The gap between legality and legitimacy in Bolivia: visualising a process-tracing analysis

Since the year 2000 Bolivia has experienced a period of deep political instability. This period has been characterized by presidential crises in which popular mobilization has forced elected governments to resign their mandates, massive social protests, unrest and warlike confrontations between civilians and a sustained loss of legitimacy or representative institutions – parliament and political parties. Furthermore, as the crisis developed, the state itself began to be the subject of political contention - entering, thus, into a foundational legitimacy crisis. Finally, the crisis manifested itself in the opening of a gap between new sources of legitimacy (identity, regional and class oriented claims for a state re-foundation), and the constitutional structure in place of the country. The result was the call for a Constituent Assembly. This project aims to trace the process by which a gap between legality and legitimacy – understood as the cause of the crisis - was opened in Bolivia.