...Inequality: The Most Pressing Problem in Latin America Throughout the years, Latin America has experienced dramatic political, social, and economic changes amongst it’s numerous countries. As time went on, various leaders brought grand ideas to the table in hopes of bettering the region. However, in most cases, the outcome was far from grand, failing to address social conflicts that derived from deep inequality and high levels of poverty. Without successfully conquering the underlying causes of conflict within the region, change in a positive direction for Latin America does not exist. This paper will define inequality as the most pressing problem that Latin American countries continue to face, and how inequality, discrimination, poverty, and crime violence stem from the underlying problem of inequality. As a result, social programs currently in place fail to properly address the issues of inequality and poverty within Latin America, thus being unsuccessful. In their literature review of the Southern Commands, Jorge Castaneda and Patricio Navia remind the reader that, “be it in the Caribbean heat or in the Andes-mountain cold, the uniform and lasting defining characteristic of Latin America is inequality” (82). They continue to explain that, “Latin America brings together – often within the same countries, same cities and occasionally even the same neighborhoods – the wealth and prosperity of the most-industrialized nations in the world and the dispossession, despair and hopelessness...
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...Eugene Harmon Poverty in Latin America Inequality: The Most Political and Economic Problem in Latin America Throughout the years, Latin America has experienced dramatic political, social, and economic changes amongst its numerous countries. As time went on, various leaders brought grand ideas to the table in hopes of bettering the region. However, in most cases, the outcome was far from grand, failing to address social conflicts that derived from deep inequality and high levels of poverty. Without successfully conquering the underlying causes of conflict within the region, change in a positive direction for Latin America does not exist. This paper will define inequality as the most political and economic problem that Latin American countries continue to face, and how inequality, discrimination, poverty, and crime violence stem from the underlying problem of inequality. As a result, social programs currently in place fail to properly address the issues of inequality and poverty within Latin America, thus being unsuccessful. In their literature review of the Southern Commands, Jorge Castaneda and Patricio Navia remind the reader that, “be it in the Caribbean heat or in the Andes-mountain cold, the uniform and lasting defining characteristic of Latin America is inequality” (82). They continue to explain that, “Latin America brings together – often within the same countries, same cities and occasionally even the same neighborhoods...
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...POVERTY AMONG AFRICAN AMERICANS AND WHITES IN LATIN 2 AMERICA AND THE UNITED STATES Abstract This article reports the relationship between the United States immigrant and African- American families presented by Daniel Patrick Moynihan in his 1965 report to President Lyndon Johnson remains the most popular folk model for explaining success, failure and mutual aid in “poverty.” The Moynihan model is an enduring part of popular discourses on race, intensified by contemporary immigrant successes narratives. The participant observation research among homeless African-American families and Latin American families had participated in a small business creation in New York City which happened more than three years ago. When kinship norms are typically American, it is said that certain immigrant family forms are more suited to mutual aid crisis. The African- American family is misused as being dysfunctional. It gives an overview of the demographic of “poverty” and how these demographics have changed since 1979. It also considers trends that have emerged over the last few decades and reconsiders the successes and failures of past public policy. It also identifies the growing feminization of poverty and the growing Latino population as the primary challenges currently facing public makers...
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...from Central and South America. The author Jimenez Francisco, an immigrant from Mexico, came with his family to the United States in the 1940’s. In an article written about him, Deanna Day writes “When Francisco was four years old, his family immigrated to California for more economic and educational opportunities” (Day). The causes of immigration, both legal and illegal, to the United States from Central and South America are first, high crime rates secondly, poverty in those regions, and thirdly, higher quality of life in the United States. First, a cause for immigration to the United States is because of high crime rates. According to the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, Central America is tied with Southern Africa as the world’s most violent region (UNODC, 12). In two countries, Mexico and Venezuela, the homicide rate on a three year average has been rising (36). A large part of the violence in this reason is due to gang activity. In 2012, the homicide rate of El Salvador went down by forty percent after a truce between two gangs in the country (45). People do not want to live in a country where they feel unsafe on a regular basis. These conditions are some of the reasons why people immigrate to the United States. Secondly, poverty is also a large concern in these areas. One out of five Latin Americans live in chronic poverty, according to the World Bank study on poverty in Latin America, "Left Behind: Chronic Poverty in Latin America and the Caribbean" (Vakis...
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...political idea that has permeated Latin American countries since claiming independence from their Iberian colonizers. Populism is salient in Latin American politics, because of the deep ties that it has to the overarching poverty and corruption seen in this geo-political region. Largely so, populism has exacerbated socio-economic issues for the common people of Latin America. Issues, including access, opportunity, sustainability, security and safety, pervade the push for politicians and governments to surrender to populist agendas. Campaigning on populism is an effective way for questionable politicians and individuals to get elected into government, especially so when they are able to convince their constituents that they can...
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...Diana Frias LACS 271 Professor Almendros March 23,2014 The chagas disease The spread of the chagas disease is most common in places of greater poverty in Latin America and the Caribbean. The chagas disease is a parasitic disease named after the Brazilian physician Carlos Chagas who discovered it in 1909. It is spread to animals and people through a bite of an infected insect named triatomine bugs or “kissing bugs” that carry the parasite known as Trypanosoma cruzi (Boston College). The triatomine insect feeds on the blood a mammal infected with Trypanosoma cruzi, ingesting the parasite. The insect then becomes infected and now moves on to bite a human transferring the parasite. As the insect bites, it releases its feces near the site of the bite wound allowing the parasite to enter the victim. The parasite then invades the first cells it comes in contact with. They use the victim cells to multiply then releasing itself into the victim bloodstream where they will then continue to multiple and spread into different areas in the body. There are many other ways in which the disease can be spread. For example, infections occur from mother to baby, through contaminated blood transfusions, organ transplant from an infected donor and rarely though contaminated food or drinks (FAQs). Symptoms do not show immediately after being bitten by the triatomine bug. It takes from five days to two weeks for slight symptoms to show. Some symptoms are mild fever with body ache and swelling...
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...Although Latin America has faced many social, political, and economic issues within the last three centuries, inequality remains one of the most important, historical, and omnipresent aspects of the region’s culture. As Europeans took over Latin America during the time of colonization, they implemented many elitist social structures that have held strong and are evident today (Harris). Income inequality is the most visible and greatest disparity that the region faces; yet inequality between gender, ethnicities, and education remain strong and significant problems with a necessity for improvement. Inequality of wealth and disparity of power and influence are Latin American’s greatest curses and are at the root of many of the developmental, social, criminal, and political problems that continue to plague the region (De Ferranti). Since inequality has pervaded into every feature of Latin American society, it is important to measure inequality accurately in order to obstruct the causes of the discrimination and prevent new ones from beginning. The Gini Coefficient is an effective way that people indicate the inequality of a country by measuring a frequency distribution of income or wealth. Using the "Gini Index" of inequality in the distribution of income and consumption, the researchers found that Latin America and the Caribbean, from the 1970s through the 1990s, measured nearly 10 points more unequal than Asia, 17.5 points more unequal than the 30 countries in the Organization...
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...Arianne Cerize A. Aman The Meaning of Development: Brazil and Costa Rica Economic development is the presumed solution to absolute poverty and to many of the world's other most pressing problems. But what is development, and how do we know it when we see it? The term, development, has been used in several ways. Traditionally, it was equated with growth of per capita income. Since the 1970s, other indicators of development have become widely used by development scholars and development agencies such as the World Bank. The meeting of basic needs (or, equivalently, reduction in absolute poverty), the creation of modern employment opportunities, and the achievement of a less unequal distribution of income and farmland have all become important criteria in determining the level of development. Traditional measures of growth, especially in developing countries, may be misleading in that they fail to account for the environmental destruction that often accompanies spurts in temporary and unsustainable economic growth; and economists are devising measures of the national capital stock that includes environmental wealth. The United Nations has placed both educational attainment and health standards on equal footings with per capita income as development criteria, in the widely followed United Nations Development Program human development index (HDI). Some leading development scholars, such as Amartya Sen, Denis Goulet, and Dudley Seers, have gone further. They argue that more intangible...
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...Economic and social development of Latin America has something to do with different geographical factors. These include the productivity of lands, health conditions, frequency and intensity of natural disasters, settlement patterns, makeup and spatial distribution of productive activities, colonial experiences. Latin America has considered geography as unchangeable, true it is, but still it does not imply that policies should overlook or better yet ignore this fact. Geographically speaking, the whole Latin America lies in different latitudes of the Earth. Thus, places in this region experiences different climate patterns and seasons. This leads us to our first geographical factor that affects their development, the productivity of land. Latin America is known for agricultural products such as vegetables, root crops, and meat. These yields are needs climate and soil conditions that will satisfy for their growth. Considering the climate and soil conditions in temperate and tropical zones of Latin America, it is highly possible that the productivity of their lands differs, as well. However, those in temperate zones yield more crops than those in the tropical. The difference is the result of inputs used by temperate zones farmers that used technological advancements such as fertilizers, tractors, seeds and labour force that increases the yields whether or not the climate and soil type suit the crop. This difference is brought about by the advances...
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...MODERN LATIN AMERICA ESSAY 1 Question: Despite most of the Latin American countries achieving political independence in the early 19th century, not one of them was able to achieve first world status over the next one hundred years. Why was this so? Concentrate on one country in your analysis. Latin America is the vast continent with three distinctive regions of Central America, South America and the Caribbean coast, and is composed of 33 republic countries varying in terms of population size from over 19 million Brazilians to 11 thousand citizens of Grenada. The ethnic make-up of modern Latin America comprises a variety of racial and ethnic groups such as Europe, Africa, Asia and American-Indians, all of whose root is based in 4 different continents. The notable physical geography is the range of Andes Mountains that are long narrow backbone of the continent from Venezuela through Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, Bolivia and on into Chile, and cut off the east coastline and the west inland areas. The other features are the Amazon and rivers, huge tropical rain forest, and lastly, an abundance of natural resources as well as vast hectares of farmland. These geography features are an important factor that hampered economic growth due to difficulties in public transit and transportation between regions, hindrance of social and political unity, and therefore, unable to achieve a formation of large unitary state, like North America, that led to separation into large and small 30 countries...
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...Chapter discussion assignment #1 Pick a country in the global core and one in the periphery (as defined in your textbook) that have a former colonial relationship. Why does one of these countries have a larger, more diversified economy than the other? How does the world-system model help to explain these differences? Are some places caught in a poverty trap despite decolonization? The relationship between Spain and Venezuela has changed among the centuries. All began in October 12 of 1498 when Christopher Columbus arrived in what he would call later; it’s little Venice comparing this early town with the Italian city (see maps 1 and 2 on the anexus). Over time, Spain took away most of the mineral richness of Venezuela, installing kingdoms and creating small cities around the mainland. However, not all that Spaniards left in the Latin American countries were poverty, inequality and corruption. The Iberic Empire brought a whole knowledge in economy, religion, education, culture and industrialization. In this essay I would like to explain the economics systems in Spain as well as Venezuela and their neighbors of Latin America. How was Venezuela’s society build? Which are the differences between Spain and Venezuela in the economy field? Before the colonization, different types of tribes like Caribes, Yanomamis, Wayuus, Caracas, etc populated Venezuela. They had a rudimentary economy based on trades: each family was in charged of the collecting of a different type of plants...
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...Justify your answer. Mexico’s joining NAFTA has resulted in increased levels of Foreign Direct Investment (FDI), with the World Bank estimating that levels of FDI in Mexico would be 40% lower had it not joined NAFTA (1.) While the amount of FDI flowing into Mexico increased, this was not accompanied by the expected boost to long-term economic growth. NAFTA aimed to benefit Mexico with by closing the US-Mexico wage gap, boosting job growth, fighting poverty, and protecting the environment. These goals, while honorable, have not been achieved to date. Despite NAFTA’s goal of reducing poverty in Mexico, the country experienced an increase in the percentage of people living in poverty and extreme poverty between 1994 and 1996. In contrast, both of these measures fell throughout the rest of Latin America in the same time period. While the trend of increasing poverty in Mexico was short lived, poverty measures continue to be a concern, and as of 2013, Mexico remains above the average poverty and extreme poverty measures for peer Latin American countries (2.). 20 years of NAFTA has moved the average Mexican household income in the wrong direction, dropping by roughly 15% between 1994 and 2010 in real dollars (3). Other measures of economic success, such as annual growth in GDP per capita, further the notion that NAFTA...
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...HIST 439 September 17, 2011 Critique: Poverty of Progress Retelling nineteenth-century Latin America through literature The time period is the nineteenth-century, the setting: a geographic and cultural space once known as the New World. It’s not your typical account of heroes and villains, the rich against the poor, good versus evil, or princesses, castles and glass slippers. Although all of these actors play a fundamental role in the tale that is about to unfold (with perhaps, the exception of the glass slippers), the real story traces its roots to a time period plagued by significant socioeconomic changes in the way of life of an entire civilization. By no means was it a homogeneous collection of peoples, but rather a mosaic of diverse indigenous folk, African descendants, Europeans, and peoples of every possible mixed ethnic makeup. This is the story of modernization imposed by the Eurocentric elites, forever leaving its mark on the social and cultural construct of Latin America. Historian, Bradford Burns, in his work the Poverty of Progress concludes it was modernization that led to the destruction of the quality of life in the aftermath of independence movements across Latin America. The overarching themes of his book revolve around the wealthy and educated minority imposing modernization on the less educated majority: the indigenous folk, Africans and those of mixed ethnicity. As can be expected, historical accounts during the nineteenth-century also reflect this...
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...relative economic standing when compared to other countries around the world. Several aspects make up what is a developing country. These types of countries usually have a relatively lower standard of living, lower economic growth, weak and sometimes corrupt governments, a wide gap between the wealthy and the poor, and a lower gross domestic product per capita. These developing economies can be found throughout the world, but are most common in Latin America, Africa, Asia, Russia and the South pacific. Most other regions are either developed economies, or are on their way to becoming one. This paper will analyze the country of Honduras. It will describe the reasons for it being a developing nation and the issues that cause or are caused by their poor economy. Background Honduras is considered part of Latin America, and more specifically Central America. Among the other six countries in Central America, Honduras ranks the 2nd poorest and has a GDp per capita of $4,700. Nicaragua is the poorest country in Central America and has a GDp per capita of $4,500, only $200 less per capita than Honduras. Apart from the fact that Honduras is a less developed country, it is known for its beautiful beaches and nice weather. It lies approximately 1000 miles southwest of Miami and its Northeastern coast is nearly surrounded by the Caribbean Sea. Inward from the coast, the country changes to have roughly 48,200 square miles of mountainous regions. Government Economic...
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...in Central America right underneath Mexico. Its true name is the Republic of Guatemala. Guatemala consists of many indigenous Mayan people. It has a very heavy Spanish influence. Mayans are called the indigenous people as opposed to the westernized Ladino’s that have European blood in them and usually live in a more urbanized areas. More than half the Guatemalan nation is composed of indigenous Mayan Indians. The national language is Spanish. The five main Mayan languages are Quichí, Mam, Qanjobal, Chol, and Yucateca (Nacie L., 2011). In addition to these five main languages there are 21 dialects that branch off of these There are many factors that contribute to the extremely high rates of malnutrition in the country of Guatemala. Poverty, socioeconomic status, and education level all play a part. The disadvantaged Guatemalan is considered indigenous. Much racism goes on between indigenous and non-indigenous “Ladino’s.” Ladinos mainly rule the country (BBC, 2012). The amount of education is directly correlated with the amount of money made. The per capita GDP of Guatemala is $3,177 ranked 16 out of 19 in all of the Latin American Countries (Edwards, 2002). Guatemala has an approximate population of 14,027, 000. The life expectancy for men is 66 years old and for women 77 years old. Guatemala has the largest economy in Central America but it also has the lowest growth rates of human development (Edwards, 2002). Fifty one percent of the population lives in poverty. The majority...
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