For many people throughout much of the world today, the terms “Amazon” and “rain forest” are synonymous—indeed, it seems as if the two must have always intertwined. However, while this much-invoked realm of shimmering, fragile nature, together with its ferocious jungle alter ego, does have deep roots in the past, its present-day incarnation has much to do with the global environmental movement that began emerging in the 1960s and has continued to morph over time. This article examines contemporary representations of the Amazon with an eye to what is now changing, as well as why. It underscores the key role that these depictions play in shaping policy, which gives them an importance far transcending purely narrative concerns.

This article analyzes the image of Brazilian Indigenous minority groups as a figurehead in media discourse, which is based on racializing logics that celebrate historical performances of Indigeneity but minimize attention to the political activity and grassroots movements of the existing population. Using cultural studies as a starting point, this study draws on Diana Taylor's understanding of identity and on postcolonial thinker Homi Bhabha's theorizing on nation to conduct a reading of discourses and performances of Indigeneity as part of cultural memory. I propose an analysis of the limited scenarios allowed in this construction of a nation in Brazilian media outlets, which often claim there is political motivation for identity and are incapable of dealing with contemporary Indigenous groups. Overall, this analysis highlights the need to rethink the way we discuss ethnic identity so as to foster a larger dialogue about identity, heritage, and minority cultures in such a way that we avoid falling into a paradigm of modernization and acculturation when discussing ethnicity, and to promote better understanding of the different ongoing political and cultural movements in contemporary Brazil.

The existing literature relating ethnic fragmentation to public good provision sheds little light on inequalities in access to public goods across groups, despite the fact that some of the causal factors underlying the hypothesized relationship seem to predict such inequalities. This article seeks to fill this gap by examining the relationship between ethnic fragmentation and both the level and distribution of access to clean water in Mexico, using regression analysis at both the municipal and individual levels for the period 2000–2005. Using the divide between indigenous and nonindigenous people to measure ethnic fragmentation, the results first replicate the general finding in the literature: more fragmented municipalities have worse access to clean water, all else being equal. However, this worse access is not equally distributed. Instead, there is a systematic gap in water access between indigenous and nonindigenous people, even after controlling for fragmentation and other relevant factors. The findings have important implications for future research regarding ethnic fragmentation and public good provision.

The Brazilian democratization took place between 1985 and 1988. In 1985, the authoritarian power holders transferred political power to civilians, and in 1988, a new democratic constitution was enacted, thus finalizing the transition. The end of the transition triggered processes of participation in different Brazilian cities, such as São Paulo, Belo Horizonte, Recife, and Rio de Janeiro. However, only in Porto Alegre could the political context in the postdemocratization period generate a process of reverting priorities, that is to say, of inverting the pattern of democratic participation and the pattern of public investment at the urban level. In this article, I show the social conditions of the poor in the city of Porto Alegre in 1985, explain the emergence of participatory budgeting in the city, and show how democracy made a difference in the living conditions of the urban poor in the city of Porto Alegre. In the second part of the article, I analyze the recent expansion of participatory budgeting in Brazil and its recent expansion to midsize cities. In the final part of the article, I show how new participatory institutions are being introduced at the federal level of government. Participation at the local and national levels is making a difference in the living conditions of the Brazilian poor.

The present article analyzes the media produced by the Brazilian Chamber of Deputies, especially its national cable TV station and online news agency. We discuss whether these media sources promote accountability and participation. Our findings suggest that although these sources have been employed, according to the logic of audience democracy, to promote the public visibility, credibility, and reputation of Brazil's federal representatives, they do contribute to enhancing the accountability and quality of Brazilian democracy, insofar as they provide access to relevant information about legislative processes.

El asesinato de setenta y dos indocumentados en Tamaulipas en agosto de 2010 parece confirmar el punto de vista oficial de que el contrabando de indocumentados entre México y los Estados Unidos ha pasado a manos de los grupos delictivos que operan en la frontera. Este artículo, a partir del uso de una metodología cualitativa que incluye la realización de entrevistas en profundidad de cuarenta coyotes, examina la estructura de las redes de contrabando de indocumentados en Tamaulipas y analiza los nexos existentes entre el coyotaje y los grupos delictivos.

This article draws on participant observation research in a Civil Police station (delegacia) in the city of São Paulo, Brazil, to disentangle existing notions of police resistance to democratic change. Through processes such as “talk of castigation,” the Civil Police reproduce three kinds of authority—public, institutional, and criminal—that influence how police work is done. These authorities are antagonistic, battling over different normative worldviews and notions of acceptable police practice, and these antagonisms result in police work that is often a conflicted amalgam of democratic, institutional, and criminal pressures. The slow pace of democratic change at this police station emerges from not one but multiple modes of resistance that complicate how police can do their work.

Considerable research has been conducted on the relationship between socioeconomic inequality and political engagement. However, there is little consensus on the exact nature of the relationship, and considerable variation in the relationship exists even among countries with similar levels of inequality. This lack of clarity in the literature exists because the impact of inequality on engagement is not constant, but changes depending on the strategic choices of political leaders. Populist leaders; who tend to explicitly connect political and socioeconomic exclusion, can activate latent grievances around inequality. Using data from the Latin American Public Opinion Project, we show that inequality leads to disengagement among the poor in most contexts but increases engagement under populist rule. In other words, a primarily structural relationship is mediated by political variables. Even though the severity of inequality is outside the control of any political actor, leaders' reaction to inequality can dramatically alter its impact on mass political behavior.

I examine how domestic workers have fared legally and politically in post-transition democracies in Latin America. Paid domestic work employs more than 15 percent of the economically active female population in Latin America, yet national labor codes tend to mandate lower salaries and benefits and longer working hours to those working in this sector. They also suffer from race, gender, and class discrimination. Although organizations advocating for domestic workers have demanded equal rights, political actors in the region have been extremely reticent to respond to these demands. By analyzing domestic workers' legal rights across the region and process-tracing political reforms in Chile and Bolivia, I find that although elite resistance to change is a constant, under the right circumstances, domestic workers can gain legal reforms. Domestic workers' social allies are labor, feminist, and indigenous organizations; however, to get the attention of these allies, and consequently to pressure politicians, they must first organize autonomously and publicize their cause. Although leftist parties are more likely to be receptive to their cause, they need pressure to act on behalf of the needs of such a marginalized group. Once they do, however, they need not be majority parties to get the issue on the agenda. The key political battle is getting and keeping the issue of domestic workers' rights on the political agenda; once it goes to a vote, it is unlikely to be rejected.

Este artículo estudia la circulación y apropiación de la legislación electoral en Colombia entre 1855 y 1886. Ofrece algunas respuestas y una nueva perspectiva para el estudio de la propagación, recepción y lectura de la democracia en Colombia e Hispanoamérica en el siglo XIX. El trabajo abre con un estudio de la circulación de las constituciones y las leyes electorales, en un esfuerzo por examinar las distintas maneras en que los gobernantes, periódicos, librerías y tiendas expandieron este campo de la cultura escrita. Se ofrece también un análisis de cómo se apropiaron de esta legislación electoral numerosos sectores de la sociedad en distintos contextos. El ensayo concluye con unas reflexiones acerca de las dos primeras secciones, cuestiona algunos lugares comunes de la historiografía imperial acerca de las repúblicas de Hispanoamérica, e indaga por el lugar que tuvo la circulación de estas constituciones y leyes electorales en un mundo todavía dominado por los imperios y los reinos.