Legislative Empowerment at a Cost? The Uncertain Democratic Gains of Parliamentary Reforms in Latin America

Parliaments are central arenas for democratic deliberation, the expression of dissent, and the construction of political consensus. However, contemporary political contexts characterized by high levels of public distrust in representative institutions, intense party fragmentation, and the rise of ideologically extreme or openly undemocratic governing actors pose significant challenges to the performance of legislatures. Recent debates in legislative studies present contrasting views on parliamentary change: while some accounts posit a global decline of parliaments, others report mixed findings when parliamentary decline is measured in a disaggregated manner, revealing heterogeneous outcomes across regions. This debate highlights the need for more systematic and comparative analyses of institutional change within parliaments and of their evolving relationships with other branches of government. This paper examines how the role and organization of parliaments have recently evolved, focusing on the presidential systems in Latin America. We show that, alongside anti-incumbency dynamics and ideological polarization in presidential politics, legislatures have undergone significant organizational and procedural transformations that warrant closer analytical attention. These changes are arguably shaping the functioning and outcomes of representative democracy, affecting lawmaking capacity, accountability mechanisms, and the quality of deliberation. The paper presents a comparative analysis of three Latin American cases—Argentina, Brazil, and Peru—which illustrate a range of recent organizational changes and adaptive strategies adopted by legislatures under conditions of political fragmentation and institutional stress. The cases of Brazil and Peru reveal a strengthening of congressional power vis-à-vis the executive. In Peru, a highly fragmented legislature has nonetheless succeeded in dismissing three presidents from power in five years as well as in approving far-reaching institutional reforms, remarkably, the reintroduction of bicameralism after more than three decades of unicameralism. These reforms, alongside new electoral thresholds and an asymmetric bicameral design that favors the Senate, will be implemented in 2026. They are expected to alter significantly the dynamics of political accountability. In Brazil, Congress has expanded its role in lawmaking and distributive politics and increased its control over the budget through some changes in the internal rules aimed at accelerating legislative processes and limit obstruction. While these changes have enhanced legislative capacity, they have also concentrated arbitrary power in the hands of chamber presidents, thus reducing opportunities for dissent and deliberation. Argentina, by contrast, exhibits fewer organizational and procedural reforms, with Congress creatively resorting to existing rules and procedures to muddle through a context of expanding unilateral executive action and declining legislative productivity. This comparative analysis critically assesses the democratic implications of these novel institutional developments. Gains in terms of enhanced institutional balance are ambiguous if achieved at the expense of deliberation, transparency, and the quality of the legislative process, that is, the core representative functions of parliaments in contemporary democracies.