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Fragile states / Working Paper

The Latin American State: "failed" or evolving?

15/05/2007 By Laura Tedesco

A relatively new concept has come to influence greatly the debates in development studies and political science: that of state failure. Latin American countries have been included in some lists of ‘failed states’.

However, it is argued that Latin America’s plight is far better understood through the prism of a theory of the state that recognises the complex and ongoing, underlying process of transformation through which the region’s political institutions are passing.

During the last two decades Latin American countries have implemented profound political and economic reforms. But, the region’s deeply unequal income distribution persists.

The transition from authoritarianism to democracy implied important changes but has not brought about a solution to the uneven distribution of wealth.

This is not, however, a feature of state failure. Rather, it should be seen as the result of historical development and the fact that state formation in Latin America is far from completed.

In short, the conflicts and weaknesses besetting the Latin American state flow from a complex process of historical evolution.

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Keywords

Failed states Latin America & Caribbean Political Reform

Bio author: Laura Tedesco

PhD from Warwick University. She is now Visiting Professor at the Department of Political Science Department of the University Autónoma of Madrid.