BY TIM JOHNSON

  WASHINGTON - Peruvian President Alejandro Toledo cautioned Monday of growing ''disenchantment with democracy'' in Latin America. He urged developed countries to invest in the region to create new jobs and avert a slide to authoritarian rule.

  In a plaintive appeal, Toledo said his government has followed responsible economic policies but cannot push Peru toward progress without significant outside help and investment.

  ''We have been a good boy. But that is not enough,'' Toledo told business executives at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. ``The government cannot generate jobs.
  That's why we need you.''

  Earlier in the day, Toledo warned the Organization of American States, a hemispheric assembly, that support for democracy weakens when it is not accompanied by economic prosperity.

  ''We have the urgent and unavoidable duty of reversing this increasing trend towards disenchantment with democracy,'' he told ambassadors from the organization's 34 active member states. ``If we do not do this, we will be inexorably threatened by the constant uncertainties of our history, of falling back on an authoritarian regime.''

  If authoritarian rule were to return to nations of the region, Toledo said, it ``would be a mediocre, authoritarian, corrupt and savage order.''

  He exhorted fellow members of the OAS to begin ``an honest and transparent dialogue regarding social and economic problems seriously threatening our democracies today.''

  Over the past two decades, the Western Hemisphere has swung away from military dictatorship toward democracy.

  However, surveys show that rising numbers of people feel that democratic rule has brought them little or no improvement in their well-being.

  Toledo, a Stanford-educated economist who took office in mid-2001, nearly fell from power in June amid widespread unrest in the southern Peruvian city of Arequipa over a plan to privatize state power companies. Toledo called out the military and suspended the privatizations.

  Meanwhile, his nation still struggles with the legacy of the decade-long rule of former President Alberto Fujimori, an authoritarian who left the presidential office in
  November 2000 and lives in self-imposed exile in Japan.

  Noting his own low public support, Toledo said the temptation is great for democratic leaders to veer toward deficit spending to pump up dwindling popularity.

  ''My popularity rate is low. I could raise it to 50 or 60 percent if I spent a lot of money,'' Toledo told the gathering.

  ``[But] that would be irresponsible. It would only last a year, a year and a half.''

  Peru, a nation with significant mineral and oil deposits, is on a path to chalk up 4 percent economic growth this year, economists say. But 54 percent of Peru's 26 million citizens live in poverty, almost half of them in extreme poverty.

  ''Join me, please,'' Toledo said. ``If we reduce the level of poverty, [jobless Peruvians] will not only participate in the productive process, they will also be consumers.''

  Peru has better prospects than many other Latin American countries, presenting foreign companies with ''an extraordinary opportunity to make money,'' Toledo said.