The Spanish translation of the Democracy Report 2025 is now available. Translated by the V-Dem Regional Center Latin America, Informe Sobre la Democracia 2025: 25 años de autocratización: ¿democracia truncada? includes a new section on legislative oversight and democratic resilience in Latin America.
From Guardians to Spectators
The added section, written by Sergio Huertas-Hernández, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile; and Gessica Batista de Freitas, University of Notre Dame, takes a closer look at the differences in democractic progress in the region.
While Latin America and the Caribbean as a region showed democratic progress in 2024, there are large variations within the region. The new section discusses the impact of democratic backsliding on the relationship between the executive and the legislative branches, particularly concerning the mechanisms of checks and balances, and horizontal accountability.
Examining the strength or weakness of congresses in relation to the executive and their connection to episodes of democratic backsliding in Latin America in a comparative study of three groups of countries in the region, the authors conclude that the presence of autonomous opposition parties in congresses, capable of effectively exercising their oversight function over the executive, is essential for democratic resilience.
On the other hand, when the opposition lacks autonomy and oversight capacity, the executive gains a free hand to weaken democratic institutions and concentrate power, and the absence of checks and balances facilitates the consolidation of authoritarian leaderships.
Download the Spanish version (link)
Read more about the V-Dem Regional Center Latin America (link)
