The chapter introduces the approach to Latin American politics and society adopted in the book. It discusses the topics covered in the book’s historical overview and anticipates the argument that progress was made regarding democracy and nation building, but that gains concerning state capacity and socioeconomic development have been more elusive. It justifies the focus on democracy in the analysis of contemporary Latin America; argues that Latin America has made progress on easy problems, but failed to resolve hard problems, regarding democracy and citizenship; and introduces the book's overarching argument that problems of democracy have prevented the elimination of problems for democracy, and problems for democracy block the possibility of reducing problems of democracy.

Chapter 7 focuses on political parties as agents of representation that channel citizen interests and values into the policy-making process in contemporary Latin America. It illustrates the flaws of democracy without representative parties through a discussion of Peru, and shows that many Latin American democracies have experienced crises of representation because citizens see many party leaders as cut off from common citizens. To explain the state of parties, it argues that crises of representation persist when neoliberalism is treated as inevitable. It also maintains, through an analysis of parties in Bolivia, Brazil, and Uruguay, that parties become agents of representation due to the work of skillful political leaders, committed activists, and vigorous social movements. It also highlights that a weak state undermines party building because it limits the possibility that elected officials can deliver public goods and engender popular support. It concludes that, although democracy has become the norm in Latin America, few democracies have parties that act as agents of representation, and that this lack of a deep, substantive sense of representation is a key problem of democracy.

Chapter 11 focuses on the new violence that has erupted in many Latin American countries in the early twenty-first century. It shows that Latin America is the most violent region in the world and that violence is perpetrated by drug cartels, gangs, common criminals, militias, and state agents. The chapter explores the causes of violence through case studies of Mexico and the Northern Triangle countries (El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras) and draws several conclusions. International factors, such as the global drug trade and US policy toward Latin America, have played a largely negative role. The state has failed to guarantee citizen security, in part because it is absent, and in part because it colludes with criminal groups. Additionally, needed reforms of the state’s security forces are not enacted because the democratically elected politicians who have to propose such reforms are threatened or bought off by actors who benefit from violence. This chapter shows that problems of democracy – the poor quality of democracy – and problems for democracy – the failure of democracies to guarantee civil rights such as the right to life – are tightly interconnected.

Chapter 6 describes and explains the political inclusion of disadvantaged groups (women, indigenous peoples, Afro-descendants, and ordinary people) in contemporary Latin America. It highlights many impressive accomplishments – most notably, the steps taken to increase the number of women in political office by instituting gender quotas, a mechanism that obliges political parties to field a certain percentage of female candidates. It also discusses how various other institutional innovations have fostered political inclusion. However, it shows that indigenous peoples and Afro-descendants have gained less access to political office than women, and that few steps have been taken to redress this problem. It discusses this problem in Brazil, among other places. Moreover, it points out that institutions offering, in principle, an avenue for citizen input into government beyond voting for representatives are frequently hijacked by governments. It stresses both the promise and the limits of various initiatives to make democracy more inclusive. It concludes that, even though Latin American democracies have become more inclusive, democracy still works better for some groups than for others.

Chapter 8 provides an introduction to civil rights in contemporary Latin America. It proposes a definition of civil rights that encompasses four classes of rights: equality rights, liberty rights, security rights, and due process rights. Relying on data about these rights, it characterizes the state of civil rights in Latin America as mixed. The politically powerful have had to answer for past abuses of human rights; and many rights of women, indigenous peoples, Afro-descendants, and LGBTQ+ people have been legally recognized. However, many democracies are corrupt, discriminatory, semi-free, violent, and unjust. This state of affairs is explained in terms of multiple factors. Democracy has served as a stepping stone for some improvement of civil rights, especially when an active civil society has pressed for certain rights. But the impact of democracy is muted because Latin American democracies are not high-quality democracies. Moreover, the judiciary has not been a consistent promoter of civil rights, and the state has also not been capable enough or state agents have not been committed enough to enforce the law uniformly throughout the full territory of a country.

Chapter 12 provides an introduction to social rights in contemporary Latin America. It proposes a working definition of social rights that encompasses five classes of rights: the right to an adequate standard of living, the right to a family life, the right to health, the right to education and participation in cultural life, and the right to decent work and to social security. It uses data on these five classes of rights to show that social rights are a problem for democracy. Social progress across several types of social rights has been widespread and many democracies are partly inclusive. However, most Latin American democracies are unequal democracies. To explain this mixed state of affairs, it considers the impact of several factors. A history of democracy, especially when left-center parties are strong, is associated with relatively easy aspects of redistribution. Social mobilization has also been pivotal in pushing for social rights. However, problems of democracy, such as the weakness of political parties, attenuate democracy’s redistributive potential. Additionally, weak state capacity has been an obstacle to the implementation of redistributive policies.

Chapter 15 addresses economic inequality and its impact on democracy in contemporary Latin America. It illustrates the significance of inequality with discussions of Brazil and Chile, and shows that wealth and income are unequally distributed and that certain categories of citizens (rural dwellers, indigenous people, informal workers) are among the poorest Latin Americans. It stresses that it is paradoxical that several decades after Latin America achieved democracy – a political system based on the idea that citizens are political equals – social inequality remains deep and pervasive. Yet it accounts for the difficulty faced by democratic governments in reducing economic inequality through redistributive policies in terms of the structural and instrumental power of economic elites, the control of the media by economic elites, and the actions of politicians and state agents. The chapter also stresses that persistent economic inequality has negative consequences on democracy and shows how recent political developments in Chile – for decades seen as the poster child of political and economic success in the region – are a warning sign against complacency with economic inequality.

Chapter 8 expands on the theoretical implications for the study of state building, public safety, and taxation. It also discusses the security benefits that elites’ investment in strengthening the state has brought about in the region. Further, the final chapter addresses the sustainability of the state-building efforts discussed in the book and their potential consequences for other aspects of political and economic development.

Chapter 5 describes and explains the state of democracy in contemporary Latin America. It shows that the most common problem of democracy is that democracies are low-quality or medium-quality ones. It stresses that even though Latin America has achieved and stabilized democracy, a notable success, it has not democratized fully. It also notes that democracy has broken down in some countries (e.g., Honduras, Venezuela). It argues that multiple factors account for the state of democracy in contemporary Latin America. Ideological differences over neoliberal economic policies have fueled some problems of democracy, as is shown in the cases of Honduras and Venezuela. Changes in various aspects of the international context have helped to stabilize democracies. Additionally, the region’s problems of democracy are also explained by some enduring features of Latin American politics: the exploitation of advantages that accrue to incumbency in political office, the influence of economic power, and the weakness of the state.

The case of El Salvador illustrates how temporal variation in the strength of government–elite linkages played a role in explaining the difference between a failed attempt in Mauricio Funes’ administration and a successful one in Salvador Sánchez Cerén’s administration. Even in the context of one of the highest levels of violent crime in the world, the country’s first left-of-center administration failed to adopt elite taxes in order to increase public-safety expenditures. It wasn’t until the government formed a coalition with right-of-center parties and linkages with the business sectors improved, that an increased tax burden on the wealthy became possible.

Chapter 3 explains how the conventional crisis-oriented approach in the literature cannot explain variation in efforts to involve elites in the state-building enterprise. Instead, it argues that both demand and supply factors must be taken into account and disaggregates the components of each, including whether elites can satisfy their demand for public goods in the private market, the ideology of the government, and the extent to which linkages between business elites and the government exist. Chapter 3 also evaluates alternative explanations, including the availability of nonfiscal resources such as oil rents and foreign aid and the degree of inequality in society.