Documentos CIDOB América Latina, n.º 7

A research project in which, from a dual approach (by sector and by country), the authors go deeper into understanding the transformation process of the Latin American state, marked, from 1990, by a spectacular growth in the number of autonomous regulatory institutions in the region. The authors of this essay consider that the creation of regulatory authorities is the distinctive mark of the transformation of the State as a service provider into a regulatory State and, in more general terms, a demonstration of the configuration of a new world order of regulatory capitalism. In a review by sector, they define the central banking system as a pioneer in this trend, followed by other sectors that today have their clearest example in the field of telecommunications. In concordance with a comparative analysis in terms of the dynamics of reforms in Europe, they emphasise that while the rate of spread in spheres of economic regulation are similar in both regions, in regard to social regulation, approximately twice as many agencies have been established in Europe as in Latin America. According to the analysts, the study of the spread of regulatory agencies in other sectors, such as the environment, the postal service, pharmaceutical production and food safety, will be one of the aspects that will pose the most challenges to state action and to the spreading process over the next ten years.

Jacint Jordana is a Professor of Political Science in the Department of Political and Social Sciences at Pompeu Fabra University (UPF).
David Levi-Faur is a Senior Lecturer in the School of Political Science at the University of Haifa, Israel.

ISSN: 1697-7688 (print edition)

ISSN: 1697-8137 (online edition)

52 pp.