Unequal Democracy: The Social Construction of Citizenship in Latin America (Democracy, Diversity, and Citizen Engagement Series)

Across the world populist leaders are mobilizing citizens increasingly frustrated with political institutions and market outcomes, while analysts struggle to explain where liberal democracy has gone wrong.Unequal Democracy traces the roots of this dissatisfaction, arguing that persistent inequality and polarization constrain citizenship, weaken participation, and undermine democratic governance.Drawing on lessons from Latin America, long central to scholarship on democratic formation and breakdown, the volume uses these insights to make sense of the contemporary crisis. Inspired by Philip Oxhorn’s work on civil society and citizenship, the book presents case studies from Argentina and Chile, Mexico, Paraguay and Guatemala, Peru, the United States, Egypt and Syria, and South Africa.Contributors explore how social movements engage political parties; how marginalized groups gain access to social policy; how media and immigration shape political inclusion; and how states manage inequality,