Internal conflicts, political instability and increasing authoritarianism are characteristic of the situation in many Latin American countries. A good two decades after the beginning of the great democrati s zation wave in the southern part of the American continent a considerable number of the region’s democracies have come under pressure. Their central institutions have been undermined and now often serve only as facades. Everywhere the executive is extending its power, attempting to restrict the influence of parliament, to remove independent controls, and to avoid the oversight of the law. However, democratic institutions are being undermined not only by the rulers. Authoritarian tendencies and undemocratic procedures and patterns of behaviour may be found across the spectrum of social and political actors. A third dimension of the trend towards undermining democracy consists of the fact that the authoritarian tendencies of the political actors correspond to empirically confirmed attitudes and sentiments among the population. If the current trend is maintained there could soon be democracies without democrats. In democracy research this development is reflected in the search for new concepts which attempt to capture the connection between democratic institutions and neo-populist and authoritarian practices. The concept of “delegative democracy” developed by Guillermo O’Donnell is particularly appropriate: the winners of elections act as they see fit, without bothering with their election promises or government program, and limited only by real (non-institutionalised) power relations. Latin America’s susceptibility to this deformation of democracy is grounded among other things in the clientistic practices which traditionally have been prominent there. Group and individual interests often count more than the public good. Clientistic particularism shaped the modus operandi of political parties for long periods during the twentieth century. In the wake of the neoliberal restructuring since the 1990s, however, the conditions of clientistic politics have changed radically. On the one hand, the economic adjustment measures have weakened the organi s zational structures of interest representation. Clientistic networks can no longer fulfil their mediation functions and governments are practically defenceless against a population which after the liberal reforms is more fragmented than before. On the other hand, in the wake of liberalization and privati s zation the state in Latin America has extensively relinquished the instruments by which particular interests are served. The state has been compelled to refer potential clients with their demands to the market. People have not stopped expecting that the state will solve their problems and putting their particular interests before the public good, however. The consequences of this divergence are the disintegration of party ties and anti-political attitudes. This constellation constitutes both a challenge and an opportunity for the Left in Latin America. The traditionally stronger social orientation of leftwing parties and their anchoring in social movements and grassroots organizations has given them credibility. Since the Left was not involved in putting through adjustment and liberalization packages it stands as a new and unsullied political force. However, the leftwing governments which in the meantime have come to power in a number of Latin American states must produce social and economic successes in order to counteract the strengthening of authoritarian tendencies and the advance of cynicism and anti-politics. They have it in their power to counteract anti-party and anti-democratic attitudes through the extension of participatory approaches. In that way entirely new forums and structures of mediation between state and society could come into being which for the first time will not function along clientistic lines but rather are oriented towards a realistic conception of the public good.