Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 September 2022
This article proposes a conceptual framework to discuss the left and left turns in Latin American politics. It then proceeds to argue that winning elections—the recurrent criterion for these turns—might generate tremendous enthusiasm but is also a restrictive benchmark. Other indicators I discuss here include the left's agenda-setting capacity, its redefinition of the political and ideological center, and its incipient challenge of the liberal setting of politics as actors experiment with post-liberal arrangements.
Este artículo propone un marco conceptual para caracterizar a la izquierda y el giro a la izquierda en la política latinoamericana. Luego sugiero que el entusiasmo generado por su reciente éxito electoral no significa que las elecciones sean el único criterio para explicar el resurgimiento de la izquierda. Por eso planteo otros indicadores, entre ellos, su capacidad para incidir en la elaboración de la agenda política y el hecho de que la izquierda está redefiniendo el centro político e ideológico. Por último, discuto su incipiente desafío al esquema liberal de la política a medida en que los actores experimentan con modos de participación que podemos denominar como pos-liberales.
An earlier version of this article was presented at the Peter Wall Institute for Advanced Studies, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, May 24–27, 2007, as part of the project “Left Turns? Progressive Parties, Insurgent Movements, and Policy Alternatives in Latin America.” coordinated by Jon Beasley-Murray, Maxwell Cameron, and Eric Hershberg of Simon Fraser University and the University of British Columbia (http://weblogs.elearning.ubc.ca/leftturns/). I thank the discussant, Tanya Korovkin, and the participants for their observations. I also wish to thank Francisco Panizza and the three anonymous reviewers of LARR for their detailed comments.