When ideological loyalty succumbs to pragmatism: the rupture between Rafael Correa and Lenin Moreno

Abstract

This article discusses the motivations that lead some presidents to change the direction of their predecessor’s public policies, despite the fact that they come from a similar political-party background. Although intuition suggests that a change in the status quo is to be expected when there is an ideological shift in the Executive, this is only sometimes the case. The governments of Rafael Correa and Lenin Moreno in Ecuador are an excellent case study to describe this phenomenon and identify some explanations. Through descriptive statistics and historical narratives, we propose that ideological convictions
are displaced when political and economic difficulties increase. Studying the changes in Ecuador can therefore contribute to analysis of the link between costs and benefits in public decision-making