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In 2009, the Colombian Constitutional Court issued ruling Auto 004, declaring 34 indigenous groups as being at risk of extermination due to the internal armed conflict and ordered the Colombian government, led by the Interior Ministry, to protect them. Since then, although the critical situation persists, the government has proven its compliance with the Court's order through a documentation process. The purpose of this article is to examine the role of documentation in mediating legal protection in a violent context. Based on yearlong participant observation at the Colombian Interior Ministry, the study approaches the production of the government's documentary response as an artifact. It addresses its formulation and context within the institutional setting, the discussions regarding what to include and what to exclude, and the decisions that shape its content. It highlights how the assembled document enchants, by skillfully combining the aesthetics and technical aspects. It illustrates how numbers that portray compliance are constructed and displayed in the document, while concealing the failure to make the changes that were ordered: a phenomenon termed here as complying incompliantly. The paper's originality lies in deconstructing the powerful governmental sophism of money invested as compliance with an obligation, through ethnographic attention to the document. Likewise, the analysis is part of the challenge dealt with by studies of the gap between law and reality, by suggesting that the problem lies not in a gap between well-intended law and the violent reality that overflows it but rather in the way this "gap" is filled by complex documenting processes. As such, the paper contributes to the anthropological studies on law, documentation and accountability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective/Context: The article seeks to analyze the problematic and paradoxical normative-administrative translation of the paradigm of human rights in Argentina's current migration policies. The study of this case is of particular interest, on the one hand, because Argentina has been and is the leading Mercosur country receiving migrations in the past decades, and, on the other hand, because its migratory management model, inaugurated in 2004 with the sanction of the Law of Migrations 25871, even if it finds itself based around the human rights approach, coexists with an emphasized tendency towards securitization and control. Methodology: The investigation that supports this article is qualitative: the main ideas and conclusions have been extracted from the study of laws, decrees, regulations, reports, and resolutions emitted by different national and international public agencies, also from the comparison and contrast with secondary bibliography. Conclusions: The advancement of the securitarian approach on migration, centered more on control than regulation, together with the lack of normative and administrative adaptation of the different state agencies in the guaranty of rights recognized as universal, explain the ineffectiveness of the human rights paradigm in critical areas such as being the documentary regularization policy and the access to universal rights. Originality: The article seeks to deepen the analysis of Argentina's migration policies, focusing on the different supra, intra, and counter-state levels involved in its implementation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective/context: In 2019, promoted by President Martín Vizcarra, the Congress of the Republic of Peru sanctioned a law on mandatory primary elections for voters and political parties. However, the regulation was not implemented, given that it was suspended by the Legislative Branch for the general elections in 2021 and the regional elections in 2022. Methodology: This paper studies the reform process of mandatory, simultaneous, and open primaries (PASO, for its acronym in Spanish) in Peru and its counter-reform based on its suspension on two occasions (2021 and 2022). Twenty-three key actors were interviewed for this research, including congresspersons, ministers, electoral officials, and researchers, in addition to the revision of secondary sources and newspapers of legislative sessions. Conclusions: The paper concludes that PASO were a "decorative" reform, i.e., a law passed without the intention of implementing it. Its sanction was the product of a reformist coalition between civil society and the President of the nation, where the objectives of increasing popular support for President Vizcarra and the need to improve the legitimacy of the political system converged. The reform was resisted by congresspersons who formed two counter-reformist coalitions that suspended the PASO on two occasions. Originality: The research shows that these counterreform coalitions are intrinsically linked to the atomization and personalization of the Peruvian party system, characterized by hyper-personalism and a lack of party structures. In addition, it generates theoretical contributions to studying the processes of reforms and counter-reforms in the context of institutional weakness. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective/context: In 2009, the law of mandatory, simultaneous, and open primaries (PASO, for its acronym in Spanish) was enacted in Argentina. Among others, this regulation seeks to democratize party structures. From a gender perspective, this paper studies the effect of PASO on women's access to the Chamber of Deputies (2003-2023). To this end, it analyzes how the final lists are assembled, the places assigned to women candidates, the ease with which they gain access to expectable positions, and the permeability of groupings towards their participation since the implementation of PASO. Methodology: This is an exploratory and descriptive study of the effect of PASO on the allocation of seats for the category of female deputies in Argentina, considering all female legislators elected in successive elections (2011-2023). Conclusion: The findings show that PASO's objective of democratizing party structures and making their components more representative does not seem to have impacted the country's existing political and party traditions prior to implementing the law regarding the place given to women in a party. Originality: The article presents a study on the democratization effect of PASO on party structures from a gender perspective. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, using empirical and statistical research, we analyze the impact of the external sector on economic growth in Paraguay during the 1994-2020 period. The results enabled the assessment of the validity of the income elasticities of imports calculated in the long term, attributed to the presence of cointegration among the series. Consequently, the economic growth rate associated with the external balance was obtained, aligning with Thirlwall's Law. The empirical analysis and validation of Thirlwall's Law suggest that the growth dynamics of the Paraguayan economy can be explained by the Thirlwall model. Thus, it was determined that the external sector has had an impact on Paraguay's economic growth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Population aging has positioned as a key demographic change. This paper analyzes the characteristics of older adults in situations of dependence, care strategies and the profile of caregivers for Chile, Colombia, Paraguay, El Salvador and Uruguay. The population in a situation of functional dependence is mostly female and over 75 years old. Between 54% and 70% receive some type of care, with unpaid family care being the main care strategy. Unpaid caregivers are mostly women, under 65, and economically inactive. We evidence a negative relationship between the status of elderly caregiver and employment, that is stronger for women. Although elderly informal care leads to a lower probability of employment among individuals of all ages and income quintiles, the employment gap between caregivers and non-caregivers narrows substantially among higher-income people. Improving care for older people would have positive effects on female employment and inequality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Several studies have examined the relationship between monetary policy and the stock market. However, few have assessed the impact of fiscal management on this market. This paper examines the extent to which fiscal policy affects a firm's stock market capitalization using the Panel Vector Autoregressive (PVAR) methodology. The study finds that the stock market capitalization in the CPI fully reflects the available information on the movements of variables related to monetary policy. However, total public indebtedness exerts a significant lagged effect on the stock market capitalization of Mexican firms. This finding indicates that the CPI does not fully reflect the available information on the movements of fiscal policy variables. A comprehensive analysis of fiscal policy measures can enhance stock market performance for investors and financial analysts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective/Context: This paper aims to analyze the vast, varied and lasting presence of the little-known revolutionary rhetoric exploited by Francisco Franco throughout the dictatorship in Spain. To this end, this rhetoric is connected with the different contexts in which it was used and with the terminology employed in those same years by thinkers or politicians linked above all to the Falange. Methodology: As this article is interested in the public discourse of Franco's regime, it has examined in detail and qualitatively the content of Franco's public speeches. For this purpose, we have resorted to the official compilations made under Franco's regime and, because of their selective and incomplete nature, also to newspaper sources. Thus, more than a history of intellectual or political ideas, this work is linked to their public and pragmatic dimension and delves into the complex practical functioning of ideologies. Originality: With few exceptions, Franco's rhetoric has not been studied in detail, and even less in the revolutionary rhetoric. The originality of this study lies in the fact that it is the first specific and analytical approach, although not quantitative, to Franco's revolutionary rhetoric. For example, it explains its unknown survival until the 1960s and even the 1970s, so that it outlived the so-called defalangization of Francoism. Conclusions: Franco's revolutionary rhetoric was characterized by great flexibility and imprecision. It underwent many changes over the years and coexisted with other central discursive frameworks, such as the Cruzada's. It was a crucial factor in the discursive legitimization of Francoism, especially in its initial years. Compared to the Cruzada, with which it complemented, it stood out for its elasticity and pretended transversality. In addition, it was connected with a legitimacy of exercise, not of origin, which was, in fact, more easily connected with the present and the future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective/Context: This paper studies the first Chilean school newspapers led by women and the role of high school students as mediators of scientific knowledge at the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th. The analysis is part of the expansion and modernization of the press and publishing industry, as well as the in$uence of positivism and the educational reforms that were implemented in Chile during that period, a context in which the ruling class considered scientific knowledge, both its development and access to it by the population, as a priority. Methodology: The article is based on the studies of historians of science who have understood audiences as active agents in generating new knowledge, problematizing categories such as expert, amateur and layman, and examining the types of relationships they sustained. This theoretical perspective is applied to analyzing the magazines of four women's high schools that took advantage of the valid study plans to access the university in the period and is complemented with other sources, such as prospectuses and relevant administrative documents. Originality: The study makes visible the role of women in science and, specifically, Chilean schoolgirls in this context, which have not been studied from the perspective presented here. Conclusions: Despite the lack of attention given to this population group in terms of scientific contribution, it is shown that high school students were active readers, disseminators and producers of knowledge, managing magazines, generating networks and circulating the knowledge beyond the walls of their educational establishments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective/context: The organizational vitality of political parties is understood as their capacity to attract activists, keep them allied to the organization, and united among themselves. More vital parties promote greater participation of their activists and increase their ability to resist changing circumstances and exogenous shocks. Four conditions explain the reproduction of political party vitality: trauma, programmatic purpose, channels of ambition, and exit barriers. This paper aims to analyze the vitality levels of the Centro Democrático (CD) party from the year of its creation (2013) until 2020. Methodology: The paper examines the case of the CD. Empirical support comes, fundamentally, from in-depth interviews with (former) leaders and activists of the CD and experts in the party. Secondary sources are also explored. Conclusions: As one of its main findings, this work highlights the moderate vitality of the CD. Trauma has a positive and significant relationship with vitality, while purpose, exit barriers, and ambition channels have positive effects, but smaller than those produced by trauma. A variable that moderates the behavior of the explanatory factors of vitality is the strong personalistic leadership of the founder of the party, former president Álvaro Uribe. Originality: This work contributes to understanding the organizational structures of political parties and their impact on their performance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyzes the development of Latin America over the past three decades by using growth incidence curves and weighted growth rates calculated on the basis of harmonized microdata from national household surveys. Over the past three decades, Latin America has made progress in fundamental socioeconomic indicators. On average, there has been significant growth in income as well as some educational and housing variables, particularly among the lower income strata. In contrast, progress was slower among the most vulnerable population in other important areas (e.g., higher education, female labor participation). Despite notable improvements in various areas of development captured through household surveys, the evidence reveals that substantial shortfalls and disparities still persist. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

At the end of the 1960s, neighborhood movements burst onto the municipal agenda in many metropolitan environments worldwide through numerous demands related to basic needs. In Madrid, these demands took different neighborhood spaces and some former municipalities that were integrated as districts in the city's urban core as a geographic scale of reference. This placed these locations at the center of the political debate, which gradually faded away as a result of the various municipal reforms developed during the first two decades of parliamentary democracy in Spain. In the last fifteen years, neighborhood demands have taken a different turn, as a political phenomenon has appeared linked to new forms of neighborhood protest called neighborhoodnalism. This process was not diminished during the hardest moments of the global covid-19 pandemic; rather, it has been strengthened as a dynamic of political socialization, solidarity, and daily resistance in many of Madrid's neighborhoods. As a result, the referents and elements of identification around the neighborhood, as well as the political practice of neighborhoodnalism itself, have been expanded. From a spatial perspective of neighborhood movements that considers political identity as a dynamic and resignified process through protest and collective organization, and through ethnography and the analysis of in-depth interviews held over five years in the Madrid district of Hortaleza around the Three Kings Parade, this paper studies how these socio-political practices are being articulated in urban space and how the learning of this form of spatial socialization is influencing Madrid's municipal agenda as a whole. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Money neutrality has complex consequences for small, open, and dollarized economies. For instance, it can cause external debt, when used as a stabilizer of the stock of circulating money in the face of negative exogenous shocks, not to contribute to economic growth in times of stagnation. The purpose of this paper is to describe this problem for the Ecuadorian case using a cointegration methodology and a vector error correction (VEC) model estimated over the 2000-2019 period (quarterly). The resulting impulse-response functions of the VEC model present evidence in favor of the money neutrality hypothesis, and the simulation of an exogenous negative shock in oil prices qualitatively describes the potential interaction between circulating currency, external debt, and production in dollarization. The paper concludes by presenting multiple empirical monetary-real patterns that may be useful for future research on dollarization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although ethnographic work has been premised on elucidating the nature and forms of social relations, the relational approach in social theory has opened up new lines and horizons of problematization to explore this topic from a different perspective. As we will discuss in this article, this orientation has had a significant impact on ethnographic practice, as it has reformulated its objects of study, its methods of inquiry and its narrative structure. In particular, we believe that this approach can be central to the understanding of contemporary ethnic recognition processes in women and men who identify with an indigenous people of the American continent. As such, this paper points out the possibilities of another way of dealing with social relations--relational pathways--which will contribute to the debate on ethnographic futures. We seek to elucidate the shifts in contemporary ethnographic practice, based on a methodological discussion of conceptual change, a reflection on the heuristic possibilities of this process in ethnography, and a case study from our own experience of working with the Mixtec population of Oaxaca, Mexico. We argue, in this paper, that based on the problematization of the uses and meanings of the notion of social relation and its implementation in current ethnography, styles, themes, and ways of understanding social phenomena have been renewed, while simultaneously offering other approaches to current ethnic processes, such as the one we are studying in the Oaxacan Mixtec region. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective/context: The paper examines the contribution of think tanks (TTs) to debating ideas and their relationship with the environment. Specifically, it analyzes the variations introduced by the electoral campaign in the political positions of TTs and the role of ideology and party affiliation as possible determinants. Methodology: The content of the web pages of ten TTs is monitored before and during the electoral campaign for the 2021 presidential elections in Chile, where numerous TTs have become protagonists. For each TT, attention to socio-political issues is analyzed, and the trend of their positions is recorded. Conclusions: The analysis shows that TTs adapt their communicative agenda to the electoral campaign and that their ideology is a principal variable in this strategy. Originality: Evidence is provided on the entry of TTs in electoral campaigns with differences between conservatives and progressives. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective/context: The paper analyzes the causes of the crisis of Latin American regionalism, seeking the reasons that determine its nature, scope, and consequences, as well as the dilemmas posed by different exit options. Methodology: Based on a definition of the concept of crisis, a model of analysis is proposed that traces significant governance processes and crisis factors at the systemic, regional, and domestic levels, using a series of indicators that allow interpreting their impact on Latin American regionalism projects and their effects in the form of crisis. Conclusions: The findings suggest the existence of structural conditioning factors that exceed the established paradigms and political dynamics that were unable to overcome their contradictions, which led to a triple crisis of results, model, and expectations, the effects of which directly affect the credibility of the projects. The crisis, therefore, does not appear as a mere question of political will but as a complex combination of multiple factors involving states and other national and international actors and social forces. Originality: The article broadens the analytical perspectives of Latin American regionalism by proposing a novel approach that helps better understand its particularities vis-à-vis other regionalisms and opens the possibility of continuing and deepening the empirical analysis of each specific regionalism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The text proposes a journey through the methodology and work process followed in the Post Scriptum. A Digital Archive of Ordinary Writings (Early Modern in Spain and Portugal) project, which led to the formation of a digital epistolary corpus—now available online—from funds preserved in judicial archives during the Modern Age in the Iberian Peninsula. Based on a practical case, the paper reflects on the reality of the fieldwork carried out in order to build a digital corpus, as well as on its strengths and weaknesses, which allows a first-hand insight of some changes and challenges of the digital revolution we are immersed in. Methodology: Advances in the field of Digital Humanities are taken as a starting point to examine the multidisciplinarity that characterizes both the corpus formation process and the possibilities for its analysis and study. Originality: The paper describes the complete work process involved in the transformation of primary sources into digital sources in an innovative project in the field of Digital Humanities; it also reflects on problems faced by historians in working with private letters produced by common people (sixteenth-nineteenth centuries), which range from the location of these sources to their selection, digitization, editing, treatment, and subsequent study. Conclusions: In addition to describing the process of transforming sources into a digital corpus and the possibilities of its analysis, the article evidences different analytical ways. Likewise, it addresses the wealth of archives as essential repositories for recovering private and ordinary epistolary sources while also reflecting on the future of their conservation in the digital environment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The increased volatility of commodity prices caused by the entry of financial investors within the framework of so-called financialization, makes macroeconomic management more complex, especially for economies with a high incidence of primary products in their international trade. The purpose of this paper is to measure the exposure to export price risk for the Argentine case during the 1993-2018 period. The Value at Risk (VaR), typically used in finance, is employed in a novel way to design an export portfolio of commodities that operate daily in international markets. Among the main results is that 2.90% of the total exported is exposed to a monthly price risk from 2004 to 2018 in Argentina compared to 1.73% registered between 1993 and 2003. This indicator contributes to the design of fiscal rules that allow planning expenses based on structural income in contexts of high volatility. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the gender wage gap in Spain by analyzing data from the 2018 Spanish Structure of Earnings Survey to quantify the gap and decompose it into the explained and unexplained gaps using three different "discrimination- free" distributions (Reimers, Cotton and Jann). As covariates, in addition to seniority at work, studies and type of contract, common in the literature, they introduce occupation. The study treats full-time workers separately from part-time workers. This distinction is important due to the characteristics of the Spanish labor market, where part-time contracts predominate among women. The results show that part-time female employees are less discriminated against than full-time female employees, and that at lower levels of education and in lower skilled occupations The results show that part-time workers are less discriminated against and that at lower levels of education and in lower-skilled occupations, women's wages are closer to those of men. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The International Criminal Tribunal for former Yugoslavia (ICTY) was established in 1993. Intended to shed light on the events that occurred during the Yugoslav conflict (1992-1995) and to prosecute and convict those accused of crimes against human rights and international humanitarian law, it's mandate lasted until 2017. This paper was prompted precisely by this end. It takes stock of the contributions of archaeology and forensic anthropology to the Tribunal's investigations and argues that the work of these professionals provided evidence of the systematic attack in which civilians were killed as part of a state policy of extermination against ethnic and religious groups in the region. The authors also point out the importance of the involvement of Latin American professionals in this research, as well as how much this experience enriched research processes in Latin America itself. This work is based on a systematic bibliographic search, which includes, among other documents, archives that were reserved at the time, but are now open to the public. It also draws on information obtained from the authors' participation in the forensic operations conducted between 1999 and 2001, both in the field and in the morgue. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective/Context: The objective of this paper is to build a definition of the concept of the political in Marx as a third way between the autonomy and the heteronomy of the political. Methodology: This paper suggests a hermeneutical and philosophical methodology, which consists of interpretation of arguments and concepts of theoretical texts. Primary sources -hereupon: Marx's texts-will be preferred, although they will be connected with other scholars. Conclusions: The paper arrives to a double conclusion. On the one hand, the essential connection (as championed by Marx) between the political and the world of material production does not involve a reductionist, mechanistic or heteronomous understanding of the political, for material production and the political are for him two distinct, albeit jointed, forms of human freedom. On the other hand, the concept of the political in Marx has two souls: the plasticity of the human second nature and the ideal of self-transparency of the philosophy of history. Facing this dilemma, the paper claims for an open and finite Marxism. Originality: Reflections on this topic are not new, but the thesis of the political and the production as two distinct, albeit jointed, forms of human freedom seems to be a relative new contribution to the theoretical and political discussion. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of this article is to describe and analyze the reconversion experiences of four social organizations to sustain the social bond and collective care in popular neighborhoods of the Metropolitan Area of Buenos Aires (AMBA), Argentina, during the Covid-19 pandemic. Based on qualitative research work with an ethnographic approach, conducted remotely between July and September 2020, we i) reconstructed the social context and characterized the activities of the socio-community organizations studied in AMBA, before and during the pandemic; ii) sketched images such as the collective "la olla" organization, which describe the community provision of care; and iii) showed how, in the context of restricted movement, the organizations had to deploy tactics to "contain," "accompany" and take care of themselves and others. In line with debates about an economy of care, which produces values surreptitiously appropriated by the rest of the economy, this paper focuses on those resulting from socio-community practices related to: food --"la olla" and "la fila"--, health, and socio-affective --"containment"--. This proposal is intended to contribute to the theoretical-political field of discussion, in which it is situated, on the paradox between the centrality of (socio-community) care, for the production of social welfare, and its insufficient recognition in economic, social, and political terms. Methodologically, the paper portrays the challenges --for social research-- of reading and interpreting practices when co-presenciality is technologically mediated. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Fiscal credibility plays an important role in creating favorable scenarios for investment and economic growth. Adequate management of public finances can be decisive in the perception of country risk and the attraction of foreign capital. The aim of this paper is to build a fiscal credibility index and evaluate its impact on investment expectations in Colombia for the 2005-2019 period. Using monthly data on fiscal credibility, investment expectations, and a set of control variables, estimates were made using OLS and GMM methods. Robustness tests were performed using impulse-response functions. The findings reveal that fiscal credibility directly influences the investment decisions of private agents, and that local interest rates and international volatility negatively affect investors' expectations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There is much debate around whether labor informality reflects situations of exclusion or whether it constitutes a valuable alternative for those who work in this sector. This paper contributes to the discussion by comparing the characteristics of those who move from the formal to the informal sector with the characteristics of those who remain in formal sector jobs during the 1995-2019 period in Argentina. Multinomial choice models are used for this purpose. The influence of such movements on the variation of wages is also evaluated. Both sets of evidence reveal that the positions in the informal sector, taken as a whole, do not seem to constitute a desirable destination for those who work in the formal sector. However, there is also evidence of heterogeneity in the informal sector, since the profile of those who move to one of its segments -that of employers- is consistent with the idea of voluntariness. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper empirically studies the impact of government quality on foreign direct investment (FDI) inflows in a sample of 46 economies in the 1996-2018 period. In particular, we comparatively examine to what extent quality of government influences FDI inflows in two groups of countries that show relevant differences in their levels of government quality: 33 OECD countries and 13 Latin American countries. Applying panel data methods, we found that institutional quality positively affects FDI in both groups of countries, and the impact is stronger in OECD countries than it is in Latin American countries. This study reveals that the design of public policies that strengthen institutional quality is essential, particularly in Latin American countries with weaker institutions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyzes the influence of backgrounds (i.e., parents' education, observable and non-observable circumstances) on formal educational outcomes for cohorts born between 1955 and 1989 in a developing country: Uruguay. The information is taken from the Longitudinal Survey of Social Protection which contains information on parents, children, and siblings (regardless of cohabitation). Three complementary approaches are analyzed. The percentage of the variance of the years of education explained by each model is used as a summary measure. The father's education explains 28.6% of the total variance and the mother's 29.2%. Based on an equality opportunities approach using a broad set of observable circumstances, this value was estimated at 39.6%. In turn, family and neighborhood contexts shared by siblings were estimated at 63% of the variance of the years of education. The study of the importance of backgrounds has been growing consistently for the last cohorts. No relevant differences were found between men and women. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we analyze the changes in food consumption patterns throughout the lives of five individuals (n=5), one subadult and four adults, found in archaeological sites of El Remate, Bajo los Cardones and Finca Cruz. All of them are associated with the Formative period (ca. 2500 - 1000 years B. P.) and are located in the Quebrada de Amaicha (Tucumán, Argentina). We propose an analysis of the carbon and nitrogen isotopic composition in the dentin of different sections of the same tooth and in different teeth of the five individuals. This approach sheds light on the way in which the characteristics of children's diets affect their adulthood, as well as providing a more inclusive perspective on consumption patterns in the agropastoralist societies of the study area by integrating young individuals into the analysis. Little intravariation and intervariation was found, with a predominance of food resources framed in the C4 photosynthetic pattern. The exception is an individual, probably female, whose diet was based on C3 resources during the first period of life. This could be the result of the existence of a "childhood diet" or of a change in geographic residence, with both areas being isotopically distinguishable. Finally, we illustrate the methodological steps required to reconstruct life histories through the serial study of human dental pieces. This is a novel approach, which has been applied to human remains from the Argentine Northwest for the first time. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With the outbreak and devastating spread of the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic, different forms of containment methods have been implemented across Latin America that have radically and rapidly transformed public health approaches. The purpose of this paper is to provide a preliminary delimitation of the problem of person-to-person accusations and complaints in proximity contexts under the confinement regime in the metropolitan area of Buenos Aires (AMBA). This paper examines three issues: 1) anthropological perspectives on judicialization; 2) the broad-ranging consequences and paradoxical effects that accusations, denunciations, and judicializations have been proven to cause for the well-being, health, and survival of affected individuals and social groups; and 3) the particularities that anthropological work assumes in highly normatized, sanctioned, and criminalized contexts. This article addresses heterogeneous materials: historical background, anthropological arguments, research results, media information, regulations, etc., to analyze the case of the AMBA. Specifically, the text focuses on the practices employed during the months of the initial period of confinement in AMBA, from March 20 to November 9, 2020. This analysis sheds light on the ways in which proximity accusations and allegations lead to the fragmentation of social fabrics, deepen inequalities, and accentuate uncertainty about social responses to possible infection and death. They also compromise and distort epidemiological, preventive, and care strategies. While legal actions of the same type have taken place for other ailments and epidemics, proximity accusations and allegations, in this case, are understood as enabled and legitimized strategies that express and translate deep transformations --at the micro-scale of isolation-- of the links between public health, legislation and security forces in social confinement regimes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective/Context: The year 2021 marked the 50th anniversary of the Regional Indigenous Council of Cauca (CRIC), the first organization established in Colombia to fight for territorial and identity rights of Indigenous Peoples. From a historical perspective and proposing an approach related to the concept of resistance, this paper focuses on how this latter has been expressed through this indigenous movement since its inception. Methodology: The information and reflections presented here are based on a corpus of bibliographical and documentary sources, as well as on a follow-up of the political mobilizations of indigenous peoples in situ, in the media, digital social networks, official minutes, and other statements. Conclusions: The analysis reveals the persistence of indigenous resistance and an expansion of the project that accompanies it, from a struggle for land and territory to efforts carried out along with other actors and social organizations to create a "better world." Originality: The originality of the article consists of an analysis of the political dimensions of the resistance of Indigenous Peoples, which are still little known. In addition, it offers a novel approach to stress the intersection of (sub) national and global dynamics in which the demands of Indigenous Peoples and issues related to Colombia's society and the whole world converge. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines the scientific literature on return migration in Colombia that assesses and sheds light on the importance of this phenomenon in terms of its empirical contributions, in the first two decades of the present century. To do so, four dimensions of analysis are used as a starting point: what and who are the returnees; where they return to —the territorial scale of return from an ontological viewpoint, specifically, the territorial dimension—; the reasons for return; and the public policies of return. The bibliographic review and selection strategy was undertaken in four phases: 1) bibliographic search in indexing and abstracting systems (SIR): ALAP-OIM, DOAJ, Redalyc, Scopus, Seriunam, Clacso, Clase, LatAM-Estudios, Redib, SciELO Colombia, Biblat, Publindex-Colombia, Cepal and Web of Science; 2) purging of duplicate studies; 3) eligibility; and 4) specific selection. The total number of papers located was 424. Of these, a total of 127 were selected according to the inclusion-exclusion and methodological evaluation criteria. Despite the progress made, we concluded that there is a lack of studies on return migration in areas such as family, multidimensional reintegration, transnationalism, and political participation. There are also few studies that address current return from Venezuela, making it difficult to design policies to manage the phenomenon. Finally, the originality of this article consists in the dimensions of the analysis of return and its temporality. This in the light of a methodological procedure using grounded theory, in which each scientific text constituted a heuristic and hermeneutic unit of comparative analysis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The long-lasting consistency of a regulatory framework is essential for the proper functioning of incentives, particularly in industries such as electricity generation, with high sunk costs where different schemes have been developed to guarantee a long-term supply. In this respect, the instability of the regulatory framework can both impede the proper functioning of such incentives and, on occasion, violate the legitimate expectations of the agents involved. The purpose of this paper is to study the stability of the regulatory framework in terms of the long-term incentive mechanism for power generation applied in Colombia, known as "Cargo por Confiabilidad." The findings of this paper suggest the independence of the regulatory agency must be strengthened and that the instability of the regulatory framework has generated redistributions of income among agents. This study observes that among these agents, the best-organized pressure groups benefit the most from such a redistribution of incomes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective/context: this paper is the result of a doctoral research that sought to analyze the trajectories of black and white railroad workers in the interior of the State of São Paulo, Brazil, in the cities of Rio Claro, São Carlos, and Araraquara between 1930 and 1970. The research focused on a reading of how railroad companies in the 20th century, in addition to interconnecting regions and bringing workers of different races closer together, influenced their ascension and mobility in the economic, political, social, and cultural fields in relation to other workers of the period. It aimed to analyze the trajectories and memories of these workers, to understand how black and white workers related to each other considering race and class issues. Methodology: based on the methodological concepts of memory and oral history, approximately 75 former Companhia Paulista railway workers were interviewed. Direct and indirect documentary sources such as books, articles, period newspapers, and other printed materials were also used in the research. Originality: the article advances the analyses presented in terms of possible intersections impregnated by oral history under the criterion of ethnicity and their position occupied in the world of work. Conclusions: the idea of a railway family was adapted to the myth of racial democracy, in its double meaning: although internal conflicts may exist, recognition as railway workers opened the way for all of the workers in the environment outside of work. The ambiguity between color and class coexisted in the trajectory of the interviewees as a relationship of implication, not of causality. The reduction of distances by means of informal cohabitation had an emotional background that was present even in those relationships that would be more characteristically impersonal. The fetish of equality among railroad workers functioned as a mediator in class relations, which contributed to the fact that conflictive situations frequently did not result in factual conflicts, but in conciliations within the railroad company. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article aims to address the changing relationship between waste and urban space in Buenos Aires. Specifically, based on an analysis of the period between 1976 and 2019, it seeks to understand the way in which cartoneros (waste pickers) are inscribed today. By studying the productive role played by frontiers as sites of conflict, this paper presents three movements in which borders trace over waste. This mapping reveals the place of the cartoneros as important actors in a network that links waste management, the production of urban space, and a certain way of organizing the labor force. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective/Context: The internal capability of state agencies is a necessary condition and predicts their strategic capacity to achieve long-term industrial development goals. The paper characterizes the Ministry of Industry of Argentine (2009-2015) in order to see the extent to which its hierarchization was reflected in the variation of its capabilities, which are corroborated in two fundamental dimensions: a) public spending, and b) the availability of personnel and their quality. Methodology: The research is qualitative. Official documents (budget laws, financial management reports, and reports from public administration personnel) were examined, semi-structured interviews were conducted with 15 officials of different hierarchies within the organization, and the Bureaucratic Flexibility Index was applied to account for the behavior of the variables associated with the analysed dimensions. Conclusions: Evidences suggests a hierarchization process with a hollowing out of the state agency that is expressed by the low level of spending and the fact it has the smaller and more flexible staff structure (high level of staff mobility) of the national public administration. Originality: The paper provides robust variables and empirical references that inform central attributes of state structures in peripheral contexts. In particular, it tests the usefulness of the Bureaucratic Flexibility Index that captures the degree of staff retention and the accumulation of expertise of the agencies. The Index can be replicated in comparative studies in other national and sub-national contexts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents a growth strategy that, modifying the distribution of income in favor of wage earners, allows boosting aggregate demand, productivity and employment. This proposal is essential for the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals, especially those related to growth, innovation, employment, and distribution in Colombia, opposed to the model that has historically been applied and that implied an exclusive growth. To build this alternative vision, the paper presents a renewed theoretical proposal based on the concept of inclusive growth, and by means of Structural Equations Modeling (SEM), the hypothesis that the concentration of the productive structure generates distortions in the economic, innovation process and job creation. This makes necessary to adopt policies focused on increasing productivity and diversifying the productive structure. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective/Context: In this research we analyze the change in heterosexual masculinities in Argentina and Mexico during the second half of the twentieth century with a special focus on working class men who, while playing the insertive role in sex with maricas, jotas and gays, still considered themselves and were perceived by their peers to be straight. The evidence shows that, although sex between maricas and young heterosexual men occurred frequently, it was not stigmatized by straight peers, nor did it erode the perceived heterosexuality of these young men in any way. Methodology: In order to explore the representation of sexual activities from the point of view of those involved we conducted in-depth interviews and used a wide range of historical evidence, such as autobiographical literature, ethnographies, and judicial records, materials that have not previously been analyzed together. In addition to discussing self-representations, this paper also analyzes the ways in which scholars and activists from the time period perceived sex between men and the associated identitites. Originality: This paper rests on a comparative approach that helps to reconstruct regional historic and social processes in the midterm. This is the first paper that studies the problem from these straight young men's point of view, based on a novel and diverse corpus. Conclusions: In opposition to the prevailing analysis, this paper develops a counter-intuitive hypothesis: given that sex between men did not deprive heterosexual men of their identity and, instead, it constituted a way of reaffirming their masculinity, these sexual activities between men cannot be categorized as homosexual. On the contrary, the very performance of same-sex sexuality served to shape heterosexuality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper empirically analyzes the incidence of productive diversification on regional performance in Argentina between 2008 and 2018. Assuming that spillovers between productive activities requires proximity in the knowledge base, a distinction is made between related and unrelated productive diversification, which are estimated using entropy indicators. Econometric estimations are performed to explain the dynamics of employment and wages (as proxy for productivity) by the levels of related and unrelated regional diversification. Findings suggest that related diversification has a positive impact on employment and wage dynamics at the regional level, while unrelated diversification contributes to maintaining regional employment during macroeconomic contractions. No empirical evidence is found supporting that general purpose technology (such as mechanical engineering and ICTs) enhances the effects of related diversification on regional performance. It is observed, however, that the software sector enables the presence of externalities between technologically distant activities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In a decade of low TFP --factorial total productivity-- in Latin America, the paper shows evidence of the low level of TFP due to the degree of technical inefficiency of companies in the Peruvian productive sector case. For this, the technical efficiency indices of 116 875 companies (83 271 formal and 33 604 informal) distributed in 25 regions and ten productive sectors (agriculture, livestock, agriculture, mining, fishing, manufacturing, construction, commerce, hotels and restaurants, and the rest are non-governmental services). The estimates yielded a general average efficiency index for the regions and sectors of Peru of 37.94 --in other words, the total product of the companies would multiply by 2.6 without requiring additional productive factors--. This figure suggests that government or company interventions that induce technically efficient behaviors in production can contribute to increasing the TFP of the economy, probably at lower cost and time. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores in detail the transfer and investment components of the General Budget of the Nation, whose composition is complex to evaluate due to the nature and variety of its items. For the study of these items, the literature on the political economy of the budget and the budget process in Colombia is considered. The transfer and investment items represent about 60 % of the General Budget and have great inflexibility of public spending, due to the diversity of appropriations with legal backing, especially in the transfer's item. The investment is made up of a wide range of social programs, subsidies, and infrastructure projects, which in some cases correspond to commitments acquired in previous terms, through the so-called future terms. The rigidity of the budget deepens with the frequent approval of laws that generate additional spending on a temporary or permanent basis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines the presence of students from the National University among the readers of the National Library during the first half of the 1870s. Although some contemporary observers considered the library to be inoperative, the institution was an active agent in the circulation of books in Bogotá: a space of student sociability and a place of university knowledge. Methodology: First, the paper examines the institutional relationship between the library and the university. Then, it characterizes the students and their readings at the library. Finally, it analyzes the recorded readings in relation to the programs of courses taught at the National University, the academic performance of students, the presentation of public speeches, and library attendance by students from regions other than Bogotá and its surroundings. Originality: In a scenario of educational reforms promoted by liberal governments during the 1870s, the National Library was described as “anachronistic” and “useless” by the agents themselves of the nineteenth century. These critical judgments have become a commonplace in historiography. The analysis of new documents, especially library reader records—an unpublished source—, enriches the field of reading appropriation and offers empirical elements that vindicate the institution’s centrality at a time of political and ideological struggles. Conclusions: The article demonstrates that young students at the National University used books from the public repository in academic spaces of professional training, which calls into question the idea of its inoperative character as well as the reasons that originated this liberal criticism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper is based on the results of a socio-pedagogical study in a public secondary school situated in a context of urban poverty in the Metropolitan Region of Buenos Aires, Argentina. A qualitative methodology is used to recover elements of ethnography and audiovisual production through a documentary film workshop. This is a collaborative effort that explores audiovisual language as a research practice that allows us to use different forms of narration. We reflect on the students’ ways of saying when they take the camera. Our hypothesis is that the way in which students construct their narratives constitutes a narrative that is told by action and that is driven by and through images. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent years have witnessed a growing interest in examining the dynamics of the legitimation of science in light of the debate over the public undermining of its authority as a discourse of truth. This article explores the questions raised by this debate based on the analysis of a controversy recorded in the framework of ethnographic fieldwork in a research laboratory. This controversy pits scientific facts relevant to policy decisions about children’s cognitive development against each other. From the native’s point of view, the dispute revolves around two issues: (a) the misrepresented communication of knowledge about poverty and childhood development by outreach institutions, multilateral agencies, and various health and neuroscience professionals; and (b) the political use of such statements and knowledge to guide local level government actions. What is reconstructed throughout the paper, is the way in which the set of researchers mobilizes scientific evidence to dispute factual claims presented in the media as true. This is done by considering the dynamics of legitimacy that unfold around this controversy. Following the perspective of co-production, the analysis shows that the legitimacy of scientific knowledge goes beyond the proof of its truth and involves a plurality of contested perspectives in which both the weight of evidence and the different political imaginaries that the agents sustain come into play. This plurality exposes the inseparable relationship between epistemic, social, and normative aspects, while the ethnography highlights that science cannot be separated from society and politics. Science does not only serve to inform political decision-making; it is also produced in response to and in continuity with public discussion and acts in the co-production of a sense of the political and the social. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of this article is to analyze the practices of resistance and protests in the prisons of Córdoba in Argentina, and to reflect on the media representations of these practices. This article focuses on the social and historical constructions that have been reified over time in the media about a certain narrative on prisons, prisoners, and riots. The purpose of this paper is to propose local perspectives and discuss with the exclusivity of the riot as the only practice of resistance installed in the social imaginary. Accordingly, the native meanings are approached in their own context of use, through the analysis of situations in which the actors actualize their representations of their own social world. Following this intention, an ethnography with persons deprived of their liberty and their relatives is used as a starting point. It is concluded that local perceptions of prison protests do not necessarily coincide with the meanings attributed to them by the media. n this analysis, it is of interest to illustrate how the subjectivities historically constructed through the images that circulate in the media about prisons influence the constitution of the punitivist imaginary in the current situation of Preventive and Compulsory Social Isolation (ASPO) to tackle the Covid-19 pandemic. Conducted between July and October 2020, this work contributes to the deepening and complication of studies on the practices of protests and resistance in prisons, through the analysis of the meanings assigned to them by the protagonists. This text proposes a questioning, from an academic perspective, of the social classifications of persons deprived of their liberty in the media representations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective/Context: Big Data is a novel and promising methodological approach to acquire and analyze information from an extensive range of scientific disciplines. Despite the fact that Big Data has wide dissemination and acceptance in different scientific disciplines, its use in the field of Global Studies is still incipient. Taking this into account, this paper discusses the methodological challenges and presumable contributions that Big Data offers to Global Studies. Methodology: The starting point for this paper is the critical analysis of the conceptual bases of Big Data and its relationships with Global Studies. So, this paper proposes the possible applications of Big Data in the Global Studies contrasting some key concept. In this way, the conceptual elements that define Data Science are examined and compared with the paradigmatic conceptions of Global Studies. On these conceptual fundaments, the article discusses links, limits and, scopes of Big Data and how it can contribute to Global Studies. Conclusions: This paper concludes that technological tools based on Big Data can enrich our understanding of global phenomena only if we position ourselves in a critical attitude that recognizes that the choice of data and its analysis are decisions embedded in historical and social contexts. In this way, as with any other methodological approach, Big Data is only a partial way to obtain and analyze information. Originality: The originality of this paper is to shed critical light on the scope and limits of Big Data, beyond a positivist vision of scientific knowledge. In other words, this article recognizes the biases behind the supposed neutral explanations regarding the use of techniques based on Big Data. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective/context: This paper is the result of Colombia Internacional's call to reflect on Global Studies from the South. It is a critical theoretical contribution aiming at putting aside the binary opposing the global and the international. Instead, it seeks to think about them as mutually constitutive. Methodology: Through a bibliographical revision that inquires into its most important texts, it argues that Global Studies has as raison d'être a narrow conception of International Relations and of the international. The article holds that the latter is conceived as equal to interstate. This way, the global emerges in opposition to the state and linked to global civil society. The paper proposes Michel Foucault's concept of governmentality as a tool to elude this binary. Governmentality is globalised and presented both as an analytical framework and as a liberal government practice. This way, it allows to think a power decentred from the state, as well as exercised in multiple directions, and not in opposition to civil society but through it. Conclusion: It concludes that governmentality allows conceiveing both the governmentalised state and civil society as products of liberalism understood as a globalised govermental practice, thus erasing the binary on which the emergence of Global Studies is based. Originality: The paper is a contribution from the Foucauldian perspective on governmentality to the debate between International Relations and Global Studies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective/context: This paper inquires about the process of emergence of a working-class community in the port of Buenos Aires, resulting from actions by workers and inhabitants of the workingclass neighborhood at the beginning of the 20th century. Originality: At the crossroads of diverse historiographies (social, cultural and political history), this paper proposes a joint regard at the labor dimension, worker disputes, carnival celebrations and electoral participation, and to use this multiplicity of events and experiences to think about the emergence of a radicalized worker community, with a particular identity gestated in the mobilization during a specific time at the beginning of the 20th century. Methodology: The months from late 1903 to early 1904 were an important juncture in the port district, and based on a diverse set of documents (commercial, neighborhood, trade and left-wing newspapers, news magazines, police reports, photographs, among others), this paper reconstructs the worker experience in three settings converging in the summer months: protest, carnival and legislative polls. At the same time, it ponders the territorial dimension of community configuration and the key places that formed the backdrop to a story of protest, celebration, and elections. Conclusions: This analysis shows us that worker sociabilities around the port consolidated a community based on family, corporate, partisan, neighborhood and worker solidarities, in times of labor, political and festive mobilization, and of radicalized confrontation with the State and with corporations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective/context: This paper analyses the relations between 19th century travelling naturalists and the indigenous inhabitants of Brazilian Amazonia. The region was a favourite among travellers during the latter half of the 19th century. On their travel books, naturalists reported not only on local Nature, but also on local inhabitants and their contributions to the expeditions, making them valuable sources for understanding the interactions between them and the natives. Originality: The originality of the paper rests in the use of a diverse set of primary sources, in the form of 19th century travel books. The article contributes to the current historiography on Natural History expeditions while aiming specifically at the relations between naturalists and the indigenous inhabitants of the region. Methodology: The analysis relies on primary sources, which consist mainly of the travel books written and published by some of the most well-known 19th century travelling naturalists that visited the Brazilian Amazonia. It is from their personal reports and observations that we aim to understand, on the one hand, how these foreign naturalists interacted with the local indigenous inhabitants and, on the other, how the natives were able contribute to the scientific expeditions led by European naturalists. Conclusions: It is safe to conclude that the indigenous inhabitants of Brazilian Amazonia were a constant presence during 19th century expeditions in the region. The interactions between naturalists and natives, sometimes mediated by a third party, were often essential to the success of these expeditions. The principal contribution of the indigenous inhabitants, as stated by the naturalists themselves, was the aid in the collection of specimens. The natives' expertise on the habits and habitats of animals and plants, paired with their hunting and to navigational skills through the region's complex river system, seem to have been a subject of admiration as well as a source of information and specimens. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the context of the Venezuelan migratory crisis, recent opinion polls show an increase in discriminatory or xenophobic attitudes towards the Venezuelan population in Colombia. This paper presents an adjusted conceptual framework to understand the Venezuelan migrant crisis without appealing to the traditional concepts of race or language. Using a qualitative approach, we also study migrants' perceptions of discrimination, in their interaction with host communities and the Colombian state. Evidence suggests that while Venezuelan migrants interviewed do not express suffering direct discrimination generally, they or their fellow conational constantly encounter indirect discrimination. This type of discrimination is highly mediated by social status and economic resources and is observed when interacting with the state or by stereotypes pushed forward by the media. Simply put, this means that apparently neutral norms or processes, involve more difficulties for Venezuelans simply because they are Venezuelan. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Previous research shows that irregular immigration can worsen perceptions of security. However, the real effect of irregular immigration on crime rates remains unknown. In this paper, we analyze the effect of irregular immigration inflows on crime in the recipient country. For this, we build a dataset of Venezuelan irregular immigration in Colombia and crime rates at municipal level between 2016 and 2018. Our specification is based on an IV strategy using the exogenous variation in distance to the borderline as an instrument for immigration. We find that the immigration shock caused a slight increase in two types of theft in the short run and no significative changes in violent crime. These results are robust when using different instrumental variables, applying special autocorrelation corrections, and including controls for police capacity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective/Context: This article analyses the causes and consequences of the transition from Marxism to post-Marxism in Ernesto Laclau's work by establishing four permanent themes throughout his oeuvre that are scenarios of this shift: the question of the constitution of society, a theory of the political subject, the issue of political strategy and the question of the project. Methodology: The research strategy envisages genealogical archaeology. On the one hand, archaeology allows a synchronic analytical procedure to study the different stages in the author's work. On the other hand, genealogy enables a diachronic study of the treatment of the four major themes in the successive theoretical interventions. Conclusions: This paper shows how the ontological rupture affects the theory of the subject, the strategic conception, and the position of the future. The category of hegemony and discourse intervene in a new conceptual matrix that admits the infinity of the social as a historical and theoretical condition. From this movement, developments in rhetoric and psychoanalysis offer tools for investigating the three theoretical problems, and the change of epoch opens up a reflection on the horizon of the democratic future. Originality: The article contributes to the knowledge of Ernesto Laclau's proposal, explaining the conditions of his post-Marxist evolution and establishing conditions for a dialogue in the field of critical theory that focuses on the four problems: order, subjects, strategy, and the future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]