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Who benefits when economic costs to the pursuit of higher education are diminished? Can such reforms advance the educational trajectory of historically marginalized groups, including women and indigenous people, or are historic social inequalities replicated in the use of new opportunities? The 2016 Ley de Gratuidad in Chile presents a unique opportunity to examine who benefits and how when the state provides a policy guaranteeing free higher education at participating universities. Given the systematic biases and cultural norms faced by women and indigenous people in Chile and the broad design of the state-led policy, the educational reform constitutes an important test of the extent to which lowering costs can facilitate education across an economically and socially diverse population. Leveraging data from two waves of a household survey, this paper finds that educational attainment, measured in the number of years of schooling achieved by respondents, is significantly higher for those who receive such a benefit, consistent with the design and intent of the policy. More surprisingly, these increases in years of education occur for women and indigenous people, even though no programmatic element emphasizes these groups. The results suggest that state financing is significantly associated with promoting higher education in the population and that women, the poor, and indigenous people are significant beneficiaries of this effect despite the social and cultural barriers in the country. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent years have seen the rapid passage and modification of family leave policies in Latin America, a surprising trend, given the region's historically conservative gender norms. This article argues that the rise of new paternity leave policies—as well as the modifications to longer-standing maternity leave policies—reflects contending visions of gender and the family, mediated by the institutions and actors that populate the region's political landscape. Using an original dataset of family policy measures, this article finds that the factors facilitating the adoption of new, vanguard policies, such as paternity leave, function in ways different from those that shape the expansion of longer-standing policies, including maternity leave. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Carnes, Matthew Edward. Social Welfare Policies for Vulnerable Sectors and Political Constitutions. Dr. Matthew Carnes offers an overview of the impact that social welfare policies have on the most underprivileged sectors of society. The analysis focuses on three issues: democratization (the political dimension), growth (the economic dimension), and persistent inequality (the social dimension). Ultimately, the aim is to promote reflection on the need to work on the formulation and implementation of legal and political instruments that will have a positive impact on the lives of people, especially those who need it most. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on labor force in Latin America. Topics discussed include office towers in the cities in Latin America, production facilities and manufacturing. Other topics which includes domestic consumption, employment in Latin America and middle class in the region are also discussed. Economic development of the region is also mentioned.

How does welfare state expansion reconfigure political coalitions? This paper challenges traditional accounts that pit social policy ‘insiders’, who univocally oppose policy expansion, against ‘outsiders’ who favour it. It argues that labour market vulnerability and partisan cues can play a critical role in shaping the preferences of both insiders and outsiders, and thus produce new pro-expansion coalitions. To test this claim, it employs historical analysis of key social insurance configurations in Bolivia over the last 30 years, as well as an original survey carried out in Bolivia following that nation’s 2007 extension of a noncontributory national minimum pension. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

In recent decades, developing and middle-income countries around the globe have adopted path-breaking reforms to their social protection systems. Latin America has been a pioneer region, expanding the state’s commitment on behalf of low-income citizens in key policy areas in many countries. This paper undertakes two tasks. First, it documents the surprising extension of noncontributory social protection policies across many Latin American countries, highlighting how tax-financed programs have come to play a central role in a variety of settings. Second, it examines citizen-level preferences that support this trend, arguing that employment vulnerability and threats to income continuity play a decisive role in shaping demand for public, rather than private, social protection. Survey data on labor-market risks and social policy preferences from eighteen countries corroborate these claims. Our findings suggest that other countries undergoing labor-market strains may experience similar demands for a “return of the state” as a guarantor of social protection in the coming years. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since the 2002 Barcelona summit, Germany has been seen as a regional leader in achieving European states’ shared commitment to increase state-funded childcare. Yet Germany’s childcare success has not been homogeneous across its Länder; rather, it has shown remarkable subnational variation, with considerable differences in spending, policy design and coverage. Using panel data analysis and historical narratives, this article provides a theory for variation in provision of state-financed childcare for children under three years of age. We argue that competing visions of childcare at the subnational level – driven by the demands of differing numbers of women in the workforce and religious beliefs, and channelled by local government partisanship – have served as powerful constraints on convergence. Left partisanship and increased participation of women in the labour force are associated with higher provision of childcare for those aged under three, while larger Catholic populations are correlated with less extensive state-funded childcare. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

ABSTRACT Labor market dualism-the segmentation of workers between formal, legally protected employment and informal, unprotected status-has long drawn attention from scholars and policymakers in Latin America. This article argues that lasting patterns of economic and political segmentation of workers arose earlier in the region's history than has previously been understood, well before the classic 'incorporation' period. Late-nineteenth-century practices for the recruitment and retention of workers shaped Latin America's first sets of labor laws, most notably those governing union organization and individual worker job stability. Subsequently, these first laws served as important templates for development, constraining and conditioning the labor codes adopted under mass-based politics. Using historical data drawn from Chile, Peru, and Argentina, this article shows how differing recruitment practices and variation in the extension of effective suffrage rights and electoral participation shaped early legal labor market segmentation and inequality in Latin America. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Substituting one metal for another in inorganic and organometallic systems is a proven strategy for synthesizing complex molecules, and in some cases, provides the only route to a particular system. The multivalent nature of the coordination in metal-ligand assemblies lends itself more readily to some types of transmetalation. For instance, a binding site can open up for exchange without greatly effecting the many other interactions holding the structure together. In addition to exchanging the metal and altering the local binding environment, transmetalation in supramolecular systems can also lead to substantial changes in the nature of the secondary and tertiary structure of a larger assembly. In this tutorial review we will cover discrete supramolecular assemblies in which metals are exchanged. First we will address fully formed structures where direct substitution replaces one type of metal for another without changing the overall supramolecular assembly. We will then address systems where the disruptive exchange of one metal for another leads to a larger change in the supramolecular assembly. When possible we have tried to highlight systems that use supramolecular self-assembly in tandem with transmetalation to synthesize new structures not accessible through a more direct approach. At the end of this review, we highlight the use of transmetalation in self-assembled aqueous inorganic clusters and discuss the consequences for material science applications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective Although the United States 1993 Family and Medical Leave Act is considered meager by international standards, significant variation in family leave policies exists across U. S. states. This article develops a political theory-driven by mobilized interest groups-to explain variation in the duration and pay level of state parental leave policies. Methods Employing four different measures of family leave policy, we use ordinary least squares and logit models to test the effects of partisanship, women in the legislature, and evangelical populations on parental leave outcomes. Results We find that states with a pattern of Democratic Party controlled legislatures and high percentages of legislative seats occupied by women see more generous parental leave protections, while states with large populations of evangelical Christians see less generous policies. Conclusion Family leave policies are the product of a battle between competing visions of the family and the state, shaped by partisanship, gender, and religion. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Solution deposition is a scalablemethod to fabricate transparentconducting and semiconducting oxide films that could enable low-costlarge-area optoelectronic devices, including solar cells and electrochromicwindows. However, high temperatures (>500 °C) are typicallyrequiredto remove excess counterions and ligands from solution-deposited films.We report the synthesis of reactive F-modified tin(II) hydroxide nitratenanoscale cluster precursors from the controlled dissolution of SnOand SnF2in minimal nitric acid (∼1.6 mol HNO3per mol Sn). After spin-casting to form films, heating attemperatures < 100 °C consumes the nitrate counterions likelyby oxidation of the tin(II) precursor to form amorphous F:SnO2. The optical, electrical, structural, and morphological propertiesof F-doped and undoped SnO2thin films are reported asa function of annealing temperature on both glass and polyimide (Kapton)substrates. Electron microscopy and X-ray reflectivity results showthat the films are uniform and crack-free with <10% thickness reductionafter annealing at temperatures up to 450 °C. X-ray diffractionshows the formation of crystalline SnO2at >300 °C.Quartz-crystal microbalance, X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy, andinfrared spectroscopy show near-complete removal of nitrate counterionsand hydroxide/water by 200 °C, leading to an approximate 30%mass loss from the as-deposited film. Secondary-ion mass spectrometryshows that the F concentration in the annealed films scales with theconcentration in the precursor solution. The F-doped films are conductivewhen annealed at ≥250 °C in H2/N2gas and at ≥350 °C in air. The lowest electrical resistivity(ρ) of 1.5 × 10–4Ω·m wasobtained from 10 atom % F-doped SnO2films annealed at600 °C in air. These films had a Hall mobility of 4.2 cm2V–1s–1and a carrierconcentration of 9.5 × 1019cm–3. Films deposited directly on polyimide sheets were crack-free afterannealing at temperatures below 350 °C. The films exhibited ρ≈ 10–2Ω·m after H2/N2annealing and were stable to more than 200 bendingcycles at angles up to 90°, demonstrating flexibility. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This studi/ employs an original, nationally representative survey of citizens in Argentina to understand the economic and political factors that shape individual-level preferences for social insurance. In the past two decades, Latin American democracies have undergone significant changes in their social welfare institutions, in some cases dramatically reversing course from previous policies. We develop a theoretical framework to explain how and when citizens shift their preferences for competing social policy proposals. We emphasize the role of dissatisfaction with prevailing policies in creating political opportunities for the introduction of sweeping reforms. Our survey capitalizes on the 2008 pension reform in Argentina to test competing hypotheses regarding preferences for different policies of old-age insurance. We find that dissatisfaction with existing private policies increases individual-level support for policy reform across all citizens, whereas partisanship has a more restricted effect, shaping preferences only among middle- and low-income respondents. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A series of mercury dithioether coordination polymerswere synthesized from mercury dihalides and rigid xylyl dithioetherscontaining methyl, t-butyl, and benzyl pendant groups(ligands 3a–c). The resulting coordinationpolymers were examined by X-ray crystallography. Changes in stericssurrounding mercury result in structures ranging from one-dimensionalpolymers (e.g., (3a·HgI2)∞, (3b·Hg2Cl4)∞, (3b·HgBr2)∞) totwo-dimensional sheets (e.g., (3c·HgCl2)∞) and three-dimensional extended networks (e.g.,[(3c)2(HgBr2)3]∞) from crystallizations which were conducted underidentical conditions with the same 1:1 stoichiometry. Bridging mercury–halidebonds were found to play a surprisingly large role in governing thefinal structures. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Drawing on recent work and data on social protection in the developing world, this essay evaluates the current state of the art and suggests several important new lines of research. We first examine the historical origin and evolution of social protection systems in developing countries, arguing that insufficient attention has been paid to the authoritarian roots of developing nations' social policy. As a preliminary effort to remedy this shortcoming in the literature, we offer a political logic for the observed variation in the character of institutions of social policy established by nondemocratic regimes. Next, we explore recent research examining linkages between models of economic development and welfare regimes in developing countries. Finally, we turn to the study of the political determinants of the social policy reforms that occurred in the final decades of the twentieth century, arguing that variation in reform across policy areas has been more complex than is generally appreciated in the literature. To explain this variation, we develop a theory that identifies the political coalitions supporting different policy outcomes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A central puzzle in the comparative politics literature has been why certain societies are able to achieve political stability while others suffer from strife, repression and authoritarian rule. This article applies the solution concept of quantal response equilibrium (QRE) to Weingast's Sovereign-Constituency Co-ordination Game in order to show how our understanding of political stability can be enhanced when uncertainty and limited rationality are explicitly modelled. Comparative statics results first confirm the intuitive logic that civil conflict is unlikely when regimes threaten penalties for revolt that are much more severe than current living conditions and when the benefits to a successful revolt are not sufficiently enticing. In addition, our analysis provides a logic for the outbreak of civil conflict, noting that it is most likely when key payoffs are in their intermediate regions and far from critical 'thresholds', resulting in ambiguous and counterintuitive decision making by leaders and citizen opposition groups. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We present the observation that chloride serves as a simple catalyst for the acceleration of a self-assembly reaction between AsCl3 and dithiolate ligands (H2L) to form As2L3 assemblies. Studies on a model monomeric arsenic complex suggest that chloride may accelerate ligand exchange dynamics in pnictogen thiolates in general. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Cyclic disulfide macrocycles were rapidly synthesized cleanly and selectively from rigid dithiols via oxidation with iodine when activated by pnictogen additives (As and Sb). Macrocycles were confirmed by 1H-NMR spectroscopy and X-ray crystallography. A p-xylyl-based disulfide trimer and tetramer crystallized in hollow, stacked columns stabilized by intermolecular, sulfur…sulfur close contacts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents a study which examines the reaction of strained ene-yne cycle (1) with alkene and alkyne metathesis catalysts. It explains that alkyne metathesis catalysts form polymers which represent a new type of nanostructured hydrocarbon. It offers information on the olefin catalysts that provides discrete trimers such as Dewar benzene derivative. Detailed discussion on the process and findings of the study is also offered.

Review: [42 refs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Large aqueous ions are interesting because they are useful in materials science (for example to generate thin films) but also because they serve as molecular models for the oxide-aqueous mineral interface where spectroscopy is difficult. Here we show that new clusters of the type M[(μ-OH)2Co(NH3)4]3(NO3)6 (M=Al, Ga) can be synthesized using Werner's century-old cluster as a substitutable framework. We substituted Group 13 metals into the hexol Co[(μ-OH)2Co(NH3)4]36+ ion to make diamagnetic heterometallic ions. The solid-state structure of the hexol-type derivatives were determined by single-crystal XRD and NMR spectroscopy and confirmed that the solid-state structure persists in solution after dissolution into either D2O or [D6]DMSO. Other compositions besides these diamagnetic ions can undoubtedly be made using a similar approach, which considerably expands the number of stable aqueous heteronuclear ions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Large aqueous ions are interesting because they are useful in materials science (for example to generate thin films) but also because they serve as molecular models for the oxide-aqueous mineral interface where spectroscopy is difficult. Here we show that new clusters of the type M[(μ-OH)2Co(NH3)4]3(NO3)6 (M=Al, Ga) can be synthesized using Werner's century-old cluster as a substitutable framework. We substituted Group 13 metals into the hexol Co[(μ-OH)2Co(NH3)4]36+ ion to make diamagnetic heterometallic ions. The solid-state structure of the hexol-type derivatives were determined by single-crystal XRD and NMR spectroscopy and confirmed that the solid-state structure persists in solution after dissolution into either D2O or [D6]DMSO. Other compositions besides these diamagnetic ions can undoubtedly be made using a similar approach, which considerably expands the number of stable aqueous heteronuclear ions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This report illustrates a successfulmercury-directed self-assemblystrategy via the design and synthesis of a new bifunctional bis-dithiocarbamateligand K2L. This ligand efficiently self-assembles withHg(II) to afford a novel bimetallic 28-membered macrocycle, Hg2L2. This supramolecular complex persists as a discretemacrocyclic structure in solution as evidenced by two-dimensionalDOSY NMR. The X-ray diffraction analysis confirms the formation ofthe bimetallic metallomacrocycle where both bis-dithiocarbamate unitsare asymmetrically bound to the mercury centers. Analysis of noncovalentinteractions in the crystalline state reveals very close Hg···Hgintramolecular mercurophilic contacts (≈ 3.3 Å) and theaction of C–H···π (chelate) interactions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We have designed a unique guided-inquiry-inspired course for entry-level graduate students using chemical research as a mechanism to teach research-oriented problem-solving skills. The course has been designed for flexibility around a shared research experience. The curriculum can be modified each year by incorporating a new research project into the framework of the course. Advanced graduate students and postdoctoral scholars serve as course instructors, providing significant teaching and mentoring opportunities for them. The benefits of the inquiry-driven approach have been reinforced through careful selection of instructors and students. We have been able to create a positive learning environment and a highly beneficial award system for students and instructors by offering an opportunity to publish class results in a scholarly journal. The course serves as a template for the implementation of similar graduate coursework at comparable research institutions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Raman spectroscopy, infrared spectroscopy, and quantum mechanical computations were used to characterize and assign observed spectral features, highlight structural characteristics, and investigate the bonding environments of [M13(μ3-OH)6(μ2-OH)18(H2O)24](NO3)15 (M = Al or Ga) nanoscale clusters in the solid phase and aqueous solution. Solid-phase Raman spectroscopy was used to reveal that the metal-oxygen (M-O) symmetric stretch (breathing mode) for the Al13 cluster is observed at 478 cm-1, whereas this same mode is seen at 464 cm-1 in the Ga13 cluster. The hydroxide bridges in each cluster are weakly Raman active but show slightly stronger infrared activity. The breathing modes associated with the clusters in the solid state are not clearly visible in aqueous solution. This change in behavior in the solution phase may indicate a symmetry breaking of the cluster or exchange events between protons on the ligands and the protic solvent. Overall, each cluster has several unique vibrational modes in the low wavenumber region (<1500 cm-1) that are distinct from the parent nitrate salt and other polymeric species with similar structure, which allows for unambiguous identification of the cluster in solution and solid phases. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]