Peruvian Congress Research Articles

Transparency Versus Collective Action

During the 1990s, the Peruvian Congress was thoroughly dominated by the presidential administration of Alberto Fujimori. In 2000, during the scandals that brought down Fujimori and his associates, the legislature was exposed as riddled with corruption. In the wake of these events, one might expect the congress to be thoroughly discredited and institutionally weakened. I argue that the Peruvian Congress made significant strides toward legislative transparency and strengthening the accountability of individual legislators to voters and that, ironically, some of the key steps in this direction were taken during the Fujimori era. This same trend, however, presents potential obstacles to collective action in the legislature. I support these claims with analysis of changes in the legislative party and coalition system from the late 1990s through the transition, examination of legislative voting patterns, and interviews with key actors inside and outside congress.

LA BIOÉTICA EN LAS CONSTITUCIONES DEL MUNDO

The author analyses a compared Constitutional Law, identifying 37 fundamental laws that include bioethic principles in their norms, such as the respect for human dignity in everything related to scientific investigation, genetic identity's protection, the right to investigate paternity, recognition of future generation's rights, etc. A proposition to incorporate bioethic norms in the future Constitution was made by the Peruvian Congress. Several of the principles just mentioned, and others stated there, if approved in the Fundamental Chart, will turn Peru into the pioneer in constitutional regulation of the new topics related to life's sciences.

No singing, no laughing, no sound

In 1995, Lori Berenson, a US citizen, was arrested and sentenced to life imprisonment by a 'hooded' court for allegedly conspiring with the Tupac Amaru Revolutionary Movement to take over the Peruvian Congress. In May this year, US pressure resulted in a retrial on the lesser charge of 'terrorist collaboration'. Here, for the first time since her imprisonment, and through the voices of women who shared it with her, she writes of the conditions in which thousands of detainees convicted under Peru's anti-terrorist laws continue to be held

State Reform, Coalitions, and The Neoliberal Autogolpe in Peru

When President Alberto Fujimori suspended constitutional rule in April 1992, he ended Peru's twelve-year experiment in civilian democratic governance. Citing the growing insurgency of Sendero Luminoso, corruption in the political parties, and difficulties with the Peruvian Congress in passing his economic program, Fujimori announced that democracy would have to be “temporarily suspended” in order to build new institutions. This move was backed by the armed forces. Perhaps most surprising to outside observers was the widespread popularity of Fujimori's move, which reflected the growing disenchantment with traditional political parties of the right and the left. Democratic procedures and institutions during the 1980s had been precarious at best. The military's counterinsurgency campaign against Sendero Luminoso had transformed Peru into one of the hemisphere's worst offenders against human rights, with the highest number of forced disappearances in the world. But despite documented cases of torture and other violations of human rights by state authorities, Peruvian military forces acted with the knowledge that they were virtually immune from prosecution.

5th Peruvian Congress Focuses on Andean Culture

5th Peruvian Congress Focuses on Andean Culture

Ninth Latin American Congress of Obstetrics and Gynecology Sixth Peruvian Congress of Obstetrics and Gynecology First Peruvian Congress of Human Reproduction

Ninth Latin American Congress of Obstetrics and Gynecology Sixth Peruvian Congress of Obstetrics and Gynecology First Peruvian Congress of Human Reproduction

Third Peruvian Congress of Radiology

Third Peruvian Congress of Radiology