Social Assistance Policies and the Presidential Vote in Latin America

Matthew L. Layton and Amy Erica Smith from Vanderbilt University have a new report out for AmericasBarometer using survey data from the Latin American Public Opinion Project (LAPOP). 

Layton and Smith find that citizens who benefit from conditional cash transfer (CCT) programs are more likely to vote for an incumbent party than are people who do not benefit from these CCT programs. The impact of these CCT programs on hypothetical votes is strongest in Bolivia, Ecuador and Venezuela. While one obviously does not want politicians to use these CCT programs simply for political gain (See Lemonade International with h/t to Tim Hoiland), the preliminary evidence is that they do reap electoral benefits.   

Here is the executive summary from Social Assistance Policies and the Presidential Vote in Latin America

In this Insights report we use a cross-national analysis of nine Latin American countries to determine what correlations, if any, exist between participation in social assistance programs, including conditional cash transfer (CCT) programs, and support for the incumbent presidential candidate or party. We find that in almost every country examined, social assistance recipients are more likely to vote for the incumbent than non-recipients, even after accounting for social class, economic perceptions, and national context. These results highlight that social programs have political effects in addition to their social and economic effects.

In the 2011 Guatemalan elections, we don't know whether the incumbent party would have benefited electorally from its CCT programs. They would have needed a presidential candidate.

Drug and violence links from around the region

From the Miami Herald 

The U.S. government’s anti-drug smuggling offensive on the Mexican border has caused a “balloon effect” that is expected to spur more narcotics trafficking through the Caribbean, South Florida’s top federal official warned Thursday.

Cocaine and other illegal drugs flooding the United States are still flowing mostly through a pipeline from Colombia to Mexico across the Southwest border. But the trend is expected to shift, U.S. Attorney Wifredo Ferrer said in Miami Thursday.

“We’re hitting them hard there,’’ Ferrer told reporters. “It’s only a matter of time before we see an increase here.’’

That's right. Our success in Mexico and Central America is leading to an uptick in drugs through the Caribbean. 


Some other drug and violence-related stories

Feds seize drug sub with 7.5 tons of cocaine off Honduran coast

Mexico's drug war comes to Belize (Why not the United States' drug war?)

 Guatemala: Drug Trafficking and Violence 

As Elections Loom, Report Profiles Guatemala's Drug Trafficking World

More on the the decline in homicides in Guatemala from Carlos Mendoza at CABI

At least 6 Colombians killed in Guatemala attacks (it's early yet, but October still looks a little more violent than the past few months)

Guatemala's murder rate hit a terrifying 52 per 100,000 in 2009. Colom is leaving with a murder rate approaching 40 per 100,000. Not bad considering where Honduras and El Salvador are today.

2nd Round Poll Numbers - Update

Siglo XXI

In Guatemala, Prensa Libre and Prodatos came out with the first poll numbers ahead of the November 6th runoff between Otto Perez Molina of the Patriotic Party and Manuel Baldizon of LIDER. The poll was conducted between October 4 and 8 among 1,204 Guatemalans using the same ballot (party symbol and presidential photo) that voters will use.

Using just the valid vote, 55.8% of those surveyed indicated that they intended to vote for Perez next month and the remaining 44.2% intended to vote for Baldizon. However, Prensa Libre does not tell us what percentage of the 1,204 responses were invalid or undecided. We really need these number to make sense of the poll. If undecideds are evenly split, it doesn't matter. However, if undecideds break for Baldizon this could be a much closer race. Remember the first round polling does not appear so off if one only looks at polls that report undecideds.

It's only one poll so I am going to wait until others come out before giving the second round victory to Perez. And even if every poll this month gives Perez a victory, that might not be enough. In 2007, Perez won six out of the seven polls conducted between the first and second round vote before losing to Alvaro Colom.

Perez received 36.03% of the first round vote and Baldizon followed a distant second with 23.20%.

***Boz alerted me to some information on the undecideds. When the blank or null votes are included, Perez has 49.4% and Baldizon 39.2%. 11% of those surveyed completed blank or null votes. I know it would be a longer newspaper title, but these numbers are the more accurate ones and should be the headline rather than 56% for Perez.

Santa Luisa School in San Salvador

Bill Howard at the Catholic News Agency has a nice write up about the Santa Luisa School in San Salvador. I traveled with Bill to the school in 2008 on The University of Scranton's Bridges to El Salvador program..

For the more than 500 boys and girls — mostly from poor or destitute families — who get a K-9 education at Santa Luisa, the school is an oasis from a city suffocating from drugs, gangs and violence. For many students, Santa Luisa represents their best chance to break out of the cycle of poverty that surrounds them daily.

Santa Luisa is beginning its 76th year and would not have reached its milestone 75th year without the aid of a group of alumni from the University of Scranton (Pa.). Led by Jesuit Father Brendan Lally, who now serves as a spiritual director at St. Joseph University in Philadelphia, the non-profit Salvadoran Children of the Poor Education Foundation (SCOPE) has helped Santa Luisa meet its annual budget and supply basic needs for the past decade.

SCOPE is the product of two immersion programs Fr. Lally steered over two decades at the University of Scranton. The first, International Service Program, began in 1987 and takes students and alumni to two homes for street children in Mexico City for six weeks of the summer. Its success spawned a second program, Bridges to El Salvador, formed after Father Lally’s heart was moved by the Catholic witness of the people there.

You can read more about the S.C.O.P.E. Foundation and ways to help the Santa Luisa School here. 

Abbas visits El Salvador

During his recent tour of Latin America, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas stopped off in El Salvador on Sunday. (Yes, it even made CNN's website.)

Salvadorian President Mauricio Funes expressed his support for a Palestinian state and said that he hopes it will soon have a place at the United Nations, according to the president's website.

"We want to strengthen our relationship with Palestine ... and contribute to the reestablishment of talks between Palestine and Israel," said Funes.

El Salvador recently recognized the Palestinian territories as a "free, sovereign and independent state," the website said.

Presidents Funes and Abbas also announced their interests in establishing diplomatic relations between the two countries including the exchange of ambassadors and the opening of embassies in Palestine and El Salvador (can't wait for the "Hezbollah/Iran opens embassy in El Salvador headlines"). 

Funes also offered to assist Palestine and Israel return to the negotiating table.

Independently, Abbas and the newly appointed Israeli ambassador to El Salvador invited Funes to Palestine and Israel. The Israeli invitation, however, does not indicate any elevated role for Funes in negotiations between Palestine and Israel.

El Salvador has an active Palestinian-Salvadoran community including names like Handal, Saca, Zablah, Siman, Bukele and Kattan.

Greg has more on Abbas' visit to the region and what it might mean for Palestine in the United Nations at Two Weeks Notice.  

Murder in Guatemala

I know that I've written several posts about the murder rate in Guatemala in recent weeks. It is frustrating that the Guatemalan and international media keep writing about murders increasing in Guatemala when they are not.

It's not that I want them to write that things are rosy in Guatemala, they certainly are not. However, here are a few suggestions for how they could better characterize the situation.

While the murder rate in Guatemala has declined the last two years, it remains one of the most violent countries in the world. (True)

While the murder rate in Guatemala has declined in 2010 and 2011, it is not clear that overall violence including robbery, assault, rape, extortion, etc. is lower. (Not sure, but is more accurate than what people are writing)

While the murder rate in Guatemala continues to decline, citizens do not perceive the security situation to have gotten any better.

A decrease in the murder rate from ~50 to ~40 per 100,000 looks better on paper than it does on the streets of Guatemala.

Any other suggestions?

I'm hoping that the murder rate continues to drop in October, November, and December, but after reading the local papers the first few days of this month, I'm a bit worried.

Salvadoran Court Refuses to Detain Five Officers

According to the AP, the Salvadoran Supreme Court of Justice has refused to detain five former military officers allegedly involved in the murders of the Jesuits in 1989. From the looks of it, the judges based their decision upon the same reasoning that led them to "release" nine officers in August.

A court spokesman said Friday the five men could not be detained because it has not received a formal extradition request from Spain.

Another roadblock, but not the end of the story.