Democratic Transitions in Latin America with New Data and Indicators

What is it about?

This study introduces a new dataset, the Democracy-Dictatorship Reprise for Latin America (DDRLA), to examine the dynamics of democratic transitions in Latin America, specifically focusing on a recent wave of democratic reversion.

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Photo by Stanislav Rabunski on Unsplash

Photo by Stanislav Rabunski on Unsplash

Why is it important?

For the period between 1946 and 2022, it shows that a noticeable wave of reversion to authoritarian rule in Latin America occurred during the last two decades. Democratic reversion has been brought about by presidents who secured office through elections and who manipulated rules to remain in office for more than two terms. The study shows that a critical democratic recession was underway in six of the region's nineteen countries in the 2000s: Bolivia, Ecuador, Honduras, Nicaragua, and Venezuela. Thus, there have been recent reversions from democratic to authoritarian regimes in more than one out of every four countries in Latin America. Of these reversion cases, all except Honduras were triggered by the elected incumbent's actions to extend his rule beyond the allotted two terms. Following a period of democratic backsliding, Bolivia, Ecuador, and Honduras were able to hold competitive elections after prolonged periods of autocratic rule. The DDRLA dataset offers new opportunities to advance studies of initial elections, the transitions between political regimes, and the significant democratic erosion underway in the region. We replicate a leading study on economic voting in Latin America and show that conclusions about economic voting are sensitive to whether only elections under strictly democratic regimes are employed. Similar findings hold in examining Kostelka's (2017) research on turnout in democratic elections. The study shows that the operationalisation of political regimes, initial elections, and transitions impacts the substantive conclusions surrounding political dynamics in the region.