Peru’s disenchantment with democracy

Peru is in an unprecedented degree of political polarisation. Results from this year’s elections, celebrated in the midst of a sanitarian crisis, showed that the radical left Pedro Castillo, of Perú Libre, and the right-wing Keiko Fujimori, from Fuerza Popular, are about to compete in a second round for the presidency of the South American country. Although previous polls did not seem to capture a real trend in voting intention throughout the whole campaign, this outcome has perfectly captured a growing sentiment against democracy from Peruvians.

Electoral preferences effectively reflected the gradual aggravation of economic conditions through the last decade. The country has perceived these years as a waste by the political class, where the government has not necessarily reflected the needs of the population and, therefore, developed policy that was not articulated with the gaps that it should cover. Additionally, the coordination mechanisms established under the legal framework have reported limitations and been ineffective at the time of articulation between institutions - which has only brought more instability, both politically and economically. Different studies have continuously manifested the citizenship’s preoccupation with problems like a detrimental health and public education system, security, unemployment, and – above all – corruption. In a context where Peruvians seemed to be increasingly disenchanted with democracy and politics, a poorly managed pandemic crisis only exacerbated these already pressing issues.

Key Factors to Explain Peru’s Current Situation

Peru has been experiencing a parties’ crisis for decades, but it has proven to be a much bigger problem than just a “crisis of political representation”. Traditional parties have ceased to represent a high percentage of the electorate, while the newer organizations are taken by improvised candidates who were never brought up in a public administration-environment. For the past 20 years, each election has presented different candidates who have (i) not remained in the party or (ii) ceased to seek a career in politics. This has only accentuated the system’s unpredictability. It is also to remark that, although there is a wide variety of political parties in Peru, none currently manages to convene large masses. “The parties are in crisis when citizen dissatisfaction and lack of leadership are combined”, expresses political scientist Carlos Meléndez.

Furthermore, Peruvian politics have suffered severely from high levels of corruption. According to the Latin American Public Opinion Project (AmericasBarometer), throughout 2018 and 2019, Peru appeared as the “most concerned about corruption” country – 36% of interviewees labeled it as the most important problem in the country. Additionally, 95% of the sample reported that – in their opinion – half or more of the politicians are or have been involved in corruption. The hyper-fragmentation of the electorate came as a result of the collapse of the political establishment, which fell due to different shocks: Lava Jato and the Odebrecht Scandal, the judicial prosecution of politicians (both from the left and the right), electoral fraud and much more.

All the aforementioned information has left Peru in a vulnerable position for the emergence of a populist leader. Widespread distrust of the political class, as well as increased social unrest as a result of the pandemic, and the inefficiency with which the government has proven to operate have created a ripe environment to the increase of trust in populist discourses. In this scenario, candidates like Mendoza (Juntos por el Perú) and Lescano (Acción Popular) confronted the economic dimension, while López Aliaga (Renovación Popular) attacked the moral establishment and Forsyth (Victoria Nacional) created a campaign revolving around “la mismocracia” (term created to criticize the political class: those who have controlled the country for the past 20 years). However, as each has spoken to specific niches of the electorate, they have segmented the moderate Peruvian voter. The parties with the most responsible proposals were very disconnected from the demands of the majority of Peruvians, which only deepened the cracks that separate Peru from its elites. It is then due to “minipopulist” candidates that extremes end up being more noticeable, and attractive, this past April.

What Can Peruvians Expect?

The outlook to come is bleak. On the one hand, the country’s two options represent different extremes of the political spectrum, which implies Peruvians will become polarized when arriving at polls to choose who will be in charge of reshaping the country’s democratic system. On the one hand, a leftist who has expressed his will to convene a Constituent Assembly to write a new Constitution – even if this implied the dissolution of the new Congress or the deactivation of the Constitutional Court. On the other, a right-wing who defends the validity of the 1993’s Constitution drawn up under a dictatorial regime (her father’s, Alberto Fujimori), but has led the party responsible for the country’s biggest political crisis of the century and is being prosecuted for corruption, money laundering, organized crime and obstruction to justice.

Another conflict cleavage will be that of political institutions. Although Castillo came up as the most elected candidate of 2021, he would still lack legitimacy, since the number of votes cast in his favor – effectively – barely exceeded 15%. Meanwhile, Fujimori did not reach 11%. In the 2016 election, votes of both candidates who moved on to the second round accounted for at least 50% of all those cast, yet a political crisis broke out. The next president’s legitimacy will have to be built throughout his or her administration, which opens the possibility for a new government focused on legitimacy building measures that override pragmatic political and economic realities and concerns, and even build strong grounds for the emergence of authoritarian figures - like former President Alberto Fujimori.

This is only worsened by its history: in the last five years, the confrontations between Congress and the Executive have marked Peruvian politics – and experts indicate that when a new government is constituted in July, these governability problems might continue to characterize Peruvian politics. Neither candidate will have a sufficient majority in Congress that may guarantee a placid relationship with the Legislature. Additionally, ten benches will form the Parliament – the largest number of groups to be elected for a same governmental period in the last 15 years. This only points to a quinquennium of political instability marked with poor inter-branches relations - given that neither of both candidates will have a majority support from Congress -, where complex solutions to complex problems (e.g. the pandemic, the economic reconstruction, social justice issues, etc.) will be unmanageable, given the lordship of parliamentarian individualism and the difficulty with which agreement will come in place.