Hostname: page-component-848d4c4894-wg55d Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-05-02T06:23:53.978Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The Adaptation of the FSLN: Daniel Ortega's Leadership and Democracy in Nicaragua

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 January 2018

Salvador Martí i Puig
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

This article explores the capacity of the Frente Sandinista de Liberación Nacional (FSLN) to adapt to a changing Nicaraguan political environment over the last three decades. It focuses on the FSLN's transformation from the 1980s until its recent return to power. The analysis uses the tools offered by studies on the transformation and adaptation of political parties in adverse contexts. It concentrates on the four key stages of the FSLN's transformation: the 1980s, the five-year period following the FSLN's defeat in the elections (1990–1995), the following decade in opposition (1996–2006), and the return to government. The key elements of the FSLN's adaptation relate to the centralization of party resources around the undisputed leadership of Daniel Ortega.

Type
Research Article
Information
Latin American Politics and Society , Volume 52 , Issue 4 , Winter 2010 , pp. 79 - 106
Copyright
Copyright © University of Miami 2010

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Alcántara Sáez, Manuel, ed. 2004. ¿Instituciones o máquinas ideológicas? Origen, programa y organización de los partidos políticos latinoamericanos. Barcelona : ICPS.Google Scholar
Alcántara Sáez, Manuel, and Freidenberg, Flavia, eds. 2001. Partidos políticos de América Latina. Salamanca : Ediciones Universidad de Salamanca.Google Scholar
Alvarez, Gabriel, and Vintró, Joan. 2009. Evolución constitucional y cambios institucionales en Nicaragua. In Nicaragua y el FSLN (1979–2009). ¿Qué queda de la revolución? ed. Close, David and Martí i Puig, Salvador. Barcelona : Edicions Bellaterra. 169–220.Google Scholar
Anderson, Leslie E., and Dodd, Lawrence C.. 2005. Learning Democracy: Citizen Engagement and Electoral Choice in Nicaragua, 1990–2001. Chicago : University of Chicago Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Barricada (Managua). 1993. Debate interno en el Fsln. December 18: 8–9.Google Scholar
Burgess, Katrina, and Levitsky, Steven. 2003. Explaining Populist Party Adaptation in Latin America: Environmental and Organizational Determinants of Party Change in Argentina, Mexico, Peru, and Venezuela. Comparative Political Studies 36, 8: 881–911.Google Scholar
Christian, Shirley. 1986. Nicaragua. Revolución en la familia. Barcelona : Planeta.Google Scholar
Close, David. 1988. Nicaragua: Politics, Economics and Society. London : Pinter.Google Scholar
Close, David. 1999. Nicaragua: The Chamorro Year. Boulder : Lynne Rienner.Google Scholar
Close, David, and Deonandan, Kalowatie, eds. 2004. Undoing Democracy: The Politics of Electoral Caudillismo. New York : Lexington Books.Google Scholar
Díaz-Lacayo, Antonio. 1994. El Fsln dos años después de la derrota electoral: aún perdido en la tormenta. Barricada Internacional no. 120: 34–37.Google Scholar
Dye, David R. 2001. Retazos de democracia. La política nicaragüense diez años después de la derrota. Hemisphere Initiatives. http://www.hemisphereinitiatives.org.Google Scholar
Duverger, Maurice. 1951. Parties politiques. Paris : Colin.Google Scholar
Envío (Managua). 1990a. Nicaragua's Poll Wars. No. 103 (February). http://www.envio.org.ni/portada.es/103.Google Scholar
Envío (Managua). 1990b. On the Verge of Peace, or Civil War? No. 105 (May). http://www.envio.org.ni/articulo/2596.Google Scholar
Envío (Managua). 1991. Bankers and Masses Square off: Economic Overhaul, Social Breakdown? No. 118 (May). http://www.envio.org.ni/articulo/2913.Google Scholar
Envío (Managua). 1992. ¿Es hora del cogobierno? No. 134 (January). http://www.envio.org.ni/articulo/762.Google Scholar
Envío (Managua). 2007a. Sixty Days on: Signals, Seals and Superficiality. No. 308 (March). http://www.envio.org.ni/articulo/3517.Google Scholar
Envío (Managua). 2007b. A Hundred Days in Babel. No. 309 (April)http://www.envio.org.ni/articulo/3525.Google Scholar
Envío (Managua). 2009. Nicaragua Is the Municipal Elections' Big Loser. No. 328 (November). http://www.envio.org.ni/articulo/3907.Google Scholar
Freidenberg, Flavia, and Levitsky, Steven. 2007. Organización informal de los partidos en América Latina. Desarrollo Económico 46, 184: 539–68.Google Scholar
Garcé, Adolfo. 2006. Donde hubo fuego. El proceso de adaptación del MLN-T a la legalidad y a la competencia electoral (1985–2004). Montevideo : Editorial Fin de Siglo.Google Scholar
Gilbert, Dennis L. 1988. Sandinistas: The Party and the Revolution. Cambridge : Blackwell.Google Scholar
Hirschman, Albert O. 1982 [2002]. Shifting Involvements: Private Interests and Public Action. Princeton : Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Hoyt, Katherine. 2004. Parties and Pacts in Contemporary Nicaragua. In Close and Deonandan 2004. 17–42.Google Scholar
Huntington, Samuel. 1997. El choque de civilizaciones y la reconfiguración del orden mundial. Barcelona : Editorial Paidós.Google Scholar
Invernizzi, Gabriele, et al. 1986. Sandinistas. Entrevistas a Humberto Ortega Saavedra, Jaime Weelock Román y Bayardo Arce Castaño. Managua : Vanguardia.Google Scholar
Katz, Richard S., and Mair, Peter. 1993. The Evolution of Party Organization in Europe: the Three Faces of Party Organization. In American Review of Politics, ed. Crotty, William, no. 14: 593–617.Google Scholar
Katz, Richard S., and Mair, Peter. 2007. La supremacía del partido en las instituciones públicas: el cambio organizativo de los partidos en las democracias contemporáneas. In Montero et al. 2007. 1–25.Google Scholar
Lacayo, Antonio. 2005. La difícil transición nicaragüense. Managua : La Prensa.Google Scholar
Levitsky, Steven. 1998. Institutionalization and Peronism: the Concept, the Case, and the Case for Unpacking the Concept. Party Politics 4, 1: 77–92.Google Scholar
Levitsky, Steven. 2001. Transforming Labor-based Parties in Latin America: The Argentine Justicialista Party in Comparative Perspective. Working Paper 288. Notre Dame : Kellogg Institute.Google Scholar
Levitsky, Steven. 2003. Transforming Labor-based Parties in Latin America: Argentine Peronism in Comparative Perspective. New York : Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Martí i Puig, Salvador. 1992. El Fsln, del poder revolucionari a l'oposició parlamenàtaria. Bachelor's degree diss., Universidad Autónoma de Barcelona.Google Scholar
Martí i Puig, Salvador. 1997. Nicaragua 1977–1996. La revolución enredada. Madrid : Libros de la Catarata.Google Scholar
Martí i Puig, Salvador. 2008. El regreso del Fsln al poder: ¿Es posible hablar de realineamiento electoral en Nicaragua Política y Gobierno 25, 1: 75–107.Google Scholar
Martí i Puig, Salvador. 2009. Nicaragua 2008: Polarización y pactos. Revista de Ciencia Política 29, 2: 515–31.Google Scholar
Montero, José R., and Gunther, Richard. 2007. Introducción: los estudios sobre los partidos políticos. In Montero et al. 2007. 15–46.Google Scholar
Montero, José R., Gunther, Richard, and Linz, Juan J., eds. 2007. Partidos políticos. Viejos conceptos y nuevos retos. Madrid : Trotta-Fundación Alfonso Martín Escudero.Google Scholar
Müller, Wolfgang C. 2000. Political Parties in Parliamentary Democracies: Making Delegation and Accountability Work. European Journal of Political Research no. 37: 309–33.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nicaragua Hoy. 2009. Declarations taken from the weekly report El 19, originally published on the official page of the Presidency of the Nicaraguan Government. August 27. http://www.nicaraguahoy.info/dir_cgi/topics.cgi?op=print_topic;cat=NoticiasGenerales;id=57515.Google Scholar
O'Donnell, Guillermo. 1996. Another Institutionalization: Latin America and Elsewhere. Working Paper 222. Notre Dame : Kellogg Institute.Google Scholar
Ortega Hegg, Manuel. 2007. Nicaragua 2006: el regreso del Fsln al poder. Revista de Ciencia Política 27: 205–19.Google Scholar
Panebianco, Angelo. 1990. Modelos de partido. Madrid : Editorial Alianza.Google Scholar
Panizza, Francisco. 2009. Nuevas izquierdas y democracia en América Latina. Revista Cidob d'Afers Internacionals no. 85–86 (May): 75–88.Google Scholar
La Prensa (Managua). 2009. Antipersonajes del año. December 29.Google Scholar
Prevost, Gary. 1997. The FSLN. In Nicaragua Without Illusions: Regime Transition and Structural Adjustment in the 1990s, ed. Walker, Thomas W.. Wilmington : Scholarly Resources. 149–64.Google Scholar
Przeworski, Adam, and Sprague, John. 1986. Paper Stones: A History of Electoral Socialism. Chicago : University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Puhle, Hans-Jürgen. 2007. Crisis y cambios de los partidos catch-all. In Montero et al. 2007. 71–98.Google Scholar
Santiuste Cué, Salvador. 2001. La incompleta transformación del Fsln. América Latina Hoy 27: 75–98.Google Scholar
Sferza, Serenella. 1994. Organizational Formats and Party Performance: The Shifting Advantages of Factionalism and the Trajectory of the French Socialist Party. Working Paper 64. Madrid : Centro de Estudios Avanzados en Ciencias Sociales, CEACS.Google Scholar
Spalding, Rose. 2009. Las políticas contra la pobreza en Nicaragua. In Nicaragua y el FSLN (1979–2009). ¿Qué queda de la revolución? ed. Close, David and Martí i Puig, Salvador. Barcelona : Edicions Bellaterra. 351–81.Google Scholar
Stokes, Susan. 2006. Do Informal Rules Make Democracy Work? Accounting for Accountability in Argentina. In Informal Institutions and Democracy: Lessons from Latin America, ed. Helmke, Gretchen and Levitsky, Steven. Baltimore : Johns Hopkins University Press. 125–42.Google Scholar
Torres-Rivas, Edelberto. 2007. Nicaragua: el retorno de un sandinismo transfigurado. Nueva Sociedad no. 207: 4–10.Google Scholar
Vickers, George R. 1990. A Spider's Web. NACLA Report on the Americas 24, 1:19–27.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Vilas, Carlos M. 1990. Especulaciones sobre una sorpresa: las elecciones en Nicaragua. Desarrollo Económico no. 118: 254–76.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Vilas, Carlos M. 1991. Una patria para todos: revolución, desarrollo y democracia en Nicaragua. Paper presented at the seminar “La democracia en América Latina: actualidad y perspectivas.” Madrid: Universidad Complutense, July 10–12.Google Scholar
Wills-Otero, Laura. 2009. From Party Systems to Party Organizations: the Adaptation of Latin American Parties to Changing Environments. Journal of Politics in Latin America 1, 1: 123–41.Google Scholar