1 “Poorer,” because the bifurcation between “poor” and nonpoor is relevant for policy makers, not for the people themselves, for whom material needs exist on a continuum. On regional conditions, see Lustig, Nora, ed., Coping with Austerity: Poverty and Inequality in Latin America (Washington: Brookings Institution, 1995), 4–5, 16–18Google Scholar; and Samuel A. Morley, “Structural Adjustment and the Determinants of Poverty in Latin America,” in ibid., 48.

2 This literature is vast. Major edited volumes on elites, institutions and social movements, respectively, include O'Donnell, Guillermo, Schmitter, Philippe C. and Whitehead, Laurence, eds., Transitions from Authoritarian Rule: Prospects for Democracy (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1986Google Scholar); Mainwaring, Scott and Scully, Timothy R., eds., Building Democratic Institutions: Party Systems in Latin America (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1995Google Scholar); and Eckstein, Susan, Power and Popular Protest: Latin American Social Movements (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1989Google Scholar).

3 By material interests, I mean the subjective evaluation of one's material wants. By political interests, I mean the subjective beliefs about what one wants from government or from the political process. Defining political interests in this way focuses on actual desires and goals, both material and nonmaterial and rejects the view that interests beyond objective material conditions are merely false consciousness.

4 Illustrative examples include Borón, Atilio, La crisis en América Latina: Nuevos desafíos para la izquierda, EURAL Working Paper 79 (Buenos Aires: Centro de Investigaciones Europea-Latinoamericanos, 1990), 35–36Google Scholar; and Seligson, Mitchell A., “Central America at the Crossroads,” in Malloy, James M. and Seligson, Mitchell A., eds., Authoritarians and Democrats: Regime Transition in Latin America (Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press, 1987), 177–187Google Scholar. A similar argument, predating the “transitions” literature, is Dahl, Robert, Polyarchy (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1971), 103.Google Scholar

5 Geddes, Barbara, “The Politics of Economic Liberalization: A Review Essay,” Latin American Research Review 30 (1995), 195–214Google Scholar; Haggard, Stephan and Kaufman, Robert R., The Political Economy of Democratic Transitions (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1995), 326–327Google Scholar; and Remmer, Karen L., “The Political Impact of Economic Crisis in Latin America in the 1980s,” American Political Science Review 85 (1991), 777–800.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

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7 Mainwaring, Scott, “Transitions to Democracy and Democratic Consolidation: Theoretical and Comparative Issues,” in Mainwaring, Scott, O'Donnell, Guillermo and Valenzuela, J. Samuel, eds., Issues in Democratic Consolidation: The New South American Democracies in Comparative Perspective (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 1992), 296.Google Scholar

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9 Two seminal works in political science, Easton, David, Systems Analysis of Political Life (New York: John Wiley & Sons, 1965), chaps. 5–7Google Scholar, and Dahl, Polyarchy, 95–104, built the preliminary theory about the contexts in which individuals' personal interests (interests in less deprivation, in Dahl's case) come to be expressed (or not expressed) in political terms. The findings in the latter part of this article build upon that foundation, although the focus is less on the cultural and psychological factors employed by those authors, and more on structural and political. Like those authors, I examine how material concerns come to be expressed as political interests. First, however, I contribute a way of conceptualizing the material interests that are to be perceived in those contexts. By understanding the material interests themselves, and also the ways that broader socio-economic conditions affect how material conditions are experienced and material interests perceived, we can better understand the potential that those interests would then be expressed as political demands. An important early contribution to understanding the material interests of the poor of Latin America and their conversion into political demands was Cornelius, Wayne A., “Urbanization and Political Demand Making: Political Participation among the Migrant Poor in Latin American Cities,” American Political Science Review 68 (1974), 1125–1146.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

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11 The hyperinflation of 1989 caused the most extreme growth in poverty and inequality, but although Argentina recovered from those extremes, poverty and inequality levels in the 1990s did not fall back to historic levels or even to the levels of the last authoritarian regime. See Argentina's Poor: A Profile Report, no. 13318-AR (Washington: World Bank, 1995), 19–20Google Scholar. Among many analyses of the changing social and economic conditions, see, especially, Altimir, Oscar, “Economic Development and Social Equity: A Latin American Perspective,” Journal of Interamerican Studies and World Affairs 38 (1996), 47–71CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Minujín, Alberto, ed., Cuesta Abajo—Los nuevos pobres: efectos de la crisis en la sociedad argentina (Buenos Aires: UNICEF/Losada, 1992Google Scholar); and Minujín, Alberto, ed., Desigualdad y exclusión: Desafíos para la política social en la Argentina de fin de siglo (Buenos Aires: UNICEF/Losada, 1993)Google Scholar

12 For details, see Powers, Nancy R., “The Politics of Poverty in the 1990s,” Journal of Interamerican Studies and World Affairs 37 (1995), 103–112.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

13 One of the 41, a taxi driver, had not experienced decline, but was included because his informal sector work and second-grade education left him highly vulnerable to economic fluctuations. Interviews took place in the first half of 1992. Further field work, including interviews with over 70 elites (in order to put the popular sector interviews into perspective), was done during parts of 1990, 1991, 1992 and 1995. Details of methodology are available from the author.

14 Extensive quotations can be found in Powers, Nancy R., “Poverty Looks at Democracy: Material Interests and Political Thinking in Contemporary Argentina” (unpublished doctoral dissertation, University of Notre Dame, 1995Google Scholar).

15 Hochschild, Jennifer L., What's Fair? American Beliefs about Distributive Justice (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1981Google Scholar); Oxhorn, Philip, Organizing Civil Society: The Popular Sectors and the Struggle for Democracy in Chile (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1995), chap. 4Google Scholar; and Stokes, Susan, Cultures in Conflict: Social Movements and the State in Peru (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1995), chap. 5.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

16 See Powers, “Poverty Looks at Democracy,” 276–85, for details.

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19 Paraphrase from second meeting with author, March 29, 1992. Pseudonyms are used to identify the people interviewed.

20 Both quotations from taped interview with author, June 10, 1992.

21 The examples below come from the situations of Argentines interviewed. I thank Roberto DaMatta for first calling my attention to coping mechanisms. The theoretical basis for my discussion of resources and assets is from Haveman, Robert H., Poverty Policy and Poverty Research: The Great Society and the Social Sciences (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1987Google Scholar); Ruggles, Patricia, Drawing the Line: Alternative Poverty Measures and Their Implications for Public Policy (Washington: Urban Institute Press, 1990Google Scholar); Sherraden, Michael, Assets and the Poor: A New American Welfare Policy (New York: M. E. Sharpe, 1991Google Scholar); and Townsend, Concept of Poverty. Although I drafted the present analysis before discovering the similarity, Nelson describes coping strategies with some of the examples and terminology used here. Our applications of the concept are distinct. Nelson writes of the lack of coping capacity among the very poor as part of an explanation of the differential costs of economic adjustment among groups, whereas I will use the concept to help explain cross-cutting political attitudes toward economic policy and policy leaders. See Nelson, Joan M., “Poverty, Equity, and the Politics of Adjustment,” in Haggard, Stephan and Kaufman, Robert R., eds., The Politics of Economic Adjustment (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1992), 230–231.Google Scholar

22 World Bank, World Development Report 1990: Poverty (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1990), 31–32.Google Scholar

23 By capacity to cope, I mean the objective conditions that enable a person to cope with economic difficulties, rather than the psychological traits that enable some people to cope better with stress.

24 Programa Alimentario de la Municipalidad de Buenos Aires (Buenos Aires Municipal Nutrition Programme). Taped interview with Cecilia and husband, June 4,1992.

25 Davies, James C., “Toward a Theory of Revolution6,” in Davies, James C., ed., When Men Revolt and Why (New York: Free Press, 1971), 134–147Google Scholar (reprint from American Sociological Review 6 [1962], 5–19Google Scholar); Gurr, Ted Robert, Why Men Rebel (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1970), 46–56Google Scholar; and Walton, John and Seddon, David, Free Markets and Food Riots: The Politics of Global Adjustment (Oxford: Blackwell, 1994CrossRefGoogle Scholar).

26 Fabián Echegaray, “Economic and Non-Economic Voting in Latin America: Testing Competing Explanations of Incumbent Electoral Support at the Aggregate-Level,” paper presented at the meeting of the Latin American Studies Association, Washington, D.C., 1995.

27 On the 1995 election, see Carlos Gervasoni, “La Sustentabilidad Electoral de los Programas de Estabilización y Reforma Estructural: Los Casos de Argentina y Peru,” paper presented at the International Congress of the Latin American Studies Association, Guadalajara, Mexico, 1997; Gibson, Edward, “Federalism and Electoral Coalitions: Making Market Reform Politically Viable in Argentina,”paper prepared for conference on Democracy, Nationalism, and Federalism, Oxford University, 1997Google Scholar; Powers, Nancy, “Re-electing Neoliberals: Competing Explanations for the Electoral Success of Fujimori and Menem,”paper presented at the International Congress of Latin American Studies Association, Guadalajara, Mexico, 1997Google Scholar; and Weyland, Kurt, “Swallowing the Bitter Pill: Sources of Popular Support for Neoliberal Reform in Latin America,” Comparative Political Studies 31, (1998), 539–568.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

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29 Average real industrial wages were relatively stagnant during the early 1990s, at approximately 30 index points below what they had been in 1980 (in the midst of the authoritarian regime). See ECLAC, Economic Survey of Latin America and the Caribbean, 1996–1997 (Santiago: United Nations, 1997), 107.Google Scholar

30 This timing also affects firms. See Carlos Acuña, H. and Smith, William C., “The Political Economy of Structural Adjustment: The Logic of Support and Opposition to Neoliberal Reform,” in Smith, William C., Acuña, Carlos H. and Gamarra, Eduardo A., eds., Latin American Political Economy in the Age of Neoliberal Reform: Theoretical and Comparative Perspectives for the 1990s (New Brunswick, N.J.: Transaction Publishers, 1994), 31.Google Scholar

31 On diversity of material needs, see Golbert, Laura and Fanfani, Emilio Tend, Poverty and Social Structure in Argentina: Outlook for the 1990s, Democracy and Social Policy Series Working Paper No. 6, translated by Lawton, Judy (Notre Dame: Kellogg Institute, 1994Google Scholar); Katzman, Rubén, “La heterogeneidad de la pobreza: El caso de Montevideo,” Revista de CEPAL 37 (1989)Google Scholar; and Murmis, Miguel and Feldman, Silvio, “La heterogeneidad social de las pobrezas,” in Minujfn, , ed., Cuesta Abajo, 45–92Google Scholar. On the growing heterogeneity of occupation and class, see Oxhom, Philip, “The Popular Sector Response to an Authoritarian Regime: Shantytown Organizations Since the Military Coup,” Latin American Perspectives 18 (1991), 84.Google Scholar

32 For a detailed discussion of this point, see Powers, “Poverty Looks at Democracy,” chap. 5.

33 Cornelius, “Urbanization.”

34 Mainwaring, Scott, “Urban Popular Movements, Identity and Democratization in Brazil,” Comparative Political Studies 20 (1987), 131–159.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

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36 See Sharpe, Kenneth Evan, Peasant Politics: Struggle in a Dominican Village (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press: 1977), 118–129.Google Scholar

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38 Lewis-Beck, Economics and Elections, 34–37; Mutz, Diane C., “Contextualizing Personal Experience: The Role of Mass Media,” Journal of Politics 56 (1994), 689–714CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Powell, G. Bingham Jr. and Whitten, Guy D., “A Cross-national Analysis of Economic Voting: Taking Account of the Political Context,” American Journal of Political Science 37 (1993), 391–414CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and Weatherford, M. Stephen, “Economic Determinants of Voting,” in Long, Samuel, ed., Research in Micropolitics: Voting Behavior (Greenwich, Conn.: JAI Press, 1986), 250–257.Google Scholar

39 Walton, John and Ragin, Charles, “Austerity and Dissent: Social Bases of Popular Struggle in Latin America,” in Canak, William L., ed., Lost Promises: Debt, Austerity, and Development in Latin America (Boulder: Westview, 1989Google Scholar); also, Walton and Seddon, Free Markets and Food Riots.

40 Thus, whereas the voting studies cited in note 38 focused on one institution or structural feature (media, parliamentary design, unions, and so forth) that might facilitate attribution of blame, they ignore a great many contextual and identity factors that work in concert to shape grassroots political thinking about material interests. I argue for a more comprehensive framework for analyzing grassroots political views, which first accounts for the type of material conditions, and then recognizes the variety of identities and contexts that affect how and whether citizens evaluate those material conditions as political problems.

41 For further discussion of this point, see Powers, “Poverty Looks at Democracy,” 227–29; and Ostiguy, Pierre, “Peronismo y anti-peronismo: Bases socio-culturales de la identidad políticaen la Argentina,” Revista de Ciencias Sociales 6 (1997), 133–215Google Scholar.

42 Some evidence for the extent of inherited political identity in Argentina comes from surveys in 1984 and 1991, which found 38 per cent and 46 per cent of Argentines, respectively, said they shared their parents' political attitudes (World Values Study Group, World Values Survey, 1981–1984 and 1990–1993 [Computer file]; Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research version [Ann Arbor: Institute for Social Research 1994]).

43 Lewis-Beck, Economics and Elections, 57–67.

44 Taped interview with author, March 14, 1992.

45 World Bank, Argentina's Poor, 13.

46 See Sartori, Giovanni, “From the Sociology of Politics to Political Sociology,” in Lipset, Seymour Martin, ed., Politics and the Social Sciences (New York: Oxford University Press, 1969), 83.Google Scholar

47 Przeworski, Adam, Capitalism and Social Democracy (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985CrossRefGoogle Scholar); and Sartori, “From the Sociology of Politics.”

48 See McGuire, James W., Peronism without Perón: Unions, Parties, and Democracy in Argentina (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1997Google Scholar). Concerning Peronism compared to other populist movements, see Roberts, Kenneth M., “Neoliberalism and the Transformation of Populism in Latin America: The Peruvian Case,” World Politics 48 (10 1995), 84–88.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

49 Compare Ranis, Peter, Argentine Workers: Peronism and Contemporary Class Consciousness (Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press, 1992), 116–127, 181Google Scholar. Ranis' study of working-class consciousness addresses a different question than here, yet is consistent with my findings. Ranis found Argentines “often see themselves in class terms” and recognize differing class interests; nevertheless, they do not expect government to respond only to their class's interests.

50 See Fundación de Investigaciones Económicas (F1EL), Indicadores de coyuntura (February 1994), 20.

51 Ranis, Argentine Workers, 209.

52 See Rosenthal, Gert, “Latin American and Caribbean Development in the 1980s and the Outlook for the Future,” CEPAL Review 39 (1989), 10–11Google Scholar. On trends in growth rates and wages, see ECLAC, Economic Survey 1995–96, 70, 99.

53 Lustig, ed., Coping with Austerity, 4–5.

54 See Ranis, Argentine Workers, 152–55 for similar findings.

55 These two conditions for political protest come from Tarrow, Sidney, Struggle, Politics, and Reform: Collective Action, Social Movements, and Cycles of Protest, Western Societies Program Occasional Paper 21 (2d ed.; Ithaca: Cornell Studies in International Affairs, 1991), 32–35.Google Scholar

56 These points are explored in more detail in Powers, “Politics of Poverty.”

57 Inglehart, Ronald and Abramson, Paul R., “Economic Security and Value Change,” American Political Science Review 88 (1994), 336–354.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

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59 Compare Lewis-Beck, Economics and Elections, 71–75.

60 See Powers, “The Politics of Poverty,” 122–24.

61 For differing interpretations of the 1995 election, see the sources in note 27.

62 “La Gendarmería volvió a reprimir en Jujuy y se extienden los conflictos,” Clarín (Buenos Aires), May 23, 1997.

63 Poll taken by Centre for Study of the New Majority, reported in “Argentina: Shades of Peron,” Luxner News South America Report (March 1, 1998). Available through http://web.lexis-nexis.com, Newsletter Database.

64 Inflation data from ECLAC, Economic Survey of Latin America and the Caribbean Summary 1997–1998 (Santiago: ECLAC, 1998), 30. Unemployment data from Argentine Ministry of Economy (http://www.indec.mecon.ar/comunica/c_eph/cplOO5.txt, retrieved August 29, 1998).

65 “La Iglesia, un plan inédito,” Clarín (Buenos Aires), August 8, 1995, 30.

66 March 9, 1998.

67 ECLAC, Economic Survey 1995–96, 90.

68 Propositions one, four and five concur with the three basic stages of perceptions leading to political demand-making in Cornelius, “Urbanization,” 1,128. Proposition five also supports conclusions in Linz and Stepan, “Political Crafting,” 46–48.