Juntos and the Bonos: Translation with Innovations Rooted in Exclusionary Institutional Legacies

The last analytical chapter focuses on the third sequence of the CCT trajectory in Latin America: translation of the CCT standard model by latecomers Peru and Bolivia. The chapter begins by presenting the historical and institutional context of social policy reforms in Peru and Bolivia. While the Peruvian political regime, under center-right governments, was still very neoliberal, the Bolivian political regime under the Evo Morales governments promised radical change from the left to dismantle colonialism and neoliberalism. Nevertheless, these two political regimes translated the same instrument as standardized by the World Bank but adapted it to local ingredients. My analysis of the design of Juntos (2004) in Peru, and the Bono Juancito Pinto (2006) and the Bono Juana Azurduy (2009) in Bolivia, demonstrates their understanding of gender relations as limited to motherhood. Without any gender equality goals in the standard CCT recipe promoted by the World Bank, Peruvian and Bolivian policy entrepreneurs translated it and adapted it to local ingredients embedded in strong exclusionary institutional legacies. The outcome of translation is therefore the exclusion of gender equality goals from CCT design and a reinforcement of existing gender inequalities.