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Does the Concept of Clientelism Withstand Popular Participation? A Comparison of the Brazilian and Venezuelan Cases In recent work devoted to participative systems in Latin America, the notion of clientelism often plays a paradoxical role: it is not exactly known whether it is akin to a perverse new logic of these systems or whether it is a nearly timeless historical characteristic of Latin-American democracies. Whatever the case, it often interferes with explaining the political logics of participation, particularly among subaltern groups. The very diverse meanings assigned the concept of clientelism as it is used in sociological explanation in themselves call for clarification. The present article seeks to profit from the archeology of the concept already carried out in political science to render intelligible the causal ties (and its tropisms) between participative systems, popular politicization and “perverse effects” of a clientelist nature. A dual perspective informs my argument: on the one hand, many contemporary uses of the concept of clientelism posit an understanding of the wealth of forms of popular politicization entailed by participatory dynamics; on the other hand, the history of a collection of inextricably positive and normative judgments regarding Latin American history and, in particular, its democratic political modernity are hidden behind the tropisms that characterize the manner in which this concept is used. ■