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The Politics of Public Accountability

Policy Design in Latin American Oil Exporting Countries

Palgrave Macmillan
  • Makes a new contribution to the literature on the policy design frame-work
  • Develops a small-n comparison of the causal mechanism linking resource nationalism and public accountability deficits
  • Focusses on four major Latin American oil producing countries: Venezuela, Ecuador, Mexico and Brazil

Part of the book series: International Series on Public Policy (ISPP)

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Table of contents (6 chapters)

  1. Front Matter

    Pages i-xv
  2. Public Accountability Deficits as a Policy Problem

    • Guillaume Fontaine, Cecilia Medrano Caviedes, Iván Narváez
    Pages 1-18
  3. The Policy Design Framework

    • Guillaume Fontaine, Cecilia Medrano Caviedes, Iván Narváez
    Pages 19-50
  4. A Realist Approach to Policy Design

    • Guillaume Fontaine, Cecilia Medrano Caviedes, Iván Narváez
    Pages 51-98
  5. Open and Closed Resource Nationalism

    • Guillaume Fontaine, Cecilia Medrano Caviedes, Iván Narváez
    Pages 99-132
  6. How Resource Nationalism Hinders Public Accountability

    • Guillaume Fontaine, Cecilia Medrano Caviedes, Iván Narváez
    Pages 133-170
  7. From Policy to Institutional Design

    • Guillaume Fontaine, Cecilia Medrano Caviedes, Iván Narváez
    Pages 171-181
  8. Back Matter

    Pages 183-227

About this book

This book seeks to consistently explain the role of ideas and institutions in policy outcomes, and addresses the problem of how resource nationalism causes a deficit of public accountability in oil producing countries from Latin America and the Caribbean. The authors present a causal mechanism linking ideas and policy outcomes through institutional arrangements, focusing on policy design to describe the role of instruments selection and combination in improving or reducing public accountability through agenda setting, policy formulation, cross-sectorial coordination and political interplays.

Authors and Affiliations

  • Latin American Faculty for Social Sciences, Quito, Ecuador

    Guillaume Fontaine, Iván Narváez

  • Center for International Studies, Paris, France

    Cecilia Medrano Caviedes

About the authors

Guillaume Fontaine is a senior researcher at FLACSO, Ecuador. He specializes in comparative policy analysis. He coordinates the Public Accountability Project, a collective research about public accountability deficits in various Latin American countries. He has published extensively on social environmental conflicts and democratic governance in Latin America.


Cecilia Medrano Caviedes is an analytical economist with a multidisciplinary background. Her research interests include the political economy of natural resources and the governance of extractive industries. She has been a consultant for the Natural Resource Governance Institute, Ciudadanos por la Transparencia, the Venezuelan Ministry of Finance, and UNESCO.


Iván Narváez is Professor and Researcher at FLACSO, Ecuador. He graduated from the University Simon Bolivar, Ecuador, where he specialized in collective indigenous rights and comparative constitutional law. He has been Director of the Environmental Protection Office at Petroecuador and has published extensively about social and environmental issues related to oil activities in the Amazon region.

Bibliographic Information

Buy it now

Buying options

eBook USD 39.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as EPUB and PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Softcover Book USD 54.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Compact, lightweight edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info
Hardcover Book USD 79.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Durable hardcover edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Other ways to access