Guys I think democracy's getting its mojo back. We're gonna need a political science new term for this. Democratic forward sliding?

Nos complace anunciar al ganador del Premio Donna Lee Van Cott 2025: Raúl Madrid (UT Austin) (@raullorcamadrid.bsky.social) por The Birth of Democracy in South America. www.cambridge.org/core/books/b.... ¡Felicitaciones! #LAPIS #LASA2025 #LatinAmericanPolitics

1️⃣ What explains electoral success in Mexico’s gubernatorial elections after the democratic transition? The key was not government performance, but the support of the incumbent governor. On average, candidates from the governor’s party were about 42% more likely to win. 🧵

Happy to share that "Polarization and Democracy in Latin America" is out now with @uchicagopress.bsky.social and available in multiple formats. If it looks interesting, please consider requesting it at your university library! Check it out 👇 press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/bo...

Electing an autocrat may have been a mistake

No runoff in Costa Rica: Laura Fernández has won the presidency. The incumbent party is projected to win 30 of 57 assembly seats, short of a supermajority. www.reuters.com/world/americ...

Ecuador was already besieged by crime and violence. Now it faces a populist president whose “strong hand” policies show little success. They may do even more damage to the country’s democracy. Last chance! Read today to read free! muse.jhu.edu/pub/1/a...

Costa Rica votes tomorrow. Rodrigo Chaves’s “heir,” Laura Fernández, will lead the pres. race – and may reach 40%, enough to avoid a runoff in 🇨🇷’s modified majority system. Watch the legislative assembly: if the PPSO wins a supermajority, changes to term limits seem likely.

‼️‼️ Check out our new first online article! 👇 Do Voters Reject Gay Candidates? We find no punishment among the general electorate: voters in Argentina reward gay candidates, while Chilean and Mexican citizens are indifferent. @rcastrocornejo.bsky.social journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...

I can't believe we're living in a world where the U.S. president accepts the Nobel Peace Prize as a bribe. This is just embarrassing.

"The ruler exercises his power without restraint... unencumbered by rules or by any commitment to an ideology or value system....[Norms are subverted by] arbitrary personal decisions of the ruler, which he does not feel constrained to justify in ideological terms."-Chehabi & Linz,Sultanistic Regimes

Delcy Rodríguez on Saturday: “What is being done to Venezuela is a barbarity.” Delcy Rodríguez on Sunday: “We extend an invitation to the U.S. government to work together on a cooperative agenda." What a difference a day makes. Gift link: nyti.ms/4jmMYdc

All we need now is L. Paul Bremer being brought out of retirement and the flat circle of time will be complete.

"The Monroe Doctrine is a big deal." He sounds like a failing student trying to bluff his way through an oral exam.

Latin Americanists this morning:

Looks like the U.S. owes someone $50 million

There's little information to go on right now, but it seems likely that Machado's efforts to woo Trump may come to naught if the Trump admin is content to capture Maduro and do nothing to ensure a regime transition. Showing once again that sucking up to Trump is a fool's bargain.

It seems likely that all of Machado's efforts to woo Trump may come to naught, as the U.S. captures Maduro but doesn't ensure a regime transition.

Wow. 1. A remarkable operation by U.S. forces & failure of Venezuelan security forces (or someone inside gave up Maduro’s location?). 2. Glad to see Maduro go. 3. No one knows what happens next. Will U.S. just leave Venezuela to sort it out? Will Cabello and Padrino take power? 🤷‍♂️

🏛️ Mientras la presidencia sigue en disputa, el #Congreso ya muestra una tendencia clara: el #bipartidismo regresó con fuerza. 🤔 ¿Puede #Honduras 🇭🇳 reconstruir la confianza democrática sin un acuerdo político mínimo entre sus principales fuerzas? latinoamerica21.com/es/el-pais-d...

Check out my annual end of year special edition of the #AmericasMigrationBrief reviewing migration trends across the Americas in 2025 and what to watch in 2026! www.migrationbrief.com/p/5-migratio...

My take on 🇻🇪: Competing actors want to either overthrow Maduro, and drugs are a pretext (Rubio); or want to use a military intervention as pretext for the Alien Enemies Act & mass deportation of Venezuelans (Stephen Miller). There’s no grand strategy from Trump – the guy's brain is cooked.

This is what happens when the students who say "I didn't know we had reading assigned today" end up running the country.

The U.S. reaches the Boligarchs stage of its Latin Americanization

📚 Do you teach human rights? Here are assigned readings for my spring undergrad class, which a lot of students take for general education credit (so it’s designed to be accessible - no heavy journal articles). Happy to talk about how readings fit together, lesson plans, etc.

Right wing candidate José Antonio Kast has won Chile's presidential runoff, 58% to 42%. apnews.com/article/chil...

Today: 🇺🇸The U.S. seized an oil tanker off the Venezuelan coast 🇻🇪María Corina Machado received the Nobel Peace Prize 🇨🇴Petro called for a transitional government in Venezuela 🇨🇴Trump threatened Petro 🇧🇴Ex-president Arce was arrested 🇭🇳Honduran election debacle continued

Professional political scientist here, still wondering how the hell this guy ever got more than like seven votes

I'm honored to receive the first annual FIFA book prize. I won. And frankly, I won big. I want to thank the people who bought this book. Smart people. They know that this book is, perhaps, the greatest book ever written. A lot of people are saying it.

I’m pleased to share my new publication with Javier Rodríguez-Sandoval in the Revista Uruguaya de Ciencia Política: “Las elecciones presidenciales de Ecuador 2025: ¿Realineamiento y bipartidismo sin partidos?” Full-text available here: revistasfcs.edu.uy/index.php/ru...

Three days after the Honduran election, the preliminary results do not give a presidential result, but do project defeat for Libre. Political and diplomatic sources point to negotiations to avoid violence and secure the key to the coming legislature. beta.elfaro.net/en/central-a...

Well Honduras is at the top of the New York Times homepage. That's probably not a good sign.

The state of play in Honduras: with 55.9% of the vote in, Tito Asfura has a *very* slim lead over Salvador Nasralla. Moncada of the incumbent Libre party is getting crushed. No congressional results yet. High possibility of contested result b/w Asfura and Nasralla. No concession from Moncada yet.

Not a lot to be excited about for tomorrow's election in Honduras.

So the US is fighting against drug trafficking by freeing a guy convicted of using the presidency to facilitate large-scale drug trafficking. Makes total sense. What JOH ally got in Trump's ear to set this up? www.pbs.org/newshour/wor...

NEW first online and open access article‼️ It analyses the impact of meaningful ideological choices (or the lack thereof) on demographic-based electoral divisions in Latin America. Check it out! By Matthew Singer journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...

Peru became the world leader in recall referendums. What drove it—and what did it do to democracy? Beyond innovation: power games! www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

Bolsonaro & Trump have been political doppelgängers, including parallel attempts to overturn an election through a coup. So it’s remarkable to see contrasting headlines today: in one case, the continuation of autocratic populism; in the other, the start of a long prison sentence.

Don't do coups, kids. apnews.com/article/braz...

Two weeks from now:

My colleague, Dr. Vahid Abedini, was illegally detained by ICE on Saturday. He is currently being held without a court date in sight, despite being in the country legally. Please spread the word! We must ensure his due process rights are upheld. www.oudaily.com/news/ou-prof...

NEW First online article 🔔 #openaccess How does the populist radical right use local office to pursue national political ambitions? #Peru #Populism #politicalambition @eljorobado.bsky.social @zsofiabocskay.bsky.social @sagepub.com journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...

“Moraes said Bolsonaro’s electronic ankle monitor had been tampered with at 12.08am on Saturday. That suggested “the convict had planned to break the ankle monitor in order to ensure the success of his escape, aided by the confusion caused by the protest”

Good article on Trump's Latin America policies. But I do hope historians don't adopt the "Donroe Doctrine" name. (And to be pedantic, it's more akin to the Roosevelt Corollary than the original Monroe doctrine.)

Not sure what stage of nativism we've reached when they're trying to make us scared of gauchos and llaneros crossing the border with their 🐄.

My only Chile prediction: don’t be surprised to be surprised. By law, there have been no polls for 15 days. Voting is compulsory, drawing in more swing voters. And the right is divided across 3 major candidates - easy to imagine voters switching their choice between these three in the past 2 weeks.