Vol. 19 No. 2 (2024): Subnational Politics in Latin America

The reconfiguration of power centers and forms of government began to draw attention to the inescapable fact that, in Latin America, subnational politics cannot be understood as a function of national politics. Thus, works such as that of Montero and Samuels (2004) pointed to the importance of developing research and studies on “decentralized power” in both federal and unitary systems, breaking the prejudice that only in the former could there be variations between the national and subnational spheres (Pino, 2017). This approach made it possible to make visible the common traits and singularities of local leaderships, the multiple configurations of territorial power and, consequently, the variations in the functioning of political systems through much more precise and realistic views. And it is in this context of strengthening studies on subnational politics that this dossier is inserted.