Citizens vividly demand to be taken into account beyond the rounds of elections that take place periodically and, although mass mobilizations of a global nature, organized spontaneously by citizens, are difficult to maintain over time, they undoubtedly constitute a political fact of the new era.
This was also demonstrated by the citizens of Latin America when, in the middle of the decade, demanded free and public university education in Chile or reductions in transport tariffs in Brazil, mobilizing governments to respond to protesters.
So far, global protests have been more effective in “blocking” a government or opposing concrete measures than in “building” a new form of political relationship.
Maybe that is a consequence naturally derived from two well-defined facts: on the one hand, we are in the presence of a political proposal that goes beyond the traditional competition of the last century between left and right or the state versus the market and, on the other, the new “digital democracy” that allows spontaneous manifestations of mass demonstrations, still lacks institutions.
In this new era, the protests seem to pose a watershed between those who exercise power in a vertical, hierarchical and exclusive manner and those who seek a horizontal, cooperative and transparent power in politics.
What is remarkable is that the new forms of political expression seem to spontaneously organize themselves from different social strata – regardless of the level of income or the degree of political development of the societies where they take place – instead of using traditional political parties or formal political structures.
Undoubtedly, this phenomenon is linked to the fact that what is claimed is more citizen participation in decisions. These claims are not organized following the traditional patterns of the 20th century between left and right protesters. And they present a challenge to political parties, which must work to close the gap between their leaders and the citizens they claim to represent.
This is the reason why new political parties or new leaders, most of the time with disruptive discourses, reach leadership positions. Latin American democracy is not alien to this phenomenon.
