Inequality Regimes in Latin America:
Theoretical Concepts and the Case of Afrodescendants
Prof. Dr. Sérgio Costa (FU Berlin)
ProDoc Programme Transcultural Management
and Governance in Latin America
Bern, 1 December 2011
Outline
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2.
3.
4.
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7.
8.
Research on Inequalities: state of the art, new challenges
Inequalities and interdependencies
Entangled inequalities: articulating historical and global
interdependencies
Inequality regimes: definition
Afro-descendants in Latin America
Inequality regimes relating to Afro-descendants
Compensatory regime: virtues and risks
Conclusions
1. Research on inequalities: state of the art,
new challenges
Conventional research on inequality: ahistorical, marked by
methodological nationalism and focus on class and income distribution
New developments:
•
Research on multiple axes of stratification (race, gender, ethnicity
etc.) – tendency also present in Latin American debate.
•
Research on multiple dimensions of inequality (economic, social,
political, legal, ecological) – also present in Latin American debate.
•
Research on inequalities beyond nation states – currently not
present in Latin American production.
Challenge: searching for units of analysis compatible with historical,
multidimensional, and transnational/global character of social
inequalities
2. Inequalities and interdependencies
World system approach (e.g. Moran/Korzeniewicz)
Inequalities are historically constituted by global interdependencies (slavery,
colonialism, dependent trade)
National patterns of inequalities are widely stable for the last 200 years
Nationality remains the most important variable for defining individuals’ position
in a global structure of inequalities
Patterns of inequality at national level reflect a country’s insertion into world
political and economic system
National possibilities of reducing inequalities are limited by global factors
(competitiveness of national products in world markets, financial vulnerability as
measured by international agencies etc.)
2. Inequalities and interdependencies
Transnational approach (e.g. Pries, Weiß)
Classes are no longer constituted at national but at transnational level
Individual position in social structures should be seen from a
transnational perspective involving both: multiple insertion into different
national structures (labor market, social policies, etc) and emerging of
transnational/ pluri-local contexts.
Empirical studies restricted to migration
3. Entangled inequalities: articulating historical and
global/transnational interdependencies
World system
approach
Transnational
approach
Entangled approach
Analytical
unity
world regions:
center, periphery,
semi-periphery
transnational/
pluri-local spaces
relational contexts:
configurations or
regimes of inequalities
Time
perspective
diachronic
synchronic
diachronic and
synchronic
Focus
global trade,
financial flows
transnational
classes, families,
networks of
migrants
global flows,
structures and actors
4. Inequality regime: definition
• Regime builds a relational (not spatial or political) unit of analysis
defined during the research process itself.
• Theoretically, the concept regime has – at least - a double genealogy:
• Management studies and international relations: regime defined as
state and non state means of regulating/governing complex issues
(human rights/ climate regime, etc.)
• Post-structuralism and postcolonial studies: regime defined as
disciplinary power oriented for normalizing differences (M.
Foucault, P. Chaterjee, S. Hall)
• Therefore, the concept regime helps capturing ambivalent articulations
between inequality and difference
• Inequality regimes include multidimensional character of inequalities
(economic, political, legal, etc.)
4. Inequality regime: definition
An inequality regime includes:
• Logics of stratification/redistribution defined as static (cast societies),
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•
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dynamic (class societies) or combined (class with racial/ethnic/gender
adscription)
Political, scientific, and popular discourses according to which
individuals interpret and construct positions of themselves and others in
society.
Legal frameworks (e.g. apartheid law, multicultural or anti-discrimination
laws)
Policies (e.g. racist migration policies, integration or compensatory
policies)
Models of conviviality in everyday life (segregating or integrating
convivial forms)
5. Afro-descendants in Latin America
Afro-descendants in Latin America are a socially, culturally and
politically very heterogeneous population. However, they have a
“geteilte” (Randeria) - i.e. a shared and divided – history.
Different denominations are found according to country and selfdefinition: black, negro, Afro-descendant, Afro + nationality (e.g. AfroPeruvian, Afro-Ecuadorian, etc.)
Afro-descendants account for about 30% of Latin American population
(approx. 160 million of about 500 million inhabitants). They live
predominantly in Brazil (50%), Colombia (20%), Venezuela (10%), and
in the Caribbean (16%)
According to all social indicators, Afro-descendants (in special black
women) have a worse and shorter life than other population groups.
4. Afro-descendants in Latin America
Source:
Andrews 2004
5. Afro-descendants in Latin America
100%
White men 100%
80%
White women 61%
60%
40%
Black men 50%
20%
Black women 32%
0%
Quelle: PNUD/IPEA 2004
5. Afro-descendants in Latin America
Population below poverty and indigence line by ethnic group (percentages)
Country
Ethnic Group
Brazil
(2006)
Afro-descendant
13.0
31.9
44.8
White
5.0
16.8
21.7
Total
9.0
24.3
33.2
Afro-descendant
22.4
36.2
58.5
White/Mestizo
14.2
25.4
39.6
Total
15.4
26.1
41.5
Afro-descendant
56.3
31.3
87.6
White/Mestizo
41.2
27.0
68.2
Total
42.3
26.8
69.1
Ecuador
(2006)
Nicaragua
(2001)
Indigent
Poor non-indigent
Total Poverty
Source: CEPAL/ ECLAC 2009
6. Inequality regimes relating to Afrodescendants in Latin America
features Stratification/redi
stribution logics
Regimes
Transnational/global
Entanglements
Slavery
caste
(until 19th Century)
slave traffic, triangular trade (Europe,
Africa, Americas)
Racist
nationalism
(from abbolition to
approx. 1930)
racial adscription
international exchange within scientific
racism (Europe, Americas)
Mestizo
Nationalism
1930-1990
class, ethno-racial
and gender
adscription
circulation of culturalist concepts
(Americas)
Compensatory
regime
Since 1990
class, ethno-racial/
gender adscription, target group
transnational anti-racist alliances
(Black Atlantic), multilateral
organizations (worldwide)
7. Compensatory regime: virtues and risks
Focus
Features
Protection against
discrimination
International context
IACourtHR, 1979
Rapporteurship on Afrodescendants, 2005
Convention 169 (ILO),
1989
Durban
Conference, 2001
Instruments
Anti-discrimination law,
legal support
Ethno-Education,
Museums, land titles
Quotas at
universities
Subject/
target
Individual citizen
Traditional communities
(e.g. Maroons)
Afro-descendants
as individual
Implemen- Latin America-wide
tation
Brazil, Ecuador,
Honduras, Colombia, etc.
Brazil, Colombia
Risks/
Limits
Essencialization/
territorialization of cultural
belonging
Racialization of
politics, end of
mestizaje as lived
experience (Wade)
Unequal access to law
Protection of cultural
rights
Affirmative
action
8. Conclusions
Going beyond conventional research on inequality, that is concentrated on
nation-state and economic/ ahistorical asymmetries, this lecture has focused on
entangled inequalities understood as:
• Asymmetries between positions taken by certain individuals or groups of
individuals in a relationally (not spatially) determined context.
• This concerns economic positions (defined by income) but also political
and legal entitlements (rights, political power, etc.).
The concept of regime has been used for researching entangled inequalities
involving Afro-descendants in Latin America in order to describe:
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historical constitution and transformation of inequalities (different regimes
in different periods)
Consideration of multiple dimensions of inequality (convivial/social,
economic, legal, political, etc.)
entanglements between national and transnational/ global structures of
inequality
complex articulations between inequality and difference (politics of
difference as reaction against inequalities / measures adopted for
mitigating inequalities producing new differences)