The contributions in this volume offer original research on how social policies construct and redefine citizenship in contemporary Latin America. Covering a diverse range of social policies, including education, health and social assistance, the book shifts the academic focus from policy design to the experience of recipients. Using an intersectional framework, the chapters demonstrate how gender, ethnicity, and class interact with state programs to create distinct experiences of inclusion and exclusion. Spanning a diverse regional scope, contributions include country cases as well as comparisons and transnational analyses, demonstrating how public programs can broaden civic participation while simultaneously reproducing structural inequalities. This volume is an essential resource for scholars, students, and policymakers. It provides critical, empirical insights into the complex relationship between state capacity, social rights, and structural inequality. It will be of particular interest to researchers in gender studies, social policy, public policy, development studies, Latin American studies, and sociology.

Camila Jara Ibarra is Assistant Professor at Faculty of Education and Psychology, Universidad Diego Portales, Chile. Her research focuses on political participation, citizenship education, and gender, examining how social policies shape democratic practices. She has led research projects on civic education and gender in Chile and published in leading academic journals.

María Gabriela Palacio Ludeña is Assistant Professor of Development Studies at Leiden University, the Netherlands. Her research focuses on social policy, citizenship, inequality, and socioecological justice in Latin America. Combining political economy and ethnographic research, she examines how states and institutions shape rights, belonging, and processes of inclusion and exclusion.

Soledad Valdivia Rivera is Assistant Professor at Leiden University, the Netherlands. Her work examines how Indigenous actors shape public policy and redefine citizenship through intercultural policies and struggles for environmental justice. She is the author of Political Networks and Social Movements (Berghahn Book, 2019) and the editor of Bolivia at the Crossroads (Routledge, 2021).