How to Subvert Democracy: Montesinos in Peru

Which of the democratic checks and balances - opposition parties, the judiciary, a free press -is the most critical? Peru has the full set of democratic institutions. In the 1990s, the secret-police chief Vladimiro Montesinos systematically undermined them all with bribes. We quantify the checks using the bribe prices. Montesinos paid television-channel owners about 100 times what he paid judges and politicians. One single television channel’s bribe was four times larger than the total of the opposition politicians’ bribes. By revealed preference, the strongest check on the government’s power was the news media.

Parties and Ballot Access in Latin America: a new trend in a new political context

For the last ten years a group of Latin American countries have passed legal reforms raising ballot access requirements. Although each of these reforms have been profusely discussed in every one of the countries involved, so far, they have not been linked as constituting a regional trend. Firstly this paper shows that this trend actually exists, so reversing the dominant leaning on reforms in this field during the 1980s and 1990s. Secondly, the paper shows that the ongoing regional trend emerges in the aftermath of a legitimacy crisis which has been surmounted in every one of the cases. More specifically, the paper identifies a common sequence followed by four countries (Argentina, Colombia, Mexico and Peru) which leads to the raise of ballot access requirements. The sequence involves the following stages: first, a legitimacy crisis which paves the way to reforms opening up the political system; second, once the legitimacy crisis is left behind, a consensus emerges on the negative consequences of the previous reforms; and third, this consensus culminates with the introduction of the restrictive reforms which have dominated the Latin American landscape for the last decade. Every case is analyzed by observing the coalescence of what Matthew Shugart (2001) defined as the inherent and contingent conditions necessary to account for the passing of electoral reforms.Fil: Scherlis Perel, Gerardo Ezequiel. Universidad de Buenos Aires; Argentina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; Argentin

The Pitfalls of Policymaking in Peru: Actors, Institutions and Rules of the Game

Policymaking in Peru over the last 25 years has been largely dominated by the Executive, and has been influenced by a variety of structural and political factors as well as by the personal ambitions of presidents and the public perception of crisis. With few exceptions, neither the Congress nor the other branches and levels of government have played effective roles in defining the national policy agenda, promoting inter-temporal cooperation and providing checks and balances on executive power. This is due in part to constitutional arrangements, in part to electoral outcomes, and in part to the historical weaknesses of political parties and other actors. Although this situation has been partially modified since 2001, it is not clear that the general pattern has changed. While certain arenas of decision-making have been reformed in recent years, in many spheres policymaking remains an arbitrary and unpredictable process, resulting in policies that are of low quality, poorly enforced and easily reversed. Although reforming aspects of the political and electoral systems could contribute to improving this outcome, the instability of the political regime per se has been a deterrent to longer-term institutional development.

The Equality of Sub-Surface Minerals

Sub-surface minerals are in most cases considered to be the proprietary right of a country should those minerals be found within its borders. PRO169 (Indigenous Peoples’ Rights, International Labour Organization) has recorded instances where the private land of indigenous peoples has been pilfered by a government – often through the sale of a contract to a private company, and without the consent of the people living on that land. Other times, indigenous peoples, the government they find themselves living in, and the company that bought mining rights engage in consultation. But these practices are far from transparent, equitable, or fair as indigenous peoples are often unskilled in contractual law and do not have the same legal resources as the company or government does. This paper argues that the sub-surface minerals found within the territory of indigenous tribes should be legally allocated as theirs

Social Justice Documentary: Designing for Impact

Explores current methodologies for assessing social issue documentary films by combining strategic design and evaluation of multiplatform outreach and impact, including documentaries' role in network- and field-building. Includes six case studies

Memory and Justice: Confronting Past Atrocity and Human Rights Abuse

This report examines the development of the movement to deal with the past from approximately 1983 to 2008 with an emphasis on the impact of Ford Foundation support, particularly from the Andean Region and Southern Cone office since the early 1990s. How has this support to various organizations mattered? How has it made a difference? Moving beyond the contribution of the Ford Foundation, the report also examines the ways in which dealing with the past has become characterized by a proliferation of activities and initiatives, as well as the creation of new institutions.The report draws on more than a dozen interviews, written correspondence with a selection of key actors, Ford Foundation grant files, an earlier consultancy report written by Professor Peter Winn, and eight commissioned papers on dealing with the past in specific countries or areas of interest

Subject: International

Compiled by Susan LaCette.International.pdf: 820 downloads, before Oct. 1, 2020

A Civil Investing Strategy for Putting Communities in Charge

This paper reflects on the difficulties encountered by development assistance institutions when they try to incorporate the idea of investing in civic capacities into the process of funding development projects. It explores the possibility that this difficulty arises not because the idea is foreign to what these donors already do, but rather because it is so similar on the surface yet mandates a fundamental change in mindset and in the power relationship between donor and grantee