, and access to power channels. From this perspective, the strategies and actions of political actors will depend on their institutional, cultural, social, or economic environments. Secondly, interactionist studies focus on the interaction processes that take place within political elite classes. Thirdly, the motivationalist approach insists on the relevance of the orientation that politicians exhibit, both before taking office and during the course of their performance. Together with these approaches, numerous research projects since the 1990s have pointed out direct links between institutional frames and politicians’ orientations (Thelen and Steinmo 1992). More recently, Alcántara (2011)  and Martínez Rosón (2011) have argued for conceiving the politician and his or her career as a reality in which very distinct elements may come together—from personal features to relations between rationality and the weight of institutions. Given that representatives in contemporary democracies are elected to act as decision-makers, it is appropriate that Political Science focus on the study of who they are, which attitudes they take, and how elite members act.

1  Politicians can be analyzed in two ways: as actors who explain political phenomena, or as actors who can be explained in and of themselves. On the one hand, political problems can be understood by way of the actions of politicians within the system. On the other hand, politicians themselves can be explained by their own processes of professionalization (Alcántara 2006).

1  PELA-USAL: A Methodological Tool for the Study of Elites

5

1.3  How to Study Elites Rigorously and Systematically? What does it mean to study elites? According to a holistic approach, it means consideration of their sociodemographic characteristics, their expectations and beliefs, and their socialization, previous expertise, and performance. However, given the importance of the figure of the politician, the scarcity of empirical research on political elites and their trajectories is somewhat surprising  (Cabezas and Barragán 2014). This scarcity is even more evident in terms of the study of political elites’ values, beliefs, and attitudes. Despite the impact of Putnam’s seminal work (1973) on the variables that determined the beliefs of political classes in Great Britain and Italy, few studies have empirically approached this subject in depth. In any case, as García et al. (2013) have pointed out, certain relevant contributions can be found that focus on distinct geographical areas. For Western Europe, we have the works of Best and Cotta (2000, 2007); for Eastern Europe, we have the contributions of Highley et  al. (1998), Crowther and Matonyte (2007), and Semenova et al. (2013). For the United States, one of the main contributions was made by Eztione-Harlevy (1993). Finally, from a comparative approach that goes beyond regional boundaries, the studies by Czudnowski (1983) and Eldersved (1989) deserve mention. For the case of Latin America, before the launch of the PELA-USAL project such contributions had been minimal, the work of Highley and Gunther (1992) notwithstanding. This scarcity of analysis in the Latin American sphere can be said to have two explanations, one theoretical and one pragmatic. Related to the former, Latin America during the 1980s was characterized by transition processes toward democracy, while during most of the 1990s, studies tended to focus on analysis of the “third wave” of democracy and on institutional strengthening. Related to the latter, the difficulty of accessing relevant material and human resources must be borne in mind. These difficulties can be even greater when applied to elites, given the complexity inherent in arranging interviews with legislators due to tight agendas and low availability, or even mistrust toward research in general. In any case, the study of elite opinions and attitudes can be undertaken through both qualitative and quantitative techniques, as well as through mixes of the two. In the first group, tools include in-depth interviews, discussion groups, and discourse analysis. With regard to quantitative tools, the survey remains the most common, and content analysis constitutes a good example of a mixed strategy. Qualitative tools focus principally on particular phenomena, seeking specificities. Interpretative epistemology (a subjective dimension) focuses on the individual subject, and the discovery of meaning is associated with intentions and motives for action. On the other hand, quantitative tools look for generalities, focusing on big data with a positivist approach. Thus, numeric measurements range from concrete cases to general descriptions that can generate reproducible analyses by other researchers. Both techniques have their advantages and weaknesses. The main strength of qualitative approaches is that they allow one to obtain information in a specific and

6

M. Barragán et al.

contextualized way. Among their main weaknesses are the huge consumption of resources they can imply in design and analysis, as well as the difficulties they present when comparing data, and the possible intrusion of bias due to the filtering of information by the researcher. Quantitative techniques allow one to generate representative samples for large collectives, creating generalizable data that is comparable in a systematic way. As a weakness, the context in which variables operate is largely ignored, and quantitative approaches by their nature cannot collect information with the same concreteness or precision as qualitative techniques. Faced with these two possible techniques, which are not exclusive and can be applied complementarily, research must first make a methodological decision to define its strategy. Adoption of one or the other approach, or a combination of the two, will depend both on the resources available and on the final objective of the study. Thus, if the context and the search for specificities are to be prioritized, then quantitative tools will be used; if generalization from large samples is the objective, quantitative tools will be used. Together with this decision, other aspects to be taken into account include the selection of concrete tools for development of the technique; the consideration of variables in the research; the process for obtaining data; and the treatment of data. In the next section, the main design characteristics developed in the PELA project will be examined from a critical perspective.

1.4  P  ELA-USAL: Beginning, Evolution, and Methodological Bases The PELA-USAL investigation began in 1994 with a project called “Political reform and parliamentarians’ values in four Latin America nations.”2 This opened a strand of research based on the study of Latin American parliamentarians’ attitudes, opinions, and values, and it sought to fill the breach of opinion studies applied to elites. The aim that propelled the project and which has directed the investigation ever since is to understand who Latin American legislators are and how they behave. Thus, we have paid attention to sociodemographic as well as ideological characteristics of parliamentarians, from a comparative approach. This has allowed, through data processing, the assessment of differences and likenesses among elites from the various countries studied, along with data on a series of factors such as legislators’ careers, their democratic and institutional points of view, their political party relations, or their foreign policy positions, among other aspects (Alcántara et al. 2014).

2  The PELA Project has always had public funding. Over its more than 20 years of activity, the following projects have been financed: SEC94/0284, SEC95/0845, SEC02/3484, SEJ 2005-08313, C/POL, CSO 2009-08971, and CSO2012-39377-C02-02.

1  PELA-USAL: A Methodological Tool for the Study of Elites

7

The research in its pilot scheme applied to a small number of countries: Argentina, Paraguay, Costa Rica, and Venezuela. The purpose of this first stage was to identify the most relevant variables for study, along with relevant hypotheses in both theoretical and empirical terms. Following this approach, we chose an investigation strategy based on case studies (García et al. 2013). Quantities of collected data and the need to study the elites in-depth prompted an increase in the number of countries observed, as seen in Table 1.1, and the first wave ended with 16 countries under review. The final subject was Brazil, which was included in the fourth wave. For the first time, the questionnaire was applied in a language other than Spanish, which allowed the Brazilian Academy to use the project’s databank. Moreover, the numbers of variables to be considered increased with the territorial extension of the project, as will be explained in the next section.

1.4.1  Methodological Design This field of investigation has been qualified as incipient, due to the scarcity of prior studies based on the attitudes and public opinion features of parliamentary elites during the 1990s (Diamond 1999). This was especially clear in Latin America, where the only important study was that by Highley and Gunther (1992). Thus PELA-USAL represented a challenge and an opportunity at the same time. On the one hand, it was a challenge due to the dearth of prior theoretical and methodological referents to guide the measurement of legislators’ attitudes and profiles. On the other hand, it was an opportunity, making the project a pioneer in the study of attitudes of Latin American Parliamentary Elites. Because a new line of investigation was being opened, the project undertook two approaches: empirical-descriptive and empirical-explanatory (García and Mateos 2001). With this double goal, the project first described parliamentary elites in Latin America by remarking those features that identify this class collectively (sociodemographic, ideological, or party-related). Later, the investigation delved more deeply into the explanatory dimension by studying the possible relationships between these features and representatives’ opinions on the consolidation of democracy. In general, as mentioned above, the initial research was focused on four countries and adopted a case-study approach that combined in-depth interviews with questionnaires applied via personalized interviews. Since then, a standard questionnaire has been adapted to different countries from the region, allowing the gathering of much systematic information. The main concepts analyzed in the investigation have been collected and combined into the central points outlined in Table 1.2. These variables were selected for studying elites in some degree of complexity. That is, focus was brought to sociodemographic features and the trajectories of legislators, as well as to their opinions on the main common issues that drive the national and international politics of any state  (Barragán and Alcántara, 2019). Considering the empirical-explanatory view of the investigation, it was relevant to

Argentina Bolivia Brazil

Argentina Bolivia Brazil Chile Colombiaa Costa Rica El Salvador Ecuador Guatemalaa Honduras Mexico Nicaragua Panamaa Paraguay Peru Dom. Rep. Venezuelaa Uruguay N

47 87 62 69 73 933

58.8 72.5 51.7 34.0 73.7

1998–2003 2001–2006 1998–2002 2000–2005 2000–2005

77.5 1997–2001 1998–2002 91.2 1998–2002 54.8 1997–2000 87.8 1998–2002 1995–2000 52.3 1997–2001 24.6 1997–2000 1996–2001 65 83 103 100 68 1371

89 88 49 58 112 63 71 126 70

74.2 54.7 86.0 69.0 92.6 78.8 55.5 25.2 75.3

Second wave Leg. P. No interviews % 1997–2001 128 49.8 1997–2002 98 75.4

Third wave Leg. P. 2003–2007 2002–2007 2003–2007 2001–2005 2002–2006 2002–2006 2000–2003 2002–2006 2000–2004 2001–2005 2000–2003 2002–2006 1999–2004 2003–2008 2006–2011 2002–2006 No interviews 105 80 134 88 95 51 64 98 79 102 124 60 64 56 96 118

% 40.9 61.5 26.1 73.3 57.2 89.5 76.2 98.0 69.9 79.7 24.8 65.2 90.1 70.0 73.4 78.7

Fourth wave Leg. P. No interviews 2007–2011 110 2006–2010 98 2007–2011 129 2006–2010 90 2006–2010 107 2006–2010 57 2003–2006 80 2009–2012 95 2004–2008 121 2006–2010 91 2003–2006 124 2007–2011 69 2004–2009 68 2008–2013 72 2011–2016 93 2006–2010 94

% 43.0 75.4 25.1 75.0 64.5 100.0 95.2 76.7 76.6 71.1 24.8 75.0 87.2 90.0 72.0 52.8

81.3 69.2 69.1 60.6 68.7 2005–2010 86 86.8 2010–2015 79 79.8 1500 1577 Fifth wave Sixth wave Seventh wave Eighth wave Leg. P. No interviews % Leg. P. No interviews % Leg. P. No interviews % Leg. P. No interviews % 2009–2013 70 27.0 2015–2019 60 23.3 2010–2014 97 74.6 2014–2018 93 71.5 2010–2014 122 23.8 2015–2019 109 21.2

1993–1998 1995–2000 1994–1998 1993–1998 1995–2000

1994–1997 67 1994–1997 123

1994–1998 52 1994–1997 46 1996–1998 72

1993–1997 93

First wave Leg. P. No interviews % 1995–1997 68 26.5 1993–1997 74 56.9

Table 1.1  Percentage of interviews in each country

8 M. Barragán et al.

86 91 56 72 94 97 91 128 52 64 55 73 78

2015–2020 69 1395

2010–2014 2010–2014 2010–2014 2006–2009 2013–2017 2008–2012 2010–2014 2006–2009 2012–2017 2009–2013 2013–2017 2017–2021 2010–2014

69.7

74.6 55.0 98.3 85.0 68.6 61.4 70.0 25.6 57.0 90.0 68.8 53.3 42.6 32.1 38.9

2016–2021 61 2016–2021 67 1126

57.0 50.9 95.0 81.0 64.2 55.1 64.1 19.6 64.8 66.2

68 84 55 68 88 87 82 98 59 47

2014–2018 2014–2018 2014–2018 2009–2011 2017–2021 2012–2016 2014–2018 2009–2012 2017–2022 2014–2019

Source: authors’ elaboration, from García et al. (2013) a There is no completely representative proof available

Chile Colombiaa Costa Rica El Salvador Ecuador Guatemalaa Honduras Mexico Nicaragua Panamaa Paraguay Peru Dom. Rep. Venezuelaa Uruguay N 85.9

2019–2024 61

156

49.4 71.9 18.0 2015–2018 100

2016–2020 78 2018–2022 92 2012–2015 90

496

40.6 77.2 73.8 2015–2017 56

2018–2022 69 2018–2022 44 2012–2015 62

20.0

66.7

1  PELA-USAL: A Methodological Tool for the Study of Elites 9

10

M. Barragán et al.

Table 1.2  Points of analysis and main variables Central points Democracy, elections, and form of government

Political parties

Institutions

Patronage system and corruption Function of the State and public policies

Integration and foreign policy

Political career and parliamentary activity

Main variables Stability of and satisfaction with democracy Democratic quality Factors associated with consolidation of democracy and regression risk Design of the electoral system Confidence in the electoral processes Definition and ideal form of government Party identity Degree of continuity among political parties Political party functions Links between political parties and society Confidence in political parties Party whip Internal democracy Confidence in institutions Independence of judiciary Obstacles to independence of judiciary Valuation of armed forces Incentives used during electoral campaigns Corruption perceptions in several institutions and groups Evaluation of public policies and public expenditures Degree of State intervention Function of the State Privatizations Tax policy Foreign policy priorities Regional integrations European Union assessment Free trade agreement assessment Socioeconomic origin and family political socialization Membership in political parties Beginnings in politics Political career motivations Motivations for joining a political party Offices of representation, appointment, and within the political party Why he/she was chosen Political expectations Representation priorities Decision-making Work in committees (continued)

1  PELA-USAL: A Methodological Tool for the Study of Elites

11

Table 1.2 (continued) Central points Ideological axis (left-right politics)

Main variables Identify one’s ideology Ideological distance between political parties Ideological placement of national and international leaders Sociodemographic features Gender Age Civil status Children Studies Job Religion and/or religious practice Level of income Opinions on abortion, drug legalization, marriage between persons of the same sex, death penalty, interdiction of arm sales, reduction of the legal age of majority and longer prison terms Source: authors’ elaboration

ask legislators many questions about their perceptions, their institutions and economic systems, their positions on international politics, and their attitudes, as well as to identify their personal ideologies. Furthermore, as PELA has become the most significant data source on legislators’ attitudes and opinions in Latin America, information has been sought that would permit a deepening of various research strands—on institutions, political economy, international relationships, etc.—thereby extending the resources available to a wide range of researchers. The practical resources needed to conduct such research (time, personnel, and material resources) also drove the decision to acquire the greatest possible volume of data for the purposes of further investigation. From these premises, and through use of the questionnaire and the selected indicators, two general aims were established: (1) the methodical description and comparison of specific cases and (2) evaluation of the reliability of indicators. As regards the first aim, the questionnaire has allowed for comparison as well as generalization due to a systematic integration of several dimensions of analysis. Moreover, recourse to a large numbers of cases allows greater use of statistical techniques to identify causal connections among different variables. As regards the second aim, certain weaknesses in terms of reliability and validation in the questionnaire have been detected and addressed in successive revisions of each wave. New axes have also been incorporated, adapting to the political and academic requirements of each given moment (García et al. 2013). At first, the more relevant indicators—measured in terms of their presence in design and capacity for exploitation—were those which also permitted a description of the legislators’ profiles, both from a sociodemographic point of view and with regard to their attitudes toward the main elements of their political systems. With subsequent waves, the project’s aims have widened and inferences have been established between the opinions and attitudes of elites and the quality of a given

12

M. Barragán et al.

democracy, along with analysis of the degree of suitability between representatives and citizens. As regards the universe under study, this is composed of members of the parliaments in every country studied, and for each term of office. This has permitted us to adopt a comparative analysis strategy of mixed type in which both representatives and countries as a whole are examined. To paraphrase García and Mateos (2001: 178–179): • Each country provides a case study in which features and causal relations within the country are gathered. In this way, the behavior of legislators at a certain moment may be explained from a diachronical view that yields information on changes and continuities during parliamentary terms. • Each country represents a unit of analysis within the region as a whole. As parliamentary elites are also considered in a global way, it is easy to infer regional conclusions and to establish both differences and similarities between specific geographic areas (Central America, the Southern Cone, the Andean countries, etc.). • Having access to studies from each parliamentary term since 1994 allows the establishment of comparisons between different historical moments, considering information from within each country as well as for purposes of regional comparison. Furthermore, such longitudinal research offers evidence of changes in attitudes and behaviors, also allowing for tests of the utility of questions and answers. With regard to the criteria for selection of proofs, a proportional criterion is applied for each political party without considerations of gender, ethnic group, or age. Thus, the specific selection of interviewees is random, in keeping with a methodological decision that gives importance to representation over personal or attitudinal characteristics. This permits the drawing of conclusions around differences and similarities that legislators from different political forces may present (not excluding the possibility of independent candidates). Moreover, the high heterogeneity in the composition of Latin American assemblies as measured in the personal characteristics of their members (by gender, age, and ethnic group) makes difficult the setting of criteria, which might apply homogeneously across all countries studied. Finally, it is important to note that in cases where a planned sample design has not been obtained, the procedure has been to apply a consideration that permits the extraction of representative and generally applied conclusions that can be projected to the entire chamber. In this sense, even where the evidence covers a significant percentage of what is being studied, the level of possible miscalculation will depend on the country being analyzed. Nevertheless, none of these aspects have remained invariable over time. One of the most distinctive characteristics of the project has been its continuous revision during successive waves. In spite of the objective of giving continuity to each questionnaire in order to generate timelines and to facilitate comparisons, changes have certainly been imposed, and these will be developed in next section.

1  PELA-USAL: A Methodological Tool for the Study of Elites

13

1.4.2  Data and Methodological Decisions Throughout more than two decades of activity, PELA-USAL has experienced a clear evolution in the quantity and nature of data collected. This has of course given rise to methodological discussions, which have sought to improve the validity and reliability of data, as well as new information that might be able to enrich the study of parliamentary elites in the Latin American region. Concerning collected data, Fig. 1.1 shows the evolution in the number of interviews in each of the different waves, gathered by legislative period. From 1994 to 2019, a substantial increase took place in the number of interviews, from 933 in the first wave to 1580 in the third. From that point on, there has been a decrease in interviews, due to two main issues. In the first place, fieldwork conducted in Venezuela from 2006 was terminated due to difficulties associated with obtaining a representative sample. In second place, data from Brazil during the 2011–2014 legislative term are still being processed and are not included in these statistics. Therefore, except in the case of Venezuela, the number of interviews has seen a sustained increase from 1994 to the present. Furthermore, in conjunction with these variations in data, the project has had to confront certain methodological challenges. In this chapter, we classify those challenges into four categories: (a) questionnaire design; (b) unit of analysis; (c) fieldwork; and (d) data exploitation.

1600 1400 1200 1000 800 600 400 200 0

1371 933

1500

1577

1395 1126 652

Fig. 1.1 Evolution in the number of interviews by wave (1994–2019). (Source: authors’ elaboration)

14

M. Barragán et al.

1.4.2.1  Methodological Decisions in Questionnaire Design The applied questionnaire has undergone a series of transformations over time, as have its overall length and specificity of measurement. Despite the standardized objective to facilitate comparisons between waves and countries, over the course of the project’s evolution certain adjustments have been introduced to improve the validity and reliability of the data gathered. In this sense, as shown in Table 1.3, early emphasis should be placed on the modification of some questions and answer categories, meant to obtain information or to facilitate its understanding. Another methodological decision was related to the inclusion of new questions. In that sense, despite problems associated with inclusions that lengthen the Table 1.3  Example of modifications to questions and/or answer categories to improve data validity and reliability Original question Currently, there is discussion around the role of the Government. In this sense, can you please indicate to what extent you either agree or disagree with the following statements? • In a society as complex as this one, the Government cannot solve citizens’ problems. • Intervention of the Government in socioeconomic life is the only way to reduce social inequalities. • The Government should focus on a series of specific areas (health, education, justice, etc.) and leave the rest in the hands of individuals. • The Government should intervene as little as possible in society and leave private initiative to deal with citizens’ needs. Revised question I am going to read some statements about the role of the national government. Please indicate to what extent you either agree or disagree with the following statements using a range where one means “strongly disagree” and seven means “strongly agree.” • The Government, instead of the private sector, should own the most essential enterprises and industries of the country. • The Government, instead of individuals, should be the main agent responsible for the welfare of people. • The Government, instead of the private sector, should be the main agent responsible for creating jobs. •The Government should implement strong policies to reduce income inequality between the rich and the poor. • The Government, instead of the private sector, should be the main agent responsible for providing retirement pensions. •The Government, instead of the private sector, should be the main agent responsible for providing health services. • The Government, instead of the private sector, should be the main agent responsible for providing university education. • The Government should implement strong policies to reduce inequalities between men and women. • The Government should implement strong policies to reduce inequalities between different cultural and ethnic groups. Source: authors’ elaboration

1  PELA-USAL: A Methodological Tool for the Study of Elites

15

Table 1.4  Example of modifications to ranges of answer categories to improve comparison with other surveys (LAPOP) Original question According to your religious beliefs, in what position would you place yourself in the following range, where 1 means “minimum religiosity” and 10 means “maximum religiosity”? Revised question How frequently do you attend religious services? • More than once a week. • Once a week. • Once a month. • Once or twice a year. • Never, or hardly ever. • No answer/not applicable. Source: authors’ elaboration

questionnaire and consequently complicate fieldwork, it was decided to give priority to present-day subjects of interest to Political Science, and to issues that allow for the analysis of changes in Latin American political current affairs as well as changes in the project’s own research agenda (for example, issues of gender equality, immigration, and populism).3 Particularly in the most recent waves, some questions related to two specific sub-fields of research. On the one hand, questions related to the study of professionalization and quality in politics have been included as indicators to potentially measure variables such as political career and leadership.4 On the other hand, some questions are focused on the level of political congruence, the degree of coincidence, and any superposition between the attitudes and preferences of citizens and legislators. It should be remarked that PELA-USAL has collaborated with the AmericasBarometer team at Vanderbilt University in the United States. This team has for nearly three decades spearheaded the Latin American Public Opinion Project (LAPOP),5 a public opinion survey that shares several thematic areas with PELA.  Because of this collaboration, changes were made to some questions in order to better fit the approach of the Vanderbilt project. Likewise, as shown in Table 1.4, changes in the range of answers were introduced to foster total homogeneity with the citizen survey. The objective of these changes was to facilitate the comparison and study of congruence. Elsewhere, other questions were eliminated because they presented problems of comprehensibility by those interviewed, or because the information they produced

 See Alcántara and Rivas Otero (2018a, b) and Bohigues (2018).  Examples of added questions: “In terms of your career, what would you like your next office to be?” or “From the following characteristics here presented (education, political expertise, honesty, charisma, or political leadership), which do you think is most important to winning an election? And to win second place?” 5  http://www.vanderbilt.edu/lapop/index.php 3 4

16

M. Barragán et al.

did not correspond to that required by the project. Still others were omitted due to changes in the regional context.6 Another methodological choice discussed across two decades was that related to ranges of answers. As García et al. (2013) argue, a debate is ongoing with regard to the use of answer-ranges, as in the choice of extension (e.g., 0–10, or 1–7, or the traditional range of 1–10). In the original design of the questionnaire, a 1-to-10 range was used, despite a bias effect where the interviewee considers 5 to be a “medium” response; the research team chose not to modify this range so as not to lose comparability with data already gathered. 1.4.2.2  Methodological Decisions Relating to the Unit of Analysis As highlighted in the above section, one criterion used in questionnaire design was proportional representation according to the number of seats won by a given political party. The aim was to collect representative data on legislators’ opinions and attitudes vis-à-vis the distribution of forces within a national assembly. However, the different types of Latin American legislative chambers presented different levels of fragmentation, with some composed of a large number of parties holding a small number of seats. This implies the challenge of guaranteeing the anonymity of the representatives who make up minority groups (García et al. 2013), as well as the challenge of avoiding a plenitude of categories which would make the use and presentation of data less parsimonious. As a solution, it was decided to create the joint category of “others,” in which parties with less than 5 representatives would be included. Although in polarized contexts this category may present a considerable level of heterogeneity, giving rise to incongruent results, it was decided to preserve the category to protect the anonymity of members of minority parties and of independent politicians. Another methodological challenge that needed addressing was related to defections by legislators. Changes in the composition of parties following elections often produced changes in the initial sample design. To deal with this situation, it was decided that each sample would be designed according to the composition of legislative bodies directly following elections, ignoring subsequent changes in the party. That is to say, representatives interviewed are included in the parties to which they were initially attached. This has allowed us to adopt homogeneous criteria for every legislature, and to take an initial photograph of each newly elected assembly. In

6  A good example here would be the question related to the advantages and disadvantages of a democratic regime: “I am going to show you a list of possible advantages of democratic regimes, and I would like to know which, in your opinion, would represent the main advantage. And the second?” At the beginning of the research, in 1994, these questions responded to the interest in democratic consolidation following transitions, and to the level of institutionalization of the state when facing possible threats. However, more than two decades later, challenges have evolved beyond the consolidation of democracy.

1  PELA-USAL: A Methodological Tool for the Study of Elites

17

contexts where the number of defections reaches special relevance, it is necessary to recall the possible bias in the PELA-USAL data and consequent inconsistencies. The third challenge had to do with comparisons between countries. Despite the fact that every legislature of every country is taken as an independent unit for analysis, comparative logic is given priority over the case study. In the same way, specific questions are not included for each particular country, to improve the comparability and homogeneity of questions and to obtain valid and reliable indicators. Finally, the time dimension also implies a challenge. Over two decades of research, countries in the region have experienced substantive changes in context that may have affected the profiles of legislators as well as their opinions and attitudes. Therefore, it can at times be difficult to establish comparisons between answers from the same country but from different periods. However, as when drawing comparisons between countries, questions relating to specific situations have been avoided in order to facilitate comparison and standardization of the questionnaire. Yet another element: the guarantee of anonymity prevents us from tracking the ideological evolution of a given representative over his or her career; it is not possible to compare answers given by the same representative in different waves. Research ethics toward anonymity are given priority, to contribute to the development of the project. 1.4.2.3  Methodological Decisions Relating to Fieldwork Once the questionnaire has been designed, and taking into account revisions made to it in each wave, the following methodological challenge is related to its application through fieldwork. Main discussions around this subject have been classified along four axes: (a) the moment the questionnaire is applied; (b) researchers personally in charge of carrying out the survey; (c) questionnaire application by telematics means; and (d) cases in which the sample could not be completed. With regard to when the questionnaire is applied, the research team decided that the ideal moment would be at the beginning of the legislative mandate. As was highlighted in the previous section in reference to defections, the research aims to obtain information on the characteristics and attitudes of legislators just after elections; thus, analysis is made of the elites who obtain a seat in the legislative period about to start. In this way, we avoid distortions and biases provoked by legislators who are preparing for elections in a near future (especially if they are in mid-campaign), as well as, by contrast, changes in attitude that may be produced later as a consequence of erosion in the exercise of their duties. In the second place, from the beginning of the project to the present day, members of the research team have generally applied the survey. This involves researchers travelling to the country in question, sometimes with the support of staff and institutions at the location. This presence in the field by members of the team responds to two rationales.

18

M. Barragán et al.

The first relates to the need for the fieldwork to be coordinated and supervised by staff already deeply familiar with both the questionnaire and the methodology, in order to avoid doubts or contingencies. In the second place, this tactic responds to the logic of periodic revisions of the questionnaire to improve the validity and reliability of the indicators used. Application of the questionnaire by members of the team further allows the detection of weaknesses when measuring questions and answer categories. As regards telematic application, in recent years there has been an incremental growth of studies using online surveys; that is to say, auto-administered surveys in which the interviewee answers the questionnaire by way of the internet. It should be mentioned that in 2011, certain “quality standards for internet surveys”7 were approved by the German Society for Research via Internet. The main advantage here is the low cost, compared with the costs of a personally applied survey. Online surveys also allow greater immediacy, as Grilli and Pratesi (2004) and Vallés (2005) have argued, noting that half of online questionnaires are available after just 4 days. In addition, this process facilitates access to people who are too busy or difficult to locate for face-to-face surveys. On the other hand, the main disadvantages of this tool are: (a) measurement error and (b) non-answer errors. The first alludes to the possibility of obtaining inadequate answers due to incorrect understanding of a question or its answer categories. The second alludes to possible low answer rates, compared to the answer rate of face-to-face surveys. In this regard, it should be mentioned that the main variables influencing the answer rate are the questionnaire’s length, its complexity, the interest shown by the interviewee, and the problems one may experience when interacting with the internet (Páramo 2004). Given the specificities of the sample and the object of study in the PELA-USAL project, the survey has so far been applied face-to-face by project researchers. Moreover, to control measurement errors of comprehension and to observe possible inconsistencies susceptible to revision, it was decided not to implement the auto-­ administered survey option in order to avoid completion of the questionnaire not by the representative but by his or her team, which could generate bias in the results. Finally, the last methodological decision related to fieldwork was the exclusion of Venezuela as a unit of analysis after the second wave. Despite it is being one of the four initial countries included in the project, the difficulties in conducting fieldwork after the 2005 elections obstructed the gathering of a sufficiently representative sample: no data is available for the 2006–2011 and 2011–2016 periods. Nevertheless, following the 2015 legislative elections, it was possible to resume fieldwork in Venezuela and to obtain a representative sample. Therefore, every Latin American democracy is currently included in the PELA-USAL project.

 http://www.bvm-net.de/user/dokumente/kodex-Q02D.pdf

7

1  PELA-USAL: A Methodological Tool for the Study of Elites

19

1.4.2.4  M  ethodological Decisions Relating to Analysis and Data Exploitation When exploiting data, the methodological debates have been focused along three axes: (a) left/right; (b) elites/citizens; and (c) quality of democracy.8 With regard to the first issue, the use of the terms “left” and “right” in public life in a heterogeneous region such as Latin America has historically proven vain and hardly illuminating (Alcántara and Rivas 2007). Given this, and in spite of several authors having argued for the importance of these terms to characterize the behavior of actors and parties in Western Europe and the United States (Inglehart and Kungemann 1976; Sartori 1976; Kitschelt and Hellemans 1990; Mair 1997), in the particular case of Latin America, the impact of other variables (such as populism) should be taken into account to describe the political universe. However, despite the complexity that the left/right axis may present for Latin America, the evolution of democracies in the region has allowed capture of the characteristics of political and party life along a left/right continuum (Coppedge 1998). In this regard, various works9 have highlighted the notion that, despite differences that may exist, this dimension is observed by Latin American legislators themselves, both for ideological self-placement and for parties and leaders. This is associated to specific attitudes and opinions that facilitate and guarantee the validity of the indicator (Alcántara and Llamazares 2006). As for the second issue, the ongoing collaboration between the AmericasBarometer team at Vanderbilt University and University of Salamanca has allowed a deepening of the study of representatives and electors in terms of ideology and program. In that sense, as García et  al. (2013) show, three objectives are at play: (a) to grasp the direct relation between citizens and representatives; (b) to measure coincident and divergent interests between the two; and (c) to present a global view of coincidence and divergence between the positions of these groups. The study of congruence between elites and citizens gains special importance in the Latin American context, where a representational crisis is seen to exist (Mainwaring et al. 2006; Hagopian 1998). As Soroka and Wlezein (2011) argue, it is necessary to delineate the extent to which government action responds to citizen demands, and to ask whether errors in the mechanisms of representation involve a source of disaffection and make difficult the consolidation of democracy. In view of this, researchers from PELA-USAL have concentrated efforts on assessing the level of congruence of opinions and attitudes between representatives and electors, from a political and social as well as an economic perspective.

8  At present, a new axis of analysis has been incorporated: that of gender, with the objective of analyzing the characteristics of women legislators in Latin America as well as their attitudes, behaviors, and perceptions on different dimensions of the political system, comparing these with those of their male counterparts. 9  See, among others, Coppedge (1998), Alcántara (2004), Ruiz Rodríguez (2003), Freidenberg et al. (2006), and Colomer and Escabel (2005).

20

M. Barragán et al.

Finally, the relation between representation and quality of democracy is a priority area for the research team. The opinions and attitudes of elites play an unquestionable role in the stability of democracy (Diamond 1999), given that they exert a major influence on decision processes, in comparison with other civil society actors. Their professional dedication to politics and greater access to information produce in the governing elites a more elaborate system of beliefs than that found in other actors (Dahl 1971). These systems of belief are in turn transferred to society and influence the political culture of the country. However, the concept of “quality of democracy” continues to present several methodological challenges due to a high level of abstraction, causing difficulties in operationalization. Regarding this problem, a debate persists between two positions: one that argues the level of quality of democracy can be assessed by citizens, and one that connects the level of quality to institutional performance (O’Donnell 1999). Thus the opinions and attitudes of elites in economic, political, and social issues, as well as their positions on policy development, acquire great relevance. To confront these challenges, the initial questionnaire design and the successive revisions have sought to identify the perceptions and attitudes of parliamentary elites and to build indicators that permit meaningful analysis of the main issues informing Latin American politics.

1.4.3  Academic Impact The fact that PELA-USAL has become a standard for reference in studies of the opinions and attitudes of Latin American legislators, together with the public nature of its funding, has moved the team to make publicly available the results of its different waves. The scientific community can now consult the project data and make requests via this website: https://oir.org.es/pela/. Beyond the data collected during fieldwork, the project has generated a heterogeneous body of academic production that, from different approaches and methodologies, has followed the objective of collecting descriptive and/or explicative studies on the profiles and behavior of Latin American legislators. These varied publications can be classified into the following categories: (1) bulletins; (2) scientific articles; (3) books and chapters; (4) contributions to congresses; and (5) doctoral theses. Bulletins are brief informative reports in which certain variables are analyzed in a comparative or case-study approach. There are four collections of bulletins: (a) the countries collection, (b) the issues collection, (c) the analysis collection, and (d) the UNPD collection. The countries collection contains studies classified by three different moments: the years 2005, 2008, and 2012, in which data from every country are exposed, along with comparative works. The issues collection, from 2006, consists of 12 bulletins focused on specific points of research. The analysis collection consists of analyses by researchers from the Area of Political Science of the University of Salamanca between 2009 and 2013. Finally, the UNPD

1  PELA-USAL: A Methodological Tool for the Study of Elites

21

59 60

49

50

38

40

31 25 24

30

18

20 10

6

11

4

2 5

0 Articles

Books and book Contributions in chapters congresses 2010-2012

2013-2015

Thesis

2016-2019

Fig. 1.2  Academic production by researchers from the project over 9  years. (Source: authors’ elaboration with information from reports from the Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness of the Spanish Government. CSO References 2009-08971 and CSO2012-39377-C02-02)

collection is the result of collaboration between the University of Salamanca and the United Nations Development Program’s Democratic Governance Office (UNDP-DGO). With regard to academic production by researchers from the project, Fig.  1.2 shows the total output for 9 years (2010–2019). Data from the project were distributed at conferences and congresses, amounting to nearly 100 documents over this 9-year period. Beyond this, during the period indicated, data from the project also appeared in books and chapters (53) and in scientific articles (62).10 The relatively low number of theses employing data from PELA-USAL indicates the need for promotion of the project to younger researchers engaged in the development of their doctoral theses. Among books and book chapters, noteworthy is Elecciones y política en América Latina,11 which draws on data about the ideological positions of parties and leaders, as well as variables related to institutional systems and the internal organization of parties. Also, El oficio del político (2011) employs comparative and longitudinal data to examine attitudes that professional politicians have toward their own political activity and careers. In the area of the contributions to academic and other congresses, as with published articles, the issues approached show wide diversity. Here, rather than enumerating the many issues involved, it is worth mentioning certain congresses where

 For further information, see: https://oir.org.es/pela/publicaciones/  See Alcántara and García Díaz (2008), Alcántara and Tagina (2011, 2013, 2016), and Alcántara et al. (2018). 10 11

22

M. Barragán et al. 83

90 80 70 60 44

50

33

32

40 30

50

21 23

37

21

20 0 2

10

0

0 0 1

0 Europe

Latin America United States 2010-2012

2013-2015

Asia

Oceanía

2016-2019

Fig. 1.3  Contributions to congresses or research seminars, by geographic area. (Source: author’s elaboration with information from reports from the Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness of the Spanish Government. CSO References 2009-08971, CSO2012-39377-C02-02, CSO2015-64773-R., RTI2018-094972-B-I00, and https://oir.org.es/pela/)

PELA-USAL data was presented (Fig. 1.3). Project data has been significantly presented at academic fora such as the European Consortium for Political Research (ECPR), the International Political Science Association (IPSA), the Latin American Studies Association (LASA), and the Asociación Latinoamericana de Ciencia Política (ALACIP). In addition, members of the research team have presented PELA-USAL data at numerous Latin American and North American universities. Furthermore, academic activities involving project findings and organized by the research team have included the Seminario sobre Calidad y Profesionalización de los políticos, the Congreso de élites y liderazgo en tiempos de crisis, and the international seminar Elites y liderazgo Político en América Latina y Europa (REDGOB) held in Salamanca in 2011, 2015, and 2019, respectively. Finally, doctoral theses in the 9 years highlighted have used data from the project relevant to democracy and legislative power (Bohigues 2019; Santos 2010), professionalization (Barragán 2016; Cabezas 2012), re-election (Treminio 2012), parliamentary opposition (Rodríguez 2014; Vázquez 2015), party competition (Martínez Hernández 2017; Cascante 2014), and parliamentary elites (Kernecker 2018; Rivas 2015).

1.5  R  esearch and Methodological Challenges, and a Future Agenda Since it was launched in 1994, PELA-USAL has maintained as a priority objective the collection of systematic and rigorous data that allows for the analysis of attitudes and opinions among Latin American legislators. This has constituted an

1  PELA-USAL: A Methodological Tool for the Study of Elites

23

important methodological contribution in a field where studies on the opinions of elites had been very few, as well as a significant theoretical contribution, providing data in order to develop theoretical works about processes in Latin America as a whole and individual countries in the region. Likewise, this broad universe of study (every legislature from 18 countries, or almost all of Latin America) has served as a key element in carrying out comparative studies, both geographical and in terms of evolution over time. All this—the thoroughness and periodic upgrading of the quality of data—has been managed in consideration of the need to incorporate new indicators on issues of current concern or academic interest, along with the revision of already extant indicators. Apart from manifesting such advances, the project has also had to confront new methodological challenges. In the first place, we have refined the use of indicators that measure the quality of democracy, due to difficulties associated with the abstraction of the concept. In the second place, we have continually deepened our examination of the congruence between representatives and electors, currently among the main research lines featured in the project. With regard to fieldwork, debate around the use of auto-administered surveys continues. Despite the abovementioned reasons in favor of such an approach, this possibility has been so far rejected, and discussion currently revolves around the possibility of a mixed strategy that combines researchers in the field with the use of new technologies able to facilitate the development of fieldwork. Likewise, the diffusion of data constitutes a pending challenge. Despite the ample availability of this data and its frequent use by the research team, one of the team’s objectives is to increase its use by the Spanish, Latin American, and North American academic communities, not only in scientific articles but in Master’s and doctoral theses. In this way, the aim is to contribute empirical data to the analysis of parliamentary elites in Latin America, as well as to improve on methodologies for the analysis of opinions and attitudes held by legislators throughout the region.

References Alcántara, M. (2004). Quality of democracy or quality of politics? In G. O’Donnell & J. V. Cullell (Eds.), The quality of democracy. Theory and applications (pp.  234–238). Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press. Alcántara, M. (2006). Partidos políticos en América Latina: Precisiones conceptuales, estado actual y retos futuros. In Communication in the Seminario Permanente de Partidos Políticos y Sistemas Electorales. Mexico. Alcántara, M. (2011). El oficio del político. Madrid: Tecnos. Alcántara, M., & Rivas, C. (2007). Las dimensiones de la polarización partidista en América Latina. Política y gobierno, 14(2), 349–390. Alcántara, M., & García Díaz, F. (2008). Elecciones y política en América Latina. Mexico: Instituto Electoral del Estado de México. Alcántara, M., & Llamazares, I. (1997). El análisis de los diputados latinoamericanos en el contexto de los estudios sobre la clase política. Características, objetivos y estrategias de investigación. América Latina Hoy, 16, 15–28.

24

M. Barragán et al.

Alcántara, M., & Llamazares, I. (2006). Los partidos de la derecha en los legislativos latinoamericanos. In M. Alcántara (Ed.), Políticos y política en América Latina. Madrid: Siglo XXI. Alcántara, M., & Rivas Otero, C. (2018a). Despenalización del aborto en América Latina: Proceloso camino. In Latinoamérica Análisis de Política Exterior. Retrieved from https://www.politicaexterior.com/latinoamerica-analisis/ despenalizacion-del-aborto-america-latina-proceloso-camino/. Alcántara, M., & Rivas Otero, C. (2018b). Migración en América Latina: Percepciones de la clase política. In Latinoamérica Análisis de Política Exterior. Retrieved from https://www.politicaexterior.com/latinoamerica-analisis/migracion-america-latina-percepciones-la-clase-politica/. Alcántara, M., & Tagina, M.  L. (2011). América Latina: Política y elecciones del bicentenario (2009-2010). Madrid: Centro de Estudios Políticos y Constitucionales. Alcántara, M., & Tagina, M.  L. (2013). Elecciones y política en América Latina (2009-2011). Mexico: Instituto Federal Electoral. Alcántara, M., & Tagina, M. L. (2016). Elecciones y cambios de elites en América Latina, 2014 y 2015. Salamanca: Ediciones de la Universidad de Salamanca. Alcántara, M., Barragán, M., & Sánchez, F. (2014). Latin American Presidents Leadership (1983-2013): A comparative perspective. In Communication in the ECPR Joint Session. Salamanca. Alcántara, M., Buquet, D., & Tagina, M. L. (2018). Elecciones y partidos en América Latina en el cambio de ciclo. Madrid: Centro de Investigaciones Sociológicas. Anduiza, E. (1999). ¿Individuos o sistemas?: Las razones de la abstención en la Europa Occidental. Madrid: Centro de Investigaciones Sociológicas. Barragán, M. (2016). Carreras políticas en países descentralizados. Unpublished doctoral thesis, University of Salamanca. Barragán, M & Alcántara, M. (2019). ¿Nuevos socios o viejas alianzas?: El impacto de la crisis en los intereses políticos y económicos de los Estados. In: Sánchez, F. & García Montero, M. Los ciclos políticos y económicos de América Latina y el boom de las materias primas. Madrid: Tecnos. Best, H., & Cotta, M. (2000). Parliamentary representation in Europe. 1848-2000. Legislative recruitment and careers in eleven European countries. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Best, H., & Cotta, M. (2007). Democratic representation in Europe diversity. change and convergence. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Bohigues, A. (2018). El matrimonio igualitario en las elecciones de Costa Rica. In Latinoamérica Análisis de Política Exterior. Retrieved from https://www.politicaexterior.com/ latinoamerica-analisis/matrimonio-igualitario-las-elecciones-costa-rica/. Bohigues, A. (2019). El papel de las élites políticas en el fortalecimiento de la democracia en América Latina. Unpublished doctoral thesis, University of Salamanca. Bourdieu, P. (1990). Sociología y cultura. Mexico: Consejo Nacional para la Cultura de México. Cabezas, L. (2012). Profesionalización de las élites legislativas en Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador y Perú. Unpublished doctoral thesis, University of Salamanca. Cabezas, L., & Barragán, M. (2014). Repensando la profesionalización de los políticos. Iberoamericana, 14(54), 164–168. Cascante, M. J. (2014). La competencia partidista en América Central desde la óptica subestatal. Unpublished doctoral thesis, University of Salamanca. Colomer, J., & Escabel, L. (2005). The left-right dimension in Latin America (Working Paper). Mexico: CIDE. Coppedge, M. (1998). The dynamic diversity of Latin American party systems. Party Politics, 4(4), 547–568. Crowther, W., & Matonyte, I. (2007). Parliamentary elites as a democratic thermometer: Estonia, Lithuania y Moldova compared. Communist and Postcommunist Studies, 40, 281–299. Czudnowski, M. (1983). Political elites and social change. Studies of elite roles and attitudes. DeKalb: Northern Illinois University Press. Dahl, R. (1971). Polyarchy: participation and opposition. New Heaven: Yale University Press.

1  PELA-USAL: A Methodological Tool for the Study of Elites

25

Diamond, L. (1999). Developing democracy toward consolidation. Baltimore; London: The Johns Hopkins University Press. Eldersved, S. (1989). Political elites in modern societies. Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press. Eztione-Harlevy, E. (1993). The elite connection. Problems and potential of western democracy. Cambridge: Polity Press. Freidenberg, F., García, F., & Llamazares, I. (2006). Instituciones políticas y cohesión ideológica. Un análisis multinivel de la heterogeneidad ideológica en los partidos latinoamericanos. In M. Alcántara (Ed.), Políticos y política en América Latina (pp. 255–280). Madrid: Siglo XXI. García, F., & Mateos, A. (2001). Elites Parlamentarias en América Latina. Revista Española de Ciencia Política, 5, 173–194. García, F., Mateos, A., & Rivas, C. (2013). “Veinte años de élites parlamentarias en América Latina” (1994-2014). Revista de las Cortes Generales, 15, 135–174. Grilli, L., & Pratesi, M. (2004). Weighed estimation in multilevel ordinal and binary models in the presence of informative sampling designs. Survey Methodology, 30(1), 93–104. Hagopian, F. (1998). Democracy and political representation in Latin America in the 1990s: Pause, reorganization or decline? In F. Auyero & J. Stark (Eds.), Fault lines of democracy in post-­ transition Latin America (pp.  99–143). Coral Gables: North-South Centre Press, University of Miami. Highley, J., & Gunther, R. (1992). Elites and democratic consolidation in Latin America and Southern Europe. New York: Cambridge University Press. Highley, J., Pakulski, J., & Wesolowski, W. (1998). Postcommunist elites and democracy in Eastern Europe. Houndmills: Macmillan. Inglehart, R., & Kungemann, H.  D. (1976). Party Identification, ideological preference and the left-right dimension among western mass publics. In I. Budge & D. Farlie (Eds.), Party identification and beyond: Representation, voting and party competition. Chichester: Wiley. Kernecker, T. (2018). Political representation in Latin America: Legislative behavior and party strategy. Unpublished doctoral thesis, University of Vienna. Kitschelt, H., & Hellemans, S. (1990). The left-right semantics and the new politics cleavage. Comparative Political Studies, 23, 210–238. Mainwaring, S., Bejarano, A. M., & Pizarro, E. (2006). The crisis of democratic representation in the Andes: An overview. In S. Mainwaring (Ed.), The crisis of democratic representation in the Andes (pp. 1–44). Stanford: Stanford University Press. Mair, P. (1997). Party system change. Approaches and interpretations. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Martínez Hernández, A. (2017). El éxito electoral de los partidos políticos en América Latina durante las décadas de cambio político (1988-2016). Organización, programa y niveles de competencia. Unpublished doctoral thesis, University of Salamanca. Martínez Rosón, M. (2011). Ambición política y lealtad: Influencia sobre el comportamiento político. Política y Gobierno, 18(2), 231–264. O’Donnell, G. (1999). Horizontal accountability and new polyarchies. In A.  Schedler, L. J. Diamond, & M. F. Plattner (Eds.), The self-restraining state: Power and accountability in new democracies (pp. 29–52). Boulder; London: Lynne Rienner. Páramo, R. (2004). Estándares de calidad, accesibilidad y usabilidad para la realización y el desarrollo de encuestas por internet. Retrieved from http://www.netquest.com/papers/ Rparamo_Estandares_enconline.pdf. Putnam, R. (1973). The beliefs of politicians. Ideology, conflict and democracy in Britain and Italy. New Heaven: Yale University Press. Rivas, C. (2015). Élites Parlamentarias y democracia en América Latina. Unpublished doctoral thesis, University of Salamanca. Rodríguez, C. (2014). El papel de la oposición parlamentaria en las legislaturas subnacionales argentinas. Unpublished doctoral thesis, University of Salamanca. Ruiz Rodríguez, L. (2003). La coherencia de los partidos políticos. Estructuración interna de la élite parlamentaria latinoamericana. Unpublished doctoral thesis, University of Salamanca.

26

M. Barragán et al.

Santos, A. (2010). Democracia y poder legislativo en Chile. De la representación política a la conformación de las élites (1990-2009). Unpublished doctoral thesis, University of Salamanca. Sartori, G. (1976). Parties and party system. A framework for analisis. Cambridge: University Press. Schmitt, C. (1982). Teoría de la Constitución. Madrid: Alianza Universidad. Semenova, E., Edinger, M., & Best, H. (2013). Parliamentary elites in Central and Eastern Europe. Recruitment and representation. New York: Routledge. Soroka, S., & Wlezein, C. (2011). Degrees of democracy: Politics, public opinion and policy. New York: Cambridge University Press. Thelen, K., & Steinmo, S. (1992). Institutionalism in comparative politics. In S.  Steinmo, K. Thelen, & F. Longstreth (Eds.), Structuring politics: Historical institutionalism in comparative analysis. New York: Cambridge University Press. Treminio, I. (2012). Llegaron para quedarse … los procesos de reforma de la reelección presidencial en América Latina (1999-2011). Unpublished doctoral thesis, University of Salamanca. Vallés, M. (2005). El reto de la calidad en la investigación social cualitativa: De la retórica a los planteamientos de fondo y las propuestas técnicas. Revista Española de investigaciones sociológicas, 110(1), 91–114. Vázquez, C. (2015). La influencia legislativa de la oposición en las iniciativas presidenciales: El caso de los gobiernos en minoría en México, 1997-2002. Unpublished doctoral thesis, University of Salamanca.

Chapter 2

Political Ambition in Latin America Theresa Kernecker

2.1  Introduction Political scientists have identified ambition as one of the main forces driving the behavior of politicians. Ambition theory assumes that political representatives are chiefly motivated by the prospect of a successful career, and that this prospect will influence their behavior and decisions as representatives (Schlesinger 1966). Ambitious politicians cater to those actors who can provide electoral resources, and thus they may be seen as rational and utility-maximizing individuals (Mayhew 1974; Black 1972; Rohde 1979). In environments where reelection is not the primary goal, political ambition implies the desire to cultivate electoral resources more generally, with a view to nomination, appointment to a better office, campaign financing, or good favor among voters (Carey 2009: 3). This means that ambitious representatives will serve not only those who elect them, but also those who control access to whichever office they may seek next. Usually, the party is the main thread running throughout a politician’s career, and voters often elect the party label rather than individual representatives. Parties tend to control selection and recruitment processes, as well as politicians’ access to ballots and campaign funds, and the means to fulfill personal ambitions; thus they have a significant impact on the reelection prospects of their co-partisans (Strøm and Müller 2009). However, other non-party actors can likewise wield control over electoral resources, thereby potentially influencing the loyalties of representatives. Often, politicians aiming for a long-term political career cannot depend solely on their parties to determine their fate. When planning next moves, they may opt to use their party as a vehicle to further their career, or they may rely on personal resources to build a personal reputation independent from the party (Carey 2007). T. Kernecker (*) University of Vienna, Vienna, Austria e-mail: [email protected] © The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020 M. Alcántara et al. (eds.), Politics and Political Elites in Latin America, Latin American Societies, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-51584-3_2

27

28

T. Kernecker

Career ambition can be said to take three forms: (1) static ambition, (2) progressive ambition, and (3) discrete ambition (Schlesinger 1966). Static ambition refers to the desire to be reelected, while progressive ambition signals a politician’s desire to build a political career outside the legislative chamber. Discrete ambition refers simply to a desire to leave politics. Progressive ambition can take various forms, such as seeking elected office in a municipal or federal government, including the presidency, after the current term in the chamber. Most politicians are progressively ambitious, but this sort of ambition will always depend on the risks that a politician is willing to take at a particular point in time (Rohde 1979). In the classic example of the U.S. Congress, congresspeople have been characterized as “single-minded reelection-seekers,” and Congress itself as an “assembly of professional politicians spinning out political careers” (Mayhew 1974: 15). Mayhew highlights two main aspects of the reelection assumption: its empirical primacy, and its importance as an accountability link (Mayhew 1974: 17). The extent to which congressional representatives seek reelection—and how this goal affects the way they go about their tasks (or vice versa)—can tell us much about the degree to which politicians and parties are held accountable to voters and to the proper functioning of democratic linkage. For instance, US congresspeople as reelection-seekers might fit into what has been called a “promissory” mode of representation (Mansbridge 2003). In this mode, congressional representatives aim for the well-being of their constituency and base their judgments on the voters they represent; moreover, they are responsive to sanctions, given their motivation to be reelected to a subsequent term, which will in turn depend on their responsiveness to their constituency.1 The fact that voters hold the fate of politicians in their hands ostensibly forces responsiveness, if politicians are to pursue a congressional career. In this model, Congress itself is the goal, rather than a single step in a longer political career. If politicians were not ambitious to further their career, then they might not have their voters’ interests at heart; they might base decisions on their own judgment, or on that of other actors who the voters cannot identify; and if they were not seeking reelection, or any other office, they might prove irresponsive to sanctions by voters. Research on ambition has varied according the theoretical focus, the geographical coverage, and the data used. Ambition can be approached from different theoretical perspectives (Vercesi 2018), but most studies draw on actor-centered approaches that assume politicians to be rationally motivated individuals. Mainly focused on small-N analyses and case studies, exceptions draw on quantitative approaches from a comparative perspective (Kernecker 2016, 2017; Sieberer and Müller 2017). Research in this area has centered on two main veins. One vein has encompassed explanations such as “institutional opportunity structure” that drive certain types of ambition versus others (e.g., Rohde 1979; Maestas 2000; Maestas et al. 2006; Botero and Rennó 2007; Botero 2008; Samuels 2003, 2011; Kernecker

1  Rehfeld (2009) refers to aims, source of judgement, and responsiveness to sanctions as the main dimensions defining representational modes.

2  Political Ambition in Latin America

29

2016), while a broader literature examines the effects of different types of career goals on behaviors such as co-sponsorship or deviation from the party line, or on levels of specialization, or the attention paid to public opinion (e.g., Maestas 2003; Crisp et  al. 2004; Herrick and Thomas 2005; Meserve et  al. 2009; Victor 2011; Micozzi 2013, 2014; Kernecker 2017; Sieberer and Müller 2017). For Latin America in particular, research on progressive ambition has substantially expanded in recent times, while empirical research on ambition in Europe is less common—although with notable works examining the European Parliament (Meserve et al. 2009), Germany (Stoffel and Sieberer 2018), Italy (Grimaldi and Vercesi 2018), and Europe from a comparative perspective (Sieberer and Müller 2017). Political careers in Latin America diverge from the US model, where a long career in Congress tends to be the norm. Scholars examining Latin American political careers in different contexts have mainly focused on federal systems (Jones et al. 2002; Langston and Rosas 2011; Leoni et al. 2004; Lodola 2009; Samuels 2003, 2011). For instance, Brazilian legislators prefer to seek office at the municipal or regional executive levels after their stint in the legislature and often take leave of absence to take on such posts (Samuels 2003, 2011). Similarly, Mexican legislators begin their careers at the municipal and state levels and respond strongly to regional governors in light of possible future careers in the state government (Langston 2011). Even unitary systems show that regional offices (Chasquetti 2010; Chasquetti and Micozzi 2014), the national executive (Taylor-Robinson 1992), or reelection (Botero 2008) are attractive possibilities for legislators for a next career step, and even those seeking reelection may opt for “unorthodox” moves due to party competition (Botero 2008). The consensus in the literature is that, compared to US congresspeople, politicians in Latin America are progressively ambitious. However, we are mostly acquainted only with winning results—the offices that politicians successfully achieve. Are deputies truly as progressively ambitious as their career moves might suggest? Might it be that deputies are statically ambitious, even if they are not actually reelected? This chapter describes the predominant explanations behind ambition and the value associated with the major political offices in Latin America, and it provides a descriptive analysis of parliamentarians’ career ambitions based on data for the period 2006–2012 from Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Costa Rica, Colombia, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, and Uruguay.

2.2  Typical Explanations of Ambition Legislators are constantly evaluating their goals, and they tend to strive toward maximizing their benefit based on those options seen as most “available, accessible, and attractive” (Borchert 2011). Politicians examine their alternatives in terms of which can yield the greatest expected value. This is done by analyzing the costs, benefits, and probabilities associated with certain career moves at any given point in time,

30

T. Kernecker

and the result of such analysis is more likely to influence their decision than any other factors deriving from their past (Black 1972). The main relevant issues when making such a decision include evaluating the costs associated with seeking another office, and the utility that different alternatives can offer. Another question involves the timing of the decision to move on to another office (Maestas et al. 2006). For instance, a deputy who seeks a more prestigious post at the national level may want to invest more time into building his or her reputation before making such a move. Many of these calculations depend on the extent to which electoral institutions allow candidates to cultivate a personal reputation. The factors influencing certain types of ambition are many and complex, but the main aspects discussed in the literature are: the electoral system, recruitment and selection, contextual factors, and characteristics of individual legislators. The chief explanatory factor underlying career decisions is the electoral incentive, referred to by Mayhew as the “electoral connection”; specifically, this factor encourages a politician’s dependence upon (or independence from) the party as the means to continue a political career. In this vein, Carey and Shugart (1995) argued that electoral rules provide incentives for politicians to cultivate a personal reputation or to contribute to a party’s reputation, based on the extent to which parties control access to the ballot, whether votes are pooled at the party level, and whether citizens can cast party-based votes. The magnitude of a given district can also have an effect, depending on the control of access to the party label by party leaders; given an absence of intra-party competition in larger districts, the incentives for personal vote-seeking will decrease. Conversely, the presence of intra-party competition in large districts encourages personal vote-seeking because candidates need to distinguish themselves from one another (Carey and Shugart 1995: 430). This is also expected to vary based on the party-in-district dynamic, i.e., the ratio of co-­ partisan candidates to the number of seats available in the district. Other aspects of electoral systems can also determine the attractiveness and accessibility of an office (such as whether candidates can be reelected, the length of the term, and the requirements made of the candidate). For instance, an office becomes more attractive in systems that allow consecutive reelection, or that feature lower entry requirements and/or longer terms. In relation, recruitment and selection procedures governed by parties can determine which candidates have access to the ballot in the first place, as well as their place on the list (Siavelis and Morgenstern 2008). The role of electoral systems in determining opportunities further interacts with contextual variables such as the electoral environment. For instance, differing distributions of party strength and differing electoral bases should affect the availability of offices to ambitious legislators (Schlesinger 1966: 130). As competition between parties decreases, the more similar the career lines and opportunities will be. Along these lines, lower levels of competition drive legislators to seek reelection (Botero 2008) or higher offices (Samuels 2003), while high levels of competition force legislators to look elsewhere (Botero 2008). However, party competition can play out very differently at the national and regional levels. Schlesinger’s findings (1966) showed that differences in party competition between states had an effect on careers and parties at the national level, while Black (1972) found that the degree of

2  Political Ambition in Latin America

31

competition in local elections affected the risks for politicians and the investment required to win office, and that only those expecting large benefits will run for office in large, competitive districts. The cost-benefit analysis of examining different career moves also depends on the profile of the individual politician. Black (1972) argues that career moves are based more on short-term calculations; but Bell and Price (1969) report that a previous career path can also be indicative of a politician’s next goals. Previous political experience can include whether one has already been elected to political office, whether one is incumbent, and whether previous experience includes an executive office (compared to a legislative office), or an elected office as opposed to an appointed office. Each of these types of experience implies varying dependence on different constituencies, sub-constituencies, and the party. Holding a party office within Congress can be an incentive to seek reelection, while already having run a campaign implies a certain reputation and degree of public visibility. Appointed offices are more associated with party representation and may influence appointment to future offices. Kernecker (2016) has shown that congressional representatives who have held public office and have lower retrospective loyalty toward their party are more likely to seek offices such as mayor, while those who have held appointed office are more likely to seek other particular appointed offices. Further aspects including ideology can also influence a politician’s career: in the USA, those at the ideological poles are more likely to run for Congress (Thomsen 2014), while elsewhere, those on the ideological left are less likely to harbor static ambition (Leoni et al. 2004; Kernecker 2016). Overall, the electoral system, the party, and contextual factors all determine the structure of opportunity, which determine the value of office.

2.3  The Value of Office in Latin America Political offices vary in their value, making it difficult to compare offices hierarchically across institutional frameworks based on a generalizable scale. Instead, it is useful to examine the benefits of different offices that may be associated with term limits, reelection or advancement options, reputation enhancement possibilities, policy influence, access to resources, or “risk-taking” (Rohde 1979). Though career possibilities also vary in weight and value across countries, several offices do exist across institutional environments: president, national executive (cabinet post), legislative office, regional executive, and mayor. The ideal scale would measure the attractiveness, accessibility, and availability of offices based on the opportunity structure that allows assignment of a value to each office from a cross-national perspective. Failing that, it is useful to discuss the advantages and disadvantages for ambitious politicians based on the type of office and the “three As”: attractiveness, accessibility, and availability. Two main distinctions encompass whether an office is executive or legislative, and whether it represents the national or regional level of government. Mayhew (1974) points out that executive office (including a

32

T. Kernecker

presidency, governorship, or large-city mayoralty) distinguishes itself from congressional office in that candidates are highly visible in executive elections; executives control government and can take credit for its accomplishments more easily than parties. These individuals have more autonomy from the party given their individual record, as opposed to a party’s largely congressional record. Despite the attractiveness of executive office versus legislative, the scale of desirability may also depend on the level of government (e.g., national-level careers may be at the top of the scale, compared to regional careers). Reelection to the lower legislative chamber can be an attractive option for all types of deputies (rank-and-file members or “backbenchers”). On the one hand, reelection allows for building a reputation in Congress and within the party in order to continue a career at the national level (moving on to the senate or executive branch). On the other hand, reelection can be an opportunity for deputies who wish to cultivate a reputation among their constituencies, with a focus on bringing resources to the district. Most chambers allow for consecutive reelection, apart from Costa Rica (until recently, consecutive reelection was also constrained in Mexico). Term limits for lower-chamber office range between 3 and 5 years, while Argentina renews half of its chamber every 2 years. Reelection is a relatively safe option and allows one to pursue various types of career paths (e.g., congressional-national, congressional-local, or simply as one step in a longer career outside the legislature) (Samuels 2003). Compared to the senate in bicameral congresses, the lower chamber is also quite accessible and available: these offices have lower age requirements, and the chamber is generally larger than the senate, offering more potential seats. The largest chambers are in federal countries such as Argentina (257 seats), Brazil (513), and Mexico (500), while the remaining countries range between 50 and 160 seats. The attractiveness of reelection here depends on the possibilities of cultivating a reputation within the party, or among voters (e.g., by striving for leadership positions or the possibility of bringing resources to one’s district). Also important is the relative attractiveness of other offices within the political system, compared to the benefits of continuing a career in congress, along with the extent to which parties control access to a congressional office. For instance, the literature finds higher turnover rates in both Brazil and Argentina; but in Brazil, incumbents have a greater possibility of choosing their own career paths, while in other countries (such as Argentina) parties play a bigger role in the selection process, and deputies run a risk of being placed lower on the electoral list (Samuels 2003). Overall, however, reelection to the national lower chamber is an accessible and available option compared to the national executive branch or the senate, but it may be less attractive compared to other offices (e.g., at the regional level). As regards the second or higher chamber of legislature, the senate tends to be more policy-oriented and professional in many Latin American countries (Argentina, Brazil, Bolivia, Chile, Colombia, Dominican Republic, Mexico, Paraguay, Uruguay) and it is comparable to the U.S. Senate in terms of constitutional powers. The senate is a counterweight to the lower house and is regarded as imbued with greater expertise, thereby reducing the instability of legislative outcomes, and it tends to offer greater veto power or influence given the smaller number of senators (Llanos and

2  Political Ambition in Latin America

33

Sánchez 2006). Senate terms are also longer than in the lower house, in several cases; in Brazil and Chile, senators are elected for 8 years (one-third and two-thirds being renewed every 4 years in Brazil, and half every 4 years in Chile). In most cases, senators are elected for 4-to-6 year terms. Overall, Latin America’s senates are directly elected (with the exception of ten senators in Chile, who are appointed), and both chambers are almost equal in their constitutional powers (Llanos and Nolte 2003). However, the senate tends to be smaller than the lower chamber, making a senate seat less accessible than an office in the lower house. Senators also tend to have slightly different profiles than lower house deputies; they are often older and more “mature” than lower house counterparts given the (commonplace) higher age requirements. Access to a senate office is also more difficult due to more stringent electoral barriers (i.e., more financial and political resources are required). Furthermore, the partial renewals typical of the upper house reduce the number of positions at stake in every contest, thereby posing more constraints on potential candidates (Llanos and Sánchez 2006: 138). Comparison of the lower and upper chambers also distinguishes two main dimensions: congruence (the differing make­up of the chambers) and symmetry (constitutional power balance between chambers). Overall, the senate is an attractive and accessible option for politicians who have built a reputation in the lower house and are aiming to move to the more prestigious chamber, but the accessibility is comparatively lower. Moving to the executive branch, the most prestigious office is that of the presidency. Presidents are independent from congress and have at their disposal a wide spectrum of instruments to intervene in the lawmaking process: bill initiation, power of decree, and total or partial veto. Based on Doyle and Elgie’s presidential power scores (2016), the countries in the region with the most presidential power include Chile and Ecuador, while Paraguayan and Guatemalan presidents have the least (compared to their regional counterparts).2 Presidents also have access to bargaining chips: particular payoffs to representatives in exchange for support on a specific policy issue, as well as agenda-setting power (Cox and Morgenstern 2001). Recruitment and selection processes are less constraining for executives (compared to legislators) because presidential races are more centered on the candidate, emphasizing their personalities and positions within certain context. Executive candidates are thus less bound to certain loyalties that the recruitment process engenders, and yet they are usually party insiders (Siavelis and Morgenstern 2008). Additionally, the presidential office may vary in value depending on reelection prospects. Currently, four countries of the region allow one second consecutive term (Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, and Dominican Republic), six permit non-­consecutive reelection (Chile, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Panama, Peru, and Uruguay), and three prohibit reelection altogether (Mexico, Paraguay, and Guatemala). Bolivia and Nicaragua have also allowed consecutive terms for presidents, although the presidents in these countries were already in or pursuing their third consecutive terms; Ecuador likewise voted to lift term limits in 2015. Overall, the presidency is only available to

 https://presidential-power.com

2

34

T. Kernecker

one person; the position is very attractive (though this may vary depending on the constitutional powers of the office) and somewhat more accessible (given less-constrained selection processes) than legislative office. Seeking the presidency may be a useful way for candidates to seek visibility in the political arena to further their careers, yet given limited availability, they may prefer to seek positions that are more widely available. The national executive branch offers an array of appointed positions within the presidential cabinet. Cabinet members serve as a symbolic link between the president and the legislature and are visible in the public eye. Cabinet members everywhere serve two purposes, to greater or lesser degrees: they help build support for those legislative proposals that fall within the purview of their office, and they oversee government departments that implement legislation (Amorim Neto and Samuels 2010). They depend mainly on the president, who has the power to freely select and dismiss them. Generally, the roles of cabinet members will vary depending on the level of power-sharing with the president; in the USA, for instance, power in decision-­making is relatively decentralized (Araújo et al. 2016). Executives under presidentialism (as compared to parliamentarism) have stronger incentives to appoint non-partisans, and Amorim Neto and Samuels (2010) find that cabinets do indeed tend to be less partisan and proportional under pure presidentialism. Executives appoint ministers who they believe will best fulfill their goals, and executive preferences concerning cabinet composition reflect (1) their policy preferences around outcomes and (2) under majority rule, the extent of their need to negotiate with other actors—including members of their own party—in order to obtain those outcomes (Amorim Neto and Samuels 2010: 11). They should have a policy reputation and, most importantly, should be able to bargain and work with various parties to compromise on issues, given their link between the president and congress and the fact that a cabinet member’s party will not always match the partisan constellation in congress. Regarding the availability of cabinet office, there are a limited number of positions given the limited number of ministries, ranging between around 10 and 30, and this number may be increased or reduced depending on the president (e.g., in both Argentina and Brazil, the number of ministries have been reduced under current presidents). The office of cabinet member is thus attractive but may be less accessible, given their reduced number (compared to regional or congressional offices). In Samuels’ (2003) words, in reference to Brazil, “The probability of landing a national position is low because the supply remains short. There are simply very few ministries relative to the number of deputies who aspire to be minister” (Samuels 2003: 52). A cabinet office is therefore more available than the presidency, and attractive, but potentially less accessible given that these depend entirely upon the president for appointment. Regional governments vary widely across countries, thereby affecting the type of political office available at this level. Generally, sub-national governments are distributed across between one and three levels of government, and countries in the region have become increasingly decentralized across recent decades. The national/ sub-national distribution of power is an important factor in determining political careers, and this varies mainly according to the sequence with which

2  Political Ambition in Latin America

35

decentralization processes have taken place (Falleti 2010). Especially in federal systems, states/provinces have been receiving greater political, administrative, and financial autonomy, to varying extents, making the regional executive branch an attractive one. Specifically, the attractiveness of such an office depends largely on the competencies and legislative power of regional authorities (depending on the direction of power relations relative to the national government). The sub-national share of expenditures, policy-making authority, territorial representation in the national legislatures, and whether authorities are elected or appointed (Mainwaring and Samuels 1999) can help in measuring the distribution of national-to-sub-­ national power. The attractiveness and accessibility of sub-national office depends on the way regional executives are put into office, and the extent to which they can be removed. The power of regional executives can thus vary substantially, often possessing a largely symbolic power, while others have real control over the regional government and even over the regional party organization, and sometimes the power to remove municipal authorities. During processes of decentralization, there has been an effort to strengthen regional authorities and to provide direct election of regional executives in cases where they are currently appointed. Some countries allow direct election but are subject to restrictions by the central government on expenditures, or else are limited in their functions (e.g., in Colombia). Other countries have direct elections of regional executives, but these offices remain relatively weak, or in a stage of development (e.g., in Bolivia, Ecuador, Paraguay, or Peru) (Bland 2011: 85–86). Examples where regional executives are appointed (thereby increasing their dependency on the president) include Costa Rica, Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Guatemala, and Panama; in the remaining countries, they are elected for 3-to-6-year terms. A recent constitutional reform in Chile provided for direct election of the regional council and governors for the first time in 2020 (previously, intendentes were appointed by the president). In sum, the office of regional executive varies greatly in terms of attractiveness (depending on degrees of autonomy and power-sharing with other levels), availability (depending on the number of regional units), and accessibility (e.g., elected by voters versus appointed by the president). The probability of obtaining a regional executive office is clearly higher than the national executive office, given the availability of regional offices; so to an ambitious deputy, regional executive positions are more attractive than national executive positions (due to higher probability of access, and because regional executive offices come with significant benefits, especially in countries like Mexico, Argentina, and Brazil. Samuels sums up the attractiveness of a regional executive position in Brazil in terms of “prestige, pork, and the pen” (Samuels 2003: 20). However, such an office is attractive in unitary contexts (as in Uruguay, where gubernatorial elections are non-concurrent with federal elections (Chasquetti and Micozzi 2014). Availability depends on the number of regional units (states or provinces), ranging mostly between 15 and 30—as well as whether such an office exists at all. At the municipal level, a mayoralty generally offers the option of being reelected and allows devolution of resources and decision-making power to that level of government. Municipalities have become increasingly attractive and autonomous in the

36

T. Kernecker

process of decentralization, although the extent of the latter varies across countries. Whereas not all regional executive authorities are elected, mayors are mostly elected directly, meaning voters are free to choose among individual candidates (open party lists). In this case, a mayoralty is especially attractive because it allows the cultivation of a personal reputation amongst constituents, and a mayor is held accountable when and if they run for reelection, opposed to depending solely on the party. Mayors are directly elected in Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Ecuador, Nicaragua, Panama, and Paraguay. However, the office differs in the extent to which mayors can arbitrarily be removed, which is the case in several countries (Argentina, Bolivia, Ecuador, Honduras, Nicaragua, and Paraguay) (Bland 2011). Other factors making the municipal level attractive compared to other offices are (similar to the case of regional executives) the level of power-sharing with other levels of government and their overall competencies. For instance, in Brazil, municipalities have the status of federal entities, while in Argentina they are dependent on provinces. It could be expected that mayoralty is least attractive in countries that are most centralized, and where municipal authorities have fewer functions—in El Salvador, Nicaragua, Paraguay, Uruguay, and Honduras municipal politics are relatively weak (Bland 2011: 80–82). Considering the number of mayoral seats available, the office of the mayor is also quite available and accessible. For instance, in Argentina and Mexico there are over 2000 municipalities, and in Brazil over 5000. In unitary countries, the office is also widely available; several countries have 250–350 municipalities, and there are 1866 in Peru (which features two levels of municipal government). The attractiveness of a mayoral office also depends on the size, constituency, and homogeneity of the municipality. For instance, large-city mayors are more likely to enjoy greater public visibility and may more easily build a reputation independent from the party than mayors in smaller municipalities or in rural areas. The office allows politicians to target specific issues and constituencies at the municipal level and gives the opportunity to gather executive experience, to cultivate a local reputation, and to gain experience running campaigns based around their person, thus implying a certain degree of autonomy from the party reputation. Mayoralty is therefore an attractive and accessible alternative to running for reelection in several countries of the region.

2.4  Office Ambitions in Latin America One typical approach to analyzing ambition draws on actual offices held as a proxy of ambition. In other words, ambition is often measured by retrospectively collecting data on the political careers of politicians. This implies that ambitious people who have not decided to run or who were not elected to the office sought are left out of analyses; and most analyses based on such data are limited in their scope, given the lack of comparable data across countries and regions. While this analytical approach is widespread, asking politicians directly about their goals offers several advantages, as compared to tracing their career steps ex post facto. As Crisp and

2  Political Ambition in Latin America

37

co-authors assert, “It is difficult to disentangle whether legislators would prefer reelection but cannot achieve it, or if they simply do not prefer it, but career paths and ambition clearly do not follow the pattern that is typical for members of the U.S. House.” (Crisp et al. 2009: 48). Indeed, there may be a significant gap between desired and observed career paths. To fill this gap, surveys can systematically collect attitudinal data on the offices to which politicians aspire before they run for the office, thus tapping into the actual desire to run for a given office. While surveys may suffer from social desirability bias, or from the possibility that politicians are not always truthful, attitudinal measures in this case are preferable to behavioral proxies and can provide greater validity (Sieberer and Müller 2017). In fact, one can expect the actual ambitions of deputies to diverge from their actual career moves. If the costs are too high for the office they seek, they may pursue the more feasible (rather than the desired) option. In other cases, the office sought might coincide with the actual office. Until recently, little has been known about the desired careers in Latin America, since most research on ambition has drawn on behavioral proxies (actual career moves). However, since around 2005 the PELA-USAL survey has incorporated a question for congresspersons regarding their goals. All the surveys that included this question since 2006 are drawn upon here, and the available data on ambition has increased substantially compared to the sample used in Kernecker (2016). The current sample includes data from Argentina (surveys 67 and 73), Bolivia (surveys 62 and 81), Brazil (survey 75), Colombia (surveys 59 and 83), Chile (surveys 60 and 76), Costa Rica (surveys 56 and 78), Dominican Republic (surveys 64 and 82), Ecuador (surveys 72 and 90), El Salvador (surveys 58, 70, and 88), Guatemala (surveys 68, and 85), Honduras (surveys 57 and 74), Mexico (surveys 63 and 79), Nicaragua (surveys 66 and 86), Panama (survey 71), Paraguay (survey 79), Peru (surveys 61, 80, and 84), and Uruguay (survey 76). The largest chambers have the smallest samples (Mexico, Brazil, and to a lesser extent Argentina), while the share of deputies interviewed is relative high in Costa Rica, El Salvador, Uruguay, Paraguay, and Panama, with over 80% of the chamber being interviewed. On average, the samples are highly representative, with a few exceptions. The survey question in the Proyecto de Elites Parlamentarias en América Latina (PELA-USAL) asks: “After your current office, what would you like your next office to be?” The dependent variable is divided into several categories. The six main categories include the Presidency, Mayoralty, Regional Executive, National Executive, reelection to current office, and Senate. Most of the offices exist in all of the countries included in the analysis, except the senate in unicameral systems or, to a lesser extent, regional executive. Two further categories include the private sector, and “other.” Figure 2.1 provides an overview of ambitions for further office by type of goal, ordered from most to least preferred. Figure 2.1 displays the offices in terms of their overall desirability in the entire dataset, as well as the desirability of each office by country. Reelection is the most coveted ambition, for 867 of the 2244 deputies in the dataset (38.64%), and is thus at the top of the hierarchal scale of desirability across institutional frameworks. Mayoralty is the second most desired post; 262 deputies (11.68%) claim that they

38

T. Kernecker

Fig. 2.1  Office Goals by Office Type

seek a mayoralty as the next step in their career. Next, the national executive branch represents the third most coveted possibility; 250 deputies (11.14%) would seek cabinet membership after their congressional term. Following the national executive branch, the senate is the next most attractive office in those countries with bicameral legislatures (248, or 11%). An office in the regional executive branch follows this, with 209 or 9.31% of deputies in the dataset considering this office. The next most coveted political office is the presidency, with 120 deputies claiming this as their next goal (5.35%). Finally, 178 deputies (7.93%) claimed “other” as their next desired career step, while 110 (4.9%) would seek jobs in the private sector after their term in congress. Figure 2.1 shows the percentage of deputies by country that would seek each office, and Fig. 2.2 shows the same information by providing an overview of the most desired offices by country. Reelection is most desired outcome in Brazil. In fact, Brazilian deputies desire reelection about 30% more than do deputies in other countries where reelection is at the top of the list (such as Chile, the classical example of static ambition with low turnover rates). Specifically, 87% of Brazilian deputies seek reelection in comparison to approximately 50% in Honduras, Chile, Paraguay, Guatemala, Panama, El Salvador, and Peru. This may seem surprising or counterintuitive to scholars of Brazilian politics, given empirical evidence that has emphasized higher turnover rates and more dynamic career moves. One possible explanation is that the institutions actually encourage reelection-seeking, which may explain the high share of reelection-seekers in the survey responses, despite the fact that the probability of attaining and maintaining political power at the national level is relatively slim in practice. Specifically, mayoralty may simply represent one of the more tangible

2  Political Ambition in Latin America

39

Fig. 2.2  Office goals by country

options, even if deputies did not truly desire that office when asked the question at the beginning of the legislative period. Empirically, Brazilian deputies do indeed take jobs at the municipal or state level—often during their time in the legislature. For instance, based on data from 1945 to 1998, Samuels (2003) found that the number of deputies leaving for municipal-level positions approached the number leaving for state-level positions, at about 8%. Elsewhere, reelection is least desired in the two countries that prohibit(ed) consecutive reelection: Costa Rica and Mexico. Since reelection was on the agenda (at least in Mexico) before the reform of late 2013, it is not surprising that a small share of Mexican deputies desired reelection as their next office (and something similar may also be the case in Costa Rica; deputies may desire reelection even when it is impossible). In fact, only two deputies desired reelection in the first survey in Mexico (Survey 63), while nine claimed to be in the subsequent survey (Survey 79). Similarly, zero deputies desired reelection in the first survey in Costa Rica (Survey 56). These findings correspond to the empirical reality of not being able to seek reelection in a second term, as well as to previous research that Mexican deputies tend to seek regional office or else a seat in the senate. To draw on another example, Argentinian deputies express an intermediate desire for reelection. Argentina is another example where turnover rates are rather high, and deputies have much less power than their Brazilian or Chilean counterparts over their careers, since parties play a bigger role in the selection process. It may be that the reelection is not as desired given the actual accessibility, or the chances of being placed on the list by party leaders (Samuels 2003). Mayoralty was most desired in Mexico, which is in line with what Langston and Aparicio-Castillo (2008) report. They find that deputies in Mexico begin their

40

T. Kernecker

careers in the municipal and state arenas and often return to their state when the legislative term is over. They also find that deputies often return to their previous jobs, irrespective of the level (national or local). It is not surprising that representatives would have sought municipal office in pre-reform Mexico, due to the restricted reelection possibilities and the fact that deputies are forced to move on. This priority might change in future surveys, given the reform at the end of 2013 that allowed for consecutive reelection; unfortunately, post-reform data in Mexico is not yet available. The office of the mayor is also at the top of the list in Ecuador and Bolivia, both of which have engaged in decentralization processes in recent decades, making the local level a more attractive option. In Ecuador, there is a long tradition of direct election, and municipalities have exercised a significant role. In Bolivia, mayors and municipal governments have wide jurisdiction, and recent reforms have increased the amount of national income transferred to municipalities, also allowing for the participation of indigenous organizations (and not only parties). In both cases, there are some constraints in this respect: elected officials can be removed in Ecuador, and mayors are elected on closed lists in Bolivia (Bland 2011: 81–82). Interestingly, Brazilian deputies that expect to seek a mayoralty are at the bottom of the list, despite the fact that, empirically, deputies do often return to the municipal level and find such an office more attractive than reelection to congress (Samuels 2003). The national executive branch is the most coveted post in Costa Rica, which is in line with the findings that deputies seek office in the national executive branch due to non-consecutive reelection in Costa Rica (Taylor-Robinson 1992). Costa Rican deputies already orient their behavior during legislative work to cultivating a reputation among presidential candidates within their party, in hopes of attaining a position in the national executive branch (Taylor-Robinson 1992). This option is also high on the list in countries where the opportunities on other levels (e.g., regional) of government are less attractive (as in Panama or Guatemala). On the other hand, the national executive office is less coveted in Brazil and Paraguay (see Fig. 2.1), where career paths generally lead deputies to remain in the legislature (Paraguay) or to move on to more dynamic careers (Brazil). The senate is the most coveted office in Paraguay and Colombia, but desired to a lesser extent in Brazil and Argentina. In Brazil and Argentina, this is unsurprising, given the vast opportunities at the regional level that can prove promising to progressively ambitious legislators. In Colombia and Paraguay, deputies overwhelmingly desire a career in the legislature rather than in the executive branch or at the regional level. The regional executive is most sought after office in Argentina, but the least desired in Chile and Panama. Unsurprisingly, regional executive office is also high in the hierarchical scale for deputies in Argentina, given the attractiveness of gubernatorial autonomy (mentioned above) in combination with the parties’ strong control over legislative careers (Jones et al. 2002). Similarly, regional executive office is seen as desirable in Ecuador, and in Mexico, where governors are very powerful and play a significant role in candidate selection and in national-level politics. In Ecuador, provincial executives (prefectos) are elected along with half of the provincial council; however, their functions are limited as they compete for authority with

2  Political Ambition in Latin America

41

appointed provincial governors and municipalities (Bland 2011). The regional executive is less attractive to deputies in Chile, where careers in the legislature are preferred (and given regional executives’ limited autonomy). Starting in 2020, governors will be elected directly, possibly making that office more attractive in the future. Panama is another case where the office of regional executive is not attractive; although the country is politically decentralized, financial and administrative authority remains weak for local governments (Bland 2011). The final political office in the dataset is the presidency, which is most desired in Panama (third most desired, after reelection and national executive). The office is least desired in Brazil, where deputies claim to prefer all other offices, at both national and regional levels. The risk of seeking the presidency is rather high— again, the office is only available to one person. However, running for presidential office can help politicians gain visibility for future candidacies. Overall, the office’s accessibility and attractiveness depend on candidate selection and the electoral system. Unfortunately, information is lacking on the sorts of offices referred to by deputies selecting “other” as their desired next step. “Other” is the top choice in Costa Rica, while zero deputies selected this category in Paraguay. Finally, several deputies in Nicaragua expected to seek jobs in the private sector, but that sector was not desired by deputies in Uruguay, Paraguay, Panama, or Brazil. Overall, reelection to congress stands out as the most desired future post in almost all countries, with the exceptions of Bolivia, Costa Rica, and Mexico. In fact, in those countries where deputies expect to seek reelection (compared to other offices), reelection beats out all other offices by a considerable margin in Brazil, Chile, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Panama, Peru, and Uruguay. On the lower end, reelection beats other offices by a smaller margin in Argentina, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, and Paraguay. This main finding may be surprising: while the literature has emphasized that deputies often do not seek reelection, in most countries they proclaim to desire it. The legislative branch overall (reelection and senate) is most desired outcome in Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Dominican Republic, Paraguay, and Uruguay. Elsewhere, in Argentina, Ecuador, El Salvador, Honduras, and Peru, the second most desired office after reelection is either regional executive or mayor. In Guatemala and Panama, the national executive branch is most desired after reelection, while in Nicaragua the private sector is the next top priority. In countries where reelection is not the main goal, the top two desired offices are mayor and “other” in Bolivia, national executive and “other” in Costa Rica, and the senate or a mayoralty in Mexico. Obviously, different types of ambition are not static over time, since the structure of opportunity is itself dynamic and depends on contextual factors including the dynamics of party competition or individual calculation. Figures 2.3, 2.4, 2.5, 2.6, 2.7, and 2.8 display the changes (differences in ambition for each office by survey number) in the extent to which each office has been desired (observable only in those countries where the survey question was asked more than once). Figure 2.3 shows that, from one period to the next, reelection became more attractive in Costa Rica, Ecuador, El Salvador (between the first two surveys), Guatemala, Honduras,

42

Fig. 2.3  Static ambition by survey

Fig. 2.4  Senate ambition by survey

T. Kernecker

2  Political Ambition in Latin America

Fig. 2.5  Presidential ambition by survey

Fig. 2.6  National executive ambition by survey

43

44

Fig. 2.7  Regional executive ambition by survey

Fig. 2.8  Mayoral ambition by survey

T. Kernecker

2  Political Ambition in Latin America

45

Mexico, and Nicaragua. On the other hand, reelection became slightly less desirable in Argentina, Bolivia, and Chile. In Peru, surveys 80 and 84 were carried out within the same legislative period (once after the election, and once at the end of the period). Here it is remarkable that reelection was highly desired at the beginning of the legislative period (survey 80) but became less attractive at the end of the period (survey 84). Regarding the senate, Fig. 2.4 shows that the senate became less attractive in Argentina and the Dominican Republic, while it became more attractive in Chile, Colombia, and Mexico. In Bolivia, senate ambitions remained stable. Regarding the executive branch, Fig. 2.5 shows that the presidency became more attractive in Bolivia and the Dominican Republic while remaining relatively stable in Argentina, Chile, Ecuador, Mexico, and Nicaragua. The presidency became less attractive in Colombia, Costa Rica, Guatemala, and Honduras. Cabinet membership (Fig. 2.6) became more desirable in Argentina, Bolivia, Costa Rica, El Salvador (in the two most recent periods), Nicaragua, and Peru, meanwhile becoming slightly less attractive in Chile, Colombia, and Honduras. In Ecuador and Mexico, national executive ambitions remained relatively stable. Moving to the regional executive branch, Fig. 2.7 shows that the regional executive office became less attractive from one period to the next in Argentina, Ecuador, and Peru. The office became more attractive in Colombia, Dominican Republic, and stayed relatively stable in Bolivia, Chile (slight increase), Costa Rica, Ecuador, El Salvador, Honduras, Guatemala, Mexico, and Nicaragua. Lastly, Fig.  2.8 shows that mayoralty became more attractive in Argentina, Bolivia, Costa Rica, Ecuador, Honduras, and Peru. It became less attractive in the Dominican Republic, El Salvador, and Guatemala. Mayoral ambitions stayed relatively stable in Mexico, Nicaragua, and the Dominican Republic. In Chile and Colombia, the change was also relatively small, while in some cases (e.g., Costa Rica or El Salvador) the change was more noticeable.

2.5  Conclusion Research has increasingly shown that ambition is the starting point to understanding the behavior of individual representatives. Following the careers of politicians can in this way tell a lot about how representation works; those who aim to advance their careers must cater to the actors that can help them to achieve their goals. This implies politicians acting in the interest of their principal supporters—voters and parties, and often other actors—who can either hold them accountable (by reelecting them or voting them out of office), or else who promote them by providing the necessary resources for their next career step. The classic starting point for analysis has been the U.S. Congress, under the assumption that US congresspeople who seek to perpetuate long legislative careers should have their constituents’ interests at heart, if they hope to be reelected. However, scholars have increasingly been highlighting the prevalence of dynamic, often multi-level political careers that deviate from this classic model. This raises the question of what—if not reelection—are

46

T. Kernecker

their next-step goals, and what have been the consequences of those goals? Investigating that question has normative implications; politicians who do not seek reelection may not be responsive to those that elected them, since they are thinking in different prospective career terms. This chapter has provided a descriptive overview of the career ambitions of politicians throughout Latin America, with a focus on representatives for 17 Latin American countries, by summarizing the relative values of different offices and the ambitions of deputies as reported in the PELA-USAL surveys. Several studies on this topic have drawn on ex post facto career moves, but we do not know whether deputies really aspire to the offices they actually achieve, or whether other reasons might explain their career moves. By drawing on their actual stated ambitions, we have filled a gap in the literature by providing insight as declared at the beginning of the legislative period. To this point, progressive ambition has been largely assumed based on realized career moves, but the data reveal that, although deputies may harbor progressive ambition, they by and large manifest static ambition. The data further show that the hierarchy of available offices based on deputies’ statements varies widely across institutional frameworks depending on their relative value. However, in almost all of the countries included in the dataset, reelection to one’s current office is the main goal. Notable exceptions include, first, those cases in which consecutive reelection is/was constrained at the time of the survey: Costa Rica and Mexico. Another exception is Bolivia, where recent political reforms aimed at decentralization (in a context of reaching marginalized sectors of the population) has made a regional career a very attractive next move. Overall, remaining in the legislative branch (whether by reelection to the lower chamber or by election to the senate) is the option most desired by legislators in Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Dominican Republic, Paraguay, and Uruguay. The finding that legislators tend to be statically ambitious may seem counterintuitive to scholars of political careers, in contexts with traditionally high turnover rates and/or the possibility of attractive regional careers (as in Brazil or Argentina). In some cases, the stated ambition did indeed coincide with typical career moves (e.g., Mexico or Costa Rica). But as this chapter has shown, ambition is a dynamic phenomenon, subject to change from one period to the next. Despite a relatively stable hierarchy of careers in given institutional frameworks, ambition also depends on topical contextual factors, which may explain a slight increase/decrease in the desirability of a certain office over time. The data in this way allude to a gap between desired office and actual office, or between stated ambitions and actual career moves. This chapter has of course been an overview, and it leaves many questions open to future research. Next steps should be to focus on creating quantifiable scale that can reflect the values of distinct offices in distinct countries, and to continue exploring the causes and implications of ambition on the behavior of politicians from a comparative perspective. Now that a question on this subject has been included in the PELA-USAL surveys, systematic analysis can be made of ambition over time, yielding a more nuanced understanding of how ambitions can change due to contextual dynamics, such as party competition. Furthermore, future research should focus on bridging the gap between offices desired and achieved through examination of

2  Political Ambition in Latin America

47

the extent to which ambition changes throughout the legislative period, and the causal mechanisms behind the failure of some deputies to achieve their goal of reelection (or election to other offices). Given the increasing availability of data, all these questions are increasingly subject to consideration from a comparative perspective.

References Amorim Neto, O., & Samuels, D. (2010). Democratic regimes and cabinet politics: A global perspective. Revista Iberoamericana de estudos legislativos, 1(1), 1–23. Araújo, V., Silva, T., & Vieira, M. (2016). Measuring presidential dominance over cabinets in presidential systems: Constitutional design and power sharing. Brazilian Political Science Review, 10(2). Bell, C., & Price, C. (1969). Pre-legislative sources of representational roles. Midwest Journal of Political Science, 13(2), 254–270. Black, G. (1972). A theory of political ambition: Career choices and the role of structural incentives. American Political Science Review, 66(1), 144–159. Bland, G. (2011). Considering local democratic transition in Latin America. Journal of Politics in Latin America, 3(1), 65–98. Borchert, J. (2011). Individual ambition and institutional opportunity: A conceptual approach to political careers in multi-level settings. Regional and Federal Studies, 21(2), 117–140. Botero, F. (2008). Ambitious career-seekers: An analysis of career decisions and duration in Latin America. Unpublished doctoral dissertation, The University of Arizona, Tucson. Botero, F., & Rennó, L. (2007). Career choice and legislative reelection: Evidence from Brazil and Colombia. Brazilian Political Science Review, 1(1), 102–124. Carey, J. M. (2007). Competing principals, political institutions, and party unity in legislative voting. American Journal of Political Science, 51(1), 92–107. Carey, J. M. (2009). Legislative voting and accountability. New York: Cambridge University Press. Carey, J., & Shugart, M. (1995). Incentives to cultivate a personal vote: A rank ordering of electoral formulas. Electoral Studies, 14(4), 417–439. Chasquetti, D. (2010). Legislative careers in Uruguay: A study on rules, parties, and legislators in the chamber. Unpublished doctoral dissertation, Universidad de la Republica. Chasquetti, D., & Micozzi, J. P. (2014). The subnational connection in unitary regimes: Progressive ambition and legislative behavior in Uruguay. Legislative Studies Quarterly, 39(2), 87–112. Cox, G., & Morgenstern, S. (2001). Latin America’s Reactive Assemblies and Proactive Presidents. Comparative Politics, 33(2), 171–89. Crisp, B., Kanthak, K. & Leijonhufvud, J. (2004). The reputations legislators build: With whom should representatives collaborate? American Political Science Review: 703–716. Crisp, B., Escobar-Lemmon, M, Jones, B, & Jones, M. (2009). The electoral connection and legislative committees. The Journal of Legislative Studies, 15(1), 35–52. Doyle, D., & Elgie, R. (2016). Maximizing the reliability of cross-national measures of presidential power. British Journal of Political Science, 46(4), 731–741. Falleti, T. (2010). Decentralization and subnational politics in Latin America. New  York: Cambridge University Press. Grimaldi, S., & Vercesi, M. (2018). Political careers in multi-level systems: Regional chief executives in Italy, 1970–2015. Regional & Federal Studies, 28(2), 125–149. Herrick, R., & Thomas, S. (2005). Do Term Limits Make a Difference? Ambition and Motivations among US State Legislators. American Politics Research 33(5), 726–47.

48

T. Kernecker

Jones, M. P., Saiegh, S., Spiller, P. T., & Tommasi, M. (2002). Amateur legislators–professional politicians: The consequences of party-centered electoral rules in a federal system. American Journal of Political Science, 46(3), 656–669. Kernecker, T. (2016). Political ambition in 14 presidential democracies: Political ambition in 14 presidential democracies. Legislative Studies Quarterly, 41, 393–417. Langston, J. (2011). Governors and ‘their’ deputies: New legislative principals in Mexico. Legislative Studies Quarterly, 35(2), 235–258. Kernecker, T. (2017). Ambition as a micro-foundation of party loyalty. Party Politics, 23(5), 538–548. Langston, J., & Aparicio-Castillo, F. J. (2008). The past as future: Prior political experience and career choices in Mexico, 1997-2006 (Documento de Trabajo, No. 207). México: División de Estudios Políticos, CIDE. Langston, J., & Rosas, G. (2011). Gubernatorial effects on the voting behavior of national legislators. The Journal of Politics, 73(2), 477–493. Leoni, E., Pereira, C., & Rennó, L. (2004). Political survival strategies: Political career decisions in the Brazilian chamber of deputies. Journal of Latin American Studies, 36(1), 109–130. Llanos, M., & Sánchez, F. (2006). Council of elders? The senate and its members in the Southern Cone. Latin American Research Review, 41(1), 133–152. Llanos, M., & Nolte, D. (2003). Bicameralism in the Americas: Around the extremes of symmetry and incongruence. The Journal of Legislative Studies, 9(3), 54–86. Lodola, G. (2009). The structure of political careers in argentina and Brasil. Desarrollo Económico, 49(194), 247–286. Maestas, C. (2000). Professional legislatures and ambitious politicians: Policy responsiveness of state institutions. Legislative Studies Quarterly, 25(4), 663–690. Maestas, C. (2003). The incentive to listen: Progressive ambition, resources, and opinion monitoring among state legislators. The Journal of Politics, 65(2), 439–456. Maestas, C., Fulton, S., Maisel, S., & Stone, W. (2006). When to risk it? Institutions, ambitions, and the decision to run for the US House. American Political Science Review, 100(2), 195–208. Mainwaring, S., & Samuels, D. (1999). Federalism, constraints on the Central Government, and economic reform in Democratic Brazil. Notre Dame: The Helen Kellogg Institute for International Studies, University of Notre Dame. Mansbridge, J. (2003). Rethinking representation. American Political Science Review, 97(4), 515–528. Mayhew, D. (1974). Congress: The electoral connection. New Haven: Yale University Press. Meserve, S. A., Pemstein, D., & Bernhard, W. T. (2009). Political ambition and legislative behavior in the European Parliament. The Journal of Politics, 71(3), 1015–1032. Micozzi, J. P. (2013). Alliance for progress? Multilevel ambition and patterns of cosponsorship in the Argentine House. Comparative Political Studies, 47(8), 1186–1208. Micozzi, J. P. (2014). From house to home: Strategic bill drafting in multilevel systems with non-­ static ambition. The Journal of Legislative Studies, 20(3), 265–284. Rehfeld, A. (2009). Representation rethought: On trustees, delegates, and gyroscopes in the study of political representation and democracy. American Political Science Review,103(2), 214–230. Rohde, D.  W. (1979). Risk bearing and progressive ambition. American Journal of Political Science, 23(1), 1–26. Samuels, D. (2003). Ambition, federalism, and legislative politics in Brazil. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Samuels, D. (2011). Political ambition, candidate recruitment, and legislative politics in Brazil. POSTData, 16(2), 281–309. Schlesinger, J. A. (1966). Ambition and politics: Political careers in the United States. Chicago: Rand McNally. Siavelis, P., & Morgenstern, S. (Eds.). (2008). Pathways to power: Political recruitment and candidate selection in Latin America. University Park: Penn State Press.

2  Political Ambition in Latin America

49

Sieberer, U. C., & Müller, W. C. (2017). Aiming higher: The consequences of progressive ambition among MPs in European parliaments. European Political Science Review, 9(1), 27–50. Stoffel, M. F., & Sieberer, U. (2018). Measuring re-election prospects across electoral systems: A general approach applied to Germany. West European Politics, 41(5), 1191–1207. Strøm, K., & Müller, W. C. (2009). Parliamentary democracy, agency problems and party politics. In Intra-party politics and coalition governments (pp. 25–49). London: Routledge. Taylor-Robinson, M. (1992). Formal versus informal incentive structures and legislator behavior: Evidence from Costa Rica. The Journal of Politics, 54(4), 1053–1071. Thomsen, D. (2014). Ideological moderates won’t run: How party fit matters for partisan polarization in Congress. Journal of Politics, 76(3), 786–797. Vercesi, M. (2018). Approaches and lessons in political career research: Babel or pieces of patchwork? Revista Española de Ciencia Política., 48, 183–206. Victor, J.  N. (2011). Legislating versus campaigning: The legislative behavior of higher office-­ seekers. American Politics Research, 39(1), 3–31.

Chapter 3

Political Trust of Parliamentary Elites in Latin America Cristina Rivas Pérez and Manuel Alcántara

3.1  Introduction Trust (or confidence) is the firm belief or hope that something will happen or work as expected. Ever since Max Weber linked the raison d’etre of political power to its legitimacy, conditioned by the belief (rational or emotional) that individuals invest in a specific order, trust has played a central role in the analysis of politics. Political trust—the confidence that citizens place in (or withhold from) institutions—constitutes an evaluation of the existing relationship between individuals and institutions within a political system (Hardin 2000). Political trust in institutions is therefore widely regarded as a defining characteristic whose presence (or absence) immediately reflects the proper (or improper) performance of a country’s democracy (Montero et al. 2008: 21) and thus the degree of popular (dis)satisfaction with the political system (Norris 1999, 2011; Pharr and Putnam 2000; Torcal and Montero 2006). Political disaffection, for its part, is a widespread attitudinal syndrome in “newly consolidated democracies” where majority support from citizens toward a new regime collides with low confidence in the mechanisms of democratic representation, notably institutions and political representatives (Torcal 2006a: 592). The generation of trust can be an undeniable source of power for governments (Citrin and Muste 1999; Bianco 1998), linked in many ways with citizen evaluations of governmental actions and, above all else, with results. Since 2014, public opinion polls conducted in Latin America have revealed an apparent deficit of trust in institutions, which affects the credibility of political parties, parliaments, and governments (De Riz 2015: 30). A generalized perception by citizens throughout the region that neither their political institutions nor their representatives are fulfilling popular interests and expectations has fostered political C. Rivas Pérez (*) · M. Alcántara Instituto de Iberoamérica, University of Salamanca, Salamanca, Spain e-mail: [email protected]; [email protected] © The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020 M. Alcántara et al. (eds.), Politics and Political Elites in Latin America, Latin American Societies, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-51584-3_3

51

52

C. Rivas Pérez and M. Alcántara

mistrust. All these factors have generated a debate in the literature as to possible explanatory factors for this phenomenon, where the economic and political performance of governments appears to play a central role. The decade of the 1980s kick-started a new democratic phase in Latin America that worked from a very different blueprint in each country (Alcántara 2018). During the 1990s, more consistent neoliberal ideas were successfully implemented in most countries in the region, and by the turn of the twenty-first century, the effects of those politics gave way to unprecedented electoral turnouts that fueled the region’s “left turn,” which saw victories for numerous progressive presidential candidates. Meanwhile, during the first decade of the new century, Latin America experienced an economic and political phenomenon known as the “Consensus of Commodities” (Svampa 2013), which in terms of parliamentary representation entailed the strengthening of those political actors who followed a neo-extractivist model of development, with particular emphasis on the export of primary goods. From 2015 onwards, governments fell into crisis due to inefficiencies in the model implemented, along with the collapse of international prices for commodities. The crisis of the neo-extractivist model opened space for critical voices, and the unfavorable economic scenario, compounded by an inability to combat problems such as corruption, has fed frustration among citizens that has manifested visibly and increasingly in countries including Brazil, Chile, Venezuela, and (more recently) Ecuador and Bolivia. After a decade of leftist governments in half of the region’s countries, Latin America now appears to be taking a conservative turn. Thus it can be proposed that the changes that have characterized recent economic and political cycles in this region may prove to be explanatory factors for variations in the levels of trust in representative institutions (Zmerli and Castillo 2015: Torcal and Bargsted 2015; Bargsted and Torcal 2015; Castillo et al. 2016; Barragán et al. in press). However, most empirically based research on the issue of political trust has focused on the study of citizens’ political attitudes. Very few analyses have been made of the political attitudes of parliamentary elites, to uncover the degree of confidence they have in the institutions they help comprise as political actors. Certain questions deserving of exploration relate to whether the recent increase in political mistrust by Latin American citizens also extends to political elites: How (and how much) has the specific trust of parliamentary elites toward political institutions in their countries varied? Do the political and economic cycles experienced in the region in some way explain the levels of political trust expressed by these elites? Do the explanatory factors in analysis of political trust by citizens also serve to explain political trust by parliamentary elites? These are a few of the questions that this chapter seeks to answer. The chief objective of the chapter is to examine the different levels of trust by Latin American parliamentary elites in their main political institutions (the parliament, the president of the government, the judiciary, and the political parties) through the development of a simple Political Confidence Index (PCI), and then to observe the evolution of political confidence over the past two decades, during

3  Political Trust of Parliamentary Elites in Latin America

53

which the region has experienced very diverse scenarios. In this way, it will be possible to determine whether political trust has remained relatively stable, or whether to the contrary it has undergone change as a function of the political and economic performance of governments. The latter would imply that political confidence is conditioned by the political and partisan game, reflecting what some authors have called the “politicization of political confidence” (Bargsted and Torcal 2015: 175). Results from our present work may prove very useful, considering that most hypotheses and empirical evidence on this topic have heretofore focused on the attitudes of citizens. Thus the second section of this chapter will be dedicated to analysis of the relationship between: (a) aggregate levels of political trust by parliamentary elites in their institutions and (b) explanatory factors commonly used in the literature analyzing the political trust of citizens. For our analysis, we draw on the database of the Parliamentary Elites of Latin America project of the University of Salamanca (PELA-USAL).1 This is a thorough research tool that collects the opinions and attitudes of representative samples from the lower parliamentary chambers of 18 countries in the region, gathered regularly by way of interviews with legislators since 1994.2 We begin with a theoretical review of the literature on political trust and the arguments explaining its variation over time. We then consider the evolution of political confidence among parliamentary elites from 18 countries of the region over the past two decades. In the third section, an empirical analysis of the data is undertaken, to determine which individual and contextual factors may be related to changes in the political confidence of legislators, and whether those coincide with changes in the region’s recent political and economic cycles.

3.2  The Study of Political Trust The presence of political trust implies a positive evaluation of the most relevant aspects that make each institution trustworthy, such as justice, equity, competence, transparency, and openness to different points of view (Levi and Stoker 2000: 484–485). The analysis of political trust has been among the most widely discussed elements in the study of democracies, whether consolidated or relatively new, as in the case for Latin American democracies (Del Campo 2015: 271). What is unclear is whether the current moment of political mistrust is more related to long-term trends or to specific short-term changes; the latter would connect recent varying levels of trust with changing cycles of economic and political performance by governments (Torcal and Montero 2006; Moreno 2011; Paramio 2015; Alcántara 2018).  For more information on the PELA-USAL database, please consult: https://oir.org.es/pela/  The samples range in percentage from about 85–90% of legislators in small congresses (e.g., Costa Rica, where 48–50 deputies of the total 57 in the Assembly are surveyed) to between 50% and 75% in most other Chambers—except in Argentina, Mexico, and Brazil, where (due to the large sizes of their legislatures) samples cover 20–25% of members, or around 90–100 interviews. 1 2

54

C. Rivas Pérez and M. Alcántara

In the mid-1970s, the debate on political trust in the literature revolved around two perspectives: that of authors who saw political trust as systemic (i.e., based on principles and values of elements in the political system) and therefore more stable (Miller 1974a, b); and that of authors who saw political trust as an indicator of satisfaction with government that responds to citizen assessments of performance, and which is therefore constantly changing. This indicator was related to what governments did, and how they did it (Citrin 1974; Citrin and Luks 2001).3 In any case, it became clear that explanations of the different levels of political trust among individuals and countries, and their evolution over time, were fundamental to further analysis. After several decades of political science study around the explanatory aspects of trust in institutions, it now seems possible to identify a cluster of critical variables appearing in most research. However, there is no agreement as to what makes citizens trust more or less in the central political institutions of their respective countries, or in how to explain the different levels of political confidence between and within countries. A review of the literature on trust in political institutions reveals four explanatory theories: culturalist, institutionalist, economic, and a mixed approach linked with corruption. Culturalist explanations argue that political trust is a reflection of the underlying cultural characteristics of a society—a political culture shared by citizens and linked to the political system as a whole. Along the same lines, the main explanatory factor to account for varying levels of trust in institutions is the amount of time that a country has operated under representative democracy (Torcal 2000), whereby those with a longer democratic tradition show higher levels of political trust. From this culturalist perspective, political attitudes are the result of a process of socialization and are difficult to change over time (Torcal and Montero 2006; Hooghe and Zmerli 2011: 4; Del Campo 2015). Belonging to this culturalist perspective are the “theorists of modernization,” who affirm that both citizens’ attitudes and political mistrust are characteristic of backward societies, and that modernizing the latter will transform the former. According to these studies, citizens tend to be more politically active as a society becomes more modern (or at minimum, they expect and assume a more active role in the political system). Thus political trust should evolve along with culture (Torcal 2006a,b: 599). This theoretical perspective has produced two hypotheses: firstly, there is a relation between social capital and political trust (Putman 1995: 664–665) and, secondly, the surge of post-materialistic values can reduce trust in political institutions as skepticism and rejection of authority structures increase (Inglehart 1997).

3  These two perspectives are based on Easton’s (1965, 1975) classification of the two types of support for the political system: specific support and diffuse support. Easton argues that political trust is a form of support directed at the political regime. This form of support is also diffuse; it is linked not to what the regime does (the results of the process), but to what the regime means and represents for the citizens.

3  Political Trust of Parliamentary Elites in Latin America

55

Secondly, research based on institutionalisttheories relates political trust to institutional arrangements and characteristics; that is, to the design and functioning of the political process and representation. Norris (1999: 234) argues that institutional arrangements (e.g., the type of electoral system) are not neutral. In majority systems, winners “are more likely to believe that the political system responds to their needs” than would occur in proportional systems. Other institutional elements related to levels of trust are whether the system is federal or unitarian, or whether it is parliamentary or presidential. As regards the party system, fragmentation and the number of political parties participating in the system also seem to influence political trust. According to this institutionalist perspective, levels of trust in political institutions will vary as a function of each country’s institutional context. Thirdly, there are the variables related to the economic performance of governments. In contrast with culturalist explanations, the hypothesis that political trust depends significantly on the economic and social performance of democratic systems has become more robust since the beginning of the twenty-first century. The presence of short-term variations in political trust gives support to this idea (Zmerli and Newton 2011). Trust need not be a stable trait but rather must be “an answer to an interaction between individuals and institutions that either grow stronger or weaker according to the socioeconomic conditions” of a country (Moreno 2011: 25). Trust varies as a function of the evaluations of individuals regarding the economic performance of their government. Thus, citizens will show more trust in an institution that exhibits competence and that can effectively solve problems. Furthermore, it is relatively easy for citizens to evaluate the success of their government’s economic policy (Segovia 2008). Recent research shows that economic performance is indeed a critical explanatory variable for political trust. If an economy is going well, confidence in the government and other governmental institutions tends to be higher. Aspects like economic growth and inequality significantly affect political attitudes related to trust, corruption, or political support. In this sense, most research based on economic performance has used aggregated and individual subjective evaluations of economic position (Clarke et al. 1993; Cusack 1999), but fewer works have explored the relationship of objective economic indicators with political trust (Hetherington and Rudolph 2008: 499; Herreros 2015). Finally, a new line of research related to both economic performance and the political system and its results focuses on the problem of corruption. In the economic sphere, corruption is believed to lower investment and to slow growth. In the political sphere—although there is less empirical evidence to support this—research has shown that corruption in a democratic framework reduces trust in the political system and, thereby, political legitimacy. This result has been shown to be valid result for various regional contexts (Pharr 2000; Segovia 2008; Torcal and Bargsted 2015). Corruption, particularly among political elites, plays a crucial role in the confidence that those same elites have in political institutions. Mistrust of institutions is, in many cases, associated with the belief that the political system is corrupt, and also with levels of social protest (De Riz 2015: 34; Bargsted et al. 2014). Studies

56

C. Rivas Pérez and M. Alcántara

for Latin America indicate that, in the most corrupt countries, citizens express less confidence in their political institutions (Segovia 2008; Torcal and Bargsted 2015).4

3.3  Hypothesis and Variables This chapter contrasts some of the hypotheses put forward by the institutional, economic performance, and corruption theories to account for the political trust of Latin American parliamentary elites. As mentioned earlier, practically all research with empirical support on political trust has taken the citizen as a focus, which raises the first question: Are the factors that explain political trust by citizens useful in accounting for political trust by parliamentary elites? Political elites are after all part of the political system, acting as representatives of the system they are asked to evaluate. The institutionalist theory postulates that the institutional context explains variations in levels of political trust. What remains unclear from the empirical evidence to date is the direction of the relationship between certain institutional characteristics and levels of trust (Segovia 2008: 32). Here we analyze the relation between levels of political trust as expressed by parliamentary elites and two variables of the institutional context: quality of democracy, which aggregates the functioning of various institutions and the level of fragmentation of the party system; and a variable on the satisfaction of parliamentarians with the functioning of democracy. Some authors point out that a low level of political trust warns of possible deficits in the quality of democracy. Therefore, it is valid to suppose that political trust will be higher in countries of greater democratic quality (Magalhães 2006: 190; Norris 1999). Concerning the indicator on party system fragmentation, there is some disagreement on the direction of the relationship. Authors like Miller and Listhaug (1990) claim that lesser fragmentation correlates with higher levels of dissatisfaction, because citizens feel that political options are fewer. A significant number of citizens who do not feel represented will increase mistrust in political institutions. However, other authors (Weil 1989; Norris 1999; Torcal and Bargsted 2015) argue that trust will diminish in cases of high fragmentation and polarization, as obtaining majorities and generating pacts will become much more challenging. The hypothesis we seek to corroborate here is along these same lines: in essence, greater fragmentation implies more representatives in the opposition and, consequently, greater discontent with the functioning of institutions. Regarding the economic performance thesis, and in line with certain recent works (Torcal and Bargsted 2015; Herreros 2015; Castillo et al. 2016), we examine objective systemic socioeconomic indicators such as the Gini Index and the yearly growth of GDP. In the Latin American region, structural socioeconomic inequality

4  According to Della Porta (2000: 202), “political corruption worsens government performance.” Therefore, it is expected that trust will be lower when corruption is perceived to be widespread.

3  Political Trust of Parliamentary Elites in Latin America

57

is a persistent trait of most countries (CEPAL 2016). Therefore, it is crucial to expect that those countries suffering greater inequality will tend to present diminishing levels of political trust. From 2003, Latin American economies began to experience rapid growth. According to the World Bank, during the 2003–2012 period, every average growth indicator in the region was very positive. This trend has flagged over the past few years, and the recent worsening of economic growth indicators could well affect the political trust of representatives. Thirdly, we analyze the influence of corruption on levels of political trust as an indicator of systemic political performance. Corruption has become notoriously visible in Latin America, as evidenced by the multiple scandals surrounding the Odebrecht case in several countries, or the quantity of politicians who have been tried and condemned in recent years (including presidents and/or vice presidents from Guatemala, El Salvador, Costa Rica, Panama, Ecuador, Peru, and Brazil). The World Bank’s Worldwide Governance Indicators (WGI)5 as well as Corruption Control Index are used in this analysis. In general, what is expected is that, in those countries exhibiting greater control over corruption, parliamentary elites will voice more trust in the political institutions. The past few years have seen the emergence of research arguing that political trust has suffered politicization, inasmuch as evaluations of socioeconomic performance are conditioned by partisan politics (Anderson and Singer 2008; Torcal and Bargsted 2015; Castillo et al. 2016). According to this idea, voters who identify with the ruling party will tend to trust government institutions more than those who identify with the opposition. Considering that the unit of analysis in the present work is the parliamentary elite, the politicization of political trust will be even higher, as these are active players in the game of partisan politics. Thus, our expectation is that the position of any given representative, whether affiliated with the ruling party or the opposition, will be tightly linked to that representative’s confidence in the relevant institutions. Finally, this chapter will consider how changes in the region’s political cycle have influenced levels of political trust, as explanatory factors. Despite the difficulty in systematizing the political and economic cycles experienced by any region as heterogeneous as Latin America, there is some consensus around the identification of three distinct moments: the neoliberal period (1985–2000); the turn to the left (2000–2014); and the beginning of a new period of “fatigued democracies” (2014–2018). These moments have opened debate within the discipline as to the advent of a “conservative turn” (Alcántara 2020; Barragán et  al. in press). This chapter will consider the changes in political cycles taking as a reference both presidential victories and ideological turns in legislative power (Martínez-Hernández and Bohigues 2019: 94). Contextualizing each of these periods can lead to better understanding of the moments in which elites should have exerted power, and

5  This indicator is created from the subjective perception of citizens using survey data as a measurement instrument.

58

C. Rivas Pérez and M. Alcántara

Table 3.1  Variables in the analysis of trust in institutions Types of variables Political confidence variables Institutional and partisan variables

Title Political Confidence Index (PCI) Fragmentation of the party system Democracy Quality Index

Satisfaction with democracy Political performance World Bank Political variables Corruption Control Index Perception of corruption Economic and social Gini/100 Inequality Index indicators Annual GDP growth

Politicization variables

Change of political cycle: Ideological turn Official/Opponent

Source PELA-USAL (https://oir.org.es/pela/) Electoral Fragmentation Index (F-Rae). Transformation Index BTI (https://www. bti-project.org/en/home/) PELA-USAL (https://oir.org.es/pela/) World Bank Group’s Worldwide Governance Indicators (WGI) PELA-USAL (https://oir.org.es/pela/) The Standardized World Income Inequality Database (SWIID) World Bank data (n.d., https://datos. bancomundial.org/indicador/ny.gdp.mktp. kd.zg)

PELA-USAL (https://oir.org.es/pela/)

whether an “ideological turn” can favor gains in political trust (Castillo et al. 2016) (Table 3.1).

3.4  T  rends and Evolution of Political Trust Among Parliamentary Elites This section shows the evolution in levels of political trust by parliamentary elites in Latin America toward four basic institutions: the judiciary, political parties, the parliament, and the President of the Republic.6 In addition, a Political Confidence Index (PCI) has been created from the average confidence expressed by parliamentarians in these institutions.7

6  The question regarding trust in political institutions and its response categories (as used by PELAUSAL) has been exactly the same for all countries and years. This ensures that the changes seen in levels of political trust are not due to changes in the survey. 7  Calculation of the index is simple: the values assigned by parliamentarians to each of the institutions (or actors that constitute them) have been added—recalling that the options for answer are 1 “no confidence,” 2 “little confidence,” 3 “some confidence,” and 4 “a lot of confidence”—and then divided by the number of institutions. We thus obtain an average value on a scale of 1–4, where values closer to 1 indicate little or no confidence and values closer to 4 indicate greater confidence. Since these are the four most important political institutions of representative democracy, weight-

3  Political Trust of Parliamentary Elites in Latin America

59

4.0 3.5 3.0

2.67

2.84

2.70

2.92 2.67

2.87 2.71

2.5 2.0 1.5 1.0 1998-1999 2000-2001 2002-2005 2006-2009 2010-2013 2014-2017 2018-2023 Fig. 3.1  Evolution of political trust (PCI) among Latin American parliamentarians. (Source: the authors based on PELA-USAL (1998–2023))

In general terms, and as reflected in Fig.  3.1, parliamentary elites in Latin America clearly trust in their political institutions. The PCI registers values (for the whole region and for all time periods analyzed)8 above 2.6 on a scale of 1–4, where values closer to 1 indicate no confidence and values closer to 4 indicate much confidence. When considered separately, stark differences emerge in the trust levels afforded to the four political institutions. Figure 3.2 shows the evolution of the average levels of trust in these institutions by aggregating the percentages of the responses “a lot of confidence” and “some confidence” by Latin American parliamentarians for each institution. Parliament and the President are the institutions most trusted by representatives, with percentages near or above 60%, and both institutions have experienced parallel evolution over time. On the other hand, political parties and the judiciary (especially the latter) are least trusted by elites. The Judicial Branch, as Fig. 3.2 illustrates, presents the most substantial fluctuations, despite transformations and reforms of justice systems all across the region, which have given the judiciary more independence and authority (Brinks 2012). However, what might be expected to contribute increased trust appears to have the opposite effect for elite respondents. Trust in the judiciary rated high only in the 2010–2013 period. One possible explanation for this mistrust in the judicial system is that increased independence from political power means the Judicial Branch may now be able to hold elites accountable. Starting in 2000, and synchronous with the change of political cycle (the “left turn”) in Latin America, political trust in the four institutions increased, with a steeper rise for parliaments and the judiciary (the latter climbing from 34% in 1998 ing the index has not been deemed necessary, and the four institutions have been given equal weight and importance. 8  The time periods analyzed correspond to years of survey fieldwork, i.e., the beginning of legislatures in most of the region’s countries. It has been considered important to separate the 1998–1999 and 2000–2001 periods in order to clearly observe the increase in political confidence coinciding with the so-called “turn to the left” in Latin America.

60

C. Rivas Pérez and M. Alcántara

100 90 80 70 60 50 40 30 20 10 0 1998-1999 2000-2001 2002-2005 2006-2009 2010-2013 2014-2017 2018-2023 The judiciary

The political parties

The Parliament

The President of the Republic

Fig. 3.2  Evolution of trust in four political institutions by Latin American parliamentarians. (Source: authors based on PELA-USAL (1998–2023))

to 51% in 2000). However, that trust suffered a slight fall between 2002 and 2009. In 2010–2013, a period of economic growth and redistribution of wealth in the region, political trust by parliamentarian elites trended significantly upward, only to experience a decline in 2014 that became even steeper in 2018, reflecting the economic stagnation in Latin America and a new change of political cycle. This new cycle characterized by fatigued democracies has been taken to represent a “conservative turn” in contrast with the previous cycle, and levels of trust among parliamentary elites were equal to or lower than those of 1998, except as regards the judiciary. Despite its relative success in controlling inflation and fostering economic growth, the neoliberal model had by the late 1990s proven itself unable to solve one of the region’s most prominent problems: social inequality. The effects of neoliberal policies with a marked social impact (as in Argentina, Bolivia, or Ecuador) provoked intense social mobilizations, giving way to governments promising a new road to development based on state-directed economies and redistribution (Alcántara 2018, 2016: 14). As shown in Fig. 3.3, this change of political cycle in the region led to an increase in the political trust shown by elites, particularly strong in those countries that saw unprecedented electoral wins by progressive candidates (following Venezuela’s seminal election in 1999). These turns to the left included Brazil with Lula da Silva’s presidential victory in 2002,9 Argentina with Nestor Kirchner in 2003, Uruguay with the Frente Amplio in 2004, Bolivia with Evo Morales in 2006, Ecuador and Nicaragua in 2007, and

9  Although, in the case of Brazil, Lula became president in 2002, it was not until the 2010–2014 legislature that the increase in political confidence by deputies, particularly in the country’s president, became visible.

3  Political Trust of Parliamentary Elites in Latin America Argentina

100

61

Bolivia

100 75

75

50

50

50

25

25

25 0

0

0 1998-1999

2002-2005

2006-2009

2002-2005

1998-1999 2002-2005 2006-2009 2010-2013 2014-2017

2010-2013

Colombia 100

100

75

75

75

50

50

50

25

25

25

0

0

Ecuador

El Salvador

100

50 25

50

25

25 0

0 1998-1999 2010-2013

2002-2005

2010-2013

1998-1999 2002-2005 2006-2009 2010-2013 2014-2017

2018-2022

2014-2017

Honduras

México

Nicaragua

100

100

100

75

75

75

50

50

50

25

25

25

0

0

1998-19992002-20052006-20092010-20132014-20172018-2022

Panamá

100

0 1998-1999

2002-2005

2010-2013

Paraguay

100

1998-1999 2002-2005 2006-2009 2010-2013 2014-2017

2018-2022

75

75

50

50

50

25

25

25

100

0

0

0 2006-2009

2014-2017

1998-1999

2018-2023

Rep. Dominicana

75

50

50

25

25

2002-2005

2006-2009

2000-2001

2010-2013

Uruguay

100

75

Perú

100

75

2002-2005

Guatemala

75

50

0 2002-2005

1998-1999 2002-2005 2006-2009 2010-2013 2014-2017

100

75

75

2014-2017

0 1998-19992002-20052006-20092010-20132014-20172018-2022

1998-19992002-20052006-20092010-20132014-20172018-2022

1998-1999

2010-2013

Chile

Costa Rica

100

100

Brasil

100

75

2006-2009

2010-2013

2018-2022

Venezuela

100 75

50 25 0 2000-2001

0

0 2000-2001 2002-2005 2006-2009 2010-2013 2018-2022

2000-2001

2002-2005

2010-2013

2014-2017

2014-2017

The Parliament

The political parties

The Judiciary

The President of the Republic

Fig. 3.3  Evolution of trust in political institutions by Latin American parliaments according to period of field research. (Source: authors based on PELA-USAL (1998–2022))

Paraguay following Fernando Lugo’s triumph in 2008. Political trust has remained relatively stable over time in those countries, with certain exceptions—like Argentina and Brazil, where trust in the President has fallen in the latest period studied, or Bolivia, where trust in the Judicial Branch plummeted from 52% in 2010 to 18% in 2014.

62

C. Rivas Pérez and M. Alcántara

In other countries of the region, however, trust in political parties and the judiciary has suffered a considerable fall. This is the case with Colombia, long immersed in a peace process between the government and the FARC, where trust in those institutions dropped from 83% and 85%, respectively, to 48% and 44% in the 2010–2018 period. In Costa Rica, despite generally high levels of trust, the percentage of representatives trusting institutions (particularly the President) also declined during that period, and similar declines are notable in El Salvador, Honduras, Peru, and the Dominican Republic. On the other hand, Nicaragua (during that same period, and despite sharp democratic decline) registered surprising increases in trust for all four institutions in 2017, which can be explained by the majoritarian presence of the ruling party in the nation’s Assembly. However, while widespread, the decline in political trust among parliamentarians is not homogeneous, but varies in terms of political institution (Fig. 3.3) and by country (where variations are not always linear). For example, trust in the President of the Republic, being highly conditioned by partisan politics, is the indicator showing the widest variations among countries and over time.

3.5  Methodology for Data Analysis The tool used to test our hypotheses is the HJ-Biplot (Galindo 1986). This is a multivariate graphic representation of row markers (the cases; in this chapter, country-­ year) and column markers (the explanatory variables), presented in such a way that they can be superimposed onto the same reference system with maximum representation quality.10 The traditional form of testing the relationship between independent and dependent variables is to use a multiple regression model; however, hypotheses are seldom confirmed with the correction required by the model, probably because they are not verified with this sort of data (ordinal variables and Likert scales). In such tests, hypotheses assume the relationship between independent and dependent variable to be linear, and also that the variables fit a normal model and are homoscedastic (i.e., they have the same finite variance), and that the explanatory variables are indeed independent. When there is a correlation between variables, colinearity is said to be present, and the regression coefficients may not be interpretable. In contrast, Biplot methods are free of hypotheses and have the sole purpose of capturing the structures of covariation between the variables that intervene in the research; they take advantage of that covariation to substitute the observable starting variables (generally many in number) for underlying variables (usually one or two) that capture most of the information from the data (Rivas et al. 2010: 95–96).

 The HJ-Biplot has the advantages of correspondence analysis but is applicable to any data matrix, not only those expressing frequency.

10

3  Political Trust of Parliamentary Elites in Latin America

63

Biplot methods present their results in graphic plots where the axes represent the underlying variables (the principal components of the variable’s “space”), which capture the percentages of variance of all variables included in the analysis. In this chapter, the factorial plots represent the observable variables: the political confidence index, an index of democratic quality (BTI), parliamentarians’ stated satisfaction with democracy, the Gini Index, the corruption indicator index, the electoral fragmentation index, and the percentage of representatives who consider themselves part of the government (“officials”);11 as well as the individuals (country-year). One advantage of this technique is that it provides, in reduced (usually two-­ dimensional) form and with optimal quality, simultaneous visual representation of the relationship between a group of variables (those of higher explanatory power) and the positions of clusters of individuals with similar profiles. If the expected variation in percentage is high, the representation of the data expressed in the graphic will be closer to the original values of the analyzed data matrix, with a high degree of confidence.12 Interpreting a Biplot is rather simple (Galindo 1986); in an HJ-Biplot: • Each country will be represented as a factorial point, and the variables as vectors. • The length of each vector accounts for the standard deviation of the variables. Variables of higher variance will be represented by longer vectors (e.g., the Gini in Fig. 3.5). • The cosines of the angles between vectors account for the correlation between variables. This means that in an HJ-Biplot graphic, the more closely correlated two variables are, the smaller the angle between them (between 0° and 90°)—for example, in Fig. 3.4, the correlation between the PCI value and satisfaction with democracy. If the angle formed by two vectors is greater than 90°, variables will represent negative correlations—as in Fig. 3.4 between the fragmentation index (F-Rae) and the percentage of “official” representatives, which would indicate that the greater the parliamentary fragmentation, the lower the percentage of representatives who consider themselves aligned with the party in power. Lastly, a right angle (90°) between vectors means the variables are independent. • The squared correlation of a variable and a factorial axis is interpreted as the relative contribution of the factor to the element (or RCFE) and indicates the viability of the variables. This is interpreted in the same way as a coefficient in a regression.13  GDP per capita has been left out of the study because it is not significant.  The variability explained by the factorial axes is determined by the inertia absorption rate, which varies between 0 and 100, so that the closer the values of the factorial axes are to 100, the more reliable the representation will be. 13  Since the factors obtained are not correlated, the variability of a variable represented on a plane is obtained by adding up the contributions of the axes that border the plane—a quantity known as representation quality (CLR). Only variables with a high CLR should be interpreted on the plane being analyzed. An analogous measure of the CLR is also obtained for individuals (countries). A country is considered to be well represented when most of its information (measured through variability) is collected in the low dimension. 11 12

64

C. Rivas Pérez and M. Alcántara

6

Axis 2 - (28.3948%)

4

2

0

–2

–4

–6 –4

–2

0

2

4

6

8

Axis 1 - (39.2955%) Fig. 3.4  Country representation, confidence of Latin American Parliamentarians and explanatory factors based on the HJ-Biplot analysis (axis 1–2) (source: the authors, based on HJ-Biplot results). Note: order of the quadrants: first  =  upper right, second  =  upper left, third  =  lower left, fourth = lower right

• Proximity between points representing countries means that those countries are similar, so that if two countries are closer to the factorial plot, they likely share a similar profile in the variables used, especially if they are accurately represented. The average position of each of the cases by way of the variables generates a country profile. • The relationship between countries and variables is represented in terms of a scalar product; that is, from the perpendicular projection of the country-points over the vectors representing the variables. From this projection, it is possible to determine the approximate distribution that observations show along the variables. The bigger the projection of a point over a vector, the further away the point will be from the center of that variable’s mean (Díaz-Faes et al. 2013: 5). If a country shows a prominent value for a variable, that country will be represented by a point closer to the extreme of that variable vector. For example, in

3  Political Trust of Parliamentary Elites in Latin America

65

7 6 5

Axis 3 - (16.8666%)

4 3 2 1 0 –1 –2 –3 –4

–2

0

2

4

6

8

Axis 1 - (39.2955%)

Fig. 3.5  Country representation, confidence of Latin American parliamentarians and explanatory factors based on the HJ-Biplot analysis (axes 1–3) (source: the authors, based on HJ-Biplot results). Note: order of the quadrants: first  =  upper right, second  =  upper left, third  =  lower left, fourth = lower right

Fig. 3.4, Nicaragua 2017 is near the lower extreme of the vector that represents the percentage of self-identified ruling-party representatives, thereby indicating a higher percentage.

3.6  Explaining Political Trust In this section, the most significant explanatory factors of political trust among parliamentary elites (according to the literature) are analyzed, in an effort to corroborate the starting hypothesis by way of the above-described HJ-Biplot method.14 A first observation of Figs. 3.4 and 3.5 indicates that, even though the general index of political trust by Latin American parliamentarians is high, relevant differences can be found among legislators, both between distinct countries and within  The MULTbIPLOT program developed by Vicente Villardón (2015) was used to carry out the Biplot analysis. Department of Statistics, University of Salamanca. (http://biplot.usal.es/ Classicalbiplot/index.html).

14

66

C. Rivas Pérez and M. Alcántara

Table 3.2  HJ-Biplot analysis: explained variance and relative factor contributions to the element for the variables Inertia Own value Var. Explained Var. Explained Cummulative Relative factor contributions to variables PCI Satisfaction with democracy BTI (quality of democracy indicator) % of the members in the government F-Rae Control of corruption Gini

Axis 1 148.54 39.30 39.30

Axis 2 107.33 28.40 67.69

Axis 3 63.76 16.87 84.56

707 665 607 57 0 643 71

148 156 295 566 574 243 6

0 10 1 145 220 13 791

Source: the authors, based on HJ-Biplot results

particular countries over time, as well as in response to changes in the political and economic cycles. One of the objectives of this work is to determine whether the explanatory variables of trust in political institutions by citizens can also explain political trust by parliamentary elites, measured through the PCI. Figure 3.4 shows factorial level 1–2, where the explained variance is 68% (Table 3.2).15 A first aspect to highlight is the high correlation between the PCI and satisfaction with democracy, so that the greater the satisfaction with democracy, the greater the political trust in the country’s institutions. A second correlation found is that between the quality of democracy (BTI) and control of corruption, the higher the control of corruption in a country, the higher the quality of democracy, with the angles between them near 0° (Fig. 3.4). Finally, a third strong correlation (in this case, negative) is observed between the fragmentation index (F-Rae) and the percentage of government representatives, given that the cosines of their vectors form an extremely obtuse angle. In other words, the more fragmented the chamber, the more difficult it will be for the government to be composed of a majority. Moreover, the variables for quality of democracy (BTI), control of corruption, and percentage of ruling-party representatives show a moderate relationship with political confidence. Therefore, those deputies from countries with a high quality of democracy, high control of corruption, or a high percentage of deputies who consider themselves part of the government all show the highest levels of political trust. However, this is not the case for fragmentation or the Gini Index, which exhibit lower explanatory power with respect to political trust; these results therefore do not permit corroboration of the hypotheses that explain the influence of these two

 In the Biplot analysis, the first three factorial axes have been retained, capturing 85.6% of the total variability of the data, which guarantees the reliability of the interpretation of the data with a low loss of information (14%).

15

3  Political Trust of Parliamentary Elites in Latin America

67

variables on the variability of political trust among parliamentary elites in Latin America, unlike what has been observed at the citizen level. The fact that the percentage of government representatives, and not fragmentation, is related to trust by parliamentarians in the political institutions reveals that this confidence is highly politicized, since those belonging to the party or parties in government (“officials”) tend to trust these institutions more. Still, when a change of government occurs, and these same representatives become part of the opposition, their political trust diminishes. Depending on their specific situation, those countries located on the right of Fig. 3.4 have a parliamentary elite who voice greater trust in their political institutions and greater satisfaction with the functioning of democracy. Research should distinguish two types of representatives: on the one hand, those whose PCI is explained by their country’s context and institutional performance (first quadrant), as would be the case for Chilean, Costa Rican, Uruguayan parliamentarians for all periods analyzed, and for Brazilian representatives in 2010. These countries enjoy healthy democracies and strong control over corruption, and their parliamentarians are satisfied with the functioning of democracy, meaning they also trust their political institutions. In such countries, the degree of fragmentation of the party system is not an explanatory factor in the levels of political trust claimed by their parliamentarians. On the other hand, those parliamentarians whose high values in the PCI are explained by their degree of politicization (fourth quadrant)—that is, by their identification with either the government or the opposition—are the most significant. This was the case for Honduras in 2010, Ecuador in 2013, and Nicaragua in 2012 and 2017. In these cases, the politicization of parliamentarians is closely related to fragmentation of the party system, and the less fragmented the parties, the higher the percentage of deputies affiliated with the government, which leads to greater confidence in the country’s political institutions. This politicization of political trust explains why in Honduras in 2014, in Ecuador in 2009, and in Nicaragua in 2007 the indices of political trust among parliamentarians were among the lowest in the region’s last  20 years. In these countries, fragmentation of the party system was high, and the percentage of pro-government deputies as compared to previous legislatures dropped by more than 20 percentage points. In the second quadrant (Fig. 3.4), the countries whose parliamentary elites scored the lowest values in the PCI were Peru, Guatemala, and Mexico (throughout the period analyzed), Honduras (except in 2010), Ecuador in 2009, Nicaragua in 2007, and Paraguay in 2008. These lower levels of political confidence as compared to other countries are associated with high fragmentation of the party system, small percentages of “official” representatives, greater dissatisfaction with the functioning of democracy, low levels of democratic quality, and little control of corruption in their countries, on average. In recent years, the hypothesis that political confidence depends mainly on a country’s economic and social performance has gained weight, which would imply short-term variations in political trust. In this regard, the Gini Index has been used to analyze whether social inequality significantly affects parliamentarians’ attitudes

68

C. Rivas Pérez and M. Alcántara

Table 3.3  Ideological positioning in Latin American Parliaments Presidencies that moved to the left with Parliaments that moved to the left Argentina (2007) Bolivia (2009) Costa Rica (2010) Ecuador (2013) Nicaragua (2011) Uruguay (2009)

Presidencies that moved to the right with Parliaments that moved to the right Chile (2009) Colombia (2010) Guatemala (2011) Mexico (2009) Panama (2014) Peru (2011) Dominican Republic (2010)

Presidencies that moved to the left with Parliaments that moved to the right Brazil (2006) Honduras (2009 and 2014)a El Salvador (2012) Paraguay (2013)

Source: authors’ elaboration based on Martínez-Hernández and Bohigues (2019). Election year in brackets a Honduras’ Parliament moved first to the right, in 2009, then to the left, in 2014

in terms of political trust, (i.e., whether parliamentarians have less confidence in political institutions in countries with higher social inequality). The results obtained show that this variable is not a determining factor in explaining the degrees of political trust among parliamentarians, unlike what is observed for citizens (Fig. 3.5). We found only a few countries where this hypothesis would be corroborated (second quadrant): Guatemala; Honduras in 2006, 2014, and 2018; Paraguay in 2008; and Panama and Brazil in 2014 are the only countries showing any indication that high levels of social inequality lead to low levels of political trust. In contrast, countries including Honduras in 2010, Colombia in 2006 and 2011, Brazil in 2010, and Panama in 2009 and 2018 all scored high on the Gini Index, and yet their PCI scores were also high. On the opposite side, we have countries with low levels of social inequality as well as low political confidence, as was the case for Peru in 2018, and for Mexico and El Salvador in all the periods analyzed. In fact, El Salvador has registered the lowest levels of social inequality of all the countries analyzed, but the PCI of its legislators is not among the highest in Latin America. Finally, we turn to the analysis of whether changes in political cycle in the region can explain changes in the levels of political trust among parliamentarians. Table 3.3 shows the ideological positions of Latin American parliaments and their ideological consistency with concurrent presidencies. Thus the question is whether in those countries where an ideological change in government has occurred (be it to the left or the right) any increase has been observed in the political trust of elites. To this end, Figs. 3.6, 3.7, and 3.8 present the data for countries according to their classification in Table 3.3.16

 The presentation of the data in three graphs allows for better observation of whether political change in the countries represented has had any effect on the political confidence of parliamentarians. This analysis is no different from that offered in Figs. 3.4 and 3.5, but representation of the data is here simplified.

16

3  Political Trust of Parliamentary Elites in Latin America

69

2

Axis 2 - (25.39%)

1

0

–1

–2

–3

–4

–3

–2

–1 0 Axis 1 - (39.34%)

1

2

Fig. 3.6  Representation of countries with left-hand location, from the HJ-Biplot analysis (axis 1–2). (Source: the authors, based on HJ-Biplot results)

Therefore, considering countries where the presidency was positioned on the left, and with subsequent location on the left of the parliament, there was an increase in the degree of political trust over the legislative period of that change of cycle. The most notable cases here were Ecuador in 2013 and Nicaragua in 2012, where the PCI score of parliamentarians increased significantly compared to the prior periods of 2009 and 2007, respectively (Fig. 3.6). Something similar can be observed for Bolivia and Costa Rica in 2010, as compared to the previous legislative period. The case of Costa Rica deserves separate analysis, this being the only country where a parliament shifted to the left (in 2010) followed by a shift of the presidency (in 2014), which according to our analysis translates into a further increase in political trust by that legislature. As for those countries with presidencies and parliaments that shifted to the right (Fig. 3.7), it can be seen that political change also has an effect on the political confidence of parliamentarians, though not always in the same direction. Political trust in these countries proved more volatile than in countries that experienced a shift to the left. In Guatemala, the movement of the parliament to the right in 2011 led to higher values in the PCI, and this upward trend has continued into the current period. In Colombia, political trust improved in 2011 with the rightward movement of the House, but then confidence decreased again significantly in subsequent periods. Peru and Panama both show a similar situation; the rightward positioning of

70

C. Rivas Pérez and M. Alcántara

3

Axis 2 - (32.25%)

2

1

0

–1

–2

–3 –2

–1

0

1

2

3

4

Axis 1 - (46.47%)

Fig. 3.7  Representation of countries with right-hand location, from the HJ-Biplot analysis (axis 1–2). (Source: the authors, based on HJ-Biplot results)

their parliaments meant an increase in the PCI score, but in the next legislature, that confidence again decreased (while in Panama, it has once again recovered in the current legislature). Undoubtedly the most interesting cases are those in which the presidency is located on the left and the parliament is located on the right (Fig. 3.8).17 Honduras is a clear example of this. In 2010, with its Chamber on the ideological right, the PCI increased significantly compared to 2006; then in 2014, when the parliament shifted to the left, confidence decreased with respect to the previous period; finally, it has improved again in the current period. Something similar can be seen with respect to El Salvador, where the left positioning of the presidency in 2009 improved  In the case of Brazil, there are no data available to determine whether the leftward shift of the presidency in 2002 with Lula da Silva and the subsequent rightward shift of the parliament in 2006 had any effect on the political confidence of the chamber. We have data for 2010 and 2014 only, and here we can see that, with respect to 2010, the political confidence of the parliamentary elite in Brazil had decreased by 2014.

17

3  Political Trust of Parliamentary Elites in Latin America

71

2

Axis 2 - (30.06%)

1

0

–1

–2

–3

–4

–3

–2

–1 Axis 1 - (39.26%)

0

1

2

Fig. 3.8  Representation of countries with a left-turn presidency and a right-turn parliament, from the HJ-Biplot analysis (axis 1–2). (Source: the authors, based on HJ-Biplot results)

the PCI of Salvadoran legislators during that legislature; and this score remained stable until 2018, when political confidence fell. Therefore, in view of the results obtained, we can say that, in most cases, a change in the political cycle has a positive effect on the political trust expressed by parliamentarians. However, in those countries where the so-called “turn to the left” occurred, the change in the level of political confidence was more accentuated and maintained over time.

3.7  Conclusions Political confidence, or the trust that people place in institutions, is central to the analysis of politics and is among those characteristics that most immediately reflect the performance (for better or worse) of a given democracy, as well as the degree of political disaffection with the system for its citizens. Throughout this chapter, we have analyzed the levels of confidence voiced by parliamentary elites in Latin America in the four central political institutions (the parliament, the president, the

72

C. Rivas Pérez and M. Alcántara

judiciary, and the political parties) through an index of political confidence made for that purpose, and we have obtained some very revealing results. If we focus on the comparison of levels and trends evident from PCI results, it can be seen that, unlike citizens, parliamentary elites trust in the political institutions of their countries. However, differences depend on the institution being evaluated as well as the country, with evidence of distinct levels of trust, not always linear over time. As regards institutions, the parliament and President of the Republic are those that inspire the most significant trust among representatives, although the latter also presents the most considerable variations within the countries and periods analyzed. The President of the Republic is perhaps the institution most conditioned by the political game, which is to say it is the most politicized institution. The political parties and especially the judiciary are the institutions that arouse the greatest mistrust among parliamentary elites. In terms of regional differences, some countries show higher levels of trust (as in Uruguay, Costa Rica, and Chile) while other showed lower levels of trust (Peru, Guatemala, or Paraguay). With respect to temporal variations, it can be seen that, in those countries where the advent of the twenty-first century brought unprecedented electoral turnarounds and the triumph of progressive presidential candidates, increases were also registered in the levels of political trust expressed by parliamentary elites (as in Argentina, Bolivia, and Ecuador) as a result of the large parliamentary majorities enjoyed by the ruling parties. The second part of this work has been dedicated to understanding the relationship between aggregate levels of political confidence of parliamentary elites in the political institutions based on the PCI, by way of explanatory factors commonly used in the relevant literature for the analysis of political trust among citizens. For this purpose, a multivariate HJ-Biplot analysis was carried out using the explanatory variables of political confidence that measure the variations between countries and legislative periods. Through this analysis, we have been able to verify that the most determining factors to explain the political trust of representatives, as well as its evolution over time, are satisfaction with democracy, quality of democracy (measured through the BTI index), and control of corruption. However, a fourth variable—identification with the government or with the opposition—is closely related to the BTI in some countries and reveals in those cases a clear politicization of political trust. Thus an increase in the values of these four variables can be said to imply an increase in political confidence. Other factors, such as the Gini Index or fragmentation in the party system, have less power to explain the political confidence of elites, at least in our analysis. Finally, given the results obtained, we can again assert that changes in the political cycle have in most cases a positive effect on the overall PCI scores of parliamentarians. Also, in the countries that experienced a “left turn” early in the century, positive changes in levels of political trust proved both more accentuated and more enduring.

3  Political Trust of Parliamentary Elites in Latin America

73

3.8 Appendix (Table 3.4) Table 3.4  Statistics describing the variables Country_year Argentina 2008 Argentina 2010 Argentina 2012 Bolivia 2006 Bolivia 2010 Bolivia 2015 Brazil 2010 Brazil 2014 Chile 2006 Chile 2010 Chile 2014 Colombia 2006 Colombia 2010 Colombia 2014 Colombia 2018 Costa Rica 2006 Costa Rica 2010 Costa Rica 2014 Costa Rica 2018 Ecuador 2009 Ecuador 2013 Ecuador 2017 El Salvador 2006 El Salvador 2009 El Salvador 2012 El Salvador 2014 El Salvador 2018 Guatemala 2008 Guatemala 2012 Guatemala 2016 Honduras 2006 Honduras 2010 Honduras 2014 Honduras 2018 Mexico 2006 Mexico 2010 Mexico 2013

IC PPCI 2.79 2.87 2.85 2.56 2.83 2.65 2.90 2.73 2.88 3.08 3.06 3.08 3.19 2.69 2.66 2.92 3.10 3.20 2.91 2.41 3.09 3.03 2.67

Satisfaction with democracy 2.79 2.74 2.64 2.79 2.77 3.03 3.00 2.65 2.88 3.00 2.83 2.74 3.06 2.65 2.77 2.96 3.07 2.89 3.11 2.34 3.23 2.76 2.65

BTI 7.34 7.25 6.95 6.07 5.98 6.50 8.05 8.02 8.85 8.99 8.82 6.10 6.33 6.56 6.59 8.70 8.86 8.74 8.49 5.75 5.39 5.55 7.00

2.88

2.72

2.89

Corruption control −0.44 −0.36 −0.44 −0.43 −0.47 −0.70 0.05 −0.34 1.46 1.50 1.49 −0.12 −0.29 −0.37 −0.37 0.44 0.71 0.76 0.47 −0.80 −0.57 −0.60 −0.30

% Official deputies 57.3 35.2 38.1 54.2 64.9 67.8 65.1 58.9 54.4 44.2 52.9 59.4 82.4 65.8 54.3 44.6 39.3 21.8 18.2 51.1 72.3 48.9 41.4

F-Rae 0.78 0.58 0.79 0.58 0.54 0.54 0.89 0.90 0.82 0.82 0.84 0.87 0.80 0.83 0.85 0.70 0.74 0.80 0.80 0.73 0.45 0.45 0.67

Gini index 43.90 41.00 40.00 56.70 49.20 67.80 65.10 58.90 48.22 46.72 47.30 53.70 53.60 52.80 49.70 49.40 48.20 48.60 48.70 48.40 46.90 45.00 45.70

6.99 −0.25

44.1

0.66

41.60

2.89

7.23 −0.41

37.7

0.69

39.90

2.81

2.55

7.20 −0.42

39.6

0.67

40.60

2.59

2.75

6.88 −0.51

27.8

0.67

40.00

2.37 2.71 2.77 2.76 3.21 2.66 2.73 2.61 2.57 2.80

2.58 2.70 2.65 2.85 2.86 2.48 2.44 2.39 2.38 2.71

5.43 5.36 5.13 6.04 5.88 5.95 5.51 7.13 7.09 6.90

−0.65 −0.66 −0.74 −0.83 −0.89 −0.79 −0.72 −0.26 −0.36 −0.51

30.9 42.4 31.0 44.0 64.8 35.8 51.7 32.8 28.5 40.5

0.79 0.82 0.86 0.58 0.57 0.72 0.72 0.72 0.67 0.72

54.60 54.60 48.30 57.50 53.10 50.40 50.00 47.70 47.60 45.30

(continued)

74

C. Rivas Pérez and M. Alcántara

Table 3.4 (continued) Country_year Mexico 2016 Mexico 2018 Nicaragua 2007 Nicaragua 2012 Nicaragua 2017 Panama 2009 Panama 2014 Panama 2018 Paraguay 2008 Paraguay 2013 Peru 2006 Peru 2011 Peru 2018 Dominican Republic 2006 Dominican Republic 2011 Dominican Republic 2017 Uruguay 2010 Uruguay 2015

IC PPCI 2.76 2.85 2.51 3.05 3.37 2.95 2.69 2.90 2.47 2.79 2.26 2.71 2.34 2.93

Satisfaction with democracy 2.52 2.80 2.61 2.91 3.22 2.84 2.66 3.26 2.58 2.84 2.34 2.80 2.50 2.84

BTI 6.40 6.23 5.88 5.59 5.53 7.42 7.07 7.11 6.14 6.39 6.57 6.74 6.86 6.36

3.00

2.90

2.88 3.46 3.54

Corruption control −0.72 −0.93 −0.77 −0.77 −0.87 −0.30 −0.34 −0.54 −0.98 −1.04 −0.20 −0.22 −0.50 −0.70

% Official deputies 47.4 58.8 39.1 71.4 76.3 60.7 17.0 54.1 37.5 51.9 30.5 42.3 14.9 58.7

F-Rae 0.76 0.69 0.69 0.46 0.46 0.73 0.67 0.67 0.71 0.57 0.74 0.79 0.79 0.60

Gini index 43.40 43.40 48.80 43.90 46.20 51.90 50.60 49.90 50.70 47.90 50.50 46.20 43.80 51.80

6.78 −0.81

56.6

0.56

47.40

2.62

6.44 −0.74

60.3

0.56

45.30

3.25 3.46

9.25 1.28 9.33 1.32

52.6 50.7

0.62 0.62

44.50 40.20

References Alcántara, M. (2016). Los ciclos políticos en América Latina (1978-2015). Sistema, 242-243, 5–22. Alcántara, M. (2018). Politics in Latin America in the past third of a century (1978-2015). In M. Alcántara, J. Blondel, & J. L. Thiébault (Eds.), Presidents and democracy in Latin America (pp. 5–22). London: Routledge. Alcántara, M. (Ed.). (2020). América Latina vota: 2017–19. Madrid: Tecnos. Anderson C. J., & Singer M. M. (2008). The sensitive left and the impervious right: Multilevel models and the politics of inequality, ideology, and legitimacy in europe. Comparative political studies 41(4–5):564–599.. Bargsted, M., & Torcal, M. (2015). Explicando la confianza política. ¿Economía o política? Un análisis longitudinal y comparado de Europa y América Latina. In L.  Paramio (Ed.), Desafección Política y gobernabilidad (pp.  201–227). Madrid: Marcial Pons, Ediciones Jurídicas y Sociales. Bargsted, M., Castillo, J. C., & Somma, N. (2014). Political trust in Latin America (pp. 1–30). Chile: Institute of Sociology, Faculty of Social Sciences, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile. Barragán, M., Rivas, C., & Bohigues, A. (in press). Latin American Parliamentary Elites Project: How has the profile of representation evolved? Revista Española de Sociología. Bianco, W. T. (1998). Uncertainty, appraisal, and common interest: The roots of constituent trust. In V. Braithwaite & M. Levi (Eds.), Trust and governance (pp. 245–266). New York: Russell Sage Foundation.

3  Political Trust of Parliamentary Elites in Latin America

75

Brinks, D. (2012). ‘A Tale of Two Cities’: The Judiciary and the Rule of Law in Latin America. En P. Kingstone, y D. J. Yashar (Eds.), Routledge handbook of latin American Politics. Nueva York, ee. uu.: Routledge. Castillo, J. C., Bargsted, M., & Somma, N. (2016). Political trust in Latin America. In S. Zmerli & T. Van der Meer (Eds.), The handbook of political trust. Cheltenham: Edward Elgar. Citrin, J. (1974). Comment: The political relevance of trust in government. American Political Science Review, 68(3), 973–988. Citrin, J., & Luks, S. (2001). Political trust revisited: Déjà vu all over again? In J.  R. Hibbing & E. Theiss-Morse (Eds.), What is it about government that Americans dislike? (pp. 9–27). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Citrin, J., & Muste, C. (1999). Trust in government. In J.  P. Robinson, P.  R. Shaver, & L.  S. Wrightsman (Eds.), Measures of political attitudes (pp.  465–532). San Diego: Academic Press. Clarke, H., Dutt, N., & Kornberg, A. (1993). The political economy of attitudes toward polity and society in Western European democracies. The Journal of Politics, 55(4), 998–1021. Cusack, T.  R. (1999). The shaping of popular satisfaction with government and regime performance in Germany. British Journal of Political Science, 29(4), 641–672. CEPAL (2016). La matriz de la desigualdad en América Latina. Santiago De Riz, L. (2015). Democracias bajo sospecha en América Latina: Reflexiones sobre la desconfianza política. In L. Paramio (Ed.), Desafección Política y gobernabilidad (pp. 30–60). Madrid: Marcial Pons, Ediciones Jurídicas y Sociales. Del Campo, E. (2015). Democracia, desafección política y confianza institucional. In L. Paramio (Ed.), Desafección Política y gobernabilidad (pp. 267–284). Madrid: Marcial Pons, Ediciones Jurídicas y Sociales. Díaz-Faes, A. A., González-Albo, B., Galindo, M. P., & Bordons, M. (2013). HJ-Biplot como herramienta de inspección de matrices de datos bibliométricos. Revista Española de Documentación Científica, 36(1), 1–16. Easton, D. (1965). A systems analysis of political life. New York: Wiley. Easton, D. (1975). A re-assessment of the concept of political support. British Journal of Political Science, 5(4), 435–457. Galindo, P. (1986). Una alternativa de representación simultánea: HJ-Biplot. Qüestioó, 10(1), 13–23. Hardin, R. (2000). Do we want trust in government. In M. E. Warren (Ed.), Democracy and trust. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Herreros, F. (2015). Desconfianza política en Europa durante la gran recesión. In L. Paramio (Ed.), Political disaffection and governance: The political challenge (pp. 129–146). Madrid: Marcial Pons, Ediciones Jurídicas y Sociales. Hetherington, M., & Rudolph, T. J. (2008). Priming, performance, and the dynamics of political trust. Journal of Politics, 70, 498–512. Hooghe, M., & Zmerli, S. (2011). Introduction: The context of political trust. In S.  Zmerli & M. Hooghe (Eds.), Political trust. Why context matters. Colchester: ECOR Press. Inglehart, R. (1997). Modernización y postmodernización: El cambio cultural, económico y político en 43 sociedades. Madrid: Centro de Investigaciones Sociológicas. Levi, M., & Stoker, L. (2000). Political trust and trustworthiness. Annual Review of Political Science, 3, 475–507. Magalhães, P. (2006). Confidence in parliaments: Performance, representation, and accountability. In M. Torcal & J. R. Montero (Eds.), Political disaffection. London: Routledge. Martínez-Hernández, A., & Bohigues, A. (2019). ¿El giro a la izquierda en los parlamentos latinoamericanos: ¿cuándo y dónde se dio? Política y Gobierno, 26(1), 93–115. Miller, A. (1974a). “Political issues and trust in Government”. The American political science review, 68(3), 951–972. Miller, A. (1974b). “Rejoinder to ‘Comment’ by Jack Citrin: Political discontent or ritualism?”. The American political science review, 68(3), 989–1001.

76

C. Rivas Pérez and M. Alcántara

Montero, J. R., Zmerli, S., & Newton, K. (2008). Confianza social, confianza política y satisfacción con la democracia. Revista Española de Investigaciones Sociológicas (REIS), 122, 11–54. Moreno, A. (Ed.). (2011). La confianza en las instituciones. México en perspectiva comparada. México: Centro de Estudios Sociales y de Opinión Pública. Cámara de Diputados. Norris, P. (1999). Critical citizens: Global support for democratic government. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Norris, P. (2011). Democratic deficit. Critical citizens revisited. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Paramio, L. (2015). Desconfianza política y gobernabilidad: El riesgo político. In L.  Paramio (Ed.), Desafección política y gobernabilidad: El reto político (pp.  17–25). Madrid: Marcial Pons, Ediciones Jurídicas y Sociales. Pharr, S. J. (2000). Corruption and public trust: Perspectives on Japan and East Asia (East-West-­ Center Working Paper) (pp. 1–40). Honolulu: East-West-Center. Pharr, S.  J., & Putnam, R.  D. (2000). Disaffected democracies: What’s troubling the trilateral countries? Princeton: Princeton University Press. Porta, D. (2000). Social capital, beliefs in government, and political corruption. In S.  J. Pharr & R.  D. Putnam (Eds.), Disaffected democracies. What’s troubling the trilateral countries? (pp. 202–230). Princeton: Princeton University Press. Putman, R.  D. (1995). Tuning in, tuning out. The strange disappearance of social capital in America. Political Science & Politics, 28(4), 664–683. Rivas, C., Vicente, P., & Sánchez, F. (2010). La educación como elemento de calidad de los políticos latinoamericanos. Política y Gobierno, 12(2), 279–319. Segovia, C. (2008). Political trust in Latin America. Ann Arbor: ProQuest. Svampa, M. (2013). “Consensus on commodities” and valuation languages in Latin America. Nueva Sociedad, 244, 30–46. Retrieved March 7, 2019, from http://goo.gl/iL8Mv4. Torcal, M. (2000). Partidos y desafección política. Magazine, DHIAL 14. Instituto Internacional de Gobernabilidad. Retrieved from http://www.iigov.org. Torcal, M. (2006a). Desafección institucional e historia democrática en las nuevas democracias. Revista SAAP, 2(3), 591–634. Torcal, M. (2006b). Political disaffection and democratisation history in new democracies. In M. Torcal & J. R. Montero (Eds.), Political disaffection in contemporary democracies. Social capital, institutions, and politics. London: Routledge. Torcal, M., & Bargsted, M. (2015). Confianza política en Europa y América Latina: Estudio comparado con datos y causas. In L. Paramio (Ed.), Desconfianza política y gobernabilidad: El riesgo político (pp. 163–195). Madrid: Marcial Pons, Ediciones Jurídicas y Sociales. Torcal, M., & Montero, J. R. (2006). Political disaffection in comparative perspective. In M. Torcal & J.  R. Montero (Eds.), Political disaffection in contemporary democracies. Social capital, institutions, and politics. London: Routledge. Vicente Villardón, José Luis. (2015). MULTBIPLOT.  Salamanca. http://biplot.dep.usal.es/ multbiplot/multbiplot-in-r/ Weil, F. (1989). “The Sources and Structure of Legitimation in Western Democracies”. American sociological review, 54, 682–706. World Bank data. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://datos.bancomundial.org/indicador/ny.gdp. mktp.kd.zg. Zmerli, S., & Castillo, J. C. (2015). Income inequality, distributive fairness and political trust in Latin America. Social Science Research, 52, 179–192. Zmerli, S., & Newton, K. (2011). Winners, losers and three types of trust. In S. Zmerli & M. Hooghe (Eds.), Political trust. Why context matters (pp. 67–94). Colchester: ECPR Press.

Chapter 4

Satisfaction with Democracy in Latin America: Perspectives from Political Elites and Citizens Mar Martínez Rosón and Araceli Mateos Díaz

4.1  Introduction The study of satisfaction with democracy (hereafter SWD) is an area of analysis that has been attracting political scientists since the appearance of Easton’s seminal work in 1965. In these more than 50 years, a multitude of articles have focused on finding the best way to measure satisfaction with democracy, with particular interest shown to the specific levels of SWD found in individuals and in countries. Scholars have sought explanatory factors for variations in satisfaction among both countries and individuals (that is, at the macro and micro levels). This vast literature includes case studies and especially comparative studies, and it combines both synchronic and diachronic approaches. However, less attention has been paid in the literature to analysis of divergences within a single country between the levels of SWD as reported by political representatives and by citizens. In this chapter, we address that very issue. On the one hand, we analyze levels of citizen satisfaction with the way democracy works in Latin America and its correlates. On the other hand, we examine the degree of satisfaction voiced by elected representatives in the region, along with the individual explanatory variables. The results allow us to better identify similarities and differences between citizens and representatives, and to contribute to the general understanding of the Latin American context, which remains comparatively understudied.1 At the same time, we compare these results with those of other advanced democracies, to

 Notable studies include Alister Sanhueza et al. (2015), Lagos (2003), Madrid and Rhodes-Purdy (2016), Singh (2014), and Shomer et al. (2015). 1

M. Martínez Rosón (*) · A. Mateos Díaz University of Salamanca, Salamanca, Spain e-mail: [email protected]; [email protected] © The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020 M. Alcántara et al. (eds.), Politics and Political Elites in Latin America, Latin American Societies, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-51584-3_4

77

78

M. Martínez Rosón and A. Mateos Díaz

check for similar findings in the literature or specific variables for the regional context. In this analysis, we have used data from two surveys: data for citizens derives from 27,947 interviews conducted by the AmericasBarometer project during 2016 and 2017; data for analysis of the opinions of elected representatives is drawn from 1326 personal interviews during the sixth wave2 of the Elites Políticas Latinoamericanas project, conducted in each of the region’s parliaments. Results show that variables linked to institutional performance influence the degree of satisfaction of both groups, while notable differences exist concerning other variables. In the case of legislators, trust is a more relevant factor than the existence of corruption, whereas for citizens the benefits and performance of public policies (health care, roads, education) have a substantial effect on satisfaction. The rest of this chapter is organized as follows. The next section analyzes the explanatory factors of levels of satisfaction as are commonly identified in the literature. The subsequent section explains the levels of satisfaction present in the Latin American region, both among citizens and among representatives, along with the data included in the statistical model, the hypothesis, and the data analysis. The fourth section presents an analysis of the results and a discussion of the explanatory variables for both citizens and representatives. Also considered are any disparities between the two groups, and differences with previous results. The final section highlights the most relevant findings and their implications for the region.

4.2  Correlates of Satisfaction with Democracy Researchers have tried to explain differences in levels of SWD using a wide range of variables, whether to explain differences between individuals, between countries or regions, or variations over time within a particular country. These many variables can be clustered into five groups: institutional variables, cultural factors, political performance, economic performance, and individual traits. Institutional variables include all characteristics of the political design of the system, as incorporated into the constitution and laws, or else derived from them. Among these factors, the literature has paid particular attention to the electoral system3 (Aarts and Thomassen 2008; Anderson 1998; Blais and Dobrzynska 1998; Christmann 2018; Curini et al. 2012; Karp and Banducci 2008; Kim 2009; Miller and Listhaug 1990; Singh 2018); also the territorial division of power (Blais et al. 2015; Christmann 2018); the democratic experience or age of the current democratic system (Aarts and Thomassen 2008; Huang et  al. 2008); and the different forms of government (Anderson and Guillory 1997; Curini et al. 2012). Into this category we can also add factors such as the fractionalization of the party system

 Appendix (Table 4.3) contains the specific data for each legislature.  Such as type of representation, district size, electoral disproportionality, or mandatory voting.

2 3

4  Satisfaction with Democracy in Latin America: Perspectives from Political Elites…

79

(Christmann and Torcal 2017; Quaranta and Martini 2017) or the internal democracy of political parties and the selection of candidates (Shomer et al. 2015). The second category is comprised of cultural variables. These factors have received less attention in the study of the degree of SWD but have been more important to the literature around the support for democracy as a political regime, or analysis focused on diffuse regime support. This category incorporates variables related to political participation (Huang et al. 2008) and particularly electoral participation (Ezrow and Xezonakis 2016); also political knowledge (Stockemer and Sundström 2013); ethnic fragmentation (Alesina et  al. 2003); and social capital (interpersonal trust). Other variables taken into account are related to the degree of human development, such as those that measure tolerance, well-being, values of self-expression, and post-materialist values (Inglehart and Welzel 2005). Political performance has also been incorporated in the analysis, with variables such as the degree of government responsiveness and accountability (Kornberg and Clarke 1994; McAllister 2005; Sarsfield and Echegaray 2006); fulfillment of the functions of representation (Aarts and Thomassen 2008; Dahlberg et  al. 2013; Norris 2011; Sarsfield and Echegaray 2006; Wagner et al. 2009); descriptive representation (Madrid and Rhodes-Purdy 2016); ideological congruence (Dahlberg and Holmberg 2014; Kim 2009); levels of corruption and political scandals (Anderson and Tverdova 2003; Canache and Allison 2005; Booth and Seligson 2009; Mattes and Bratton 2007; Pellegata and Memoli 2018; Wagner et al. 2009); the degree of autonomy of the government concerning international organizations (Ruiz-Rufino and Alonso 2017); the structure of the opposition (Weil 1989); levels of social protection (Lühiste 2014); the electoral process (Gjefsen 2012); the quality of democracy (Christmann 2018); the protection of rights and political liberties (Ariely 2013; Bratton and Mattes 2001; Hofferbert and Klingemann 1999; Mattes and Bratton 2007); or sequence and negotiation during a political transition (Evans and Whitefield 1995). Economic factors have been included when the purpose is to consider satisfaction levels over time within a single country, or to explain differences between countries (Clarke et al. 1993; Evans and Whitefield 1995; Kim 2009). Economic performance is measured with variables such as the evolution of economic growth, inflation, unemployment levels, budget deficits, levels of public debt, modernization processes, or levels of poverty (Armingeon and Guthmann 2014; Christmann 2018; Cordero and Simón 2015; Evans and Whitefield 1995; Graham and Sukhtankar 2004; Karp et al. 2003; Lühiste 2014; Ruiz-Rufino and Alonso 2017; Anderson and Singer 2008). Lastly, scholars have also focused on analysis of individual characteristics when the goal is to explain differences in SWD among individuals. These individual variables fall into two general types. One type includes variables of economic and political performance measured at the micro level (for example, assessment of the past, present, and future economic situation of a country, or measures of internal and external political efficacy) that offer individual opinions about a macro aspect. The second type includes micro variables related to the respondent, for example: the fact that they voted for the winning or the losing party (Anderson and Guillory

80

M. Martínez Rosón and A. Mateos Díaz

1997; Blais and Gélineau 2007; Curini et al. 2012; Fuchs et al. 1995; Kim 2009; Martini and Quaranta 2019; Singh 2014; Wells and Krieckhaus 2006); sociodemographic variables (age, education, income, urban/rural residence, religious practice, and gender, to mention a few); or assessment of the respondent’s economic situation (income and employment status). In addition to these five groups of factors that help explain satisfaction with democracy, certain conclusions previously reached by the literature may be relevant to our study. Scholars have pointed out that theories proven for old democracies do not work equally well in third-wave democracies (Anderson 1998; Fuchs et  al. 1995; Linde and Ekman 2003). Anderson (1998), after comparing old and new European democracies, asserts that the explanatory structure for SWD in the new democratic systems is different from what applied in the old democracies. In older democracies of Europe, SWD is related to institutional settings as the electoral rules. On the other hand, SWD in newer democracies is associated with variables of political performance. For Linde and Ekman (2003), not only do new democracies show lower levels regarding the legitimacy of their democratic systems, but also their levels of SWD are not linked to the same explanatory variables as in old democracies. Linde and Ekman’s analysis focuses on Eastern Europe and puts heavy emphasis on electoral results as a significant explanation in degree of SWD. Whether or not representatives see themselves as winners or losers in any given election affects individuals’ satisfaction with democracy. Their results show a smaller percentage of losers reporting satisfaction in younger democracies than in mature and settled democracies. Based on their data, the expectation is that, over time, the percentage of losers who report satisfaction will increase, while those democracies will achieve a higher legitimacy. In conclusion, and according to the literature, the factors that produce changes in SWD levels in newer Latin America democracies are likely different from those that explain the changes in older democracies.

4.3  D  ata and Methods: Satisfaction with Democracy in Latin America There are various databases that allow analysis of the degree of satisfaction with democracy among political elites and citizens in Latin America. In this chapter, we look to two of the databases most widely used by academics. The first source, which reports the opinions of political representatives, is the Latin American Parliamentary Elites Project (PELA) from the University of Salamanca. As a second source, for Latin American Public Opinion (LAPOP), we rely on the AmericasBarometer project from Vanderbilt University. Both institutions have provided researchers with a

4  Satisfaction with Democracy in Latin America: Perspectives from Political Elites…

81

Fig. 4.1  Satisfaction with democracy: citizens and elected representatives in Latin America. (Source: The authors, using data from PELA and LAPOP. The question asked to representatives was, “In general, would you say that you are very satisfied, satisfied, dissatisfied, or very dissatisfied with the current way democracy works in [country]?” The question for citizens was, “In general, would you say that you are very satisfied, satisfied, dissatisfied, or very dissatisfied with the way democracy works in [country]?” The percentage displayed is the sum of “very satisfied” and “satisfied”)

large volume of opinion data, with information collected since 1994 (in the case of legislators) and since 2004 (in the case of citizens).4 In this section, we analyze SWD levels of both citizens and representatives from 18 countries, using an individual approach and selecting the most recent data available for both groups. We match datasets for citizens and representatives that are most proximate in time and select independent variables that were similar for both groups and available for all countries considered in both surveys.5 In the citizens database, analysis covered a total of 27,947 individuals from 18 Latin American countries. The representatives database includes responses from 1,326 legislators from those same countries.6 As shown in Fig.  4.1, levels of satisfaction with democracy among Latin American citizens differ widely across the region. Some cases present very low levels of SWD (under 30%), as in Brazil, Venezuela, Mexico, and Peru. However,  We thank the Latin American Parliamentary Elites Project (PELA-University of Salamanca n.d.) for access to the data and the Latin American Public Opinion Project (LAPOP) and its major supporters (The United States Agency for International Development, the Inter-American Development Bank, and Vanderbilt University) for making the data available. 5  See Appendix (Tables 4.4 and 4.5) for selected variables. 6  See Appendix (Table 4.3) for more details about the sample in each country. 4

82

M. Martínez Rosón and A. Mateos Díaz

other countries including Nicaragua and Uruguay show a much higher degree of satisfaction (over 60%). Glancing at the data on elected representatives, we likewise observe a wide range of SWD ranging from Venezuela where representatives are not very satisfied (a mere 31%) to Brazil, Costa Rica, Chile, and (above all) Uruguay where the degree of satisfaction is over 80%. In any case, in all countries analyzed, representatives show a higher degree of satisfaction than do the citizenry. Comparison of the levels of satisfaction of representatives and citizens also shows discrepancies in their perceptions of the political system. In some countries, the distance between the legislative elites and the public is short, as in Argentina or Venezuela (with a gap of less than 5 percentage points). On the other hand, that distance in Chile or Paraguay suggests a vast difference between the groups’ degrees of satisfaction (over 45 points). Only Brazil shows a higher difference, with a distance of 64 points between representatives and citizens. The fact that legislators and citizens share a similar vision of the way democracy works in their respective countries allows us to identify certain congruence around how to evaluate and value the functioning of these democracies. However, in countries where the discrepancy is larger, we might consider that each group integrates different elements into their evaluations, and that these differing elements account for the gaps between groups. This diverse scenario allows us to ask which characteristics can influence the evaluations from each of these groups, also questioning whether the discrepancies found correspond to a differentiated evaluation by the legislators (responding as members of the institution under evaluation). In this sense, it is important to highlight that the present analysis does not consider countries as units of analysis in which to analyze variations between cases; rather, our aim lies in finding which variables have a larger effect on citizens’ and representatives’ satisfaction. Therefore, one of the purposes of this chapter is to probe whether SWD in both groups can be explained with the same variables. Another goal is to confirm whether the findings on the SWD of citizens in other regions hold true in Latin America, or whether there are characteristics specific to the region that set it apart from other cases. The dependent variable for both public opinion and the assessment of representatives is satisfaction with the way democracy works. This variable has four possible answers in the original surveys (very satisfied, satisfied, dissatisfied, or very dissatisfied), here recoded into a dummy variable (0 for “Dissatisfied” and for 1 “Satisfied”). The independent variables7 are not completely similar, chiefly because the two databases have different designs, aims, and target populations. Despite these differences, we select questions of similar wording and answer categories, and those which better reflect the same dimensions for both cases: corruption, political trust, political and economic performance, and cultural and sociodemographic variables.

 Appendix (Tables 4.4 and 4.5) refers to the original questions from the surveys and the recodifications conducted.

7

4  Satisfaction with Democracy in Latin America: Perspectives from Political Elites…

83

As mentioned earlier, the difficulty of obtaining the same indicators from both databases implies that the regression models (presented later) are not identical, even if they maintain a similar coherence with respect to the analyzed dimensions and the expected effect of each indicator. In the statistical model for citizens, we include 25 variables clustered into four groups: political, economic, cultural, and sociodemographic. In accordance with the aforementioned literature on attitudinal and cultural variables, we expect to find a higher degree of SWD among those citizens with higher levels of interpersonal trust and higher internal and external political efficacy. Similarly, we anticipate higher levels of SWD when there is a high level of trust in institutions, political parties, and transparency of the electoral process (Gjefsen 2012). From an economic point of view, the expectation is to find higher levels of SWD in those citizens who are more satisfied with public services, and who positively value their economic situation, as well as their country’s. On the other hand, we presume a lower degree of SWD among those who perceive high levels of corruption in politicians (Anderson and Tverdova 2003; Canache and Allison 2005; Booth and Seligson 2009; Mattes and Bratton 2007; Pellegata and Memoli 2018; Wagner et al. 2009), as well as those who have been victims of crime, or who consider there to be low levels of freedom of press or of freedom of expression, or low protection of human rights (Ariely 2013; Bratton and Mattes 2001; Mattes and Bratton 2007). Lastly, the expectation is that those citizens with authoritarian views and attitudes, or those who show low support for democracy as a system, are less satisfied with the way democracy works. The statistical model used to explain the SWD of legislators includes 21 variables. Among these, four measure the degree of corruption among politicians and the three branches of power: legislative, judicial, and executive. In accordance with the literature (Christmann and Torcal 2017; Dahlberg et al. 2013), those individuals with a higher perception of corruption report a lower degree of SWD. However, this relationship is not present equally in every case. According to Dahlberg et  al., “expectations of non-corrupt behavior are more pronounced in old democracies, where the problems of corruption and abuse of power are not as acute as in newly democratized countries” (2013: 20). Therefore, it may be that both citizens and politicians take corruption as a given, and that this has no effect on SWD. Despite these findings, this chapter aims to examine whether a relationship exists between corruption and SWD, and the expectation is that the higher the perception of corruption, the lower the SWD. In addition to the corruption variables, we include another group that measures trust in the legislative power, the judicial system, the president, and political parties. The expectation is that higher levels of trust will be related to higher levels of satisfaction. Moreover, studies have shown that poor institutional performance and a lack of institutional responsiveness have an adverse effect on SWD (Bratton and Mattes 2001; Sarsfield and Echegaray 2006). Thus we include three variables of political and institutional performance (degree of judicial independence, stability of democracy, and the existence of links between civil society and political parties). For the analysis of legislators, we use these three variables as a proxy for the

84

M. Martínez Rosón and A. Mateos Díaz

political performance of institutions. According to Anderson, those cases where “electoral dealignment has taken place or is taking place have lower levels of democracy satisfaction than those where voters’ ties with political parties are relatively stable” (1998: 587). Following these results, we expect lower levels of satisfaction among those representatives who question judicial independence, doubt democratic stability, or believe links between society and political parties to be weak. Questions on economic performance available in the parliamentary elites survey are not comparable with those available in the public opinion survey. Therefore, we have included only one variable to measure legislators’ preferences around the role of the State in the economy. Lastly, institutional variables are a critical element in evaluating differences between countries. Although the analysis carried out here is based on individuals, a “type of government” variable has been included, measuring representatives’ preferences on the distribution of power between the executive and legislative branches. Several authors have considered the relationship between these branches to be an explanatory variable, usually measured on a scale that differentiates between majoritarian and consensus systems (Anderson and Guillory 1997; Wells and Krieckhaus 2006). Curini et al. (2012) suggest the existence of a relationship, and that the degree of satisfaction with democracy is higher in parliamentary systems than in presidential systems. In the present analysis, we use representatives’ preferences and expect SWD to be lower in those instances where representatives lean toward an increase in presidential power over the legislative.

4.4  Results and Analysis Tables 4.1 and 4.2 show the results of the logistic regression models applied for both citizens and representatives. The analysis considers a large number of variables that allow for a comparison with prior analyses from other geographical regions. In this way, we hope to enrich other analyses focused exclusively on measuring the effects of a single group of factors, whether they be economic, personal, or performance-related. Comparison between analyses shows that the legislators model seems to have a higher predictive power (R2 = 0.560) than the citizens model (R2 = 0.312). Moreover, there is a difference in the number of variables contributing to each case. Citizen SWD seems to be affected by numerous and more diverse factors than that of representatives. However, the groups appear to be in tune regarding the critical importance of political performance when it comes to explaining satisfaction with the overall functioning of democracy. The results from the statistical model show that both the variables around institutional trust and those concerning perception of corruption are statistically significant in explaining SWD among citizens (see Table 4.1). Also, variables that measure the protection of political rights (such as freedom of expression and the press) and human rights are much more important than are those that measure institutional

4  Satisfaction with Democracy in Latin America: Perspectives from Political Elites…

85

Table 4.1  Citizens’ satisfaction with democracy (logistic regression) Variables Political trust and corruption Corruption among politicians Fair trials Trust in parliament Trust in political parties Trust in the executive Trust in elections Political performance Press freedom—Very little (0) Enough (1) Too much (2) Freedom of political expression—Very little (0) Enough (1) Too much (2) Human rights protection—Very little (0) Enough (1) Too much (2) No victim of crime Economic performance Satisfaction with roads Satisfaction with public schools Satisfaction with public health system Country economic situation: Better (0) Same (1) Worse (2) Personal economic situation: Better (0) Same (1) Worse (2) Cultural and political attitudes Interpersonal trust External political efficacy Internal political efficacy President governing without the parliament Support for democracy Sociodemographic Education level: None or very low level (0)  Low level (1)   Medium level (2)  High level (3) Age Ideology Rural (1)

B

S.E.

Exp(B)

0.018 0.012 0.012 0.013 0.010 0.011

0.874 1.077 1.038 1.062 1.109 1.135

0.121** −0.085

0.043 0.045

1.128 0.919

0.299*** 0.280***

0.042 0.053

1.348 1.323

0.327*** 0.385*** 0.107**

0.042 0.059 0.040

1.387 1.470 1.113

0.461*** 0.361*** 0.523***

0.036 0.039 0.036

1.586 1.435 1.687

−0.076 −0.333***

0.061 0.061

0.927 0.717

−0.043 −0.069

0.049 0.053

0.958 0.933

0.043 0.063*** −0.039*** 0.044 0.102***

0.036 0.009 0.011 0.043 0.011

1.044 1.066 0.962 1.045 1.107

−0.063 −0.187*** −0.162** −0.005*** 0.005 0.196***

0.056 0.053 0.056 0.001 0.006 0.040

0.939 0.829 0.851 0.995 1.005 1.217

−0.134*** 0.074*** 0.037** 0.060*** 0.104*** 0.127***

(continued)

86

M. Martínez Rosón and A. Mateos Díaz

Table 4.1 (continued) Variables Female (1) (Constant) % of correctly predicted cases (N)

B −0.123*** −2.493 73%

S.E. 0.035 0.152

Exp(B) 0.885 0.083 19,120

Nagelkerke R2 = 0.312 * p