Democratic Backsliding in Latin America
Date · November 2026
Events
Political Regime Change
September 7, 2026
I. General Definition
Political science defines the political regime as the set of rules, norms, and instructions — formal and informal — that organize access to power, its exercise, and its control within a society. Unlike the State (the permanent structure of domination and administration) and the political system (which includes actors, political culture, and civil society), the regime is the most "institutional" dimension, encompassing: how positions in government are accessed, who may compete for them, what resources and strategies are permitted, and how power is legitimized or limited. The regime is not exhausted by written rules alone; it also includes informal patterns that likewise shape the political game.
Institutions are generally defined by Pierre Rosanvallon not as a static bureaucratic edifice, but as a device of political and social interaction. While invisible institutions (trust) form the psychological and cultural foundation of the republic, visible institutions (independent, oversight, reflexive, and solidarity-based) are the practical mechanisms that attempt to bridge the gap between the democratic ideal and its everyday reality.
The political regime is not merely the formal-legal scaffolding of power; if we stop there, we are left with a formalist explanation that fails to account for why regimes with similar rules function so differently in practice.
Understanding regimes means understanding the web of informal norms, practices of trust and distrust, and symbolic representations. The political regime is not a static snapshot of rules, but rather a dynamic process of producing legitimacy.
II. Themes
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The party system
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Political culture
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Security and legitimacy
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Continuismo (electoral outcomes)
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A very different Assembly