Alberto Diaz-Cayeros

Assistant Professor
Political Science Department
Stanford University

"Saving Lives: Social Programs and Infant Mortality Rates in Mexico"

Tuesday, February 19, 2008
12:30 pm - C103 Hesburgh Center

Abstract

Over the last two decades Mexico witnessed a shift in social policies transforming anti-poverty strategies from centralized and highly discretionary programs to decentralized and formula-based entitlements. We measure the effect of these policy changes upon the welfare of children, moving beyond the effects of money on the provision of local public goods to assess the overall effect of social policies on Infant Mortality Rates (IMR). We argue that the process of democratization in Mexico has a decisive impact on development by saving the lives of children.

Biography

Alberto Diaz-Cayeros is an assistant professor of political science at Stanford University whose current research focuses on geographic poverty traps, public health, and clientelism. Before coming to Stanford in 2001, he served as an assistant professor of political science at the University of California, Los Angeles, and as a researcher at Centro de Investigación Para el Desarrollo, A. C. (CIDAC) in Mexico. His work has primarily focused on federalism, local government, social development, and economic reform in Latin America, and in Mexico in particular. He is the author of Federalism, Fiscal Authority and Centralization in Latin America (Cambridge University Press, 2006). He holds a PhD from Duke University.