Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-jkksz Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-26T01:00:58.588Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Partisanship During the Collapse of Venezuela's Party System

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 September 2022

Jana Morgan
Jana Morgan*
Affiliation:
University of Tennessee
Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Core share and HTML view are not available for this content. However, as you have access to this content, a full PDF is available via the ‘Save PDF’ action button.

Political parties are crucial for democratic politics; thus, the growing incidence of party and party system failure raises questions about the health of representative democracy the world over. This article examines the collapse of the Venezuelan party system, arguably one of the most institutionalized party systems in Latin America, by examining the individual-level basis behind the exodus of partisans from the traditional parties. Multinomial logit analysis of partisan identification in 1998, the pivotal moment of the system’s complete collapse, indicates that people left the old system and began to support new parties because the traditional parties failed to incorporate and give voice to important ideas and interests in society while viable alternatives emerged to fill this void in representation.

Resumo

Resumo

Los partidos políticos son cruciales para la democracia. Por ello, la creciente incidencia en el fracaso de partidos y sistemas de partidos en diferentes países ha generado en los últimos tiempos inquietud acerca del estado de la democracia en el mundo. A través del estudio cuantitativo de cambios individuales en la identificación y militancia partidaria, este artículo analiza el colapso en 1998 del sistema de partidos políticos en Venezuela, hasta entonces uno de los más institucionalizados de América Latina. Las conclusiones indican que 1998 constituyó un momento crítico en que una serie de venezolanos(as) decidieron abandonar los partidos tradicionales y apoyar a partidos nacientes. Ello fue el resultado de la incapacidad de Acción Democrática y COPEI de incorporar a segmentos importantes de la sociedad y dar voz a posiciones políticas e ideológicas distintas, así como de ofrecer alternativas viables para llenar ese déficit de representación.

Type
Research Article
Information
Latin American Research Review , Volume 42 , Issue 1 , February 2007 , pp. 78 - 98
Copyright
Copyright © 2007 by the University of Texas Press

Footnotes

*

A previous version of this paper was presented at the annual meeting of the American Political Science Association, August 2003. Thanks to Evelyne Huber, Nathan Kelly, and Scott Mainwaring as well as the anonymous LARR reviewers for their helpful comments. Additionally, I recognize the contributions of José Vicente Carrasquera and Adolfo Vargas of the Universidad Simón Bolívar for providing access to RedPol98 as well as those of Félix Seijas of IVAD (Instituto Venezolano de Análisis de Datos), Luis Christiansen and Roberto Zapata of Consultores 21, Mario Acuña and Edmond Saade of DATOS, and Diane Ramsey of the University of North Carolina’s Odum Institute for providing access to the data used in constructing the partisan identification series. Funding for this research was provided by the Fulbright-Hays Doctoral Dissertation Research Abroad program, the Pew Foundation, the Graduate School and the University Center for International Studies at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill, and a Professional Development Award from the University of Tennessee. Of course, I am ultimately responsible for the analysis and interpretations presented here.

References

Abramson, Paul 1975 Generational Change in American Politics. Lexington: Lexington Books.Google Scholar
Coppedge, Michael 1994 Strong Parties and Lame Ducks: Presidential Partyarchy and Factionalism in Venezuela. Stanford: Stanford University Press.10.1515/9781503622272CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cox, Gary 1997 Making Votes Count. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.10.1017/CBO9781139174954CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Crisp, Brian F. 2000 Democratic Institutional Design: The Powers and Incentives of Venezuelan Politicians and Interest Groups. Stanford: Stanford University Press.Google Scholar
Dahl, Robert 1971 Polyarchy. New Haven: Yale University Press.Google Scholar
Dalton, Russell, Flanagan, Scott, and Beck, Paul, eds. 1984 Electoral Change in Advanced Industrial Societies. Princeton: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Dietz, Henry, and Myers, David 2003 “From Thaw to Deluge: The Process of Abrupt Party System Collapse.” A paper prepared for delivery at the 2003 annual meeting of the APSA.Google Scholar
Dix, Robert H. 1992 “Democratization and Institutionalization of Latin American Political Parties.” Comparative Political Studies 24: 488–511.10.1177/0010414092024004004CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fiorina, Morris P. 1981 Retrospective Voting in American National Elections. New Haven: Yale University Press.Google Scholar
Franklin, Charles H., and Jackson, John E. 1983 “The Dynamics of Party Identification.” American Political Science Review 77 (4): 957–971.10.2307/1957569CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hagopian, Frances 1998 “Democracy and Political Representation in Latin America in the 1990s: Pause, Reorganization or Decline.” In Fault Lines of Democracy in Post-Transition Latin America, edited by Aguero, Felipe and Stark, Jeffrey, 99–143. Miami: North-South Center Press.Google Scholar
International Labour Organisation (ILO) 1998 OIT Informa: Panorama Laboral. Lima: International Labour Organisation Statistical Annex.Google Scholar
Jennings, M. Kent, and Niemi, Richard J. 1968 “The Transmission of Political Values from Parent to Child.” American Political Science Review 62 (1): 169–184.10.2307/1953332CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Karl, Terry Lynn 1997 The Paradox of Plenty: Oil Booms and Petro-States. Berkeley: University of California Press.10.1525/9780520918696CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kelly, Jana Morgan 2003 “Counting on the Past or Investing in the Future? Economic and Political Accountability in Fujimori’s Peru.” The Journal of Politics 65 (3): 864–880.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kelly, Jana Morgan 2005 “Failing to Represent: The Collapse of the Venezuelan Party System.” Ph.D. Dissertation, Department of Political Science, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.Google Scholar
Kelly, Jana Morgan 2006 “Party System Change in Venezuela: From Institutionalized Party System to Anti-Party Politics, 1973-2003.” Paper presented at the XXVI International Congress of the Latin American Studies Association, March 15-18, 2006 (San Juan, PR).Google Scholar
King, Gary, Tomz, Michael, and Wittenberg, Jason 2000 “Making the Most of Statistical Analyses: Improving Interpretation and Presentation.” American Journal of Political Science 44 (2): 347–61.10.2307/2669316CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kitschelt, Herbert 1994 The Transformation of European Social Democracy. New York: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kornblith, Miriam, and Levine, Daniel 1995 “Venezuela: The Life and Times of the Party System.” In Building Democratic Institutions: Parties and Party Systems in Latin America, edited by Mainwaring, Scott and Scully, Timothy, 37–71. Stanford: Stanford University Press.Google Scholar
Levitsky, Steven 2003 Transforming Labor-Based Parties in Latin America: Argentine Peronism in Comparative Perspective. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.10.1017/CBO9780511615641CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lipset, Seymour Martin, and Rokkan, Stein 1967 “Cleavage Structures, Party Systems, and Voter Alignments.” In Party Systems and Voter Alignments: Cross-national Perspectives, edited by Lipset, Seymour Martin and Rokkan, Stein, 1–64. New York: Free Press.Google Scholar
MacKuen, Michael B., Erikson, Robert S., and Stimson, James A. 1989 “Macropartisanship.” American Political Science Review 83 (4): 1125–42.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mainwaring, Scott, and Scully, Timothy, eds. 1995 Building Democratic Institutions: Parties and Party Systems in Latin America. Stanford: Stanford University Press.Google Scholar
Mair, Peter 1997 Party System Change: Approaches and Interpretations. Oxford: Clarenden Press.Google Scholar
Martz, John D. 1966 Acción Democrática: Evolution of a Modern Political Party in Venezuela. Princeton: Princeton University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Martz, John D., and Myers, David 1986 “Venezuelan Democracy: Performance and Prospects.” In Venezuela: The Democratic Experience, 2nd ed., edited by John D. Martz and David J. Myers, 437-68. New York: Praeger Publishers.Google Scholar
McCoy, Jennifer 1999 “Chavez and the End of ‘Partyarchy’ in Venezuela.” Journal of Democracy 10: 64–77.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Miller, Warren E., and Shanks, J. Merrill 1996 The New American Voter. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Naím, Moíses 1993 Paper Tigers and Minotaurs: The Politics of Venezuela’s Economic Reforms. Washington, DC: The Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.Google Scholar
Pacek, Alexander C., and Radcliff, Benjamin 1995 “The Political Economy of Competitive Elections in the Developing World.” American Journal of Political Science 39 (3): 745–759.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Przeworski, Adam, ed., 1995 Sustainable Democracy. New York: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
RedPol—Red de Estudios Políticos 1998 Encuesta nacional. Caracas: Banco de Datos de Opinión Pública de la Universidad Simón Bolívar.Google Scholar
Remmer, Karen 1991 “The Political Impact of Economic Crisis in Latin America in the 1980s.” American Political Science Review 85 (3): 777–800.10.2307/1963850CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Shanks, J. Merrill, and Miller, Warren E. 1990 “Policy Direction and Performance Evaluation: Complementary Explanations of the Reagan Elections.” British Journal of Political Science 20 (2): 143–235.10.1017/S0007123400005780CrossRefGoogle Scholar