Clarity: I define clarity based on how clear the crisis is a violation of the primary democracy
clauses of the OAS as listed in Resolutions 1080 and the Inter-American Democratic Charter. Clarity is coded based on how the Organization of American States (OAS) views and discusses the crisis in either Permanent Council Meetings or through statements from the Secretary
General through the official OAS record of Press Releases. I first look through the minutes of the meetings corresponding to each crisis when a meeting of the Permanent Council takes place. If there is agreement among the member-states and they refer to the crisis using the language of the
IADC or Resolution 1080, such as using the phrases “sudden or irregular interruption,”
“unconstitutional interruption or alteration,” “autogolpe,” or “golpe de estado,” I code that as a clear crisis. However, if there is a debate on whether the crisis falls under that language among member-states in the OAS, it is coded as not clear, as the presence of a debate on the extent of the crisis implies a lack of consensus on whether the crisis is a violation of the primary
democratic clauses and documents. If there was no meeting regarding the crisis, I look through the press releases from the OAS to determine if any member-states [as members of the OAS] or the Secretary General spoke out regarding the crisis and how they labeled it. Again, the same language is the key for coding the crisis as a clear crisis. If there is no discussion or press releases regarding the crisis, it is coded as not clear. If the language above is not used in the minutes of the meetings or in the press releases, it is coded as not clear.
The expected relationship between clarity and OAS responses can be stated as:
H1: As the clarity of a violation increases, the likelihood of a response that invokes Resolution 1080 or the Inter-American Democratic Charter increases.
Severity: I define severity as the extent to which the crisis threatens the fundamental foundation
of democracy in the crisis state. I code the severity of a crisis in two ways in order to get a well- rounded understanding of severity and to determine how the coding of severity may affect the results. The first is derived from Boniface’s (2007) chapter regarding the OAS and its record of responses to democratic crises. He argues, based on the wording of the various charters and agreements of the OAS, that there are essentially three types of crises. Those that represent a direct threat to democracy, such as coup d’etats and autogolpes, are most likely to clearly fit the definition of an interruption of the democratic order and thus the OAS is more likely to invoke its “primary instruments for the defense of democracy” such as Resolution 1080 or the Inter-
American Democratic Charter (49). These crises include the use of force to unseat elected officials (49). Other crises, such as electoral crises, constitutional crises, and other non-coup emergencies, are considered “second-order” crises and he argues the OAS will consider these on a “case-by-case” basis (50). Third, there are the middle-range crises that are not clearly coups or autogolpes, but do contain “significant violence, resignation (and eventual exile) of a sitting president, and allegations of a coup” are termed “near-coup crises” and the response of the OAS to these crises is “likely to be contentious” (49). Using his trichotomous descriptions of the types of crises, I consider the crises he labels as direct threats to be the most severe threats to
democracy: Peru 1992, Guatemala 1993, Ecuador 2000, Venezuela 2002, and Paraguay 1996. I add Honduras 2009 to that list since it fits the same criteria as the other cases. For the empirical portion of this project, I code the crises using a dichotomous measure (1 for the direct threats (coups and autogolpes), 0 for not severe (all others)).
I also code severity using the coding scheme developed by Leiv Marsteintredet (2014) in his article regarding presidential interruptions. He codes the threat to democracy based on a scale from 0 (democratic behavior) to 5 (maximum undemocratic behavior) and then codes for both the opposition as well as the president’s behavior. His coding rules, with my additions in
italics,10 are as follows: “0: Opposition- Demonstrations, Impeachment attempt; President - No
retaliation, peaceful resignation. 1: Opposition- Continued street demonstrations, dubious congressional maneuver; President- non-violent sabotaging of protests, for example, jailing
opposition, dubious presidential maneuver; 2: Opposition- Illegal behavior /violent
protests/threats of violence against President; President- Illegal behavior/violent handling of
10Marsteintredet’s project covers only presidential interruptions, and as a result his universe of cases does not perfectly overlap with mine. However, his coding of democratic threats transfers well to this project,and where presidential abuse or opposition behavior is not accounted for in his coding, I approximated the best fit and included it as an italicized addition to his coding scheme.
protests/threats of use of violence against opposition leaders. 3: Opposition- Violence against government; President: Violent, targeted attacks, or unconstitutional attack on opposition, key
actors, institutions, electoral fraud at sub-national level elections; 4: Opposition- Boycotts
democratic game, for example elections, aims to delegitimize president sufficiently to have him
ousted; President- electoral fraud for national level elections. 5: Opposition- civil-military coup;
President- self-coup” (22). This coding of the threat level allows me to analyze multiple actors in the democratic crises and clearly label and compare the type and extent of violation of the
constitutional democratic process. For the cross-tabulations, I use a dichotomous coding of severity. I code any crisis that earns a “4” or “5” as a “1” and all others as a “0.” The expected relationship between severity and responses from the OAS can be stated as:
Hypothesis 2: As the severity of a crisis increases, the likelihood of a response that invokes Resolution 1080 or the Inter-American Democratic Charter increases.
Threat to the President: My third hypothesis, that the OAS is a “club of presidents” and will be
more likely to respond to threats to the president than to presidential overreach, is also tested in the cross-tabulations. A crisis is coded as a threat to the president if the crisis is one that includes one or more of the following: questionable impeachment proceedings, mass protests demanding the resignation or removal of the executive, or a coup d’etat (including both attempted coups that fail as well as successful coups). If a crisis falls into one of those categories, it is coded as a threat to the president and receives a “1.” All other crises are considered cases of presidential overreach and are coded as “0.” The relationship between whether the crisis is a threat to the president and OAS responses can be stated as.
Hypothesis 3: If the crisis is one that threatens the president of the crisis country, the crisis is more likely to receive a response that invokes Resolution 1080 or the Inter-American
Democratic Charter.