Chairs:

• Mariela Morales Antoniazzi – morales@mpil.de
• María Paula Garat – a.garat@ucu.edu.uy

According to the latest Democracy Index by The Economist (2024), only 25 regimes out of 167 (15%) are considered full democracies. In contrast, 35.9% of all countries are classified as authoritarian regimes, which means that 39.2% of the world’s population lives in an autocratic society. In the Americas, only Canada, Uruguay, and Costa Rica fall within the group of full democracies, while a considerable number of States are either authoritarian regimes (Cuba, Venezuela, Nicaragua) or hybrid systems (Paraguay, Peru, Mexico, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, and Bolivia).

What are the common patterns across authoritarian systems? Which measures are repeated time and again? Is it possible to identify these patterns as mechanisms for the persistence of authoritarianism?

Analyzing these points will allow us to delve into the measures common to these legal systems, adopted as forms of resistance against regional democratic safeguards. From the perspective of the Ius Constitutionale Commune in Latin America (ICCAL), examining these dynamics is essential not only to highlight the contrast between such actions and the protection of the rule of law, human rights, and democracy, but also to anticipate and generate alerts that help contain the development of these systems and confront the advance of authoritarianism.

This Workshop will present an analysis of some of the most common measures found in authoritarian regimes, focusing on Latin America but including international comparisons, and will address the question of how to halt these trends in defense of democracy and in rejection of authoritarianism.