Participatory decentralization: between the borders of civil society and political society

Abstract

This article analyzes the interrelationships between a mass party, with intense voluntary participation of activists - the Uruguayan Broad Front - and the participatory institutions of the city of Montevideo, the Neighborhood Councils (CVs). Which, in the Uruguayan capital, in the 1990s, were new channels of democratic participation. Elected by local residents, the CVs are intended to be channels for neighbourhood demands, participate in budget preparation and define public investment priorities. Many of the new citizens participating in the CVs are linked to the FA, they participate weekly in the neighborhoods in Party Base Committees, forming close networks of interconnections between civil society and political society. From the permeable political and social borders, and the particularities of the Uruguayan political system, the dynamics established between the FA and the new Participatory Institutions of civil society are problematized. For these analytical purposes, we used secondary sources and primary sources, interviews carried out in the city of Montevideo with counsellors of Participatory Decentralization.