in: Mass-Elite Representation Gap in Old and New Democracies. Critical Junctures and Elite Agency, edited by Jaemin Shim. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 115-143.

This chapter builds upon and extends an earlier attempt I made to theorize differences in cleavage politics in old and new democracies. In conceptual terms, it specifies why elites have greater leeway in shaping cleavages from above in new democracies than they did in the old democracies. Empirically, it adds more flesh to the bone based on three focused comparisons explaining the divergent trajectories of party systems and their capacity to represent voters’ substantive policy preferences in 20th Century South America.

Link to Abstract and Download

The chapter is part of a book that theorizes and charts mass-elite discrepancies and their implications for substantive representation in a global perspective (Link to Open Access version of the book at University of Michigan Press).