Paper short abstract:

The paper looks at how political struggles among actors in diverse institutional and socio-political configurations shape the design, implementation and reformulations of Cash Transfers programmes in Chile (eg. Chile Solidario) and Ecuador (Bono de Desarrollo Humano).

Paper long abstract:

This paper will look at the institutional and socio-political configurations behind the design, implementation and reformulations of Cash Transfer (CT) programmes in Chile and Ecuador - Chile Solidario and Bono de Desarrollo Humano. It will analyse, from a discursive-institutionalist theoretical perspective (Panizza and Miorelli, 2012), how political struggles among actors in these configurations have shaped the programmes in terms of priorities and changes. For instance, it will look at how these struggles moulded decisions regarding the CTs emphasis on either short-term (income) or long-term (human capital) objectives or changes such as the recent incorporation of school performance conditions in Chile's CTs under the new Ingreso Etico Ciudadano. The paper will present research findings from fieldwork in Chile and Ecuador based on interviews to policy makers and implementers as well as to socio-political actors influencing decision-making processes in this policy area. Chile and Ecuador have been chosen in order to compare two South American countries with significantly different characteristics, especially in terms of their socio-economic structures, economic development strategies, and, last but not least, their past and current politics.

Reference: Panizza, F. and R. Miorelli (2012) Taking Discourse Seriously: Discursive Institutionalism and Post-structuralist Discourse Theory. Political Studies. doi: 10.1111/j.1467-9248.2012.00967.x