Does participation generate democratization? Analysis of social participation by institutional means in Argentine, Brazilian and Uruguayan foreign policies

Abstract

ABSTRACTThe article questions if the participation of civil society actors in foreign policy making would lead to the democratization of foreign policy processes. The analysis is based on the comparison of three foreign policy participatory initiatives – the Civil Society Consultative Council, the Social and Participative Mercosur Programme and the Dialogue and Consultation System – which currently take place in Argentina, Brazil and Uruguay, respectively. The hypothesis to be tested is that participatory institutions modify representation in foreign policy by breaking with the monopoly of the diplomatic bureaucracy in foreign policy making on regional integration. For that, we develop a comprehensive model based on social participation indicators and assess the specifics of each participatory initiative by mobilizing documental sources and conducting face-to-face interviews with key actors for each initiative. We ultimately find that the democratic nature is rather correlated with the institutional design adopted by the participatory initiative under scrutiny.