After decades of following a right-neoliberal agenda that brought up debatable development results, the rise of leftist governments all over Latin America presents significant challenges for the implementation of a political agenda that has historically been associated with the role of the political opposition. Governments have been concerned with strengthening democratic practices with the increasing participation of civil society. The recent election of leftist governments in the region represent a further step in this road, opening up spaces that may lead to the construction of post-liberal, radical approaches to democracy. Unlike aggregative and deliberative theoretical frameworks, the agonistic model of democracy claims that politics should not seek to promote consensus within society. Instead, mechanisms that allow for the flourishment of confrontation might lead to foster democracy and civic engagement. This paper will concentrate in the democratic innovations implemented during the presidencies of Luis Inacio Lula da Silva (2002-2010) in Brazil and Cristina Fernandez (2007-2011) in Argentina. The paper will argue that the policies promoted in both cases provide significant empirical evidence of agonistic practice in contemporary Latin American politics and a possible radicalization of the democratic approach, overcoming the liberal, representative understanding of democracy. In Brazil, the proliferation of national conferences as a space of confrontation as public policy tool has shown that democracy might benefit from a friend-foe political approach. In the case of Argentina, the paper will analyse the confrontations of the government with the media, in particular during the reform of the National Law on Media. It will also be argued that these two experiences of antagonism are not confined to Brazil and Argentina, representing a larger phenomenon in Latin America politics, suggesting the transformative potential resulting from the recent left turn.
