Abstract:

The overthrow of Alfredo Stroessner (1989), as a corollary to a coup that originated "above" and within the regime itself, unleashed a hegemonic crisis that to this day is still fully valid. The paper aims to analyze, from the perspective of historical sociology, the mechanisms used after the end of the authoritarian stronist regime to reconstruct the legality to give the democratic regime the legitimacy it needed to reproduce the form of domination. To that effect, it will analyze the reform of the National Constitution promoted by Andrés Rodrí­guez in 1992, since it exposes the prevailing struggle between the conservative forces and the democratic ones within the dominant bloc in Paraguay in a regional context that favored the latter. The legacy of eloquent signs of authoritarianism in the political system in general and in the political culture in particular, the State’s singular nature, and the disputes occurring within the dominant classes made transition to democracy a long and winding road that to this day still shows significant signs of continuity of the authoritarian regime deposed by the late eighties. The constitutional reform introduced a number of amendments of which we want to highlight three: the prohibition of presidential re-election, the incorporation of the impeachment, and the replacement of the State of siege for the State of exception. Based on these three amendments/incorporations we will attempt to question the limits of the transition and the process of democratization in Paraguay.

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