Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Review Method: Peer Reviewed
Abstract: In this paper I test the claims that government decentralization can strengthen democracy by considering one form of decentralization: the decentralization of health service administration to community boards. Based on comparison of four poor communities in Peru, two of which experienced community-based decentralization of health service administration, and two similar communities that did not, I evaluate whether or not community-based decentralization initiatives do indeed promote or strengthen social capital and local democratic practices.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Review Method: Peer Reviewed
Abstract: I explore the state’s utilization of rape as a tactic of terrorism and torture during states of emergency in the cases of both apartheid South Africa (1950-1990) and Peru during the height of Leftist insurgency, from 1980 until 1992. I propose that this rape is part of a strategy to maintain the subordination of disadvantaged social groups. In both South Africa and Peru, agents of the state used rape to punish women who associated with, who were related to, or who were themselves insurgents; to obtain information about insurgencies; to demonstrate the regime’s power; and to cower an entire disempowered ethnicity or class by raping a few of the girls or women belonging to the group. Rape is, of course, not documented as an official state policy by either government.

Publication Type: Proceeding

Publication Type: Proceeding
Abstract: This paper is a comparative study of Fujimori of Peru and Chandrababu Naidu of India, and their redistributive programs. The paper traces similarities between the two leaders policy strategies, and narrates the experience of the implementation of their respective development programs - FONCODES and Velugu. The paper argues that 'neo populists' like Fujimori and Chandrababu Naidu are capable of reaching the poor, but run the risk of making the poor worse off.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: The use of indigenous identity in political discourse to appeal to the masses in the current political debate in Latina America is called “the indigenization of the political discourse.” This papers aims to unpack the relationship between indigenous identity and nationalism, citizenship, ethnicity and race, by analyzing two moments of the recent Peruvian political life. The first one refers to an electoral moment, when Alejandro Toledo run for the presidency and took office in July 2001. The second moment corresponds to a non-electoral path, when a military troop captured a police station as leverage to ask for President Toledo’s resignation, in January 2005. By examining newspaper articles, speeches, and statements of political organizations, I conclude that political leaders are reclaiming the indigenous identity and cultural past, because they foresee both as crucial for Peru’s development, and yet in a different way. For Toledo, to “incorporate” the poor and indigenous population (always neglected in the Peruvian history) it is necessary to democratize the society. In turn, for Humala, the true Peruvians i.e. indigenous, have to regain control over the country, taken away by the Spanish colonial power (in 1532). Ultimately, these cases illuminate the nature of the Peruvian nationalist project as being in the making, where a great deal of the population remains excluded and constrained in their exercise of rights.