Radical Democracy in the Andes

Donna Lee Van Cott examines institutional innovation by indigenous party-controlled municipalities in Bolivia and Ecuador.

Donna Lee Van Cott (Author)

9780521515580, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 25 August 2008

278 pages, 9 tables
23.5 x 15.8 x 2 cm, 0.5 kg

'… an indispensable book for political and social scientists interested in indigenous people and politics. Donna Lee Van Cott was a leading scholar in the field of indigenous people and politics. Her death in 2009 is an enormous loss for political and social sciences.' Elisabet Dueholm Rasch, European Review of Latin American and Caribbean Studies

After a decade in local office, are indigenous peoples' governments in the Andes fulfilling their promise to provide a more participatory, accountable, and deliberative form of democracy? Using current debates in democratic theory as a framework, Donna Lee Van Cott examines 10 examples of institutional innovation by indigenous party-controlled municipalities in Bolivia and Ecuador. In contrast to studies emphasizing the role of individuals and civil society, the findings underscore the contributions of leadership and political parties to promoting participation and deliberation - even at the local level. Democratic quality is more likely to improve where local actors initiate and design institutions. Van Cott concludes that indigenous parties' innovations have improved democratic quality in some respects, but that authoritarian tendencies endemic to Andean cultures and political organizations have limited their positive impact.

1. Introduction: the political and cultural origins of democratic institutional innovation
2. The legal and political context for municipal reform in Bolivia and Ecuador
3. Mayoral leadership and democratic institutional innovation
4. Political parties, civil society, and democratic institutional innovation
5. Institutional innovation in Ecuador
6. Institutional innovation in Bolivia
7. Conclusion: an interaction model of democratic institutional innovation.

Subject Areas: Political structures: democracy [JPHV], Politics & government [JP]