From Ballots to Blockades: The Normalization of Protest in Latin American Democracies

Abstract

Why is mass protest a normal, almost routine component of the participatory “repertoire” in certain democratic systems, but not others? I contend that this often-sharp variation is the result of differences in political institutions and trends in citizen engagement across nascent democracies. Specifically, ineffective institutions coupled with engaged democratic citizenries precipitate more radical modes of political participation, as governments’ ability to deliver on citizens’ expectations of democracy fails to match the capacity for mobilization of politically active democrats. Drawing on cross-national surveys from Latin America and qualitative and quantitative sub-national data from Argentina, I test this explanation against other leading theories in the literature, offering one of the first comprehensive multilevel, mixed-methods studies of the contextual determinants of protest participation across and within developing regimes.