Date of Award
Spring 5-2022
Document Type
Thesis
Degree Name
Master of Arts (MA)
Department
International Studies
First Advisor
Lynn Horton, Ph.D.
Second Advisor
Andrea Molle, Ph.D.
Third Advisor
Hilmi Ulas, Ph.D.
Abstract
To expand our theoretical and empirical understanding of mobilization and repression in Latin America, this thesis asks three critical questions. Are economic indicators sufficient predictors of social movement emergence in Latin America? What other factors contribute to large-scale mobilization in Latin America? How do government’s respond to large-scale Latin American social movements? Specifically, when, and why do democratic governments choose to employ repression against social movements? Accordingly, I construct a quantitative model to test the correlation between rise in protest and worsened economic conditions. I apply it to a comprehensive dataset of political events in multiple South American countries throughout the first quarter of 2018 and the last quarter of 2021. Then, I turn my attention to Chile specifically, to illustrate how economic indicators alone cannot produce a fully predictive model. I contextualize the most recent “Chile Despertó” movement and situate it within the longer historical process of democratization and social movements in Chile. I argue that Federico M. Rossi’s concepts of “repertoire of strategies” and “stock of legacies” fills the gaps in the quantitative data by allowing researchers to analyze how public actions emerge because of both institutional constraints and identity-framing processes. Similarly, the state responds in ways that are consistent with their own institutional and constructed identity. Finally, there is strong evidence that the relationship between social movements and repression is in fact relational and interdependent.
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 License.
Recommended Citation
Leon, Tanya Lizette. "Contextualizing the 2019 'Chile Despertó' Movement: The Impact of Historical Relational Processes on Mobilization and Repression." Master's thesis, Chapman University, 2022. https://doi.org/10.36837/chapman.000390
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