1

How participative are Latin American populist’s in public office?

Saskia Pauline Ruth (University of Zurich)

Yanina Welp (Center for Democracy Studies Aarau)

***Draft –do not cite without permission of the authors***

Paper prepared for the 8th ECPR General Conference 2013 in Glasgow, Great Britain

Panel: Executive Politics and Populism in Latin America

Abstract: This article investigates the connection between populism and citizens' direct participation

in the political process in Latin American democracies. On the one hand, we analyze under which

conditions presidents support the introduction of new or additional mechanisms of direct democracy -

thereby addressing the hypothesis that populist presidents are more inclined towards institutions of

direct citizen participation than their non-populist counterparts. On the other hand, we investigate

under which conditions populist presidents actually use mechanisms of direct democracy as

instruments to increase citizens' participation in the policy-making process. By means of Qualitative

Comparative Analysis (QCA) we test causal combinations of theoretically derived conditions expected

to explain the introduction as well as the usage of mechanisms of direct democracy.

Key words: populism, political participation, direct democracy, referendum, initiative, Latin America,

delegative democracy

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1. Introduction

One of the main debates on politics in Latin America in the last decade circulates around the

on-going crisis of representation in this region. Symptoms of this crisis are, among others, the

de-institutionalization of traditional party systems in several of the countries

(Mainwaring/Torcal 2005, Alcántara/Freidenberg 2001), decreasing levels of trust of citizens

in democratic institutions and democratic accountability (LAPOP 2008, 2009), the instability

of presidential systems evident in the number of presidents forced to leave office before the

end of their term (Hochstetler 2006; Peréz-Liñan 2007), as well as the rise of populist

candidates to the presidency (Seligson 2007, Doyle 2011; Levitsky/ Loxton 2013; Mudde/

Rovira Kaltwasse 2012). Most importantly, however, the crisis paved the way for alternative

forms of citizens' political participation, both informal as well as formal ones, in the Latin

American political arena in recent years. On the informal side, protestors took to the streets to

express a lack of confidence in representative institutions and demanded—among other

things—more direct citizens' intervention, as it has happened, for instance, in the Argentinian

crisis of 2001 but also more recently in Chile (2011-2013) and Brazil (July 2013). On the

formal side, a new realm has been promoted through constituent assemblies which have

‘constitutionalized’ citizen participation by including a wide range of mechanisms of

participation in new constitutions since the 1990s (e.g. Colombia 1991, Perú 1993, Venezuela

1999, Ecuador 1998 and 2008, and Bolivia 2009). As a model of participatory democracy it

incorporates and regulates both institutions for direct decision-making and for deliberation as

well as other institutions of transparency, accountability and control at the national and

subnational levels.

This descriptive evidence indicates that the introduction and use of mechanisms of direct

democracy (hereafter: MDDs) ––defined here as a set of procedures allowing citizens to take

political decisions directly through a vote beyond regular elections of representatives–– have

been identified as one outstanding solution to the pitfalls of democratic representation.

However, the phenomenon of populism has also been associated with the introduction and

increased use of MDDs in the region (Barczak 2001). Populist presidents have often

campaigned against representative institutions in their respective countries and propagated a

new form of participative democracy (Hugo Chávez in Venezuela is a well-known example).

Despite that, until now there has been no systematic test if populist presidents really have an

affinity towards direct democracy. Are they really more likely to introduce new or additional

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types of MDDs in their countries constitutions? Moreover, do they use MDDs more often than

other non-populist presidents in the region?

To address this research lacunae the aim of this article is to investigate the relationship

between populism and direct democracy in Latin America since the 1980s. More specifically,

the research question centres on the conduct of populist presidents towards mechanisms of

direct democracy, both with respect to their legal provision as well as their practice.1 To do

so, we take an actor-centred approach focusing on specific constellations in the political arena

that shape presidents’ behaviour (both populist and non-populist) towards these mechanisms.

By means of Qualitative Comparative Analysis (QCA) we then test causal combinations of

theoretically derived conditions expected to explain the introduction and/or practice of direct

democratic mechanisms.

The article is organized as follows: The next section elaborates on the definition of populism

and its relationship with direct democracy. The third chapter concentrates on the incentive

structure of both populist as well as non-populist presidents to introduce MDDs. The fourth

chapter discusses the research design and case selection. The fifth section presents the

analysis and interprets the results while the last section summarizes the theoretical arguments

and concludes.

2. Populism and Direct Democracy

After the so-called third wave of democratization that began in the late 1970s and put an end

to the authoritarian regimes that held sway in most countries in Latin America, democracy (in

its narrow sense as a set of procedures to access and exercise power) has become the

hegemonic political regime of the region. However, even if elections are the only way to

access power and the soldiers are back in their barracks, several factors would appear to

undermine the consolidation of liberal democracies in Latin America. Most importantly,

O'Donnell (1994) has qualified many Latin American democracies in the 1990s as delegative

democracies. A delegative democracy is grounded on a strong majoritarian premise, where

the basic democratic principle "consists in constituting, through clean elections, a majority

that empowers someone to become, for a given number of years, the embodiment and

1 In this preliminary version of the paper we only focus on the formal introduction of MDDs, leaving the

investigation of the use of MDDs through populist presidents as a future task to be included.

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interpreter of the high interests of the nation” (1994: 60). Such delegative democracies do not

only pose beneficial conditions for the rise of populists to power, they are also compatible

with direct democratic instruments (Barczak 2001; Linz 1994). In line with O'Donnell's

(1994) concept, for example, top down MDDs (triggered by the president) could be

instrumentalized as the procedure by which the collective authorizes the leader to act as he or

she sees fit. Hence, it is especially the inclination towards the type of delegative democracy

that makes Latin America an analytically interesting region to investigate the relationship

between populism and direct democracy in the context of presidential systems.

To analyse this relationship, however, we first have to define our core concepts of interest .

Following Weyland we define populism as “a political strategy through which a personalistic

leader seeks or exercises government power based on direct, unmediated, uninstitutionalized

support from large numbers of mostly unorganized followers” (2001: 14). More specifically,

we argue in line with Mudde and Rovira Kaltwasser that this populist strategy is based on a

specific political discourse "that considers society to be ultimately separated into two

homogeneous and antagonistic groups, ‘the pure people' and ‘the corrupt elite,' and which

argues that politics should be an expression of the volonté general (general will) of the

people" (2012: 8, italics original).

Several arguments have been made in the literature that populism has both negative and

positive effects on representative democracy. On the one hand, populism has a fierce

relationship with institutions of liberal democracy, especially parliaments and courts, since the

populist discourse is rooted in the representation of the people as a homogeneous group and

negates the diversity of society inherent in the liberal principle of democracy (Levitsky/ Way

2002; Levitsky/ Loxton 2013). On the other hand, populism has the potential to strengthen

political participation and may serve as a corrective to democracy through the inclusion of

underprivileged groups and its inclination towards plebiscitarian democratic practices (Rovira

Kaltwasser 2012; Hawkins 2012). Populist presidents have often campaigned against the

representative institutions in their respective countries and propagated a new form of

participatory democracy. But why should populist presidents strengthen citizens' direct

political participation?

Given our interest on the national level, here we focus exclusively on MDDs, defined as a set

of procedures allowing citizens to influence national political decisions directly through a

vote beyond regular elections of representatives (Serdült/Welp 2012). With respect to the

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consequences of MDDs on democracy, scholars tend to agree that these may be positive and

negative. While some mechanisms of direct democracy seem to look forward in an attempt to

democratize politics others appear to look backward, enhancing the power of politicians who

deliberately use them to maintain the status quo. As Altman (2011: 1) suggests, “from this

latter perspective, instead of giving power to the people, other times it subjects the people to

the powerful”.

In line with this distinction, MDDs can conveniently be grouped according to who started the

call for a vote. The vote can be prescribed by the constitution or the law and thus be

automatic, it can be triggered by the authorities in power (be it the parliament or the

government), or it can depend on the collection of signatures in order to, on the one hand,

block decisions post factum or, on the other hand, introduce legal provisions independently of

previous legislative action (Serdült/Welp 2012).

There is some agreement around the value of automatically triggered referendums as a source

of legitimation in contemporary democracies (Auer 2007), and, in the same vain, those

mechanisms where the initiative comes from the citizens themselves are supposed to produce

social accountability and to reduce the distance between representatives' actions and citizens'

preferences (Altman 2011). Conversely, the use of referendums triggered by the authorities

commonly to ratify decisions or to resolve conflict between political powers raises a certain

amount of scepticism because of its risk of manipulation and plebiscitarian nature (Barczak

2001). Thus, we consider that top down MDDs could lead to reinforce delegative democracy;

when for instance the executive overcomes institutional restrictions through referenda, to call

for a constitutional convention as was the case in Venezuela 1999 (Massüger/Welp 2013). On

the opposite, mandatory and citizens initiated referenda could add limits to the executive as

happened in Venezuela with a mandatory referenda rejected by the people in 2007 or with the

activation of a recall referenda against Chávez in 2004. So, in agreement with Kaufmann and

Waters (2004) we see both bottom up and mandatory referendum as citizen-empowering

instruments of direct democracy, hence, we group them together as functional equivalents in

our empirical analysis.

The widespread of constitutional reforms by which different types of MDDs were

introduced and used in Latin American countries opens room for analysing under which

conditions they have been introduced and to what extent there is a clear relation between

populism and direct democracy.

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3. The Complex Causality of MDD Introduction

Designing and changing direct democratic institutions within the context of representative

liberal democracies is a delicate task and usually involves several political actors (Scarrow

2001). Direct democratic institutions touch upon the power balance between political actors

and their influence in the political decision-making process, and therefore, entail high stakes.

For example, referenda in hands of the executive could erode the power of the legislature

(Welp/ Wheatley 2009); while mandatory and bottom up referendums could be activated

beyond the control of governments and may even be directed against the policies that

governments pursue (Setälä 1999). Thus, it could be expected that the introduction or re-

design of MDDs will most likely be resisted by some political actors directly affected by the

change. In presidential systems the executive is a key actor in this game of power. This is

especially the case in Latin American presidential systems where the presidency is the most

important prize to win, and usually, one of the main veto players in processes of institutional

change. Due to our interest in exploring the connection between populism and MDDs in

presidential systems in Latin America our main unit of analysis are presidential terms.

We believe that there are different paths to the introduction of direct democratic mechanisms

in the presidential systems of Latin America and one of these paths is closely related to the

ever more present populist mandates of presidents in the region. Therefore, we theorize

several conditions that are associated either with a populist path to the introduction of MDDs

or an alternative legitimacy path that also may lead to the introduction of a more participative

democratic setting.

The first two general conditions, however, which should influence the introduction of new

MDDs in a country are related to already existing provisions of MDDs in the respective

constitutions, i.e. the institutional status quo. The need to introduce MDDs should be less

pressing if some provisions for citizens' direct involvement in the political decision-making

process already exist and political actors are able to call on them without engaging in the

complicated matter of institutional change. In line with Scarrow we also believe that the

presence of some MDDs does not fully keep political actors from redesigning them or

introducing more far reaching provisions, since "there is no single recipe for optimally

balancing direct and delegated decision making, institutional solutions are often reengineered

to address perceived shortcomings with existing practices" (2001: 652).

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Therefore, we formulate two conditions that account for the institutional status quo of MDDs

in a country. We define two conditions due to the theorized nature of different types of MDDs

in section 2, i.e. top down instruments and bottom up instruments.

H1: The presence of institutional provisions of top down MDDs reduces the

pressure on political actors to introduce new MDDs.

H2: The presence of institutional provisions of bottom up MDDs reduces the

pressure on political actors to introduce new MDDs.

The populist path to direct democracy

Several arguments have been made in the literature on the consequences of populism that it

may increase citizens' participation through the inclusion of former marginalized groups or

the introduction and use of direct democratic instruments - both strengthening the vertical

accountability between citizens and democratic leaders (e.g. Rovira Kaltwasser 2012;

Scarrow 2001). While the populist strategy may perfectly fit to gain public office playing by

the existing rules of the game, once in power positions the same populists may face the need

to turn against existing institutional provisions to maintain power over time (Levitsky/ Loxton

2013, Ruth n.d.). Furthermore, in line with Geddes (1996) institutional change is unlikely if

the balance of power between political actors remains stable, populist presidents, however, are

often political outsiders, and therefore, more likely inclined to change the institutional balance

of power if they have the means to do it (e.g. Levitsky/ Loxton 2013). Therefore, to analyse

the institutional consequences of populism we focus on populism in power as opposed to

populists seeking power (Torre 2000).

Presidential candidates that campaign for office using a populist strategy often promise to be

closer to the interests of the public than their opponents - usually the corrupt traditional

political elite. The introduction of direct democratic instruments is perfectly suited to address

such promises once they are in office, since they allow for the direct involvement of citizens

in the decision making process (either with respect to institutional changes, or with respect to

important policy decisions, see Durán-Martinéz 2012).

There are two political programs that are closely related to populist mandates: complex

economic policy programs and institutional change programs (e.g. Weyland 1996; Levitsky/

Loxton 2013). Both may be connected to the introduction of direct democratic mechanisms.

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On the one hand, populist presidents may want to legitimize complex and drastic economic

policy programs through direct democratic approval. On the other hand, populist presidents

may want to legitimize their crusade against the established political elite and classical

institutions of representative democracy (which are usually controlled by the established

elites) through direct democratic mechanisms. They involve citizens in the process of

constitutional engineering through constitutional referenda and the introduction of other direct

democratic mechanisms on the way.

This leads us to our third condition for the introduction of direct democratic mechanisms in

Latin America:

H3: Presidents with populist mandates are favorable for the introduction of

MDDs.

However, populist mandates alone are no sufficient condition for the introduction of direct

democratic mechanisms. The situation of a divided government also could lead to the

introduction of MDDs in order to overcome institutional deadlock (e.g. Peréz-Liñan 2007).

Populist presidents favour MDDs especially when they face an opposition led legislature that

may block their economic policy or institutional change agenda. Especially with respect to the

latter, many populist presidents pursued re-election projects for which they needed to change

the respective constitutions in their country. Therefore, they often depended on the support of

at least some opposition party or bloc. Hence, situations of interbranch conflict increase the

need of presidents to resort to alternative institutional procedures - like direct democratic

mechanisms. Moreover, situations of divided government may also incline the legislature to

introduce MDDs to bring the public in as a "poder moderador" to solve interbranch deadlock

situations (Hochstetler 2006).

H4: Situations of divided government make it more likely that (either the

president or the legislature) opts in favour of the introduction of MDDs.

Hence, we now can sketch the populist path towards the introduction of direct democratic

mechanisms as follows:

POPULIST MANDATE * DIVIDED GOVERNMENT * status quo top down *

status quo bottom up => MDD INTRODUCTION2

2 Capital letters indicate the presence of a condition, while lower case letters indicate the absence of a condition.

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The legitimacy path to direct democracy

Following Breuer (2009) we also specify another likely causal path towards the introduction

of direct democratic mechanisms: the legitimacy path.

Many researchers have identified a crisis of governability in the Latin American region.

Especially the frequency of presidential falls in many Latin American democracies is

interpreted as one sign of this crisis (e.g. Peréz-Liñan 2007). Presidential falls, however, do

not necessarily result in new elections. On the contrary, they most often lead to the succession

of non-elected presidents for some times considerable time periods (e.g. both José Sarney and

Itamar Franco governed Brazil over 4 years as non-elected interim presidents). These non-

elected presidents lack the vertical legitimacy of classical presidents - a central feature of

presidential systems - and are therefore, in a unfavourable position vis-à-vis other

representative institutions (like legislatures and provincial governors) (see Breuer 2009). To

boost their presidential projects and their institutional position, they are likely to turn towards

direct democratic instruments to quasi-legitimize their non-elected presidential status.

H5: Non-elected presidents are favourable towards the introduction of MDDs to

boost their vertical legitimacy

Furthermore, Hochstetler (2006) identified the importance of popular protests with respect to

presidential falls. A heightened sensitivity of the public towards pressing political issues in

times of governability crisis, most likely leads to demands in the public towards more citizen

involvement in political decision making. We base H5 on the notion of Political Opportunities

(Eisinger 1973, Tarrow 1994) to suggest that when the political system is vulnerable to a

challenge it creates opportunities for other actors (e.g. civil society, social movements) to

promote social or institutional change. This vulnerability could be the result of increasing

political pluralism (relevant in cases of democratization such as Colombia), divisions within

elites, or increased political enfranchisement, among others. It opens a window of opportunity

that encourages people to engage in contentious politics. .

H6: Increased popular protests are favourable for the introduction of MDDs.

Hence, we now can state the second path towards the introduction of direct democratic

instruments in Latin America:

INTERIM PRESIDENTS * POPULAR PROTEST * status quo top down *

status quo bottom up => MDD INTRODUCTION

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A summary of both causal paths - the populist and the legitimacy path - towards the introduction of

MDDs in Latin American democracies is depicted in Figure 1.

Figure 1: Two Causal Paths toward the Introduction of MDDs

4. Research Design and Operationalization

Research Design and Case Selection

As outlined in the theoretical part, the introduction of direct democratic mechanisms is based

on complex causal connections between several conditions. Hence, we use a qualitative

comparative analysis (QCA) design (Ragin 1987, 2006; Schneider/ Wagemann 2012), which

allows us to model such situations of complex causality. Furthermore, QCA is especially

suited for research designs with low- and medium numbers of cases. Based on Boolean

algebra the method helps to identify those conditions that bring about a defined outcome.

With crisp set QCA both the conditions as well as the outcome are binary coded, classifying

their presence (=1) or absence (=0) for each case.

To analyze under which conditions a presidential administration pursues the introduction of

MDDs in Latin America, we compare all presidents (both elected and non-elected) since the

third wave of democratization (1978-2012). Based on these criteria we compiled a data set

Introduction of

Direct Democratic

Mechanisms

Populist Presidents

Status Quo of MDDs

Divided Government

Interim Presidents

Popular Protest

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covering 18 Latin American democracies from 1978-2012 including a total of 125

presidential terms.

Operationalization

Introduction of Direct Democratic Instruments. The outcome condition in this study refers

to the successful introduction of direct democratic mechanisms that previously have not been

provided in a countries constitution. Hence, we code the outcome as present (1) if there has

been an amendment to a countries constitution which institutionalizes at least one new direct

democratic instrument (irrespective of its nature, be it top down or bottom up). The coding is

irrespective of the previous status quo of direct democratic mechanisms, since there are cases

in our sample where some direct democratic instruments are provided in the constitutions but

the present government nevertheless expands these instruments through the introduction of

new direct democratic mechanisms (e.g. Rafael Correa 2008 in Ecuador and Evo Morales

2009 in Bolivia).

Furthermore, we code the six hypotheses stated in the theoretical part into dichotomous

conditions - taking on the value 1 if the condition is present and the value 0 if the condition is

absent.

Status Quo of MDD. We consider that MDDs could reinforce representative democracy

(mandatory or bottom up mechanisms, not controlled by authorities and able to increase

responsiveness) or eroding it (when the authorities appeal to them, commonly to overcome

institutional deadlocks). Thus, bottom up and mandatory referenda are taken as functional

equivalents, while top down express the other condition. Both conditions take on the value 1 if

the constitution of the respective country provides for at least one direct democratic element

of the respective type before the inauguration of the respective president. Data on direct

democratic mechanisms in Latin America are provided by the C2D database, (www.c2d.ch).

Populist Mandate. As mentioned before, the definition of populism is a debated topic which

makes the selection of cases a matter of debate as well (Weyland 2001). As the arguments in

the former section are based on the concept of a populist mandate, to be coded a 1 in this

condition a president necessarily needs to be elected and must have used a populist discourse

in her or his electoral presidential campaign. Furthermore, we also consider re-elections as

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independent cases (both immediate and non-immediate). To identify presidents with a

populist mandate we follow the two-step procedure by Ruth (n.d.) that is based on a

combination of both a qualitative literature review and expert ratings. In total, we identified

15 presidents with populist mandates which were holding 20 presidential terms. For a list of

these populist presidents selected in this study see Table A1 in the Appendix.

Divided Government. The construction of a binary condition indicating if there has been a

situation of divided government during each presidential term is based on the distribution of

seats in the congress - in bicameral systems the coding is based on both chambers of congress.

The condition takes on the value 1 if the presidential party (or coalition) had less than 45% of

the seats in one chamber of the congress or if an opposition party (or coalition) had a majority

of seats in at least one chamber of the congress. Data on legislative seats was taken from

http://americo.usal.es/oir/legislatina/ and http://www.ipu.org/parline/. Information on

governmental coalitions was mostly taken from Neto (2006). For the countries and years not

included in Neto (2006) information was gathered from several sources, available on request

from the authors.

Interim President. Data on presidential terms was taken from http://www.rulers.org/ and

http://www.ipu.org/parline/. The condition is coded as 1 if we encounter a non-elected

president. This may be due to the death of the former president or due to a previous

presidential fall. In total, 18 cases in our sample are non-elected presidents.

Popular Protests. To identify the level of popular protest we rely on the common measure

provided by Banks and Wilson (2014). The data set provides annual counts of three types of

protest events: riots, anti-government demonstrations, and strikes. In line with Przeworski et

al. (2000) we build an additive index of these three protest events to capture the overall level

of popular protest in each country and year. To code these events into a dichotomous

condition we take each country's mean protest level over the whole period under study as the

cut-off point. Hence, presidents that experienced protest levels over their country's average

protest level during their term are coded as 1, and those that experienced protest levels under

the average country's protest level are coded as 0.

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5. Qualitative Comparative Analysis (crisp set)

Based on this data set the Boolean algebra constructs a truth table covering all possible

configurations of the six conditions. With six dichotomous conditions 36 configurations are

logically possible. The 125 cases in this study cover 35 of these configurations, leaving one

logical remainder. In line with a conservative approach the outcome of logical remainders is

coded as absent (blanket assumption) as to exclude them from the analysis (see Schneider/

Wagemann 2012). Furthermore, as can be seen in Table 1 the QCA yields five contradictory

configurations with respect to the empirically observed cases and the presence or absence of

the outcome.

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Table 1: Truth Table

SQ

TO

P

SQ

BO

TT

OM

PO

PU

LIS

T

DIV

IDE

D

INT

ER

IM

PR

OT

ES

T

OU

TC

OM

E

N

CO

NS

IST

EN

. CASES

1 1 1 1 0 0 1 2 1 BOL_MOR; ECU_COR 1 1 0 1 0 1 1 1 1 ECU_MAH 0 0 1 1 0 0 1 1 1 PER_FUJ1 0 0 0 1 1 1 1 1 1 BOL_MES 0 0 0 0 1 1 1 1 1 BRA_SAR 1 1 1 1 0 1 C 3 0.3 VEN_CHA1(1); ECO_GUT(0); PER_FUJ4(0) 0 0 1 0 0 1 C 2 0.5 ARG_MEN1(1); PER_GAR1(0) 0 0 0 1 0 0 C 6 0.2 CRI_PAC(1); ARG_ALF(0); BOL_EST(0);

MEX_CAL(0); RDO_FER1(0); RDO_FER2(0) 0 0 0 0 0 1 C 16 0.1 NIC_TOR(1); BOL_SIL(0); BOL_SAN1(0);

BOL_BAN(0); BOL_SAN2(0); COL_TUR(0);

COL_VAR(0); CRI_MON(0); CRI_CAL(0); CRI_FIG(0);

HON_AZC(0); HON_CAL(0); HON_REI(0);

PER_BEL(0); RDO_BLA(0); RDO_BAL1(0) 0 0 0 0 0 0 C 12 0.3 HON_MAD(1); COL_GAV(1); RDO_FER3(1);

BOL_PAZ(0); COL_BET(0); CRI_CAR(0);

CRI_ARI1(0); CRI_ROD(0); HON_SUA(0); HON_FLO(0); MEX_SAL(0); RDO_GUZ(0)

1 1 1 0 0 1 0 3 0 PER_FUJ3; PER_GAR2; VEN_CHA2 1 1 1 0 0 0 0 1 0 PER_FUJ2 1 1 0 1 1 1 0 2 0 BOL_ROD; ECU_NOB 1 1 0 1 0 0 0 2 0 COL_URI1; NIC_ORT; ECU_MAH 1 1 0 0 1 1 0 2 0 ECU_PAL; PAR_GON 1 1 0 0 1 0 0 1 0 PER_PAN 1 1 0 0 0 1 0 6 0 COL_PAS; GTM_ARZ; GTM_POR; GTM_COL;

PAR_WAS; PAR_CUB 1 1 0 0 0 0 0 10 0 COL_SAM; COL_URI2; CRI_ARI2; CRI_CHI;

GTM_BER; NIC_ALE; NIC_BOL; PAR_DUA;

PAR_LUG; PER_TOL 1 0 1 1 0 1 0 2 0 ECU_BUC; VEN_CAL 1 0 1 1 0 0 0 1 0 BRA_COL 1 0 1 0 0 1 0 1 0 ARG_MEN2 1 0 1 0 0 0 0 2 0 ARG_KIR; ECU_ROL 1 0 0 1 1 1 0 3 0 ECU_HUR; ECU_ALA; VEN_VEL 1 0 0 1 0 1 0 4 0 ARG_RUA; ECU_FEB; ECU_BOR; ECU_DUR 1 0 0 1 0 0 0 2 0 ARG_FER; VEN_HER 1 0 0 0 1 1 0 3 0 ARG_DUH; BRA_FRA; HON_MIC 1 0 0 0 1 0 0 3 0 ARG_PUE; ARG_SAA; ARG_CAM 1 0 0 0 0 1 0 8 0 BRA_CAR1; BRA_CAR2; BRA_LUL1; CHL_FRE1;

CHL_FRE2; CHL_LAG2; HON_ZEL; VEN_PER 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 5 0 BRA_LUL2; CHL_AYL; CHL:LAG1; CHL_BAC; VEN_LUS

0 1 1 1 0 1 0 1 0 PAN_MOS 0 1 0 0 0 1 0 6 0 ELS_CAL; PAN_END; PAN_PER; PAN_TOR;

URY_SAN1; URY_LAC 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 5 0 ELS_FLO; ELS_SAC; URY_SAN2; URY_BAT; URY_VAZ

0 0 1 0 0 0 0 1 0 RDO_MEJ 0 0 0 1 0 1 0 4 0 MEX_ZED; MEX_FOX; RDO_BAL2; RDO_BAL3 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 2 0 BOL_QUI; RDO_AZA

NOTE: Case acronyms have been chosen according to the following schematic: country acronym_first three letters of last

name. In case of several terms the acronym includes the number of the presidential term. For example, Evo Morales in

Bolivia is abbreviated as BOL_MOR.

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The Populist Path(s) Towards Direct Democracy

The analysis of the truth table (Table 1) leads to three sufficient causal paths towards the

introduction of MDDs that include the condition of a populist president:

(SQ BOTTOMUP*protest)

+

POPULIST * DIVIDED (sq topdown*protest) → INTRODUCTION OF MDD

+

(sq topdown*sq bottomup)

These causal paths indicate several things: firstly, presidents with populist mandates really do

increase the formal potential of direct citizen participation in Latin American democracies.

However, they do so only in conjunction with a situation of divided government. This makes

sense, since populist presidents only need to include the citizenry as a third power in the

decision making game if they need to overcome interbranch stalemate. Both conditions occur

in all three causal paths and are therefore necessary for the outcome to be present. Secondly,

the three paths indicate differences in the constitutional context in which these populist

presidents with opposition led legislatures opt for the introduction of direct democratic

mechanisms. In line with the general expectation, populist presidents are inclined to introduce

direct democratic instruments in the total absence of both top down and bottom up

mechanisms. Furthermore, they also do so in cases where their constitutions do not provide

for top down mechanisms and against the background of no popular protest. Finally, they do

so even if their respective constitutions already provide for bottom up direct democratic

instruments, however, only in combination with low levels of popular protest.

Table 2 also reveals several contradictory configurations that cover populist presidents and

therefore merit a closer inspection. The analysis of contradictory cases is well suited to assess

the sensitivity of the results of a QCA (see Hug 2013 on the sensitivity of QCA). Firstly, three

presidents with populist mandates fall into the same cluster of cases: Hugo Chavéz (1st term),

Lucio Guitiérrez, and Alberto Fujimori (4th term). All three of them governed in the context of

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popular protests, an opposition led congress and under constitutions that provided for both top

down and bottom up instruments of direct democracy. However, only Hugo Chavéz

introduced further mechanisms of direct democracy. Before 1999, Article 181 of the Organic

Law of Suffrage and Political Participation (LOSPP) regulated a consultative referendum. The

new constitution included the mandatory referendum –to amend or rewrite the constitution–,

the legislative initiative, the abrogative referendum and the possibility of popular recall for all

elected officials.

Lucio Gutiérrez and Alberto Fujimori (4th

term), on the other hand, did not further strengthen

the direct democratic mechanisms at play in their respective countries [The introduction of

mandatory and bottom up mechanisms during Fujimori's first mandate was the result of an

attempt to resolve the institutional crisis produced by his coup d’Etat in 1992, but was not part

of a previous strategy to increase citizen's direct participation and he did not promote further

development later on, (see Welp/Wheatley 2009). In the case of Gutierrez, neither during the

campaign neither in office appealed him to direct participation. Gutierrez strategy was

oriented to create alliances with parties and groups but this strategy was based on clientelism

and the repression of any opposition (see Paltán 2005). The main difference between these

two populist presidents and Hugo Chavez (1st term) can be seen through a closer inspection of

the condition popular protest. While Lucio Guitierrez and Alberto Fujimori (4th term) had

very low levels of popular support during their respective presidential terms (with 5 anti-

government demonstrations from 2004-2005 in Ecuador and 9 anti-government

demonstrations during 2000 in Peru; see also Carey 2003), Hugo Chávez could count on very

high levels of popular support (with no anti-government demonstrations in 1999, the year he

launched his constitutional reform agenda, see also Massüger/Welp 2013). Hence, in the case

of Hugo Chávez encountered in our coding of popular protest are signs of popular support for

the populist agenda of the president. Taking this into account, Hugo Chávez would fall into

the same cluster of cases as Evo Morales and Rafael Correa, two populist presidents that are

often cited for their likeness of conduct and political agenda.

Secondly, two further populist presidents make up another cluster of cases: Carlos Menem (1st

term) and Alan García (1st term). Both governed in the context of popular unrest and under

constitutions that did not provide at all for direct democratic mechanisms. However, both

presidents had a comfortable majority in their respective legislatures and therefore the

possibility to follow their respective policy agendas. Nevertheless, under Carlos Menem (1st

17

term) there has been a constitutional reform that introduced direct democratic instruments in

Argentina. Alan García, on the other hand, neither tried to introduce such mechanisms during

his first term in office in Peru nor did he try to activate existing mechanisms in a context of

crisis and lack of popular support. A closer look at the situation in Argentina in the early

1990s shows, that while Carlos Menem embarked on an endeavour to change the Argentinean

Constitutions in 1993 with his primary goal to change the reelection rules of the presidency,

as to secure him a potential consecutive second term in office (see Negretto 1999). To reach

this goal he had to engage in negotiations with the main opposition party Unión Cívica

Radical, especially their party president Raúl Alfonsín, who had enough seats in the

legislature as to block a constitutional reform.3 As in Fujimori's case, the package of direct

democratic mechanisms was less part of the president ideology than a result of mutual

concessions to obtain other reforms MDDs finally introduced in the 1994 constitution only

include top down mechanisms, i.e. a popular consultation promoted by the executive

(consultative) or the parliament (binding) (see Lafferriere 2009). Hence, with respect to his

institutional reform agenda, Carlos Menem may be coded as a president with an opposition

controlled legislature. In this case, he would make up a cluster of his own, which then would

fit into the third populist path towards direct democracy shown above.

The Legitimacy Path Towards Direct Democracy

We now turn to our second hypothesized legitimacy path towards the introduction of direct

democratic instruments. In line with our expectation, the QCA reveals one sufficient causal

path with three necessary conditions for the introduction of direct democratic instruments, one

of which is the presence of an interim president:

sq top down * INTERIM * PROTEST → INTRODUCTION OF MDD

In line with the theory (see Breuer 2009), interim presidents are inclined to boost their

legitimacy through top down - mainly government initiated - direct democratic instruments.

3 It is worth to mention that Carlos Menem called for a consultative referendum to inquire after the people's will

regarding a constitutional amendment to introduce his re-election (Decree2181/93). The referendum was

cancelled when he agreed to the 'Pacto de Olivos' with Raúl Alfonsín.

18

For example, the first post-authoritarian president in Brazil, Jose Sarney, came to power as the

vice president after the sudden death of Tancredo Neves, the first democratically elected

president after twenty years of military rule. He inherited a fragile political and economic

situation and a public that grew more and more disenchanted with Brazil's young democracy

(see Panizza 2000). To uphold the fragile coalition forged by Tancredo Neves, he supported

the introduction of direct democratic mechanisms into the constitution of 1988 (Barczak

2001).

Moreover, iIn 2003 the ‘gas war’ in Bolivia triggered the fall of President Gonzalo Sánchez

de Lozada due to the popular outrage provoked by his decision to export oil to the United

States via Chile (Schilling Vacaflor 2011). After Lozadas fall, Carlos Mesa succeeded him as

interim president and resolved the crisis by holding a referendum on energy policy. Against

the context of popular unrest and lacking democratic legitimacy, he therefore needed to

amend the constitution in which referendums were not regulated until then. The 2004 reform

provided for instruments of direct democracy such as the citizens’ legislative initiative and the

referendum.

Of all the other sixteen interim presidents in the period covered by this study, only two

governed under the absence of top down direct democratic mechanisms - which are,

according to theory best to legitimize executive agendas without. Two interim presidents -

Jorge Quiroga in Bolivia and Jacobo Azar in the Dominican Republic had no such elements at

their disposal, but both of them did not face a context of popular unrest and they had the

support of a governing majority in their respective legislatures.

A Third Path: The Bottom Up Path to Direct Democracy?

Finally, our analysis also reveals a third sufficient causal path towards the introduction of

direct democratic instruments that neither includes populist nor interim executives:

SQ BOTTOM * DIVIDED * PROTEST * populist * interim

→ INTRODUCTION OF MDD

19

This path shows that in the absence of the two defining conditions of the other two causal

paths towards MDD introduction - populism and interim presidency - governments are

inclined to introduce direct democratic instruments in situations of interbranch deadlock and

the presence of popular protest and in context where the citizenry already has the formal

power to influence public policy directly through bottom up instruments.

The case that leads to this solution is Jorge Mahuad in Ecuador. However, the call for a

constitutional convention resulted from a referendum held by interim president Fabian

Alarcon, his predecessor, after social protests that ended with the fall of president Abadalá

Bucaram (Pachano 2005). Hence, when Jorge Mahuad was elected president in the second

round on July 12, the procedure leading towards the constitutional convention was already

running. In fact, the constitution entered into force at the same time the president took

position (August 10, 1998). Hence, some prevention should be made about this third path

towards the introduction of MDDs. A closer examination of the case of Jorge Mahuad, for

example, suggests that the original impulse to introduce MDDs into the Ecuadorian

constitution resulted from his predecessor Fabián Alarcon, an interim president.

Consequently, this case might lead to a future reassessment of the solutions of the QCA,

which is a method that allows for the re-examination of the historical context of specific

cases, and finally for their recoding.

Other cases that lead to the introduction of direct democratic elements that are not related to

either populist or interim presidencies are Ricardo Maduro in Honduras, Cesar Gaviria in

Colombia, Leonel Fernandez in the Dominican Republic, Abel Pacheco in Costa Rica, Violeta

Torres de Chamarro in Nicaragua. To give just a few examples we elaborate on two cases

here: Cesar Gaviria in Colombia and Abel Pacheco in Costa Rica.

The Colombian case is emblematic for a bottom up process towards direct democracy to the

extent that popular demonstrations led to an informal referendum, and the pressure exerted by

the protest movement (known as the Movimiento de la Séptima Papeleta) forced the

government to call for a constitutional convention in 1991, something which had not been

allowed by the former constitution. The decision of holding a constitutional convention during

the presidential term of Cesar Gaviria from the Liberal Party, was based on a decade of social

mobilization prior to his rise to power (see Collins 1988; Falleti 2005) . Hence, we may talk

of this process of MDD introduction as a prototype example of a bottom up procedure.

20

Another example of a bottom up process of MDD introduction happened during Abel

Pacheco's term as the President of Costa Rica between 2002 and 2006. Abel Pacheco (Social

Christian Unity Party) was a weak president governing in a context of low trust of the public

in politics (however without high levels of popular unrest) and facing an opposition led

legislature. The introduction of MDDs in 2003 was part of a package deal that originated

through several popular protests in the end of the 1990s expressing opposition to the liberal

policies of the government of his predecessor.

6. Outlook & Conclusion

In this paper we investigated the relationship between populism and direct democracy from an

empirical perspective. Our main goal was to systematically analyse the often assumed positive

correlation between populism in power and the introduction of mechanisms of direct

democracy (MDDs). Since the relationship between the two phenomena is characterized by

complex causality, we apply Qualitative Comparative Analysis (QCA) to a newly compiled

data set on all presidential terms in Latin America from 1978-2012 as well as all formal

introductions of direct democratic elements into a countries constitution.

Our main finding is that, contrary to the widespread assumption, populism is neither

necessary nor sufficient on its own for the introduction of MDDs in Latin America. Only in

combination with a situation of divided government do populist administrations add MDDs to

their respective constitutions. Moreover, populist presidents that are associated with the

introduction of new MDDs in situations of divided government in their countries may be

grouped into two clusters: those that introduce MDDs to bolster their power positions vis-à-

vis oppositions dominated legislative institutions (e.g. Hugo Chávez in Venezuela, Evo

Morales in Bolivia, and Rafael Correa in Ecuador), and those that introduced MDDs as

concessions to opposition groups with pivotal positions in institutional change processes (e.g.

Carlo Menem in Argentina and Alberto Fujimori in Peru).

However, the introduction of MDDs by populist presidents in Latin America is just one side

of the whole story. Future research will also have to investigate the assumed correlation

between populism and the use of direct democratic mechanisms.

21

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8. Appendix

Table A1: Populist Mandates in Latin America (1978-2014)

Country President 1st Term Pre-

Selection

Expert

Statements

Finalα

ARG Carlos Menem 1989-1994 Conflicting Yes Yes

ARG Carlos Menem 1995-1999 Second Consecutive Term

ARG Néstor Kirchner 2003-2007 Yes Conflicting Yes

BOL Evo Morales 2006-2010 Yes Yes Yes

BRA Fernando Collor de Mello 1990-1992 Yes Yes Yes

COL Álvaro Uribe 2002-2006 No Conflicting No

DOM Joaquín Balaguer 1986-1990 Yes No No

DOM Hipólito Mejía 2000-2004 Yes Borderline Yes

ECU Jaime Roldós 1979-1981 Yes - Yes

ECU Abdalá Bucaram 1996-1997 Yes Yes Yes

ECU Lucio Guitiérrez 2003-2005 Yes Yes Yes

ECU Rafael Correa 2007-2009 Yes Yes Yes

HON Manuel Zelaya 2006-2009 No Yes No

NIC Daniel Ortega 2007-2012 Conflicting Conflicting No

PAN Mireya Moscoso 1999-2004 Yes Borderline Yes

PER Alan García I, 1985 1985-1990 Yes Yes Yes

PER Alberto Fujimori 1990-1992 Yes Yes Yes

PER Alberto Fujimori 1992-1995 Second Consecutive Term

PER Alberto Fujimori 1995-2000 Third Consecutive Term

PER Alberto Fujimori 2000 Forth Consecutive Term

PER Alejandro Toledo 2001-2006 Conflicting No No

PER Alan Garíca II, 2006 2006-2011 No Yes Yes

VEN Carlos Perez 1989-1993 Yes No No

VEN Rafael Caldera 1994-1999 Yes Yes Yes

VEN Hugo Chávez 1999-2000 Yes Yes Yes

VEN Hugo Chávez 2000-2006 Second Consecutive Term α Cases were excluded from the final selection if opposing accounts of at least one expert exists without accounts

in favour of the coding by another expert. Cases with conflicting and borderline accounts were included or

excluded from the analysis based on a re-assessment of the literature (see Ruth 2013).