Academic Publications
For a comprehensive overview of all my publications and ongoing projects, please visit my ORCID profile.
Peer-Reviewed Journal Articles
Rethinking social assistance amid the COVID‐19 pandemic: Guaranteeing the right to income security in Ecuador (2024)
Journal of International Development
In collaboration with H. X. Jara, this study assesses potential reforms to the social assistance system in Ecuador, including the implementation of a universal basic income (UBI) funded through progressive taxation. Our findings demonstrate that poverty and inequality would decrease significantly under the more generous UBI scenarios.
DOI: 10.1002/jid.3878
Falling through the cracks: Digital infrastructures of social protection in Ecuador (2021)
Development and Change, 52(4)
This study examines how Ecuador's social registries and data systems shape inclusion and exclusion in cash transfer programs. While intended to improve targeting, these infrastructures often overlook informal workers and reinforce existing biases.
DOI: 10.1111/dech.12664
Inequality and the socioeconomic dimensions of mobility in protests: The cases of Quito and Santiago (2021)
Global Policy, 12(S2)
Co-authored with F. A. Díaz Pabón, this study examines how rising transport and fuel costs in Quito and Santiago in 2019 exposed deeper inequalities linked to mobility and precarity, reflecting broader struggles over access to urban space and public services.
DOI: 10.1111/1758-5899.12944
Institutionalising Segregation: Women, Conditional Cash Transfers, and Paid Employment in Southern Ecuador (2019)
Population and Development Review, 45(S1)
Explores how conditional cash transfer programmes interact with existing gender norms, perpetuating certain forms of economic dependence while claiming to empower women.
DOI: 10.1111/padr.12268
De prestaciones a garantías: Reimaginando el Bono de Desarrollo Humano en Ecuador (2019)
Estado & Comunes, 8(1)
Reassesses Ecuador's conditional cash transfer scheme (the Bono de Desarrollo Humano), proposing ways to transform a short-term benefit into a broader social guarantee.
DOI: 10.37228/estado_comunes.v1.n8.2019.106
Edited Volumes
Política social, pobreza y desigualdad en el Ecuador: 1980–2021 (2024)
edi|PUCE
Co-edited with H. J. Jara (London School of Economics) and A. Mideros (Pontificia Universidad Católica del Ecuador), this volume explores Ecuador's social policy landscape over four decades. It delves into the Ecuadorian tax system, social assistance programs, social security, health and education systems, child and adolescent protection, and the impact of reforms to direct taxes and cash transfers. Furthermore, it explores poverty and inequality from a multidimensional perspective. Full text is available here (open access).
Selected Book Chapters
Health Systems Resilience and the COVID-19 Pandemic in Ecuador and Mexico (2025)In Legler, T.F. (Ed.). (2025). The Politics of COVID-19 in Mexico: Governance Meets Government (1st ed.). Routledge
This chapter, co-authored with R. Velazques Leyer, compares how Ecuador and Mexico adopted global health security principles before the COVID-19 pandemic, revealing structural weaknesses in their healthcare systems.
Little People, Big Words: 'Generationating' Conditional Cash Transfers in Urban Ecuador (2016)
In R. Huijsmans (Ed.), Generationing Development:
This chapter examines how being a cash transfer recipient influences children's roles within the household and their interactions with the state, along with the tensions between patriarchal norms, productionist narratives and the lived experiences of teenage motherhood in low-income families.