Descripción:
FROM MARTYRDOM To POWER provides a comprehensive examination of the origins, development, and rising electoral prominence of Mexico’s Partido Acción Nacional (PAN). Yemile Mizrahi, widely recognized as a leading authority on this topic, has based her book on the extensive research and original field work she has conducted over the past ten years. Her personal interviews with government officials and party leaders and her surveys of public opinion in three Mexican states enrich this unique study.

Mizrahi’s theoretical and empirical analysis of the electoral success of PAN is situated within a larger assessment ofpolitical parties and the changes they undergo. Her discussion ofhow and why political parties adjust to changes in the political landscape is particularly relevant to scholars ofLatin America. Mizrahi contends that PAN party leaders have not acted quickly or decisively enough in making internal changes that will allow them to make a smooth transition from a survivalist minority party to Mexico’s ruling party. In contrast to the past, when the PAN’s main problems were associated with its inefficacy in the electoral arena, today the party confronts problems associated with its electoral success.

Mizrahi argues that PAN’s relatively unchanged party structure presents serious obstacles to electoral expansion. Mizrahi’s account is analytically powerful and offers clear policy and political suggestions for her subject itself.


CONTENTS:

List of Figures, Tables, and Charts......vii
Acknoeledgements......ix

Introduction......1

1. The Paradoxes of Electoral Success......13

2. Political Parties as Organizations: A Typology of Parties......31

3. The PAN as a Sectarian Party......51

4. The PAN as an Electoral Party......67

5. The PAN in Government: Obstacles to Building a Catch-All Party......89

6. The Voters’ Perspective: Explaining the PAN’s Electoral Performance......111

Coclusion: Vicente Fox and the PAN: A Happy Marriage?......139

Notes......151
Bibliography......187
Index......197