Foreword -- Summary -- Introduction -- Social policy and protection -- Social protection in Latin America in the new millennium -- Co-responsibility transfer programmes and social protection -- Towards a comprehensive social protection system -- Co-responsibility transfer programmes as a gateway into social protection -- Consolidating social protection in Latin America: Main challenges -- Bibliography -- Social protection and economic, social and cultural rights -- Three model co-responsibility transfer programmes in the region -- Estimated cost of non-contributory cash transfers -- Statistical annex

Foreword .-- Introduction .-- Part 1. Social policy institutions. -- Chapter I. Institutional framework for social development / Rodrigo Martínez, Carlos Maldonado Valera .-- Chapter II. Social development and social protection institutions in Latin America and the Caribbean: overview and challenges / Rodrigo Martínez, Carlos Maldonado Valera .-- Part 2. Components and institutional framewoek of social protection. -- Chapter III. Labour market regulation and social protection: institutional challenges / Mario D. Velásquez Pinto .-- Chapter IV. Institutional aspects of Latin America's pension systems / Andras Uthoff .-- Chapter V. Care as a pillar of social protection: rights, policies and institutions in Latin America / María Nieves Rico, Claudia Robles .-- Part 3. Policies for specific populations and their institutional framework .-- Chapter VI. Life cycle and social policies: youth institutions in the region / Daniela Trucco .-- Chapter VII. Disability and public policy: institutional progress and challenges in Latin America / Heidi Ullmann .-- Chapter VIII. Latin American Afrodescendants: institutional framework and public policies / Marta Rangel.

The potential role of social protection in the development process has received heightened recognition in recent years, yet making a strong investment case for social protection remains particularly challenging in many emerging and developing countries. This report challenges us to think deeply about the economic rationale for social protection investments through an inclusive development lens. It helps us understand the links between social protection, growth and inequality; how to measure those links empirically; social protection’s impact on inclusive growth; and how to build a more solid economic case for greater social protection investments.

Throughout the twentieth century, much of the population in Latin America lacked access to social protection. Since the 1990s, however, social policy for millions of outsiders - rural, informal, and unemployed workers and dependents - has been expanded dramatically. Social Policy Expansion in Latin America shows that the critical factors driving expansion are electoral competition for the vote of outsiders and social mobilization for policy change. The balance of partisan power and the involvement of social movements in policy design explain cross-national variation in policy models, in terms of benefit levels, coverage, and civil society participation in implementation. The book draws on in-depth case studies of policy making in Argentina, Brazil, Chile, and Mexico over several administrations and across three policy areas: health care, pensions, and income support. Secondary case studies illustrate how the theory applies to other developing countries.

Social protection is the first axis of the Regional Agenda for Inclusive Social Development, which was recently adopted at the third session of the Regional Conference on Social Development in Latin America and the Caribbean, held in Mexico City in October 2019. This Agenda, through which the countries aim to make progress with the implementation of the social dimension of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, acknowledges the progress the region has made since the turn of the century, when most of the governments of Latin America and the Caribbean --at different times, according to their national realities-- abandoned the residual approach to social policy, increased their social investment and strengthened their social protection systems. The works collected in this publication contribute to a better understanding of the scope and limitations of social protection policies and programmes in the region and offer the reader access to the vast corpus of knowledge ECLAC has produced on the topic of social protection between 2006 and 2019, covering everything from conceptual considerations to the emerging challenges and current debates and proposals for social protection policy in Latin America and the Caribbean.