Chile S Shock Therapy And Structural Adjustment Programs In Latin America Reforms And Outcomes

Seminar paper from the year 2017 in the subject Politics - Region: Middle and South America, grade: 1,5, University of Potsdam (Chair for Political Science, Public Administration and Organization), course: Government and Governance in Developing Countries, language: English, abstract: In this short paper, I followed a comparative case study approach to explore the reforms and reform outcomes in four different Latin-American countries during the 1980s. I chose Chile as a successful example of structural adjustment politics and Bolivia, Peru and Argentina as deviating cases to evaluate different reform success. My findings supported a case-by-case evaluation. It turned out that orthodox structural adjustment policies were implemented differently in every country due to country-specific political, historical and institutional features as well as an altering relationship to international financing institutions. Generally, orthodox reforms seemed to back economic stabilization but not necessarily structural economic adjustment. A review of the current state of literature showed differing explanations for varying reform success. While some researchers attribute failure to heterodox deviation, others see a too orthodox course or suggest an explanation by inappropriate time and place for the reforms. Further research will be needed to clarify causalities. It is suggested to put a stronger focus on underlying context-dependent reform drivers and stumbling blocks.

Seminar paper from the year 2017 in the subject Politics - International Politics - Region: Middle- and South America, grade: 1,5, University of Potsdam (Chair for Political Science, Public Administration and Organization), course: Government and Governance in Developing Countries, language: English, abstract: In this short paper, I followed a comparative case study approach to explore the reforms and reform outcomes in four different Latin-American countries during the 1980s. I chose Chile as a successful example of structural adjustment politics and Bolivia, Peru and Argentina as deviating cases to evaluate different reform success. My findings supported a case-by-case evaluation. It turned out that orthodox structural adjustment policies were implemented differently in every country due to country-specific political, historical and institutional features as well as an altering relationship to international financing institutions. Generally, orthodox reforms seemed to back economic stabilization but not necessarily structural economic adjustment. A review of the current state of literature showed differing explanations for varying reform success. While some researchers attribute failure to heterodox deviation, others see a too orthodox course or suggest an explanation by inappropriate time and place for the reforms. Further research will be needed to clarify causalities. It is suggested to put a stronger focus on underlying context-dependent reform drivers and stumbling blocks.

In the last ten to fifteen years, profound structural reforms have moved Latin America and the Caribbean from closed, state-dominated economies to ones that are more market-oriented and open. Policymakers expected that these changes would speed up growth. This book is part of a multi-year project to determine whether these expectation have been fulfilled. Focusing on technological change, the impact of the reforms on the process of innovation is examined. It notes that the development process is proving to be highly heterogenous across industries, regions and firms and can be described as strongly inequitable. This differentiation that has emerged has implications for job creation, trade balance, and the role of small and medium sized firms. This ultimately suggests, amongst other things, the need for policies to better spread the use of new technologies.

Our Continent, Our Future presents the emerging African perspective on this complex issue. The authors use as background their own extensive experience and a collection of 30 individual studies, 25 of which were from African economists, to summarize this African perspective and articulate a path for the future. They underscore the need to be sensitive to each country's unique history and current condition. They argue for a broader policy agenda and for a much more active role for the state within what is largely a market economy. Finally, they stress that Africa must, and can, compete in an increasingly globalized world and, perhaps most importantly, that Africans must assume the leading role in defining the continent's development agenda.

Reshaping Health Care in Latin America: A Comparative Analysis of Health Care Reform in Argentina, Brazil, and Mexico

In the last ten to fifteen years, profound structural reforms have moved Latin America and the Caribbean from closed, state-dominated economies to ones that are more market-oriented and open. Policymakers expected that these changes would speed up growth. This book is part of a multi-year project to determine whether these expectation have been fulfilled. Analysing the impact of the reforms on employment it is argued that expectations were not fulfilled with respect to the operation of the labour markets. The reforms limited the expansion of employment in some sectors, particularly in tradeable goods. They also created a bias in labour demad for better educated workers which exacerbates inequality. It is thus made clear that the region faces major challenges both in increasing the number of jobs and improving job equality.

This work provides a thorough analytical review of the processes that led to the transformation of many Latin American economies during the last decade. The author examines every aspect of adjustment and reform since 1980 and suggests alternative ways to consolidate the achievements.

This book describes and explains the extraordinary wave of popular protest that swept across the so-called Third World and the countries of the former socialist bloc during the period from the late 1970s to the early 1990s, in response to the mounting debt crisis and the austerity measures widely adopted as part of economic "reform" and "adjustment". Explores this general proposition in a cross-national study of the austerity protests, or the 'IMF Riots' that have affected so many debtor nations since the mid-1970s Argues that modern austerity protests, like the classical "bread riots" in eighteenth-century Europe are political acts aimed at injustice, but acts that are an integral part of the process of international economic and political restructuring Evaluates how modern food riots are most important for what they reveal about global economic transformation and its social, and political, consequences Provides a general framework (drawing on comparative and historical material) and then trace the cycle of uneven development, debt, neo-liberal reform, and protest in Latin America, Africa, Asia, the Middle East, and Eastern Europe Focusses on the role of women in structural adjustment and protest politics and the features of seemingly anomalous cases which qualify the general argument