Think tanks and political parties in Colombia. The case of the constitutional reforms of 2003 and 2009

The relationships between think tanks, political parties and policy change in Colombia are not completely understood. In order to cope with this theoretical and empirical gap, the article explores how think tanks may have potentially influenced the adoption of two laws that redesigned key institutions in the Colombian electoral and political arena (i.e. political reforms). The first of these two laws was enacted in 2003, the second one was enacted in 2009. The article also discusses preliminary evidence according to which think thanks influenced the regulation -not only the enactment- of the latter Law. In short, the core idea of the paper is that think tanks mobilized knowledge and opinions that, in the last analysis, may have facilitated the design, adoption, and regulation of political reforms in Colombia. The paper thus suggests think tanks activities should be theorized, and systematically tested, as an explanatory factor for policy change related to institutional change in Colombia.