Week 6: Transistions to Democracy in the Post-Cold War Era

This coming week we will be discussing the rise and eventual stagnation of democracy in Latin America. “Latin American Democratization since 1978” by Scott Mainwaring and Aníbal Pérez-Liñán in particular discusses the significant increase of democratic and semi-democratic Latin American countries from 1978 to 1992, and the impasse of democratic progress since 1992. While the reasons for democracy failing to prosper in Latin America are complex, it seems the issue can be generalized in a conflict of ideologies: democracy vs. authoritarianism. Many Latin American countries have declared their commitment to democracy, but have struggled with political elites with authoritarian tendencies that have succeeded in winning enough public support. Mainwaring and Pérez-Liñán discuss political leaders with authoritarian tendencies, including Hugo Chávez of Venezuela, Lucio Gutiérrez of Ecuador, and Alberto Fujimori of Peru. I find the case of Alberto Fujimori particularly interesting because I believe his case is especially indicative of Latin America’s failure to flourish with democracy.

Alberto Fujimori came to power in Peru in 1992, a time when Peru’s political environment was in shambles as both the two major political parties had been discredited according to Kenneth Jost (http://library.cqpress.com/cqresearcher/document.php?id=cqresrre2000110300#top). Just as many polarizing political figures came to power before him, Fujimori personally benefitted from Peru’s lack of political, economic, and social stability as an outsider promising better days. Fujimori appealed to the public’s opinion through his guarantee of democratic transitions and his work at disbanding the Shining Path, a communist militant group that wreaked havoc in Peru throughout the 1980’s. So why was Fujimori a liability in the proliferation of democracy? Following consistent political deadlock and inability to pass his policies in 1992, Fujimori carried out his infamous autogolpe (self-coup), where he suspended the current constitution, arrested political opposition leaders, and dissolved Congress with help from the military. It’s hard to imagine a country’s successful transition to democracy when it’s political leader’s success is grounded in autocratic actions. Democracy can’t work as a high-functioning government if the political leaders aren’t democratic in their action.

Despite the glaring contradictions to democracy in Fujimori’s self-coup, he won approval from the United States because he was proactive with eliminating the Shining Path and cooperative with the United States’ war on drugs. The United States’ handling of Fujimori is indicative of the United States’ general relationship with the young democracies of Latin America. While the United States criticized the authoritarian practices of Fujimori, they continued to work with him because he cooperated on two of the United States most important foreign issues at the time, the spread of communism and the war on drugs. The United States has consistently looked the other way when dealing with authoritarian political figures in attempting to do what’s best for the United States in the short-term rather than what’s best for the Latin American country in the long-term.