State Density in Latin America

A territorial perspective

Rodrigo Rodrigues-Silveira

How to understand the Latin American State beyond its containers, but using them

as analytical lenses?

State's territorial imprint

But, density of what?

The State Density Index

Peruvian UNDP office (2009) created an aggregative index with five State outputs:

 

1. Identification (national IDs or birth certificates)

2. Healthcare (doctors per 10 thou. inhabitants)

3. Education (net secondary enrollment rate)

4. Sanitation (HHs with both piped water and sewage)

5. Infrastructure (HHs with access to electricity)

Our proposal

A. Tune the index a little bit

1. Using individuals instead of households

2. Decomposing the index into some societal categories

           - location (urban / rural)

           - sex (female / male)

3. Using South American second administrative level data as reference for the computation of scores (window for comparison)

 

B. Check the results by

1. Correlating with other socioeconomic variables

2. Contrasting to the literature on L.A. State Building

3. Contrasting to the literature on Subnational authoritarianism

Results

1. South America as window for comparison:

 

- allows us to frame the results in the debate on State Building and Subnational authoritarianism in L.A.

- allows the comparison of political units beyond national institutional frameworks

- coherent with other socioeconomic indicators

 

2. Socioeconomic spatial segmentation:

 

- Urban/rural divide

- Small gender gap, but more pronounced on certain regions

 

 

 

 

Next steps

Refine the empirical analysis

 

Select some countries and analyze the topics 1,2,4, and 5 of our methodological "billboard".

 

Test for the effect of time in the measurement of State Density

Thanks for your attention!

Comments and suggestions are needed!!!