1 SOCIAL EFFECTS OF NEOLIBERALISM IN LATIN AMERICA (The 90´s) South-South Institute IDEAS-CLACSO-CODESRIA Bangkok – nov.2014 Laura Tavares Soares (FLACSO-Brazil)

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SOCIAL EFFECTS OF SOCIAL EFFECTS OF

NEOLIBERALISM NEOLIBERALISM

IN LATIN AMERICAIN LATIN AMERICA

(The 90´s)(The 90´s)

South-South Institute IDEAS-CLACSO-CODESRIA

Bangkok – nov.2014Laura Tavares Soares

(FLACSO-Brazil)

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Panorama of the Social Situation in Latin America

The most important manifestation of the social subject in Latin America is the social inequality. Its

constitution possesses historical roots that space from colonialism and, in some countries as Brazil, slavery;

political roots, linked to the deep conservatism of elite maintainers of the economical and political power; and economical roots, certain for a pattern of late,

outlying and dependent capitalist development, whose economical model was always its own concentrator and generator of inequalities.

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Those roots combine amongst themselves and their structural components if they reproduce

along the history of the latin american countries.

Besides its structural configuration, the analysis of the social inequality in Latin America also

needs to take in consideration the impact that the different historical, political and economical conjunctures they had on that deeply unequal

social base.

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The own inequality possesses several expressions in Latin America with a common line: the bad distribution and the correspondent concentration of the income; of the

productive resources; of the earth; of the goods and services; of the job.

Their manifestations feel in the territorial and population extent. Its geography presents great regional contrasts

and urban-rural differences. Several countries of the area, like Brazil, still possess

areas and population groups in situations characterized as indigence, exalts or poverty.

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When analyzing the recent evolution of the social

panorama in Latin America we can identify two

great movements:

reproduction of social inequalities and

widespread (extensive) pauperization of latin

american population,

configuring a social picture that can implicate

in tragic choices from the point of view of

social politics.

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Of the point of view of the evolution of the

poverty, CEPAL concludes that there was an

interruption than she calls "positive tendency""positive tendency"

of the first eight years of the decade.

In most of the South American countries GDP

stagnated or it was reduced, as well as they

increased the taxes of open unemployment

and they reduced the real remunerations.

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In that way, there was a worsening of the incidence of the poverty in the area, with the

forecast of 220 million poor people for 2002. In proportional terms, CEPAL shows that, at the end of the nineties, about 44% of the Latin-American population was in poverty situation (percentile higher than the one of 1980) and about 19% in

indigency situation. Even in countries as Chile (considered the

"model of economical growth" of Latin America), the poverty stayed stagnated around the 6%.

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When establishing a direct relationship between growth of GDP and reduction of the poverty (no evidenced in good part of our countries) CEPAL

calculates that to reduce the poverty in halfreduce the poverty in half would be necessary a growth of GDP per capita (according to the

number of people) no inferior to 2,3% a year up to 2015 (year for which the goal of reduction of the

poverty was "pushed"); and to reduce the percentile of no indigent poorreduce the percentile of no indigent poor

people in half would be necessary a growth of the order from 3% a year to the countries with larger

"relative development" and of 4% for the other savings of the area.

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Adopting more qualitative criteria, CEPAL presents researches of opinion where was possible to find that

growing percentile of the population declare to be submitted to risk conditions, insecurity and without

defense. As causes, the negative evolution of the job market appears; the retreat from the action of the

State (for the first time making it explicit in an official report); new institutional forms for the access to the

social services (before considered "virtuous”); deterioration of the traditional expressions of social

organization; and difficulties of the personal computer and of the small company to obtain an operation to

project them economically and socially.

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Besides the previous statement on the move back from the State, CEPAL recognizes that the public public

politics of focalization of the social expensepolitics of focalization of the social expense in some cases reduced the load on the public

budget of the benefits and services for the high strata and portions of the medium strata, to the same that it did with that medium and medium-it did with that medium and medium-

low (of the low middle class) sections in situations low (of the low middle class) sections in situations of occupational crisis and of decrease of the of occupational crisis and of decrease of the income if they were forced to pay the cost of income if they were forced to pay the cost of

those services directlythose services directly..

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Parallel, and of agreement to its payment capacity, they saw each other affected for the decrease of the covering and of the quality of decrease of the covering and of the quality of the social services, taking the risk besides them the social services, taking the risk besides them being deprived totally of the same ones for the being deprived totally of the same ones for the loss of derived income of the work loss.loss of derived income of the work loss.

In other words, in the enthusiasm to focus on the poverty, they ended for not including all the "old" ones poor and they left the "new" ones out also poor.

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When treating the theme of vulnerability, the explanation is that the scarce (escasso) competitive powercompetitive power and the weakness in terms of the physical and human physical and human

capitalcapital of the small businesses translates himself in that more than 50% of the busy ones are affected especially for the habitual oscillations of the latin

americans savings. In those conditions, most of AL'S homes are exposed

to important degrees of social vulnerability, recommending that the governments reduce those

vulnerabilities through politics that assist to the most affected population segments by the crisis.most affected population segments by the crisis.

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A recurring contradiction exists among recognizing that the problem is not residual but of most of the

population and to recommend politics (again focused) for the most affected, that, in the case, their second

own indicators, it is treated of most of the Latin-American population! This contradiction increases when it is recognized that, in spite of the "poor"

groups they are (especially the ones that conform with what is called hard poverty cores) those that suffer that larger social vulnerability intensely, in the last in the last

two decades the poor "no-indigent" and the medium two decades the poor "no-indigent" and the medium sections suffered abrupt variations of its incomesections suffered abrupt variations of its income, ,

generating a generating a growing rotation of the houses growing rotation of the houses (domiciles) (domiciles) around around poverty situations poverty situations..

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Whenever recommendations of politics are introduced, the sensation is of a to "go and to come":

now recognizing that the focalization of the social expense leaves out impoverished medium sections,

now just recommending sectorial politics for the most affected. In a clear evidence of that ambiguity, the

statement is verified that once overcomed the crisis of the eighties in many extents, , it would be important to it would be important to

recover some degree of universality of the social recover some degree of universality of the social politicspolitics, especially in areas as sensitive as health. In

other words, it is recognized (finally!) that there was loss of universality of the social politics and that in

some areas (as in Health) the universalization is indispensable.

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Evidently the report doesn't move forward in the diagnosis on that crucial theme, omitting, for instance,

that the privatizationprivatization in those social areas denominated "sensitive" brought enormous damages for the great

majority of the Latin-American population, increasing in gigantic proportions what CEPAL calls "vulnerability" and

that we would call a brutal increase of the social brutal increase of the social inequality in the access to essential services on the part inequality in the access to essential services on the part of those that can and the ones that cannot pay directly of those that can and the ones that cannot pay directly for themfor them. And what is still more serious, but not made

explicit, is the fact that if there was a retraction of the a retraction of the social expense with universalitsocial expense with universalityy,

the privatization of the social services was made (and still is) at the costs of public resourcespublic resources.

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Another present theme is the Social Bedding (stratification), due to the deep changes in the job market. When examining the

medium income of the busy Latin-Americans, combined with the nature of the occupation, it verifies the appearance of a "new

occupational bedding" that didn't favor neither a social mobility, much less a distribution of the income. Other than that, the

study of CEPAL concludes that 75% of the busy ones in Latin 75% of the busy ones in Latin America (in other words, those that still work) possess America (in other words, those that still work) possess

a medium income that is not enough to remove the a medium income that is not enough to remove the poverty of their families!poverty of their families!

It’s noticeable that included in this first study (regarding the period of 1999/2000) the eight countries: Brazil, Chile, Colombia,

Costa Rica, El Salvador, Mexico, Panama and Venezuela, it still doesn't includes Argentina.

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Another verification, very important in the famous debate about the relationship between Education and WorkEducation and Work

(where the EducationEducation stopped being right of citizenship and it became condition sine qua non for the

"competitiveness"), is what CEPAL defines as educational depreciation as the "incoherence" among the expansion of abundant labor offer with larger education level and

the "incapacity" of the savings for it to absorb it "appropriately". In previous studies, CEPAL called the

qualified youth phenomenon ““frustration spacesfrustration spaces”, when ”, when entering in the job market, they had to accept an entering in the job market, they had to accept an

inferior work to their qualificationinferior work to their qualification. Add to that the evidences (that will be pointed ahead) that show as the

qualified unemployed that gets work again has to accept worse work conditions and smaller wages.

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Those verifications on the occupational occupational structurestructure and their incomes take CEPAL to

consider the impracticability of the maintenance of middle class societiesmiddle class societies

in Latin America, which means a regression of the tendency of

growth of the medium sections to some countries maintained in the three decades of

the postwar period.

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In the Social Panorama 2000/2001 (see another presentation) CEPAL finally includes a study on the Unemployment in Latin America, already including Argentina in the group of studied countries. The number of unemployed increased the

reason from 10,1% a year, concentrating that increase above all in the period 1997-99. This represented an

increment of more than 10 million dismissed people. The unemployment arrived in 1999 to 8,6% of the workforce:

almost the double of the percentile verified in 1990. In the urban population that phenomenon showed to be still

more serious, with 11% of the workforce. The three larger countries of South America - Argentina, Brazil and Colombia - were responsible for that persistent increase of

unemployment.

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Once again around the diagnosis, CEPAL attributes that phenomenon to the demographic

pressure and the lack of dynamism of the job market to absorb that pressure.

As causes of that “lack of dynamism” are noted the reduction of the role of the State in the

direct generation of workstations, as well as the "restructuring" of the productive

system, particularly in the primary and secondary sections.

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It is verified although the salary reduction tends to lose weight as primary factor of the adjustment of the job market, giving place in a growing way to the destruction of jobs and the decrease for

labor demand. The salary losses that affect the people that are reinstated to the work after a vacating

period would act, in agreement with CEPAL, as a "secondary mechanism" of adjustment in the job

markets, characterized by a growing conformabilityconformability (flexibilityflexibility) of the recruiting and labor dismissal.

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In spite of that division, evidently as it increases the urban unemployment in the second half of the decade, those estimates of salary losses

tend to increase (the example of Uruguay shows that those losses would have arrived to 34% of the

previous wage). Besides, the available antecedents denote a

prolongation of the medium time of vacating, that passed from 4,4 to 5,3 months on average.

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In spite of also affecting the medium sections (where one in each ten people in active age is

unemployed), they are the strata of lower income (as always), the most affected: in 1999

in the 20% of the poorest homes the tax of urban unemployment was of 22,3%: more of

the double of the global tax of 10,6%. The conclusion is that the unemployment,

therefore, continues to be one of the main determinant of the Inequality and of the

Poverty.

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The conclusions on that theme are not very exciting when affirming that THE HIGH LEVEL OF CURRENT

UNEMPLOYMENT IN THE AREA TENDS TO MAINTAIN, given the forecasts of persistence of linked structural factors to the unemployment and a larger slowness in the recovery of the occupation levels after periods of

contraction of the growth. Its largest "volatility", united to the "vulnerability" of the medium and low strata in the destruction periods and to the slow recovery of the job levels, they would

put the need to establish public protection mechanisms (policies) to cover that risk.

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Finally, when working with the tendencies of the distribution of income in the decade of 1990, the verification is that the inequality didn't not just get better as in a good part of the countries

it worsened. The fraction of the income that was with the

40% of the poorest homes continued reduced, locating among 9 and 15% of the total income.

In the 90´s Brazil stayed "champion" in all of the relative requirements to the concentration of income: the distance among the income of the richer 10% with the one of the 40% more poor

was of 32 times (while the average Latin-American was of 19,3 times); the Index of Brazilian Gini was LA'S largest, with 0.64; and Brazil was the only case of LA where, in the decade of 90, more of the half of the population received an inferior income to 50% of

the national medium income.

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Another important evidence in that field of the inequality is that the data confirm that, even in those countries that

got to maintain a high rhythm of "sustained growth", like Chile (considered a “model”, an “example” in LA), the

distribution of income showed, according to CEPAL, a "enormous resistance" to alter its high concentration

degree. In other words, it is once again demonstrated in the path of our countries that is not enough to grow to distribute the income. As added difficulty, the decade of 90 showed that the neoliberal model deepened the concentration

of the income in Latin America. It was one decade, more than "lost" (like they called the 80´s):

it was a decade of retrocession.

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Social Panorama of Latin America 2007

Per capita GDP has grown more in 2003-2007 than at any other time since the 1970s.

ECLAC projections indicate that this trend will continue in 2008 [see after the crisis],[see after the crisis],

which will thus (therefore) be the fifth year in a row (successively) in which per capita GDP has risen

at over 3% per annum. This increase has made further progress in poverty

reduction possible, together with a decline in unemployment.

Some countries have seen improvements in income distribution as well.

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The Social Panorama of Latin America 2007 provides the latest poverty estimates available for

the countries of Latin America.

These estimates indicate that 36.5% of Latin America's population

(195 million people) were poor poor and 13.4% (71 million) were extremely poorextremely poor.

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A number of problems persist, however, and Latin America continues to lag behind other regions in various areas. Levels of social and economic inequality remain extremely high. After rising

sharply during the past decade, social expenditure -measured as a percentage of GDP- has been

levelling off and continues to fall short (be insufficient) in terms of the coverage of existing

social needs. In addition, migratory flows continue to be spurred (stimulated) by unequal levels of

development in various locations and areas within individual countries.

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As noted in the chapter devoted to the subject of poverty, these percentages signal a 3.3% drop in poverty and a 2.0%

decrease in extreme poverty, or indigence, from these indicators’ 2005 levels.

This means that 14 million people escaped from poverty This means that 14 million people escaped from poverty in 2006 and 10 million who had been classified as indigent in 2006 and 10 million who had been classified as indigent

ceased to be soceased to be so. . As a result, the region is well on track to reaching the first Millennium Development Goal target of halving the 1990

extreme poverty rate by 2015. A portion of the progress made in this respect may be accounted for by changes in family composition and in household members’ participation in the labour market.

Countries are therefore urged to develop ways to reconcile care work in the home with gainful (profitable) employment,

increase occupational productivity and improve the targeting of targeting of expenditure on the most vulnerable groupsexpenditure on the most vulnerable groups.

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A preliminary analysis is also undertaken of the problem of residential segregation,

which limits opportunities for learning to live with others under circumstances of inequality.

This type of segregation can hinder (disturb, slow down) access to employment and education,

thereby contributing to the perpetuation of poverty.

This is an issue that calls for a thorough-going review of State action in relation to urban land

management and social housing.

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This chapter concludes with a discussion of the many psycho-social divides

separating the most vulnerable groups from those that are economically better off, which

militate against social cohesionsocial cohesion. It notes that, in order to make progress in overcoming

poverty and achieving social cohesion, multidimensional policies are required that include measures for creating

opportunities that will provide vulnerable groups with greaterexpectations of social mobility, give them greater confidence

in their country’s institutions, and allow them to feel more included and to participate more actively in decision-makingand to participate more actively in decision-making

processes that influence their quality of life.

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In the chapter on social expenditure, the available statistics are examined in the light

of the main social policy challenges facing the region. The discussion of this subject

underscores (emphasizes) the fact that, apart from a few exceptions, public social expenditure has

continued to be accorded a high macroeconomic and fiscal priority, which ensures funding,

stability and greater institutional legitimacy for social policy. Despite the greater effort being

made to finance social policies (especially in the less developed nations), however,

public social spending is still insufficient, and the structure of such expenditure has to constantly bethe structure of such expenditure has to constantly be

adapted to changing risk profiles and social needsadapted to changing risk profiles and social needs. The way in which it is administered

continues to be highly procyclicalhighly procyclical, although in recent years it has not been any more so than the trend of GDP.

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The impact of such expenditure on people’s well-being is analysed on the basis of a

review of various case studies.These studies indicate that the gradual expansion of

coverage increases the increases the progressiveness of spendingprogressiveness of spending on education, that the composition of expenditure

on health services influences its neutrality from the standpoint of considerations of equity,

that the contributory nature of the social security system’s funding makes these expenditures

regressive, and that social assistance is becoming markedly pro-poor as conditional transferas conditional transfer

programmes come into greater and greater useprogrammes come into greater and greater use, although they are not entirely free of leakage although they are not entirely free of leakage issuesissues

(problemas que escapam).

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This analysis underscores the importance of distinguishing among countries based

on the differing phases they have reached in the demographic transition and their labour

markets’ degree of maturity, and a typology is outlined for use in examining the level and

structure of social spending. It is also noted that a far-reaching

(de longo alcance) social contract will be

required in order to overcome the challenges facing the region in relation to

the allocation of the allocation of public social expenditurepublic social expenditure.

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SOCIAL PANORAMA OF LATIN AMERICA 2007

ADVANCES IN POVERTY REDUCTION ADVANCES IN POVERTY REDUCTION AND THE CHALLENGES OF SOCIAL AND THE CHALLENGES OF SOCIAL COHESION

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Social Politics Configuration after Social Politics Configuration after neoliberal reforms in Latin Americaneoliberal reforms in Latin America

Considered by many as a major advance achieved in the XX Century on the capitalist world , the

Welfare State started to be considered a “problem”, even being appointed as the “cause” of all our evils.

From that perspective, it was the “generous expenses” of the Welfare States that caused fiscal deficits of the countries who adopted it; and it was

those “paternalistic” States that stimulated unemployment and fed the “laziness”, preventing a

“healthy” competition between people.

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The discourse of the majority of the Latin American

governments at the 90´s followed the one from

international financing agencies, that situated the

causality of the situation of social crisis by one side

from the economic crisis, e by other,

in the model and application of the so called Welfare

State, characterized by the waste of resources and

lack of efficiency.

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Another position states, in opposition to the previous, that social deterioration is the

consequence of State dismantling, affirming that this policy caused growing polarization in society

between the poor and the rich, with its depth and intensity being modeled by the previous social

situation and by the characteristics of the welfare state institutions, as well as the character of the

social politics implemented so far.

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These neoliberal postulates in the social areaneoliberal postulates in the social area

are, in a nutshell, the following: the welfare state

belongs to the private sector (its “natural” sources

are the family, the community, the private services).

In that way, the State should only intervene when the

necessity of relieving absolute poverty arises and

when producing those services that the private

sector can’t or won’t do it.

It’s proposed, therefore, a Public Benevolence StatePublic Benevolence State

or AssistencialistAssistencialist, in the place of a Welfare State.

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The social rights and society’s obligation to insure them by meanings of public action, as

well as universality, are abolished in the neoliberal ideology.

The strategies to reduce public action on the field the field

of welfare state are theof welfare state are the cutting of socialcutting of social

expensesexpenses, eliminating programs and reducing benefits;

the the focalizationfocalization of expenses, of expenses, meaning its direction towards the so called indigent groups, those of which should “prove” their poverty “prove” their poverty;

the privatizingprivatizing of the services production; and decentralizationdecentralization of public services on the

“local level”“local level”.

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The application of those neoliberal statementsthose neoliberal statements in Latin American countries, unlike the central countries, caused caused

an economic and social exclusion far more severean economic and social exclusion far more severe. Besides that, this process found obstaclesobstacles of diverse

natures, such as the fact that only a part of the only a part of the production of social services are of a “profitable”production of social services are of a “profitable”

nature, and its privatizing demand the existence of a stable and guaranteed market, one that needs public public

measures of supportmeasures of support. . There were also obstacles of a political natureobstacles of a political nature, once the suppression of social rights (in several countries,

like Brasil, already inscribed in constitutional and legal precepts) severely incremented social conflict, already

started by their own economical recess situation.

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Therefore, privatization, as a central element of

the neoliberal strategy, is only interesting as far as

the fund administration and the production of

services can convert themselves in profitable

economic activities.

In latin-american countries, where the majority of

the population is poor,

a “selective” process of privatizing starts to take

place, aptly stimulated by public policies designed

to design and guarantee a market.

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For it to occur, there are still three pre-conditions:

that it be created a demand for benefits or private

services, which only occurs when those offered by the

public sector are seen as insufficient and/or of bad

quality (meaning, make the privatization process

socially acceptable);

that it be maintained stable financing ways to

give support to the high costs of benefits or

private services;

and that the private sector has sufficient

maturity to enjoy the incentive to the expansion

that the public retractions means for them.

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The first of these pre-conditions is directly attached with cutting public costs. This is a decisive question, in our

view, in all that process, and also particularly conflicted to this day.

Seen as cause e not consequence of the fiscal crisis of the State, social expenses cutting had a deliberate social expenses cutting had a deliberate

meaning of de-financing of public institutionsmeaning of de-financing of public institutions.Another way of “stimulating” private demandprivate demand, proposed

by the World Bank already at the beginning of the nineties, is throughout the introduction of payment for introduction of payment for

public servicepublic service, justified by two reasons.

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The first one states that the public treasury should not pay for a “private” commodity (meaning, consumed by

“individuals”) as the cases of education and health education and health servicesservices, since some would “appropriate” themselves of

the public resources and others would not. The second reason states that it would allow the public

sector to gather resources to its “reduced” budget, since it is considered a “non-changeable” variable, based on

the principle of “public austerity”. With that measure three of the neoliberal goals would be

achieved: re-mercantilization of social commodities; re-mercantilization of social commodities; reduction of public social expenses; reduction of public social expenses;

and undermining of the notion of social rights.and undermining of the notion of social rights.

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To assure the second conditions of the selective

privatization process (the one of carving stable forms of

financing to bear the costs of public/private services)

there are available, in thesis, two mechanisms.

One is to buy, with public funds, the services/benefits to

the private sector throughout a concession, a way that

not always prosper in the neoliberal scheme which

restriction politics of public spending collides with the

payment for the private services, given its high cost.

Another mechanism would be throughout the

stimulation of private insurancesprivate insurances.

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Finally, the third condition for a selective privatization process – the capability of the private sector to answer to the capability of the private sector to answer to

demanddemand – remains resolved where it concerns the fund administration by the previous existence of large financial groups, whose expansion and integration was facilitated

by the so called financial deregulation. In relation to expanding private production of servicesprivate production of services, in

several countries there was a strong private sector, developed throughout dealings with the public sector,

especially Social Security, sector that inserted itself in the new financing process.

In case it wasn’t sufficient, the "experts" of World Bank already prescribed in 1990 that the State enabled

“stimuli” to the private sector, with initial credit and subsidizing.

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Many latin-american governments, as well as international financing institutions, “innovated” their

speech, justifying privatization and public justifying privatization and public retraction on the welfare sphereretraction on the welfare sphere as "the way to

achieve greater equality since when saving resources in the universal programs of the State it can use

them to subsidize the poorest with basic social programs " .

That way, in Latin America, the privatization and public retraction process in social area is affected by

special programs of poverty “alleviation”. Several latin-american government speeches, helped by international financing institutions (such as World Bank and IDB), promotes, since then, several public

programs with the clear objective of obtaining “minimal” levels of feeding, health, education

and birth control.

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It was the different systems of social security existing in Latin America the main target of the so called

neoliberal “reforms”. Social Security reforms remains a “point of honor” in all IMF (International Monetary Fund) treaties done with

our countries’ governments. In their vast majority the old public office systems were old public office systems were already dismantledalready dismantled – of collective nature and based on

inter-generational solidarity – by private systems of private systems of capitalizationcapitalization founded on the individual capacity of contributing, forcing a savings account that feeds

financial capital interests.

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In all the reform alternatives, the results were dramatic from the social standpoint, and they also

didn’t resolve the old problems so criticized in the Welfare State. If when functioning only as insurance the Welfare State reproduced existing inequalities in the job market, the neoliberal alternatives not

only amplified the social inequalities structures but they created new conditions of inequality in new conditions of inequality in

the access to the commodities and social the access to the commodities and social servicesservices.

The fragile citizenship right that was being The fragile citizenship right that was being constructed through dire straits in Latin America constructed through dire straits in Latin America – saved the differences between countries – was – saved the differences between countries – was replaced by “poverty certificates” that allows for replaced by “poverty certificates” that allows for

access only to precarious and badly financed access only to precarious and badly financed public services.public services.

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When we deal with latin-american countries, with

historical and structural inequalities, the distance

between the richer and the poorer increased

even more, causing a polarization that has been polarization that has been

leading to sharp and violent social rupturesleading to sharp and violent social ruptures.

Our countries remained with the “worst case “worst case

scenario”scenario”, deepening poverty situationsdeepening poverty situations

at the same time in which they see themselves

facing the contemporary process of un-facing the contemporary process of un-

affiliation of those that belonged to job market affiliation of those that belonged to job market

circuit with some degree of social protectioncircuit with some degree of social protection.

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The twisted association of structural determinations with the coming of neoliberalism explains some of the present

modifications inside the SOCIAL SITUATION OF LATIN AMERICA – not only by its manifestations

but by its implementation throughout Social Policiesits implementation throughout Social Policies.

It is thus configured, in the beginning of the twenty-first century, a social situation even more unbalanced, with its manifestations covered by an enormous complexityenormous complexity,

and if change it’s to take place, much more deep much more deep economical, social and political modifications would be economical, social and political modifications would be requiredrequired, much more than the half-measures of fighting

poverty (instead eliminate it).

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Some final considerations

It’s on the outskirts of capitalism, where the construction of a Welfare State was incomplete or incomplete or

fragilefragile, that we verify a deeper impact of the deeper impact of the adjustmentsadjustments when facing the dismantling of the facing the dismantling of the existing fragile mechanisms of social protectionexisting fragile mechanisms of social protection.

Latin America served as laboratory to several “reform Latin America served as laboratory to several “reform generations”generations”, implemented from the “revisions” of

the initial reforms and its “implementation problems”. In some cases, there was a kind of “recognition” of

the so called “market imperfections”, recommending recommending new regulations that should come from the Statenew regulations that should come from the State,

adopting new names like ““structured pluralism” or “regulated market”.structured pluralism” or “regulated market”.

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