Citizen agency, human rights and economic development in the context of populism and new democratic leadership models in Latin America

Abstract

This article reviews the concepts of governance and governability in light of the emergence of new leadership models at the turn of the century and after the 1990s in Latin America. The article reviews the challenges of democratisation processes in Latin America to strengthen and broaden the exercise of human rights, in the context of the new democratic and so-called populist leadership. After a period of foreign debt crisis, and with the emergence of new leaders in Latin America at the turn of the millennium, a different type of agenda is taking shape, centred on the characteristics of leadership, plebiscite democracies, ‘decisionism’ and the search for institutional quality. These agenda points are connected to themes such as the idea of ‘republic’ versus the idea of ‘democracy’; constitutional stability; and the notion of personal and populist leadership as against democratic leadership. The article reviews these concepts and highlights the meaning of the so-called neo-constitutionalism in Latin America, both from a legal and a political perspective.

Key words: Latin America; governability; populist leaderships; republic; democracy; constitutional stability; neo-constitutionalism