Conservatives against the Tide

This Elements proposes an explanatory scheme on the rise to power of a new right in Latin America.

This Element shows the three factors that drive the success of conservative parties: programmatic innovation by personalistic leaders; organizational mobilization of both core and noncore constituencies; and elite fear of the 'Venezuela model.'This volume in the Elements series addresses the success of conservative parties in non-authoritarian contexts in contemporary Latin America. It places the core case of Argentina's Republican Proposal (PRO) party in comparative perspective with Argentina's Recrear and with Colombia's Democratic Center (CD) party and the Bolivia's Social Democratic Movement (MDS) in an effort to understand their differing degrees of success in adverse circumstances. Based on long-term research using a variety of methods, this Element shows that success has been driven by three factors: programmatic innovation by personalistic leaders; organizational mobilization of both core and noncore constituencies; and elite fear of the 'Venezuela model.'