Punitive Populism and Autocratic Restoration in El Salvador

October 2, 2025 - 4:00 pm

Skylight Room 
The Graduate Center, CUNY

Professor Cruz will discuss how the latest installment of hard-on-crime policies in El Salvador contributed to democratic backsliding in the Central American country. Specifically, how Nayib Bukele’s administration manipulated moral panic associated with crime to restore autocratic rule. Dr. Cruz will also discuss the role of violent actors from the old regime in collusion with political elites in pushing for punitive populism.

José Miguel Cruz (Ph.D., Vanderbilt University) is Associate Professor of Criminology and Criminal Justice at Florida International University, where he directs both the Kimberly Green Latin American and Caribbean Center and the Center for the Administration of Justice. His research focuses on citizen security, criminal governance, and democratization in Latin America, with a particular emphasis on Central America. He is recognized as a pioneer in the study of criminal violence in the region and was the first to conduct comparative research on Central American transnational gangs.

Sarah Bishop (Ph.D., University of Pittsburgh) is Professor at Baruch College, CUNY. Her research explores the intersections of migration, narrative, identity, and media, using qualitative methods such as narrative analysis and oral history. She is the author of A Story to Save Your Life: Communication and Culture in Migrants’ Search for Asylum (Columbia University Press, 2022), Undocumented Storytellers (Oxford University Press, 2019), and U.S. Media and Migration (Routledge, 2016). She serves on the Board of Directors at Mixteca, a nonprofit supporting immigrant communities in Brooklyn.

Moderator: Enrique Desmond Arias, The Graduate Center/ Baruch College, CUNY

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