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  • The Political Sociology of a Concept: Corporatism and the “Distinct Tradition”
  • Howard J. Wiarda (bio)

The field of Latin American Studies owes much to Professor Howard J. Wiarda, whose pioneering work on “corporatism” and political culture during the 1960s and 1970s helped establish a new conceptual paradigm for interpreting the persistence of corporately defined, institutional identities throughout Latin America, despite the purported triumph of the “Liberal Tradition.” A child of Dutch parents, his early travels throughout Africa, Asia, and Latin America sparked a keen interest in the question of “third world development.” Entering graduate school in the early 1960s, Professor Wiarda gravitated to the newly emergent field of modernization studies at the University of Florida, where he received his masters and doctorate degrees in Latin American politics. It was a time of tremendous social ferment in Latin America and his early fieldwork took him to the Dominican Republic, Mexico and Brazil, among other places. In each instance, he found recognizable patterns that transcended geographic locations, patterns that seemed to directly challenge the predominant arguments set forth in the modernization literature at the time. “So I began to devise my own model, derived not from some pre-conceived theory of how modernization ought to proceed . . . but from my own field experiences,” as he writes in the research note below. Wiarda’s insights came at a moment when military regimes across the region were pursuing modernizing agendas that, at the same time, were frequently rooted in a defense of traditional patriarchal norms. His arguments about culture sparked intense debate within the field of political science on the role of values and norms in explaining politics in the region, while his concept of “corporatism” became an important contribution to the field of comparative politics more broadly.

A prolific scholar, Dr. Wiarda has also directly participated in foreign policy debates and decision making, notably serving as the lead consultant [End Page 81] to the National Bipartisan Commission on Central America, chaired by Henry Kissinger, in 1983–1984. He is currently Dean Rusk Professor of International Relations at the University of Georgia and a senior associate at the Center for Strategic and International Studies and senior scholar at the Woodrow Wilson Center for International Scholars, in Washington, DC.

Eric Zolov

Editor

Corporatism is undoubtedly one of the major concepts in political science, comparative politics, and Latin American studies of the last forty years. Along with developmentalism, dependency theory, state-society relations, center-periphery relations, rational choice, the new institutionalism, and, arguably, transitions to democracy, the corporatism literature has strongly shaped the discipline over the last four decades, influenced in profound ways how we think about sociopolitical and state-society relations in advanced industrial as well as developing nations, and had a profound impact particularly on Latin American studies.1

But there is still confusion over corporatism’s precise definition, its various forms (traditional, “neo”), in what areas of the world it applies (Latin America, Southern Europe, Northern Europe, China, Japan, other developing areas), and, perhaps most importantly, whether corporatism is still relevant in an era of globalization, interdependence, and transitions to democracy—when, purportedly, democracy is “the only game in town.” This essay seeks to provide new answers to some of these hallowed questions.

But the analysis provided here is more complex and, I believe, more interesting than that. For, along with Martin Heisler,2 Ronald Newton,3 Philippe [End Page 82] Schmitter,4 James Malloy,5 and others, the present author is one of the original architects of “the corporative model.”6 And, just like dependency theory and the other approaches named above, corporatism has its gurus, specialized scholars, apostles, and camp followers. There are many among these ranks who continue to believe that the corporatist approach offers rich insights into not just Latin American politics and society but the functioning of other political systems as well. Yet they wonder why this approach has not been sufficiently fleshed out, defined, a response to its critics formulated, and the continued relevance of this approach, in the light of both globalization and democratization, appraised.7 This analysis seeks to shed light on these issues; since my name is so closely associated with the corporatist...

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