Paraguay: The unraveling of one-party rule

Journal of Democracy

Volumn 20, Issue 1, 2009, Pages 143-156

  Abente Brun, Diego ^a  

^a MIAMI UNIVERSITY   (United States)

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EID: 67651221810     PISSN: 10455736     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: None     Document Type: Article

References (22)

1. The electoral system, as laid out in the constitution, mandates the plurality system to elect all executive positions (president, vice-president, governors, and mayors) and the proportional system for legislative bodies.
2. Kenneth F. Greene, Why Dominant Parties Lose: Mexico's Democratization in Comparative Perspective (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007), 297.
3. See, for example, Beatriz Magaloni, Voting for Autocracy: Hegemonic Party Survival and Its Demise in Mexico (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006); and Greene, Why Dominant Parties Lose.
4. Magaloni, Voting for Autocracy, 261-66.
5. Greene, Why Dominant Parties Lose, 210.
6. Whereas both Greene and Magaloni address the weakening of the PRI as a result of the defection of Cuauhtémoc Cárdenas to create the PRD and run as its presidential candidate in the 1988 election, they do not seem to consider the division of the PRI in 1988 a prominent factor.
7. Diego Abente-Brun, "The Quality of Democracy in Small South American Countries: The Case of Paraguay," Working Paper No. 343, Kellogg Institute, University of Notre Dame, Working Paper Series, November 2007; available at http://kellogg.nd.edu/publications/workingpapers/WPS/343.pdf.
8. Diego Abente-Brun, "Stronismo, Post-Stronismo, and the Prospects for Democratization in Paraguay," Working Paper No. 119, Kellogg Institute, University of Notre Dame, Working Paper Series, March 1989, 56. Available at http://kellogg.nd.edu/publications/workingpapers/WPS/119.pdf.
9. Tribunal Superior de Justicia Electoral, "Elecciones," available at www.tsje.gov.py.
10. As the late vice-president Arga~na put it once, even if the party candidate were Donald Duck, the Colorados would vote for him. Likewise, a prominent Colorado senator said of the Wasmosy candidacy, "He is a very bad candidate, but it would be worse for the party not to have a candidate at all."
11. He variously defined himself as the "Tendotá" (Conductor, in the widely spoken Indian language Guaraní) and "Josué" (in the circles of his Anabaptist Mennonite Church).
12. Tribunal Superior de Justicia Electoral, "Elecciones 2008," available at www.tsje.gov.py.
13. See www.senado.gov.py.
14. See www.diputados.gov.py.
15. Tribunal Superior de Justicia Electoral, "Elecciones 2008."
16. Latinobarómetro 2008, 31-32, available at www.latinobarometro. org.
17. "Decreto de Lula da Silva: Brasil amenaza a Paraguay y vecinos," Ultima Hora (Asunción), 14 October 2008.
18. "Pedidos de ampliación en diversas fuentes giran en torno al 5% del PIB," ABC, 14 October 2008. This is without taking into account a bill that proposes to grant a retirement income to all people over 60. The cost of this project is estimated at 10 percent of GDP.
19. See www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2008/10/20081027.html.
20. At the time of this writing in early December 2008, however, it remains unclear whether the government will seek approval of the agreements other than the one dealing with the provision of gas.
21. Latinobarómetro 2008, 75-76. A full 33 percent do not know where to place themselves along the left-right ideological continuum (the highest share, along with that of Guatemala, in all of Latin America).
22. This is extremely important since the president does not have a congressional majority and the National Congress is endowed with many powers. The overall legislative power of the president in Paraguay ranks last among the eighteen Latin American countries, with a combined Index of 0.19, as opposed to 0.66 and 0.62 for Chile and Brazil, respectively, which occupy the top of the scale. Inter American Development Bank, The Politics of Policies (Washington, D.C.: IADB, 2006), 49.