Corruption and Politics in Latin America : National and Regional Dynamics

Recent data confirms that corruption is perceived as one of the top five concerns for Latin America, along with crime and violence, economic opportunities, inequality and impunity. Moreover, a recent analysis looking at various indicators of government

2018

I would like to dedicate the completed work to my parents, Nora, Daniel, and Mike. Their support and encouragement carried me through the process. Your love helped me attain it. Additionally, a special thanks to all my friends that listened to my rants, theories, and complaints and knew exactly what to say to inspire me. Mel, Lynne, Yazmin, and countless others that cheered me through this process, I cannot thank you enough. Mabi, Ana, Quique, Luis, siempre en mí corazón y un agradecimiento de por vida. v ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would like to thank and compliment my thesis committee, Nisha Bellinger, Julie VanDusky-Allen, and Steve Utych, as well as Michael Allen for their immense support, patience, and helpful advice they provided through this process. Their contribution cannot be measured, but it can be praised. Twyla and Valerie, your guidance cannot go unnoticed. Thank you.

KOSTIĆ, Jelena; STEVANOVIĆ, Aleksandar (ed.). Uloga društva u borbi protiv korupcije: the role of society in the fight against corruption. Belgrade: Institut Za Uporedno Pravo; Institut Za Kriminološka I Sociološka Istraživanja, 2020. p. 285-301., 2020

In order to understand the market’s operation and its demands, it is necessary to analyze the events occurred throughout the 20th Century, especially in its second half. The economic crimes acquire an undeniable importance after the crisis of 1929, but are effectively developed after the conflicts of the 70’s and boosted after the scandals of the 90’s. Nowadays, they are required by some markets, especially in order to control greedy agents. In some way, economic criminal law should not be considered a centralizer or a conservative economic policy, but a demand of neoliberalist policies aiming for the recovery of confidence on business and, therefore, keeping up one of the key factors of its operation. In Europe, the European Council and the European Bank may have their role in fighting corruption. However, Mercosul has no power to incentive regional measures and projects compared to them when it comes to the Latin America. Any other regional organization in Latin America has no impact either. The criminal policy is not exactly democratic in Latin America. Only Chile, México and recently Colombia are part of OECD, but this international organization has a central role on defining internal legislation and public efforts in economic criminal law. By this way, criminal law benefits and privileges for instance transnational companies with non-empirically validated mechanisms of compliance and ethical behavior surveillance.

Social Psychological and Personality Science

Culture, Theory and Critique, 2018

This is the introduction to the 2018 special issue of the journal Culture, Theory and Critique (59:4) devoted to understanding the historical continuities and discontinuities in the ways that corruption is both understood and practiced. The introduction compares cases in Latin America (and gives a sense of the special issue content) with the current political context in the U.S.

More than thirty years have passed since Latin America began the arduous task of transitioning from military-led rule to democracy. In this time, more countries have moved toward the institutional bases of democracy than at any time in the region's history. Nearly all countries have held free, competitive elections, and most have had peaceful alternations in power between opposing political forces. Despite these advances, however, Latin American countries continue to face serious domestic and international challenges to the consolidation of stable democratic governance. The challenges range from weak political institutions, corruption, legacies of militarism, transnational crime, and globalization, among others.

2017

2018

Corruption is a phenomenon that began to generate interest within the economic literature since the nineties. At first it was considered a topic of recurrent debate by sociologists, politicians, and historians; however, it has quickly become relevant among economists, generating two main opposite approaches on the effect of corruption on economic growth and development: one standing for a net positive effect and the other identifying a negative net impact. On one hand, many studies, both theoretical and empirical, conclude that corruption is a phenomenon with a negative impact on the economy. On the other hand, there are still few empirical studies that show a positive effect of corruption, arguing that corruption helps to avoid excessive bureaucratic processes imposed by governments. All countries experience some kind of corruption; however, there are differences in the magnitude and how widespread corruption is. The Latin American region is featured by constant corrruption that, in recent times, has assumed quite alarming proportions. Therefore, the main objective of this study is to determine the impact of corruption in this region, considering a sample of 17 countries over the period 2000-2015. Using panel data, several estimates have been made and the main conclusion is that corruption has a negative impact on the economic level, assessed by Gross Domestic Product per capita and by the Human Capital Index. It is also emphasized that during the period under analysis, with the exception of Chile, Uruguay and Costa Rica, most of the countries considered had little improvement in terms of corruption, scoring below 40 on a scale of 0 (highly corrupt) to 100 (highly clean) in the Corruption Perception Index.

Since 1990, the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) has been promoting the human development approach, as a process of expanding people's choices in health, education, and standards of living. Over the past two decades, there has been substantial progress in many aspects of human development in the world and in the Latin American and Caribbean Region. Moreover, according to various reports, many Latin American and the Caribbean economies have shown during the last five years a strong and more balanced economic performance. Having weathered the global financial downturn comparatively well, the region has been able to post impressive economic growth numbers.

Latin American Research Review, 2005

Some three decades ago when I was in graduate school, a great deal of scorn was being heaped on a previous generation of scholars for their concentration on laws and their supposed failure to differentiate