Social Science Research Council

The Regional Advisory Panel for Latin America was for some time concerned about the dearth of theoretically informed social scientific research devoted to understanding the deterioration of social, political, and economic conditions throughout the region commonly referred to as the Andes. Despite concern among governments and policy makers in Latin America and beyond, few have focused on the origins of the current breakdown, or have explored those fateful decisions that exacerbated rather than minimized friction. Thus far there have been few attempts to catagorize differences or commonalities across the countries of the region.

The Regional Advisory Panel sought to catalyze conversations among researchers in order to fill this gap in the debate and, in the process, enrich substantially the stock of knowledge available to those who are grappling with the region's crises. To do this, the Regional Advisory Panel organized a series of workshops to promote discussion of these topics. These workshops, described below, resulted in completion of an edited volume to be published in March 2006 by the University of Pittsburgh Press.

The first workshop, which was held in conjunction with the Duke-UNC Consortium in Latin American Studies (click here for a list of participants), took place on September 10-11, 2001, at the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill. The second, which was organized in conjunction with FLACSO-Ecuador (click here for a list of participants), took place at the FLACSO campus in Quito on October 4-5, 2001.

A third workshop, entitled "Participation, Institutions and Governability in the Andes," was co-sponsored by the Program on Latin American Studies at Princeton University, and was held at Princeton on March 28-29, 2002. The workshop convened 15 leading scholars on the Andes from a variety of disciplines and country specializations to analytically approach dilemmas of participation and governability in the region. (click here for a list of participants)

Subsequently, in collaboration with the Instituto de Estudios Peruanos (IEP), the Regional Advisory Panel co-hosted a one-day seminar on the topic of decentralization in Peru and the Andes region. The meeting, which took place in June 2002, brought together members of the SSRC's Regional Advisory Panel on Latin America with IEP researchers, representatives of regional NGOs and members of the World Bank. The first discussion panel addressed decentralization, state reform and governability, while the second focused on parties, party systems and regional diversity.

Each of these workshops explored distinct analytic approaches to understanding relations between state and society in a region where limited democracies have grappled with neo-liberal economic reforms and where, in several instances, domestic or international factors have fostered increased militarization. Participants in these meetings have been central to advancing debates concerning Andean crises in a variety of venues. In addition to their contributions to academic conferences in the region and beyond, core participants in this effort have shaped attempts by the CPPF to strengthen the capacity of UN agencies to grapple with policy challenges in the Andes, advised government agencies and independent commissions concerned with preserving democratic governance and advancing development in the region.