Few but warriors? Constitutional multiculturalism in five countries with a minority indigenous population

studying institutions: some lessons from the rational choice approach

Abstract

This study offers an explanation of the national-level factors that have affected the degree of multiculturalism present in the constitutions of five Latin American countries with minority indigenous populations, during the period between 1988 and 1999: Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, Paraguay and Venezuela. Consequently, in this text we seek to find a causal relationship between the degree of multiculturalism in these constitutions and the different variables related to the theory of Political Opportunity Structures, more precisely three variables related to systemic changes and the theory of constitutional change.  As a result of this analysis, we aim to discover why Colombia and Venezuela’s constitutions contain more multicultural elements than in the case of the other countries, beyond the strength of their indigenous movements, as well as the demographic proportion of the indigenous population in relation to the national population.