At a conceptual level, my research interests have focused on long-term patterns of political change in developing societies.  On an empirical level, most of my work has concentrated on Latin America and, because of U.S. influence throughout the hemisphere, on inter-American relations.  In pursuing these themes, I have developed a persisting interest in quantitative and comparative methodologies.

Current and recent work fastens on three areas:

The politics of regional economic integration, including NAFTA and the putative Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA).  A collaborative effort with colleagues from Mexico and Canada has resulted in a coedited volume entitled NAFTA in the New Millennium (2002); my own chapter employs a rational choice model to formalize bargaining processes that might eventually lead to FTAA.

Cross-regional comparison, with specific reference to Asia and Latin America.  This work has emerged from a multiyear project at the Center for Iberian and Latin American Studies, of which I am past director, and has produced two coedited volumes: East Asia and Latin America: The Unlikely Alliance (2003), to which I contribute a chapter on U.S. policy toward these two regions before and after 9/11, and Promises of Empowerment: Women in Asia and Latin America (forthcoming, 2004), in which I co-author an introduction dealing with concepts of power.  Both books contain original essays by specialists from Asia and Latin America.

Democratization in Latin America, a multi-faceted study that attempts to determine what (if anything) is "new" or unprecedented about the current cycle of democracy throughout the region.  Much of the analysis emerges from a dataset on political characteristics of nineteen Latin American countries from 1900 to 2000.  As time progressed it was not clear if I would finish the project before it finished me, but I finally brought it to an end in mid-2004.  (That's not quite the same as bringing it to completion, but that's another story.)  It will be published in early 2005 as Democracy in Latin America: Political Change in Comparative Perspective (Oxford University Press).  Whew!

Smith_Democracy_Online Updated 8-08.dta

Smith Codebook - Final Draft 062005.xls