Civil Society and the State in Left-led Latin America: Challenges and Limitations to Democratization

This book provides a critical examination of the role of civil society and its relation to the state throughout left-led Latin America. Featuring a broad range of case studies from across the region, from the Bolivian Constitution to participative budgeting in Brazil to the communal councils in Venezuela, the book examines to what extent these new initiatives are redefining state-civil society relations. Does the return of an active state in Latin America imply the incorporation of civil society representatives in decision-making processes? Is the new left delivering on the promise of participatory democracy and a redefinition of citizenship, or are we witnessing a new democratic deficit?

Table of Contents:
Introduction

1. Globalization, democratization and state-civil society relations. challenges for left-led Latin America - Peadar Kirby and Barry Cannon

Part 1: State-civil society relations: case studies
2. Reconfiguring the state/society complex in Venezuela - Thomas Muhr
3. State-civil society relations in post-crisis Argentina - Christopher Wylde
4. Civil society-state relations in left-led El Salvador, Honduras and Nicaragua - Barry Cannon and Mo Hume
5. Rafael Correa's government, social movements and civil society in Ecuador - Carlos de la Torre
6. Re-evaluating participatory governance in Brazil - Bernhard Leubolt, Wagner Romão, Joachim Becker and Andreas Novy
7. State-civil society relations during student mobilizations in Chile in 2006 and 2011 - René Jara Reyes

Part 2: Localized conflicts in a globalized age: extractivism, social policy and participation in left-led states
8. The return of the state and new extractivism. what about civil society? - Barbara Hogenboom
9. Indigenous and peasant participation in resource governance in Bolivia and Peru - Almut Schilling-Vacaflor and David Vollrath
10. Chile's mining unions and the 'new left', 1990-2010 - Jewellord T. Nem Singh

Part 3: The global, the national and the local: broadening participation?
11. Civil society participation. poverty reduction in Bolivia, Honduras and Nicaragua - Sarah Hunt
12. New left governments, civil society and constructing a social dimension in Mercosur - José Briceño Ruiz

Conclusion
13. Civil society-state relations in left-led Latin America. deepening democratization? - Barry Cannon and Peadar Kirby