Indigenous people in Latin America have mobilized in unprecedented ways - demanding recognition, equal protection, and subnational autonomy. These are remarkable developments in a region where ethnic cleavages were once universally described as weak. Recently, however, indigenous activists and elected officials have increasingly shaped national political deliberations. Deborah Yashar explains the contemporary and uneven emergence of Latin American indigenous movements - addressing both why indigenous identities have become politically salient in the contemporary period and why they have translated into significant political organizations in some places and not others. She argues that ethnic politics can best be explained through a comparative historical approach that analyzes three factors: changing citizenship regimes, social networks, and political associational space. Her argument provides insight into the fragility and unevenness of Latin America's third wave democracies and has broader implications for the ways in which we theorize the relationship between citizenship, states, identity, and social action.

• Articulates a novel argument about why people choose to mobilize around ethnic identities and when social movements emerge in the process
• Provides original material on indigenous movements in three countries: Ecuador, Bolivia, and Peru
• Defines the ways in which indigenous movements are advancing debates about multiculturalism

1. Questions, approaches, and cases
2. Citizenship regimes, the state, and ethnic cleavages
3. The argument : indigenous mobilization in Latin America
4. Ecuador : Latin America's strongest indigenous movement
5. Bolivia : strong regional movements
6. Peru : weak national movements and subnational variation
7. Democracy and the postliberal challenge in Latin America