Presidential Ideology’s Effect on CCT Adoption and Design The quantitative analyses conducted in the previous chapter identified

strong correlations between presidential ideology and various measures of CCT scope as well as the choice of CCT model. Such analyses, while useful at providing an overall picture of what occurred across the region, do not explain how presidential ideology and CCT design are related. Missing are the causal mechanisms— the political processes, motivations, and actions of political actors and the complex sequencing of events— that link presiden-tial ideology with CCT design choices (Hedström and Swedberg 1996).

Quantitative methods are poorly equipped to achieve these tasks.

The next chapter uses in- depth qualitative case studies to trace the con-nections between ideology and the adoption and design of three CCTs adopted in the second half of the 2000s: Costa Rica’s Avancemos, Bolivia’s Bono Juancito Pinto, and Argentina’s Asignación Universal por Hijo. This is not to say that government ideology was the immediate or sole cause behind the adoption of those programs. To be clear, this book does not claim that government ideology determines the timing of adoption. It does argue, however, that once a president decides to adopt a CCT, ideology determines its design.

The cases are based on face- to- face interviews with politicians, social policy technocrats, and independent policy analysts conducted during field research in those countries during 2012– 13. Adopting a mixed- methods approach takes advantage of the differences between quantitative and quali-tative research, using each approach’s strengths to compensate for the oth-er’s weaknesses (Lieberman 2005; Seawright 2016).

6.3.1 Case Selection

The cases selected are ideal for testing this book’s arguments for three rea-sons (see table 6– 1). First, they vary with regard to the main variable of interest— presidential ideology. Additionally, the programs were adopted at around the same time, between 2006 (Bolivia) and 2009 (Argentina).¹² Finally, the cases offer a fairly representative sample of countries from across Latin America.

As noted, the purpose of the case studies is to flesh out the connection between the dependent and independent variables of the previous chapter’s quantitative analyses. When that is the goal, Lieberman (2005) recom-mends selecting “on- the- line” cases (or “on- liers”)— cases that are represen-tative of a quantirepresen-tative model’s findings (see also Seawright and Gerring 2008). For these types of studies, Seawright (2016, chap. 4) further recom-Table 6– 1. Country Cases (circa 2012– 2013)

Costa Rica Bolivia Argentina

Political Variables

Initiating President Oscar Arias Evo Morales Cristina Fernández de Kirchner

Initiator’s Ideology¹ Center Left Center- Left

% of History under

Left² 0% 100% 100%

CCT Details

Program Name Avancemos Bono Juancito Pinto Asignación

Universal por Hijo Year of Adoption 2006 (Pilot)

2007 (Nationwide) 2006 2009

Coverage (% Pop.)³ 3.63% 18.14% 8.15%

Coverage— Poverty⁴ – 8.65 percentage points – 9.11 percentage points – 2.44 percentage points

Cost (% GDP)³ 0.19% 0.18% 0.47%

Target Population Low- Income

Secondary School StudentsPublic School Students Children (18 and under) of Informal/Unemployed Workers

Targeting Mechanism Proxy Means Test Public Schools Parent Employment Status Conditionality Started Lax,

Stipend Structure Variable by Grade Uniform Uniform

Notes: The observations are from 2013 or thereabouts because the field research for the case studies was carried out during 2012– 13.

Sources: ¹ Dataset on Political Ideology of Presidents and Parties in Latin America (Murillo, Oliveros, and Vaishnav 2010); ² From the day the CCT launched until the start of 2013; ³ Non- contributory Social Protection Programmes Data-base (CEPAL 2018); ⁴ Socio- Economic Database for Latin America and the Caribbean (SEDLAC 2018).

mends selecting cases with extreme values on the main explanatory vari-able. Returning to figure 5– 7, the three cases are located close to the line. In Costa Rica, a centrist president enacted a textbook human capital program closely resembling Mexico’s Progresa/Oportunidades. In Bolivia and Argentina, by contrast, left- wing presidents enacted programs that resem-bled Brazil’s basic income model. In fact, those left- initiated CCTs went fur-ther in the basic income direction than Brazil’s Bolsa Família, which had its roots in earlier programs enacted by a centrist president. The three cases are also “extreme” in the sense that government ideology remained constant throughout the entirety of the period of study. Whereas Bolivia and Argen-tina had left- wing presidents during the entire period, Costa Rica was one of only a handful of Latin American countries that did not elect a left- wing president during the first decade of the 2000s.¹³

Cross- case comparison is further facilitated by the fact the decisions regarding the adoption and design of these programs occurred in the sec-ond half of the 2000s, well after Brazil had “invented” and started promot-ing the basic income model. Given my reliance on in- person interviews, focusing on newer programs offers practical advantages. Time is of the essence when attempting to reconstruct policy adoption processes. Actors involved form part of ad- hoc networks that disperse soon after a policy transfer occurs or fails (Evans and Davies 1999, 375; Lana and Evans 2004, 194). Studying recent programs maximizes the likelihood of identifying and locating the key policymakers involved and increases the reliability of the information obtained through interviews.

Selection of diverse cases is recommended when conducting qualitative research on policy diffusion. As Starke (2013, 569) notes, “Qualitative diffu-sion scholars cannot use Mill’s methods of agreement and difference (also known as the ‘most similar cases design’) as these designs do not allow for interdependence of cases.” Therefore, they should pick “cases that represent the universe of cases, at least approximately.” The three countries studied come close to providing a representative sample of Latin American coun-tries. Geographically, they span Latin America’s three subregions: the Southern Cone (Argentina), the Andes (Bolivia), and Central America (Costa Rica). They also include one of the region’s most prosperous coun-tries (Argentina, second out of 18 in 2013), one whose income is close the regional average (Costa Rica, tenth), and one of the poorest (Bolivia, sixteenth).

The three cases run the gamut with regard to their welfare regimes

(Esping- Andersen 1990). Argentina is a regional pioneer that began its social policy expansion in the early twentieth century. Its welfare regime, under which most benefits have tended to be linked to employment status, most closely resembles Europe’s conservative corporatist welfare regimes, with the caveat that workers in the informal sector have been excluded (Huber 1996, 159). Costa Rica was a late bloomer with regard to social pol-icy, dramatically expanding social services during the second half of the twentieth century. The country possesses what has been described as the region’s only “embryonic social democratic regime” in that most social ser-vices constitute universal rights unrelated to income or employment status (Huber 1996, 159). Bolivia, by contrast, has been a laggard by regional stan-dards. To the extent that it is possible to speak of a welfare regime, it is

“informal- familialist,” meaning that government programs are limited in scope and exclude much of the population. In the absence of state involve-ment, families must step in to fill the vacuum (Martínez Franzoni 2008).

6.3.2 Overview of the Programs

As on- the- line cases, the programs closely match both CCT ideal types.

Whereas the two basic income CCTs aim to cover most if not all children, Costa Rica’s human capital CCT covers a more restrictive sample. Among the three countries, only Costa Rica selects beneficiaries using a rigorous proxy means test. In contrast, Argentina’s program is open to all children whose parents are unemployed or employed in the informal sector.

Together, this program and contributory child allowances ensure that all parents receive a benefit that partially offsets the cost of raising children.

Bolivia’s program is practically universal, targeting all public- school stu-dents. Costa Rica has universal enrollment at the elementary level but strik-ingly high rates of secondary school desertion (Román 2010, 37; Acosta el al. 2015, 18; Oviedo et al. 2015, 48). As a result, its program is restricted to secondary school students. In contrast, Argentina, which also has universal elementary school enrollment and where, on average, students complete more years of schooling than in Costa Rica (Barro and Lee 2013), opted to cover all children under 18, including those too young to attend school.

Bolivia, which has more serious desertion problems at all levels, particu-larly in rural areas and among the indigenous, currently covers all grades, though it initially covered only up to fifth grade.¹⁴

The programs also differ with regard to stipend structure and

condi-tionality enforcement. To compensate for the increasing opportunity cost of remaining in school and outside the labor force as the student grows older, Costa Rica followed Mexico in increasing the size of the stipend with each passing grade. Said stipends were rigorously determined based on sur-veys of how much minors could expect to make in the informal sector at different ages (Sauma 2013). In contrast, Argentina and Bolivia pay a flat stipend per student, regardless of grade or sex. Neither provided a technical justification for the stipend amounts.

With regard to conditionality, Costa Rica aspired to Mexican- style rig-orous enforcement (Cecchini and Martínez 2011, 111). Enforcement was initially weak but improved significantly with the adoption of an electronic platform for monitoring attendance (La Nación 2012).¹⁵ Argentina’s pro-gram is semiconditional in that 80% of the stipend is unconditional while the remaining 20% can only be collected at the end of the school year by proving school attendance (Bertranou and Maurizio 2012). Even then, enforcement of these conditionalities has been lax (OEBA 2012). Although Bolivia’s is technically conditioned on school attendance, conditionality is not enforced (OSPE- B 2011, 24).