Call for Papers
CURRENT CALLS
DEBATES EN SOCIOLOGÍA Nº62
DOSSIER
Mobilizations, Social Outbursts, and Political Change:
After Social Insurgency in Latin America and the Caribbean
Section Editors: Ana Natalucci (CONICET/EIDAES & Universidad de Buenos Aires, Argentina), and José Antonio Villarreal Velásquez (FLACSO, Ecuador).
Deadline (EXTENDED): December 15, 2025
In the wave of mobilization and social change at the beginning of the 21st century, social actors and movements challenged neoliberal regimes, playing a significant role in shaping progressive governments in several Latin American countries. However, in the cycle of protests produced in the second half of the current century, uprisings, mobilizations and social outbursts took place and yielded contradictory outcomes. These events generated widespread expectations for changes in the democratic regime and the State throughout Latin America and the Caribbean, especially in Andean regions.
In Chile and Colombia, after long years of neoliberalism, progressive-leaning governments came to power following social mobilizations. Particularly, succeeded in convening a constituent assembly, as well as electing a left-wing government helmed by president Gabriel Boric. In Colombia, Gustavo Petro was elected president, backed by left-wing forces, in a clear rupture of previous administrations. Ecuador, which experienced a progressive government for a decade, and in Peru, which underwent a prolonged neoliberal phase, peasant, Indigenous and popular movements led social uprisings that failed to renew a process of political representation or to contain the neoliberal agenda that had been heavily criticized. Contrary to expectations, right-wing forces, alongside oligarchies, regained electoral victories, capturing the State and consolidating exclusionary projects that initially sparked protests. In Bolivia, following the coup d’état led by Jeanine Áñez, the Indigenous movement led by MAS (Movimiento al Socialismo), managed to return to a democratic path and won the elections with its candidate Luis Arce. However, after a short period in office, his government opened a period of economic and political instability in the country. The Caribbean was no exception: in 2021, waves of protest erupted in more than seventy Cuban cities, taking the regime by surprise. Still, after several days in which demonstrators defied the existing system of domination in the streets, the criminalization of dissent became a systematic tool of the State to quell mobilizations and restore social order.
A brief overview would suggest that social movements have demonstrated great creativity and played a significant role in developing repertoires of interaction with the State (Abers et al., 2018), which have influenced the processes of change and societal transformations that took place in the first decade of the 21st century (García Linera, 2024). While it is true that, through their protagonism, they have been among the main catalysts of contentious dynamics—especially during the social outbursts of the 2010s—both the new collective actors (peasants, youth, neighborhood organizations, feminist groups, unaffiliated individuals, etc.) and already established social movements seem to have failed to articulate and consolidate sufficient forces to drive expansions of the political representation system or improve the performance of state institutions. In fact, several of these actors and movements have been inclined toward (de)mobilization (Lapegna, 2019) and/or the use of non-conventional resources, tactics, and strategies (repertoires) to confront and negotiate with public authorities and political-ideological adversaries.
From a critical perspective, this dossier aims to study the role and trajectories of social actors and movements during and after the uprisings that occurred in Latin America and the Caribbean in the second half of the 21st century. Our interest lies in establishing a comparative analysis to explore the patterns (similarities and differences) that can help explain how and why the power of these outbursts has—or has not—managed to consolidate sustained processes of organization, articulation, negotiation, accumulation, and political representation that bring about changes in State–society relations, similar to those that took place at the beginning of the 21st century.
When we use the term social outbursts (’estallidos’ in Spanish), we refer to contentious events that reach a high peak of intensity, where a diverse array of protagonists can be observed—even if it is not yet possible to distinguish between organizations—and where collective violence plays a central role (Farinetti, 2002). In such outbursts, participants may not share common goals—as evidenced by the diversity of demands—but they do share common perceptions regarding a social order that is strongly challenged and which can be traced. Following Farinetti (2002), the social and political moments in which these events occur are characterized by a breakdown of the parameters that previously offered a sense of certainty. In this sense, an uprising or outburst disrupts the routine political process to create a new one, including a strong questioning of the previously hegemonic social actors. Perhaps the only thing those who mobilize during an outburst share is that feeling of uncertainty, that perception of blurred social parameters. However, one certainty about these outbursts is the unpredictability of their institutional consequences and political ramifications. Such events may give rise to new political entities and social orders.
In this way, we aim to open the debate and generate sociological and political science responses regarding the forms of politicization and the tendencies toward the active production of both mobilization and demobilization of social actors and movements. These movements, through their collective and contentious action, have shown some short-term impact in the social sphere, but little influence on the formation of political communities of belonging (Preciado Coronado, 2025), the institutional framework of democratic systems, and above all, statehood in Latin America.
How is the contentious dynamic of social actors and movements in Latin America changing? Following the social outbursts in the Andean region, are we witnessing a process of social demobilization, and if so, to what factors can this trend be attributed? How are right-wing, conservative, and ultranationalist groups organizing and mobilizing in this context? Have the actions of these actors created new forms of institutionalization, representation, or statehood? Ultimately, how do these outbursts challenge the existing theoretical categories for studying contentious collective action in Latin America? What does all of this tell us about the transformation of State–society relations?
Based on this brief introduction and these questions, we propose a dossier aimed towards analyzing the morphology of mobilization and the effects of social outbursts in relation to the democratic political regime and its influence in generating substantial changes in the representation and legitimization of the public order.
THEMATIC FOCUS
Some proposed discussion topics include:
- Characteristics of mobilizations and social outbursts, considering their precipitating or triggering factors.
- Protagonisms and transformations of social movements throughout the course of social outbursts.
- Emergence of right-wing, conservative, and ultranationalist collective actors.
- Appropriation and re-signification of repertoires of action during social outbursts.
- Demands, slogans, and framing of public issues during the mobilizations and social outbursts.
- Types and characteristics of interactions between mobilized actors and political authorities and elites.
- Governmental responses to the mobilizations and outbursts, especially in terms of repression, security forces involved, scale of repression, and criminalization of protest.
- The performative dimension in the narratives that were activated or emerged during social outbursts, according to mobilized actors, political authorities, and/or elites.
- Digital performances of protest and appropriation of digital technologies for mobilization and demobilization.
- Political and institutional effects of mobilizations and uprisings in relation to statehood.
- Normative changes at legislative and constitutional levels.
Deadline (EXTENDED): December 15, 2025
Publication date: June 15, 2026
Submissions: revistadebates@pucp.edu.pe or via this link.
PERMANENT MULTIDISCIPLINARY CALL FOR PAPERS
DEBATES EN SOCIOLOGÍA #60 (June 15, 2025)
Debates aims to receive multidisciplinary empirical and theoretical works using varied methodologies and conceptual approaches. The topics included in our permanent call for papers are Sociology, Politics, Ecology, Communication, Social Sciences in general, and others. Accepted manuscripts will be published in the “Varia” section of our journal.
We accept research papers, essays, book reviews in English, Portuguese and Spanish.
Permanently open call.
Deadline for issue #60: January 15, 2025
Publishing date: June 15, 2025
Submit your paper: revistadebates@pucp.edu.pe or following this link.
Author Guidelines: https://revistas.pucp.edu.pe/index.php/debatesensociologia/normas_autores
THEMATIC DOSSIER PROPOSALS
Debates is open to receiven proposals from guest editors for thematic dossiers. This call for proposals is permanently open. The topics included in our permanent call for papers are Sociology, Politics, Ecology, Communication, Social Sciences in general, and others.
Proposals sent should have a length of 1000 to 1500 words and will be sent to our email. Once submitted, the editorial body will evaluate the pertinence of the proposal and may request adjustments to it.
Send your proposal: revistadebates@pucp.edu.pe.
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PAST CALLS
DEBATES EN SOCIOLOGÍA Nº61
DOSSIER
Urban Frontierizations: From Land Occupation to Legalized Property
Section Editors: Mattias Borg Rasmussen and María Cariola (University of Copenhagen, Denmark).
Deadline: May 15, 2025 (EXTENDED)
Publication Date: December 15, 2025
Urban property development often begins illegally, and only later becomes legal. The legalization of property, rather than preceding its exercise, often occurs afterward. Typically, the legal codification and recodification of land access formalizes facts that already exist on the land being legalized. In this call for papers, we invite empirical explorations of these dynamics of legalization and occupation of urban land in Latin America.
This topic is urgent: the global population is increasingly urban. Around the world, cities struggle to accommodate growing demands for land, housing, and public services. However, conventional research on land and urbanization is characterized by two major shortcomings:
- Urban and rural land questions seem to lead separate lives: Rural land is seen as a productive resource, while urban land is typically considered in technical terms of rapid urbanization and the challenges of providing sufficient housing, infrastructure, and services.
- Work on urban land often has an unfortunate emphasis on the distinction between formal and informal, and legal and illegal. This focus creates a simplistic dichotomy in which poor urban segments of the population are confined to informality, perpetuating colonial categories. However, these categories are neither fixed nor stable, and they are not solely created by governments. In fact, informality is conditioned by formality. Urban property legality becomes a contested field where people attribute legal and lawful qualities to certain facts, enabling informal settlements to achieve legal recognition.
Consequently, through imitation and creative application of the law, people contribute to its construction, becoming law-makers themselves. Thus, law emerges both from below and from the top. Over time, non-legal settlements may become "established facts," too entrenched and costly to undo. This creates a paradox: a large proportion of urban development does not follow official legal plans. Instead, actual urban development is legitimized when land users and authorities cloak access and possession as property —essentially legalizing it. These processes are often highly contentious, as critical questions of property, identity, land value, and public authority are at stake. The image of law as a source of universal justice and order conceals its real operations. Instead, law legitimizes the actual distribution of rights, resources, and privileges.
THEMATIC FOCUS
Some proposed discussion topics include:
- How are various spontaneous urban settlements legalized? How do they become legal in the eyes of both the population and the government?
- What are the individual and collective strategies for accessing and legalizing urban land?
- How do landowners and public authorities institutionalize land access?
- How does the legalization of urban land impact social and environmental justice?
- What is the relationship between private property and other forms of possession in urban spaces?
- What public policies govern legalization and regularization?
- How do colonial and dictatorial legacies of legalization influence contemporary norm creation dynamics?
- How do different actors use the boundary between legal and illegal to establish value and extract rent in urban peripheries?
- What are the dependencies between formality and informality in urban space?
- How is durability in (peri)urban tenure established?
- What role does mortgage access play in the construction of cities?
Deadline: May 15, 2025 (EXTENDED)
Publication date: December 15, 2025
Submissions: revistadebates@pucp.edu.pe or via this link.
DOSSIER
Environment and Society in Latin America and the Caribbean:
theoretical reflections and public discourses
Section editors: Dr. Fernanda Wanderley (Instituto de Investigaciones Socio-Económicas, Universidad Católica Boliviana “San Pablo”), Dr. Fabrício Cardoso de Mello (Universidade Vila Velha, Brasil) and Dr. Alice Soares Guimarães (Universidad Mayor de San Andrés, Bolivia).
DEADLINE: FEBRUARY 15, 2024
Contemporary societies are going through accelerated and profound changes in different spheres of social life, which have impacted human-nature relations. Accordingly, we observe a renewal of the debates on the relation between environment and society, which have acquired new contours and perspectives in discussions on the public sphere as well as in academic reflections. Latin America and the Caribbean are also part of this process.
Although discussions on socio-environmental issues are not new in the region, the current context sets new social-political, theoretical, and methodological challenges. We are witnessing changes in discourses and actions of different actors, and the renovation of public narratives in a context marked by multiple crises –environmental, social, economic, and political–. At the global level, we face climate change and the effects of several crises, such as the COVID-19 pandemic or problems in the food supply chain. In Latin America and the Caribbean, we register the acceleration of deforestation and biodiversity loss; the encroachment of protected areas and indigenous territories; the contamination of soil, water, and air; droughts, wildfires, floods, hurricanes, landslides and other hazards; and the deepening of inequalities and conflicts related to access and control of natural resources. Although these are global dynamics, their manifestations in different societies are not homogeneous, hence situated perspectives are required for understanding them.
These processes and dynamics demand the development of new strategies and models of analysis, to advance an understanding of the multiple forms by which the environmental, economic, and social challenges faced by Latin American and Caribbean societies are articulated, as well as their impacts in different contexts of the region. They invite us to a reflection on the ways that different actors and political agendas seek to legitimize new conceptions about the environment amidst the plurality of Latin American and Caribbean public spaces.
This dossier is focused on contemporary reflections on the relations between environment and society in Latin America and the Caribbean. We aim to include papers on topics along two main axles:
(1) Discussion and systematization of contemporary theoretical reflections aimed at thinking about socio-environmental processes and dynamics from the standpoint of different disciplines of the social and human sciences. This axis encompasses both papers centered on one specific approach, and efforts of dialogues among different traditions, disciplines, theoretical frameworks, and epistemological perspectives.
(2) Analysis of current discourses in the public sphere and of the imaginary of different collective actors (productive organizations and economic elites; political parties; multilateral international institutions; social movements, etc.) on the social-environmental question. This axis intends to identify the main interpretative frameworks supporting the projects of signification and appropriation of nature by such actors.
However, feedback undeniably exists between these two dimensions, a dialogue between the socio-political and the academic-scientific worlds in their respective approaches to environmental issues. Just as we observe public discourses relying on techno-scientific arguments, the expert knowledge on environmental issues is also intertwined with complex power relations and involves social dynamics which surpass the academia. Papers dealing with this particular dialogue are also welcome.
THEMATIC FOCUS
Some of the proposed topics of discussion are the following:
- The contemporary theoretical production on the relation between environment and society from and about Latin America and the Caribbean.
- The implications of discussions on climate change (and/or other socio-environmental crises) for the (re)organization of the public debate about development in the region.
- The public controversies and social conflicts related to control and access to natural resources, extractive activities, and other forms of environmental appropriation and exploitation in the region.
- The relation between academic production and the conceptual frames advocated by international actors, such as the United Nations, the World Bank, and the IMF, as well as the role of these actors’ narrative constructions in the socio-environmental agendas and discourses in Latin America and the Caribbean.
- Post-anthropocentric initiatives and proposals for the composition of common worlds (Gaia, Buen Vivir, ecofeminism, etc.).
- The impact of different forms of denialism (climatic, sanitary, etc.) and “post-truth” in the contemporary public debate.
Deadline: February 15, 2024
Publication date: December 15, 2024
Submissions: revistadebates@pucp.edu.pe or through this link.
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DEBATES EN SOCIOLOGÍA N°57
DOSSIER
Alternatives and resistances to capitalist hegemony models in rural worlds
Section editors: Dra. Mercedes Ejarque (Instituto Nacional de Tecnología Agropecuaria [INTA], Argentina) and Dr. Tomás Palmisano (Universidad de Buenos Aires, Argentina).
DEADLINE EXTENDED: APRIL 15, 2023
There is a widespread contemporary political and academic consensus about the multidimensional crisis in which the capitalist mode of production finds itself, and the unequal distribution of its consequences among different geographies, classes, and social groups. The growing productive and speculative consumption of nature has reinforced the historical role of Latin America as a pantry and quarry of the world-economy. With greater or lesser intensity, the geopolitical relations that articulate the global and local scale cross the social and productive processes and dynamics changing rural spaces. Consequently, critical voices and experiences about the erosion or loss of "lifeworlds" have expanded.
Additionally, technoscience has continued its developments –and promises– of a future where the social and environmental impacts of capitalism are resolved or mitigated through technical solutions or complex mechanisms synthesized in the dissemination and application of perspectives or models of "green capitalism". Heir to the notion of sustainable development, this perspective usually addresses specific aspects or consequences without challenging or criticizing the mode of production, development projects, and the ways of life that generate them.
This approach is far from being the only possible path. From different latitudes, collectives made up of different social subjects propose alternative ways of inhabiting rural worlds. We believe that there is an interesting reflection interface here, where traditions of thought and specific practices come together. From the North, the paradigms of degrowth, transformations (towards sustainability), post-humanism or the post-Anthropocene can dialogue with notions from the South, such as post-development, post-extractivism, post-growth, or trans-development. They can also problematize considering the analytical and purposeful contribution of indigenous and popular notions (such as Buen Vivir, Sumak Kawsay, Suma Qamaña, Küme Mongen, Vivir Sabroso) that reaffirm and recreate their own ways of life. These cases show the radical transformation of agri-food systems at various scales, a "careful" use of common goods in the countryside and the city, and more austere ways of life seem to be at the center of the scene.
This dossier intends to contribute to the theoretical debate around resistance and proposals for new modalities that can contribute to the transformation of a global scenario threatened by the new expansion of capitalism. A first triggering question refers to who are the subjects that resist and create life alternatives, considering their origins, their demands, their possible and current alliances with other subjects in the countryside, the city and the rururban space. We aim to deepen the political, productive, cultural, historical, and identitary dimensions displayed by these actors to analyze the wide interface space between resistance and the proposal of new alternatives. Thus, we ask ourselves how these processes aim to modify or resolve the social inequalities present in Latin America and the Caribbean.
Some of the topics expected to be covered in this dossier are the growing popularity of agroecology; community productive strategies; the involvement of consumers in production processes; the defense and use of native or “local” seeds, plant, and animal species; and the interaction between movements against extractivism and rural inhabitants seeking other ways of life. We are interested in the enunciation/reflection positions based on Latin America and the Caribbean, which are built with or from the voices that emerge from the territories. We are especially interested in receiving contributions that contemplate critical views, problematize Eurocentric theories, promote an intercultural, intergenerational and gender perspective, and adopt new methodological approaches that question the "traditional" ways of building knowledge.
THEMATIC AND CONTEXTUAL FOCUS
With this in mind, we invite you to submit contributions that inquire about some of the following topics:
- Theoretical and methodological dilemmas for addressing alternative food production modalities.
- Projects and experiences that interrelatedly address food production, access to health, education, and government/land management.
- Non-commercial uses of the common goods of nature.
- (Re)configuration of alliances between other subjects of the countryside, the city, and rururban spaces.
- Articulations and disputes on the public scene for the social legitimization and institutionalization of alternative processes.
Deadline: March 15, 2023
Publication date: December 15, 2023
Submissions: revistadebates@pucp.edu.pe or in this link.
Author guidelines: https://revistas.pucp.edu.pe/index.php/debatesensociologia/normas_autores
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THEMATIC DOSSIER CALL FOR PAPERS
A Social Contract of Conservation? Unpacking struggles over legitimacy in Latin America’s protected areas
Deadline: December 12th, 2021
Prof. Mattias Borg Rasmussen, University of Copenhagen; Prof. Deborah Delgado Pugley, Pontificia Universidad Catolica del Peru
We live in times of multiple, interlocking emergencies, as the thresholds of planetary boundaries are being passed one by one. While the records of conservation are tainted by patterns of dispossession and violence on a global scale, nature preservation schemes in some form seem indispensable for creating an inhabitable future on a planet whose social and economic structures are shaped by capital relations.
Conservation in Latin America has been shaped by a different set of historical conjunctures compared to African colonial-style conservation. However, the scholarly narrative on conservation is dominated by the African experience. This occludes regional differences and the fundamental role that local initiatives have had in Latin American state-building, where local actors and interests have played a major role. Likewise, the Latin American experience with conservation has historically had a significant amount of articulation between local communities, civil society, and state institutions.
While conservation in Latin America is not inherently benign and there are clear patterns of internal colonization and disregard of local lifeworlds, its implementation, the historical relations and current dynamics of conservation suggest that there are experiences worth learning from when conceptualizing a new kind of conservation, a conservation which understands conviviality as deeply embedded in contexts of inequality and the continuous dispossession of land, labor and resources driven by economic interests.
Current conservation has at least two problems: The protected areas are mostly located in frontier economies, where competing institutions and Big Capital struggle to secure access to whatever resource they find holds value. Second, land-based conservation is inherently spatial and rests upon colonial imaginaries of fixity, sedentariness and boundaries. It is increasingly recognized that territories held under indigenous or otherwise place-based stewardship show far greater conservation outcomes. That even holds true for territories that are only recognized as indigenous, but which do not have a formal status as a protected area. Furthermore, recent developments in Latin America show a rapprochement between local communities and conservations. In some places, communities push for the establishment of protected areas, in others for the institutionalization of co-management within already existing areas. In both cases, we observe a renegotiation of the terms of conservation; an inversion whereby conservation initiatives are increasingly community-led (as distinct from an imposed community-based conservation) and may serve a greater purpose of creation forms of sovereignty over resources, landscapes and modes of life.
In this special issue we would like to focus on the variations occurring in Latin America, particularly in the Andean region, on the relationship between conservation and other forms of “natural” territories preservation. We are particularly interested in exploring the contests over legitimation and the different forms the rapprochement between these different, oftentimes competing territorial projects. Thus, we invite contributions approaching the struggles over legitimacy in conservation encounters from different disciplinary angles, including rural and indigenous communities, NGOs, state institutions and/or international organizations.
This issue of Debates aims to produce a multidisciplinary compilation, as such, we accept empirical and theoretical works using varied methodologies and conceptual approaches.
THEMATIC AND CONTEXTUAL FOCUS
- Latin American conservation dilemmas
- Conservation of Andean region “natural” territories
- Territorial projects in competition with livelihood and conservation projects
- Power relations and legitimation disputes in conservation projects
- NGOs, States, and International organizations interplay
Deadline: December 12th, 2021
Publication: June 15th, 2022
Submissions: revistadebates@pucp.edu.pe
Author guidelines: https://revistas.pucp.edu.pe/index.php/debatesensociologia/normas_autores
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