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1. The Impact of Clubfoot Intervention on Dimensions of Human Flourishing: Evidence from the Organization Hope Walks in Ethiopia

Author:
Bruce Wydick, Gianna Camacho, and Patrizio Piraino
Publication Date:
09-2024
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Kellogg Institute for International Studies
Abstract:
We study the impact of clubfoot disability and its treatment on multiple dimensions of human flourishing among children. Working with Hope Walks, a faith-based development organization that funds clubfoot interventions in numerous countries, we use a quasi difference-indifferences approach on data collected from 564 children in Ethiopia. To generate counterfactuals to clubfoot status and treatment, we use outcomes from nearest-age siblings of children born with clubfoot nested within a family-level fixed effect. We find that clubfoot status (early treatment) results in a disability (restoration) of -1.44σ (0.91σ) in physical mobility, -1.17σ (0.79σ) in mental health, -1.07σ (0.64σ) in social inclusion, -0.48σ (0.98σ) in an education index, -0.76σ (0.42σ) in religious faith, and -1.19σ (0.79σ) in an aggregate index of human flourishing (all p < 0.05). We attribute the large, broad, and significant impacts from clubfoot treatment to (i) a highly effective medical intervention that is (ii) carried out in an impoverished setting with scarce existing support for children born with disabilities, which (3) generates spillover effects into multiple facets of human flourishing.
Topic:
Health, Disability, Human Development, and Dignity
Political Geography:
Africa and Ethiopia

2. An Integrative Framework to Assess Trade-Offs and Implications of Choosing Measurements

Author:
Laura García Montoya
Publication Date:
08-2024
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Kellogg Institute for International Studies
Abstract:
Deciding how to measure critical social science concepts like inequality and democracy is one of the most consequential decisions researchers and policymakers make. Yet we lack concrete guidelines to recognize and weigh the tradeoffs that make going from concept to measurement such a challenging task. This paper builds on existing work on measurement validity and develops a framework that allows scholars to identify the trade-offs between three desirable properties of measurement: completeness, interpretability, and normative alignment. The first challenge results from the inherent trade-off between completeness and interpretability. The second challenge results from the lack of empirical tools to assess the normative implications of choosing one indicator over another one. To exemplify how to navigate these challenges, the paper engages with debates on how to measure democracy and inequality. The paper aims to guide scholars in the consequential task of choosing one indicator that matches their research goals as well as their normative orientations.
Topic:
Poverty, Democracy, and Inequality
Political Geography:
Global Focus

3. Positioned for Peacebuilding? The Complex Role of the Catholic Church in the Venezuelan Conflict

Author:
David Smilde and Hugo Pérez Hernáiz
Publication Date:
07-2024
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Kellogg Institute for International Studies
Abstract:
The Catholic Church would seem to be perfectly positioned to facilitate peace in the Venezuelan conflict. It is the country’s most respected institution, and Pope Francis has been personally interested in peacemaking in the region. Furthermore, there is precedent in the region. In Colombia, since the 1980s, the Catholic Church has played a key role in mobilizing the population for peace, supporting the peace process directly, and through involvement in issues of transitional justice. In this article, we briefly describe the peacebuilding activities of the Colombian Catholic Church, more extensively describe the activities of the Venezuelan Catholic Church, and then compare the two to understand the particular challenges the Venezuelan Church faces. We suggest that while the Venezuelan Church faces a similar political opportunity structure as the Colombian Church, it does so with less mobilizing strength and with a lesser ability to provide a clear ideological alternative to the conflict.
Topic:
Religion, Transitional Justice, Conflict, Catholic Church, and Peacebuilding
Political Geography:
Colombia, South America, Latin America, and Venezuela

4. The Simple Job of Giving Torment,The Grupo Élite: A Death Squad of the Guatemalan Army

Author:
Manolo E. Vela Castañeda
Publication Date:
06-2024
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Kellogg Institute for International Studies
Abstract:
This article analyzes the Grupo Élite, a death squad within the Guatemalan Presidential General Staff, whose members received orders from the intelligence sector, particularly the Intelligence Directorate of the General Staff of Guatemala’s Defense Ministry. This was a specialized unit charged with special intelligence operations against dissidents. Such operations included surveillance, infiltration into opposition groups, arrests, interrogations by means of torture, sexual violence, extrajudicial executions, and forced disappearances. This article examines seven patterns that serve to characterize this particular unit and its members, including: 1) the command structure of the squad; 2) sociodemographic profiles of its members; 3) methods of recruitment; 4) the job description of members as part of an internal secret code; 5) the use of nicknames as pseudonyms; (6) careers and medals; and 7) careers after leaving the squad. Within the theater of war operations in Guatemala’s civil war, few actors rival the cruelty, perversity and sadism that characterized the actions of the country’s death squads.
Topic:
Corruption, Conflict, Violence, and Peacebuilding
Political Geography:
Central America and Guatemala

5. Social Policy Expansion and Retrenchment After Latin America’s Commodity Boom

Author:
Sara Niedzwiecki and Jennifer Pribble
Publication Date:
05-2022
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Kellogg Institute for International Studies
Abstract:
The literature on social policy expansion and retrenchment in Latin America is vast, but scholars differ in how they explain the outcomes, arriving at different conclusions about the role of democracy, left parties, favorable economic conditions, and social movements in shaping reform. What can welfare state developments since the end of the commodity boom teach us about the theoretical power of these arguments? This paper engages this question, seeking to explain recent incidents of social policy reform in 10 presidential administrations in Argentina, Brazil, Chile, and Uruguay. Using a combination of crisp-set qualitative comparative analysis (csQCA) and case studies, we identify multiple paths toward social policy expansion and retrenchment that involve the absence and presence of electoral competition, economic resources, party ideology and linkage mechanism, social movement pressure, international pressure, and legacies. The results show that while both parties of the left and right expanded social programs, only the right engaged in retrenchment, yet partisanship alone is insufficient for explaining reform outcomes, as the variable must appear in combination with other factors depending on the party’s linkage mechanism. The results provide new insight into the politics of social policy reform in Latin America, showing the relevance of complex forms of causality.
Topic:
Health, Poverty, Social Movement, Democracy, Inequality, Public Policy, and Political Parties
Political Geography:
Brazil, Argentina, South America, Uruguay, Latin America, and Chile

6. Protesting Against Crime and Insecurity: High-Risk Activism in Mexico's Drug War

Author:
Sandra J. Ley Gutiérrez
Publication Date:
09-2022
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Kellogg Institute for International Studies
Abstract:
When do protests against crime and insecurity take place, regardless of the risks that such mobilization may entail? This paper argues that while violence provides an initial motivation for participating in protests, social networks play a fundamental role in incentivizing citizen mobilization against insecurity. Socialization within networks helps generate solidarity and empathy among participants, while at the same time transforming emotions associated with living in a violent context into potential for action. Also, through networks, individuals share information about opportunities for collective action and change their perceptions about the effectiveness and risks of such activism. These distinct mechanisms are valuable for the activation of protest against crime across levels of violence. Supporting evidence is derived from an original dataset on protest events in reaction to violence in Mexico between 2006 and 2012. Additionally, I rely on qualitative in-depth interviews and participant observation to illustrate the role of networks in protest against crime across several Mexican states. This paper contributes to the growing literature on criminal violence and political participation.
Topic:
Security, Civil Society, Crime, Social Movement, Protests, Violence, Social Networks, and Activism
Political Geography:
Latin America, North America, and Mexico

7. Democracy and Urban Political Culture in Spanish South America, 1810-1860

Author:
Paula Alonso and Marcela Ternavasio
Publication Date:
07-2022
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Kellogg Institute for International Studies
Abstract:
“Democracy,” a word seldom used in public debate at the start of the nineteenth century and negatively associated with tumult, disorder, and direct rule, in a few decades became linked to representative government and increasingly employed with positive connotations. This paper argues that these conceptual changes should be explored in their political and social contexts, since the term “democracy” was invoked to (de)legitimate certain political practices and social sectors. Therefore, in exploring this non-linear process in Spanish America, these pages focus on the interactions between the emerging language of democracy and its varied meanings and uses in urban politics. These interactions were part of the factional disputes on how to implement the principle of popular sovereignty. Starting with an overview of selected emerging political practices during the Independence period, the paper then focuses on Lima and Buenos Aires, two regions with contrasting colonial pasts, responses to Spanish crises, and post-independence paths, showing how the concept of democracy could be put to varied uses according to different contexts and political objectives.
Topic:
Civil Society, Governance, Culture, Democracy, Citizenship, and Institutions
Political Geography:
Argentina, South America, Latin America, and Peru

8. Estimating the Effect of Christian Messages on Civic Engagement: Evidence from a Community-Collaborative Study in Zambia

Author:
Elizabeth Sperber, Gwyneth McClendon, and O'Brien Kaaba
Publication Date:
04-2021
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Kellogg Institute for International Studies
Abstract:
A significant literature suggests that religious conviction can drive political participation, perhaps because religious people internalize a moral obligation to act toward the common good and/or because religious conviction gives people a sense that their actions will make a difference. This paper presents findings from a community-collaborative pilot study in Zambia that examines these ideas. Zambia is an overwhelmingly Christian state experiencing dramatic democratic backsliding. Zambian churches are among the major providers of civic engagement education and programming. Together with our community partners, we randomly assigned Zambian youth (aged 18-35) volunteers into one-time civic engagement workshops. Identical basic civic educational material was presented in each workshop. Yet, we ended this curriculum with two different sets of pre-recorded Christian motivational messages: In 50% of the workshops, these messages emphasized a religious obligation to sacrifice for the common good. In the other 50%, the messages emphasized the power of faith to make change in the world. We found that the latter message (emphasizing the power of faith) moved workshop participants to be more willing to participate in peaceful protest, to disavow political violence, and to critically evaluate other people who choose not to participate in electoral politics. By contrast, the message focused on sacrifice for the common good did not affect political participation relative to baseline. We discuss how the study advances research on religion and political participation as well as knowledge about Christian civic education programs, which are prevalent but understudied throughout.
Topic:
Civil Society, Politics, Religion, Democracy, and Youth
Political Geography:
Africa and Zambia

9. Operation Condor, The War on Drugs, and Counterinsurgency in the Golden Triangle (1977-1983)

Author:
Adela Cedillo
Publication Date:
05-2021
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Kellogg Institute for International Studies
Abstract:
In the late 1960s, the Mexican government launched a series of counternarcotics campaigns characterized by the militarization of drug production zones, particularly in the northwestern region—the so-called Golden Triangle, epicenter of both production and trafficking of marijuana and opium poppy since the 1930s. Operations Canador (1969–1975) and Trizo (1976) served as a laboratory for methods to curb drug production, ranging from harassment of drug growers to the aerial defoliation of illicit crops. Operation Condor (1977–1988) combined and enhanced these strategies, wreaking havoc on communities of alleged drug growers, but without entirely disrupting the drug industry. This paper explores the role of the US government in the militarization of Mexico’s anti-drug policy, underscoring how the ruling party (the Institutional Revolutionary Party, PRI) took advantage of this shift to tackle domestic issues and reassert its hegemony. I argue that Operation Condor functioned as a counterinsurgency campaign oriented to thwart both social and armed movements, eliminate competitors in the narcotics market, and reorganize the drug industry to protect successful drug lords. Operation Condor also caused the decentralization of the drug industry from the northwest and created a new clientelistic pact between drug lords and national security agencies, such as the Federal Security Directorate (DFS), the Office of the Attorney General of Mexico–Federal Judicial Police (PGR-PJF), and the Secretariat of National Defense (SEDENA), which benefited from drug proceeds. Finally, the de facto state of siege imposed in the Golden Triangle produced thousands of victims of harassment, torture, rape, murder, forced-disappearance, and displacement; massive human rights abuses that authorities either concealed or denied.
Topic:
Security, Corruption, Human Rights, Governance, Social Movement, History, Borders, and Violence
Political Geography:
Latin America, North America, Mexico, and United States of America

10. Violence in Post-Revolutionary Mexico

Author:
Gema Kloppe-Santamaría
Publication Date:
05-2021
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Kellogg Institute for International Studies
Abstract:
Despite the formal end of civil war and armed conflict, Mexico continued to experience significant levels of violence during the 1930s and 1940s. This period has traditionally been associated with the process of pacification, institutionalization, and centralization of power that enabled the consolidation of rule in post-revolutionary Mexico; a process epitomized by the marked national decline in levels of homicide that began during the 1940s and continued throughout the second half of the twentieth-century. However, the dynamics of coercion and resistance that characterized state-society relations during this period, particularly at the regional and local levels, reveal that violence pervaded all aspects of society and that it was perpetrated by a multiplicity of actors, including vigilantes, pistoleros, private militias, lynch mobs, military, police, and others, including violent entrepreneurs. Violence was used both as a means to contest the legitimacy of the post-revolutionary state project and as an instrument of control and coercion on behalf of political elites and local power brokers. Conversely, violence superseded the realm of traditional politics and constituted a central force shaping Mexican society. Violence against women in both the public and private sphere, violence driven by economic interests, and violence incurred in citizens’ attempts to control crime and social transgressions, reveal that citizens—and not only state actors—contributed to the reproduction of violence. Although violence in post-revolutionary Mexico was neither centralized nor exercised in a top-down manner, impunity and collusion between criminal and political elements were central to the production and perpetuation of violence, both within the Mexican state and within civil society. When examined in light of these two decades of the post-revolutionary period, the character and levels of violence in contemporary Mexico appear less as an aberration and more as the latest expression of a longer historical trajectory, uneven and nonlinear, of decentralized, multifaceted, and multi-actor forms of violence.
Topic:
Security, Religion, Culture, Peacekeeping, Democracy, Conflict, and Violence
Political Geography:
Latin America, North America, and Mexico