Políticas de atención a la pobreza y la desigualdad

Mayra Paula ESPINA PRIETO. CLACSO-CROP Series. CLACSO. Buenos Aires, April 2008.

The theme of poverty in relation to the effects of reforms and policies for addressing poverty has been at the center of social science thinking in Latin America, since the 90‟s. This book provides a panoramic vision of this field of studies and a critical rereading of the ways poverty has been constructed as an object of analysis and politics by way of social knowledge. From this perspective, the work examines the Cuban experience, its logic of managing crises and economic reform in the 90‟s, its strength and weaknesses in confronting poverty through a static and centralized organization of economy and society. The Cuban case allows for a particular analysis of focalization-universalism, providing an argument which sustains an integrated posture looking at the two as complementary and to replace a minimalist concept of poverty attached to basic needs and marginal states, in order to connect poverty to policies of social development.