In the previous chapter, I showed how the Venezuelan opposition’s strategic choices helped Hugo Chávez erode democracy. In this chapter, I develop the other part of my argument by highlighting the role of the Colombian opposition in preventing democratic erosion. Between 2002 and 2010, Alvaro Uribe tried to erode democracy in Colombia. Like Hugo Chávez (1999–2013) in Venezuela, he introduced several reforms that sought to reduce the checks on the executive and extend his time in office beyond a second term. He was polarizing, and willing to push as far as he could to increase the powers of the presidency and stay in office beyond a second term. His government harassed opposition members, journalists, and members of the courts and worked in tandem with illegal armed actors to systemically undermine those who criticized the president. Contrary to Chávez, however, Uribe was not able to turn Colombia’s democracy into a competitive authoritarian regime. Despite his attempts to undermine the independence of the courts and the fairness of elections, Colombia’s constitutional order remained fairly strong, and Uribe had to step down after his second term.

The Paraguayan party system, centered on two 132-year-old parties seemingly poised to remain alive and well for years to come, constitutes an anomaly in Latin America. This chapter discusses the evolution of the Paraguayan traditional parties highlighting their changes and continuities in two different historical settings: the nondemocratic period, which includes a semi-competitive (1870–1940) and a dictatorial subperiod (1954–89) and the post-1989 democratic period. The findings point to three distinctive features of the Paraguayan party system: the ability of the traditional parties to plant deep roots into the country’s social structure facilitated by historic and institutional factors; the capacity of the parties to aggregate in a clientelist mode the interests of a population that lacks strong collective actors, made possible by a socioeconomic societal matrix; and the versatility with which parties have coordinated interests, both in semi-democratic as well as in democratic settings, which includes electoral mobilization but also civilian recruitment for armed uprisings. Finally, the chapter discusses possible future trends in light of the growing influence of illegal financing and recent changes to the rules governing elections mandating the system of “open lists.”