James W. McGuire

Social Policy and Mortality Decline in East Asia and Latin America

Abstract Since 1960, Chile and Costa Rica have improved life expectancy and infant survival as much as South Korea and Taiwan, despite growing more slowly, suffering more income poverty, and having more unequally distributed incomes. This paper analyzes the origins and impact of the publicly-funded social services that allowed Chile and Costa Rica to achieve rapid reductions in the risk of early death, despite relatively poor performance on income-related indicators; and explores how South Korea and Taiwan managed to achieve similar progress at reducing premature mortality, despite making less deliberate efforts to fund social services for the poor.

Labor union strength and human development in East Asia and Latin America

Ordinary least squares multiple regression is used to test the impact of labor movement strength on growth, income distribution, and premature mortality in sixteen East Asian and Latin American countries. Labor movement strength is measured by a new index based on information from the International Labour Organisation. Controlling for other relevant variables, the Labor Strength Index is found to have a weak positive effect on growth, a weak negative effect on income equality and on infant survival and life expectancy levels, and a strong negative effect on infant survival and life expectancy progress. One reason for the negative overall effect of labor strength on human development may be that unions, together with actors representing better-off urban groups, often induce governments to enact urbanbiased and formal sector-biased policies that contribute to the neglect or impoverishment of the rural poor and shanty-town dwellers.

Political regime and social performance

The association between political regime form and social performance, measured by the infant mortality rate, is explored using time-series cross-sectional regression analysis of 155–180 countries observed annually from 1972 to 2007. Controlling for other factors likely to affect infant mortality, democracies are found to have lower infant mortality than authoritarian regimes, and long-term democratic experience is found to matter more than short-term democratic practice. Among authoritarian regime types, one-party regimes have lower infant mortality than military or limited multiparty regimes, which have lower infant mortality than monarchies.

Development Policy and Its Determinants in East Asia and Latin America

A policy-focused human capital approach to development, incorporating industrial policy but stressing land reform, education, and labor-intensive production, is used to explain why South Korea and Taiwan have developed more successfully since 1960 than Argentina, Brazil, or Mexico. The policy-focused human capital approach is contrasted to free-market and cultural-values approaches.

Democratic governance and social inequality

Introduction: Globalization, Social Inequality, and Democracy - B. Lamounier. THINKING ABOUT DEMOCRATIC GOVERNANCE. Democracy, Inequality, and the Reconstitution of Politics - S. Friedman. Progress and Poverty Revisited: Toward Construction of a Statist Third Way - T.J. Lowi. A Clash of Ideologies: International Capitalism and the State in the Wake of the Asian Crisis - J. Rocamora. CASE STUDIES. Toward a New Approach to Welfare Policy in South Africa: Building Assets in Poor Communities - X. Mangcu. Democracy and Consolidation in Contemporary Latin America: Current Thinking and Future Challenges - J. Hartlyn. Globalization, Social Inequality, and Democratic Governance in South Korea - C. Moon and J. Yang. CONCLUSION. Toward a New Economic Paradigm: Crafting a Research Agenda for the 21st Century - B. Lamounier, S. Friedman, and J.S. Tulchin.

Peronism without Peron: Unions, Parties, and Democracy in Argentina

1. Peronism, party institutionalization, and democracy 2. Sectoral elites and political parties before Peron 3. Peronism and its legacy 4. Peronism, proscription, and the rise of Augusto Vandor 5. Vandor versus Peron 6. Revolution, restoration, and repression 7. The rise and fall of renewal Peronism 8. Free-market reform and political shenanigans 9. Distributive conflict, party institutionalization, and democracy Notes Index.