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It is impossible to look at contemporary Latin America and not be struck by the prevalence of violence, whether in the form of drug cartels in Mexico, criminal gangs in Central America, the long-term conflict in Colombia, or urban violence in Brazil. Further, the headliners of violence from these locations obscure a more complex set of interactions that include not just traditional criminal elements but also various social actors and the state itself. This plural violence in the region is the focus of Violent Democracies in Latin America, the volume edited by Enrique Desmond Arias and Daniel M. Goldstein.
The book takes a multidisciplinary approach to its subject matter and provides mostly case-study material from across the region. The disciplines in question include political science, history, sociology, and anthropology, while the cases derive from specific examples of differing types of violence in Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, Mexico, and the Dominican Republic. There are also general essays that take a more comparative approach.
A key point made about the violence in the region is that it is not part of a stark dichotomy of the state trying to keep order in the face of violent counterstate actors, but rather that the violence has multiple sources and many of them have their origins within the state apparatus itself. This argument is well illustrated by case studies of police abuse in Argentina and Mexico, as well as the complex relationship between Colombian paramilitaries and the state (to cite three examples).
Taken individually, the essays are quite strong, and as a group they make a compelling case for a reexamination of the question of violence within democracy in the region. As such, the usefulness of the basic contributions of the volume is clear, as this is a topic that needs substantially more attention. Just as it is clear that neoliberal economic reforms have not brought their promised prosperity for the poor in the region, so, too, formal democratic governance in the region has failed to adequately provide civil liberties and rights to that same population. Indeed, Arias and Goldstein make this connection in their introductory essay.
An important theme raised by this discussion of violence in democracies is how to address the serious question...