Why Power Contenders Choose Liberalization: Perspectives from South America

Abstract

Liberalization of military-authoritarian regimes in South America is taking place under conditions which make its outcome dependent on a kind of debate, rather than on either revolution or conformity with traditions. A key element in its analysis, therefore, is the interests of major actors, and their calculations of how liberalized regimes will affect them. “Liberalization” is defined as increasing competitiveness (as distinct from “democratization,” which includes increasing categories of participants), and four dimensions of a liberal policy-making process are identified: location of responsibility, basis of dissident control, pluralism, and openness of information flows. The military, state administrators, economic groups, organized labor, and others see these varying dimensions differently. There are three recent changes in political conditions generally characteristic of these South American countries that are shifting the sum of these varying calculations toward liberalization: a shift in the character of the political agenda; changes in the level and type of conflict; and the failure of political control to keep pace with a rapidly expanding state apparatus.