Current Projects
Inhabit and Re-inhabit a Community in the Aftermath of a Natural Disaster: The Case of 2008 Chaiten Volcano Eruptions (principal investigator, with E. Kronmüller). Grant: Centro Nacional de Investigación para la Gestión Integrada de Desastres Naturales (CIGIDEN) and VRI/PUC, 2015-2016, Chile.
The human consequences of disasters extend beyond the immediate damage caused by the events. After several years of the disaster, survivors frequently can suffer from posttraumatic stress disorder. Furthermore, the cohesion of affected communities may present strong negative changes as a result of residential migration induced by catastrophes. In spite of such salient consequences, our knowledge about them is scarce. Most of the existing evidence refers to advanced nations, especially USA and Japan, but we know little about the persistent effects of natural disasters on individuals and communities in other regions of the world.
The present project attempts to fill in these gaps by examining the determinants and consequences of the choice to inhabit a zone exposed to natural hazards. The project will provide evidence about these topics by analyzing the case of Chaitén. This community is a port town located in the south of Chile. In 2008-2009 the town was affected by the eruption of Chaiten volcano, located 10 kilometers northeast of the town. The eruption began unexpectedly on May 2 and continued in its diferent phases until late 2009. Its considered one of the biggest eruptions in the last thirty years worldwide (Carn et al., 2009; Lara, 2015; Major & Lara, 2013). At that moment the Chilean government declared the province of Palena “disaster zone” and ordered the total evacuation of the population of Chaitén town. In total 8,119 people were evacuated.
On May 12 of 2008 the accumulation of sediments in the Blanco river (also called Chaitén river), that connects with the southern sector of Chaitén volcano, produced its overflow diverting it through the town from east to west, destroying about 18 blocks and flooding the rest with a mixture of water, wood, mud and ashes. Currently the town remains divided by the river which has led to the distinction between two geographical sectors: North sector and South sector. As a result of these damages, the town was declared uninhabitable from 2008 to 2010. It is not until February 2011 that the authorities decide to rebuild Chaitén in the same place, enabling the occupation only of North sector, even though recent studies confirm the high risk to which the population is exposed in the entire town (Lara, 2015). Currently, the two sectors of the town are inhabited and the estimated population is 1,732 inhabitants. In 2015, we conduced a field work in Chaitén to collect qualitative information (interviews) and quantitative data (a representative survey) that register evidence about the choice to inhabit and to re-inhabit Chaitén, social connections in this community, stateness, and risk perception. To analyze the collected data, we plan to use the division of Chaitén as a natural geographic experiment and, in doing so, to identify persistent effects of natural disasters on individuals and communities. By doing so, we expect to contribute to the study of the effect of environmental and natural disasters on human communities.
Moral Economy of Meritocracy and Redistributive Preferences (co-investigator, with J. C. Castillo and J. Atria). Grant: National Fund for Sciences and Technology (CONICYT/FONDECYT), 2016-2020, Chile.
Meritocracy refers to a social order where merit is a central criterion to assign resources. Descriptive studies reveal a high acceptance of merit as a just principle of distribution and redistribution among citizens. However, several important gaps still persist in the literature for understanding current social dynamics in western societies. To the best of our own knowledge, there has been modest literature on the meanings of meritocracy in terms of public opinion. Some studies present evidence about the association between individual characteristics and beliefs about meritocracy, but research about the roles of social and institutional contexts on this association is also scarce. Furthermore, no study on the impact of meritocracy on redistributive preferences has ever appeared in sociology’s leading journals.
The project “Moral Economy of Meritocracy and Redistributive Preferences” attempts to fill in some of these gaps by examining the association between both concepts and, in doing so, contribute to the understanding of the role of meritocracy in currents societies. Following a theoretical framework based on the notion of moral economy, we propose a case study of Chile by using a mixed longitudinal and cross-national comparison perspective. Chile is a particularly interesting case because it represents a bellwether of liberal policy reforms in Latin America. At the same time, during the 2000s, new left governments adopted major initiatives towards a social-right based social policy. This kind of institutional mixture offers a unique opportunity to study the interactions between institutional change and beliefs. The research design of the project consists in three phases. First, “Theory, Meanings, and Practices of Meritocracy”, which consists in a set of qualitative studies of meritocratic cases in Chilean society. The second phase, “Context, Merit, and Redistributive Preferences”, is composed by cross-national multilevel studies that will use ISSP (International Social Survey Programme) and LAPOP (Latin American Public Opinion Project) data to evaluate the relationship between meritocracy, redistributive preferences and institutional contexts. Finally, on the basis of the results of the two previous studies, the third step will analyze in deep the relationship between meritocracy and preferences. “Measurement and Social Consequences of Meritocracy in Chile” and includes the application of a micro level panel survey of the Chilean population that will help to test the validity of constructs and the identification of causality in the relationship between meritocracy and redistributive preferences by using observational and experimental designs.
Inhabit and Re-inhabit a Community in the Aftermath of a Natural Disaster: The Case of 2008 Chaiten Volcano Eruptions (principal investigator, with E. Kronmüller). Grant: Centro Nacional de Investigación para la Gestión Integrada de Desastres Naturales (CIGIDEN) and VRI/PUC, 2015-2016, Chile.
The human consequences of disasters extend beyond the immediate damage caused by the events. After several years of the disaster, survivors frequently can suffer from posttraumatic stress disorder. Furthermore, the cohesion of affected communities may present strong negative changes as a result of residential migration induced by catastrophes. In spite of such salient consequences, our knowledge about them is scarce. Most of the existing evidence refers to advanced nations, especially USA and Japan, but we know little about the persistent effects of natural disasters on individuals and communities in other regions of the world.
The present project attempts to fill in these gaps by examining the determinants and consequences of the choice to inhabit a zone exposed to natural hazards. The project will provide evidence about these topics by analyzing the case of Chaitén. This community is a port town located in the south of Chile. In 2008-2009 the town was affected by the eruption of Chaiten volcano, located 10 kilometers northeast of the town. The eruption began unexpectedly on May 2 and continued in its diferent phases until late 2009. Its considered one of the biggest eruptions in the last thirty years worldwide (Carn et al., 2009; Lara, 2015; Major & Lara, 2013). At that moment the Chilean government declared the province of Palena “disaster zone” and ordered the total evacuation of the population of Chaitén town. In total 8,119 people were evacuated.
On May 12 of 2008 the accumulation of sediments in the Blanco river (also called Chaitén river), that connects with the southern sector of Chaitén volcano, produced its overflow diverting it through the town from east to west, destroying about 18 blocks and flooding the rest with a mixture of water, wood, mud and ashes. Currently the town remains divided by the river which has led to the distinction between two geographical sectors: North sector and South sector. As a result of these damages, the town was declared uninhabitable from 2008 to 2010. It is not until February 2011 that the authorities decide to rebuild Chaitén in the same place, enabling the occupation only of North sector, even though recent studies confirm the high risk to which the population is exposed in the entire town (Lara, 2015). Currently, the two sectors of the town are inhabited and the estimated population is 1,732 inhabitants. In 2015, we conduced a field work in Chaitén to collect qualitative information (interviews) and quantitative data (a representative survey) that register evidence about the choice to inhabit and to re-inhabit Chaitén, social connections in this community, stateness, and risk perception. To analyze the collected data, we plan to use the division of Chaitén as a natural geographic experiment and, in doing so, to identify persistent effects of natural disasters on individuals and communities. By doing so, we expect to contribute to the study of the effect of environmental and natural disasters on human communities.
Moral Economy of Meritocracy and Redistributive Preferences (co-investigator, with J. C. Castillo and J. Atria). Grant: National Fund for Sciences and Technology (CONICYT/FONDECYT), 2016-2020, Chile.
Meritocracy refers to a social order where merit is a central criterion to assign resources. Descriptive studies reveal a high acceptance of merit as a just principle of distribution and redistribution among citizens. However, several important gaps still persist in the literature for understanding current social dynamics in western societies. To the best of our own knowledge, there has been modest literature on the meanings of meritocracy in terms of public opinion. Some studies present evidence about the association between individual characteristics and beliefs about meritocracy, but research about the roles of social and institutional contexts on this association is also scarce. Furthermore, no study on the impact of meritocracy on redistributive preferences has ever appeared in sociology’s leading journals.
The project “Moral Economy of Meritocracy and Redistributive Preferences” attempts to fill in some of these gaps by examining the association between both concepts and, in doing so, contribute to the understanding of the role of meritocracy in currents societies. Following a theoretical framework based on the notion of moral economy, we propose a case study of Chile by using a mixed longitudinal and cross-national comparison perspective. Chile is a particularly interesting case because it represents a bellwether of liberal policy reforms in Latin America. At the same time, during the 2000s, new left governments adopted major initiatives towards a social-right based social policy. This kind of institutional mixture offers a unique opportunity to study the interactions between institutional change and beliefs. The research design of the project consists in three phases. First, “Theory, Meanings, and Practices of Meritocracy”, which consists in a set of qualitative studies of meritocratic cases in Chilean society. The second phase, “Context, Merit, and Redistributive Preferences”, is composed by cross-national multilevel studies that will use ISSP (International Social Survey Programme) and LAPOP (Latin American Public Opinion Project) data to evaluate the relationship between meritocracy, redistributive preferences and institutional contexts. Finally, on the basis of the results of the two previous studies, the third step will analyze in deep the relationship between meritocracy and preferences. “Measurement and Social Consequences of Meritocracy in Chile” and includes the application of a micro level panel survey of the Chilean population that will help to test the validity of constructs and the identification of causality in the relationship between meritocracy and redistributive preferences by using observational and experimental designs.