This volume is a very welcome initiative examining the relationship between clientelism and democracy. The book's aim is to move beyond the traditional perspective that clientelism is a ‘vestige of authoritarian regimes that undermines democratic institutions and processes’ (p. 3). Thus the contributors to this volume attempt to present the different ways in which clientelism both undermines and improves accountability and access to the state.
The book's main argument is that ‘clientelism can erode, accompany and/or supplement democratic processes’ (p. 4). The editor departs from the assumption that clientelism is contextually embedded and, in order to reinforce her argument, the book includes a very relevant and updated literature review on varieties of clientelism.
The volume is divided into three main sections that discuss theoretical perspectives and the dynamics of clientelism, with examples from El Alto in Bolivia, Rio de Janerio, Recife and Bahia in Brazil, Oaxaca in Mexico and Montevideo in Uruguay. The last section includes some proposals for future studies.
The theoretical sections include chapters by Luis Roniger and Jon Shefner. In a chapter enriched by many examples, Roniger discusses the combination of resilience and systemic fragility present in clientelism. Shefner uses the provocative title, ‘What is Politics For?’, encapsulating his aim to examine democracy and clientelism. With examples from Latin America, as well as Lebanon and Zambia, he points out that when economic opportunities have been restricted, clientelism has been more successful at providing goods than have democratic processes. His conclusion states that popular material welfare should increase with democratisation to avoid a setback in the wave of democratisation. He affirms that in a context of scarce resources, clientelism is a rational alternative for the poor and ‘a strategy of both social control and social provision for the state’ (p. 58).
The second section of the book analyses clientelism and democracy in the context of local politics. Pablo Lapegna and Javier Auyero examine the relationship between democracy and clientelism by analysing how violent collective action may erode democratisation. The authors present a case study of El Alto in Bolivia, and argue that recent action originated in the workings of clientelist networks. The emphasis of their work is to show that patronage politics could foster violent collective action. Robert Gray also explores the relationship between clientelism, democratisation and the social and political violence of organised crime networks. His case study is the favela of Vidigal in Rio de Janeiro's Zona Sul. Françoise Montambeault's chapter also looks at Brazil, offering a study on the impact of participatory budgeting on clientelism in Recife. Her conclusion points out an interesting distinction between the short-term and long-term consequences of the relationship between clientelism and democracy. Julián Durazo Herrmann's chapter offers an account of clientelist networks in Mexico and Brazil and shows that the relationship between clientelism and democracy is often ambiguous – clientelism can simultaneously erode, accompany and supplement democracy. A case study of Montevideo offers an analysis that shows a positive connection between past clientelistic practices and successful community engagement with the project of participatory decentralisation introduced by the Frente Amplio. Eduardo Canel concludes that positive capacities could be generated when clientelist networks can be adapted to new forms of urban governance.
The last section offers an attempt to review empirical and theoretical analysis of clientelism, with the aim of presenting future directions of study. Tina Hilgers’ chapter includes a comprehensive literature review and analysis of contemporary research on clientelism. She attempts to refine the concept following Sartori's and Collier and Mahon's guidelines for concept creation. Hilgers recalls all the ideas or actions that have been defined as clientelism, such as informal political exchanges, vote-buying, public works distribution for the benefit of certain clients, bribes between citizens and politicians, bribes between politicians from different political parties, and job distribution to clients, political allies or family and friends. The author recognises that there is a factor that unifies all these different types of clientelism: all of them involve ‘a more or less sinister misappropriation of public goods and misuses of representation that should, ideally, be available universally’ (p. 167). The chapter is thus an attempt to conceptualise clientelism at the relationship level, the organisational level and the state or system level.
The final chapter, written by Jonathan Fox, presents and debates eight propositions for discussion: the persistence of clientelism in democracies underscores the relevance of the analytical distinction between regime and state; clientelism makes principal–agent relations bidirectional; clientelism is only one of many strategies for using material resources for political manipulation; perceived ballot secrecy is necessary but not sufficient to allow voters to exercise their political rights; politicised resource allocation and programmatic/entitlement-based approaches are often assumed to be inherently mutually exclusive, yet in practice they overlap; access to social programmes that begins with politicisation can evolve into perceived entitlements; how social programme beneficiaries vote is a necessary but not sufficient indicator of vote-buying or clientelism; and finally, we should ‘put clientelism in its place’ by locating it in the broader context of the politicised use of government programmes at different scales. After analysing these propositions in detail, the author argues that clientelism remains an elusive concept.
This is a very interesting book that provides theoretical analysis as well as detailed empirical work. Unfortunately, neither the editor nor the authors make a great effort to combine these two aspects. A general conclusion could have helped to fuse together the two levels of analysis and to assess what the empirical studies presented in this volume show about the assumption that clientelism, sometimes simultaneously, erodes, accompanies and/or supplements democratic processes.
Notwithstanding this, the book is a sophisticated and detailed contribution to the study of clientelism that offers excellent case studies and helps to make clientelism a less elusive concept.
