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This paper analyzes some aspects of Latin American social movements, especially their notion of participatory democracy. In order to explain what they are and how they solve the problem of political organization, following Zibechi, two countries are studied: Brazil and Bolivia. In the first, powerful rural social movements have emerged, but they have lost part of their political role during the years of the PT's progressive government. In the second, urban social movements have emerged that have transformed a country whose government lias decided to carry out an antiliberal political-economic reform. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses issues concerning the 1980s transitions in the historical pattern of democracy in Latin America in the midst of economic crisis that led to adverse economic conditions. It elucidates the democratic transitions in Brazil, Peru, Bolivia, and Argentina which concurred with periods of economic difficulty. It emphasizes that a series of social pacts calling for cooperation among political parties and representatives of labor and business organizations can help in governing and coping with economic crisis in the 1980s since it will boost governing capacity through the harmonization of social expectations and economic realities.