Guarding Privileges and Saving the Day: Guatemalan Elites and the Settlement of the Serranazo

Bjune, Maren Christensen; Petersen, Stina

doi:10.1057/9780230105812_10

Cited by 3 publications

(2 citation statements)

References 0 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…The Republic of Guatemala today has a multiparty system and has with the 2011 presidential elections celebrated seven subsequent relatively free and fair elections since the restoration of civilian government. With the exception of President Serrano's failed autogolpe in 1993, the constitutional order has survived (Bjune and Petersen 2010). While many of the same actors remain on the political stage, only one party has survived as an electoral option in the presidential elections throughout the postauthoritarian period.…”

Section: Political Contextmentioning

confidence: 99%

Te Deum Cristiano Evangélico: ‘The Evangelical’ in Guatemalan Politics

Bjune

2013

Iberoamericana – Nordic Journal of Latin American and Caribbean Studies

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Over the course of less than forty years the percentage of non-Catholics in the Guatemalan population has risen from about 2 to 40 per cent, of whom the great majority are Evangelical Christians (Morales, interview, Guatemala City 31.01.2012; O'Neill 2012; Pew Forum 2006). The physical representations are hard to miss; throughout the country the construction of Evangelical churches is steadily increasing accompanied by painted messages recommending the public to prepare for the coming of the saviour, and that 'Jesus is the lord of Guatemala'. Alongside these physical changes, the so-called transformations can allegedly also be seen in the individual; as people convert, many change lifestyles, friends, and at times even personal economic status.The phenomenon of rapid evangelisation in Guatemala has received broad scholarly attention, much of which serves as an inspiration for this article. However, as the percentage of Evangelical Christians increases, so does the diversity of the members of the category 'Evangelical', complicating the drawing of general conclusions with regard to the impact and effect of Evangelical growth. Perhaps most controversial and most debated in the field, has been the assessments of the impact of this largescale Evangelical conversion on Guatemala's socio-political development, and more specifically, on the processes of democratisation. Hence, today most studies concentrate on Evangelicalism as experienced by individuals and smaller communities.The aim of this article is nonetheless to make the case for analysing the political impact of Evangelicalism at the national level. The findings suggest that in recent years, representatives of Evangelical communities have increased their presence in political spaces such as advisory boards to the President and hearings in Congress. The article explores to what extent this has been a deliberate strategy. As a hypothetical point of departure, the article argues that in national politics 'the Evangelical' can be considered

show abstract

Section: Political Contextmentioning

confidence: 99%

Te Deum Cristiano Evangélico: ‘The Evangelical’ in Guatemalan Politics

Bjune

2013

Iberoamericana – Nordic Journal of Latin American and Caribbean Studies

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…According to Collins (2009a: 77), for the US the "most frequent factor for the initiation of economic sanctions was to foster democracy in states abroad." In cases such as Guatemala (1993), the US was able to swiftly forge an international coalition that imposed sanctions in reaction to President Serrano's decision to dissolve Congress and the judiciary (Christensen Bjune and Petersen 2010;Crawford 2001: 194).…”

Section: Sanctions and The Changed Global Environment After The Cold Warmentioning

confidence: 99%

Sanctions and Democratization in the Post-Cold War Era

Soest

Wahman

2013

SSRN Journal

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Previous research, which has focused mostly on pre-1990 dynamics, has shown that sanctions have a negative impact on the level of democracy in targeted authoritarian countries. Given this finding, it is puzzling that democratization has become the most common goal of sanctions issued against authoritarian states. This paper studies how sanctions have affected democratization in targeted countries since the end of the Cold War and asks whether "democratic sanctions," those that explicitly aim to promote democracy, are in fact counterproductive. Contrary to the earlier research, this analysis demonstrates that sanctions do not generally decrease the level of democracy in targeted countries. Using a new data set covering sanctions for the period 1990-2010 and cross-sectional time-series analysis, the study shows that sanctions have an insignificant but positive democratic effect. More importantly, it finds that "democratic sanctions" have a statistically significant positive effect on democratic development in targeted countries. This positive outcome can be explained by the smaller selection effect associated with this specific sanction type. The high cost of conceding to "democratic sanctions" makes authoritarian regimes less likely to give in to senders' demands before sanctions are implemented. The high-cost argument is corroborated by a supplementary test that demonstrates that democratic sanctions in particular make authoritarian institutions and rulers more instable.

show abstract

Presidential Instability in Latin America: Why Institutionalized Parties Matter

Martinez

2020

Gov. & oppos.

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Pedro P. Kuczynski (Peru 2018) and Evo Morales (Bolivia 2019) are the most recent cases in a long list of Latin American presidents who have been forced out of office. We seek to contribute to understanding why some presidents fail to fulfil their terms by analysing the role of an actor overlooked by the extant literature on presidential failures: political parties. We hypothesize a non-linear relation between party institutionalization and the risk of presidential failure. That is, when parties are weakly or highly institutionalized, the hazard of presidential failure is lower than when parties are moderately institutionalized. We test this and other hypotheses with a survival analysis of 157 Latin American administrations (1979–2018). We also qualitatively explore how the occurrence (or non-occurrence) of certain events affects the risk of failure in three countries with different levels of party institutionalization. We find that party institutionalization – as well as legislative support, anti-government demonstrations, presidential scandals and economic growth – significantly affects the risk of presidential failure.

show abstract

Guarding Privileges and Saving the Day: Guatemalan Elites and the Settlement of the Serranazo

Cited by 3 publications

References 0 publications

Te Deum Cristiano Evangélico: ‘The Evangelical’ in Guatemalan Politics

Te Deum Cristiano Evangélico: ‘The Evangelical’ in Guatemalan Politics

Sanctions and Democratization in the Post-Cold War Era

Presidential Instability in Latin America: Why Institutionalized Parties Matter

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About