Reshaping the Political Arena in Latin America: From Resisting Neoliberalism to the Second Incorporation

Market affirming economic, social, and political reforms in the last quarter of the 20th century reopened the "social question" in Latin America as expanding waves of popular sectors resistance to their exclusionary effects gripped the region. The resurgence of the left pushed the issue to the forefront. How were politically activated popular sectors to be reincorporated in the political arena? Following Ruth Berins Collier's and David Collier's classic Shaping the Political Arena (Princeton University Press, 1991) and Federico M. Rossi´s approach elaborated in The Poor´s Struggle for Political Incorporation (Cambridge University Press, 2017), this volume examines the question of the role played in the second wave of incorporation by political parties, trade unions and social movements in five paradigmatic cases: Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Ecuador, and Venezuela. The book analyzes the various forms of incorporation and posits the emergence of different types of popular sector interest intermediation between state and society.