The author analyzes how indigenous peoples' movements in Latin America transformed into viable political parties. For her, these new parties are good for democracy because they enrich and strengthen the legitimacy of the political and electoral system. You assume that the main link between state and society are the parties and their impact in terms of responsibility on the institutions. It demonstrates that the crisis of traditional parties and the transformation of historical electoral constraints were determining factors that contributed to the formation and consolidation of ethnic parties. Van Cott's conclusions were based on the study of six countries: Bolivia, Ecuador, Colombia and Venezuela as success cases, and Peru and Argentina as failure examples. The time frame chosen goes from the early 1980s to the end of the 1990s. The puzzle that motivates this research challenges conventional wisdom in studies of political parties. According to the author, the formation of strong ethnic parties is not an automatic result of societies with a large ethnic population, moreover, the awakening or revival of ethnic needs does not even justify the appearance of alternative parties, because those were there before, Indians could even vote and participate in democracy before becoming a party. However, during the 1990s, several ethnic groups refused to participate in the programmatic benefits provided by an established party and began to translate their specific demands into social cleavages and collective interests. They took advantage of the economic instability, the growing rates of violence and corruption, as well as the exhaustion of the discourse of class struggle together with the armed subversive option; and they have transformed, in some cases, into acceptable p......middle of paper......different realities despite their geographical proximity. The book opens an unexplored path, setting the conditions for further research on the issue of social movements. At this point, the path taken by some indigenous communities after significant changes in the democratic landscape of selected Latin American countries seems clear. Now we need to ask ourselves several questions: what social processes has violence stopped and provoked? In the case of Colombia; Furthermore, what is the role of other minority groups in the political-electoral field? Are there general recommendations for an ideal electoral system? How do current populist governments in Latin America influence the political system? And how did social movements with a political component react to this news? These are just a few examples of the investigations that produce the work reviewed.