Skin colour and ethnic inequality in Latin America: an intersectionality approach

Abstract

A novel trend in Latin American social sciences has been the rediscovery of the presence of indelible inequalities related to skin colour. Using the PERLA colour palette, scholars have found that skin colour influences income and education. More precisely, darker-skinned Latin Americans are consistently in lower status positions than their lighter-skinned counterparts. However, there are relevant research gaps regarding this effect that this thesis aims to fill. First, it still needs to be determined how gender, social origin, ethnoracial identity, and ethnoracial composition at the country level can moderate the skin colour effect on socioeconomic outcomes. Second, we also need to know if that effect remains statistically significant and if so if it happens in the expected manner after considering the interviewer's effects and controlling for the skin colour of the interviewer. Using the 2010-2014 LAPOP survey and different regression models, we show that each one of these moderators significantly influences how much skin colour affects income and education. The results are not always consistent with our initial assumptions, nor do they remain consistent for every dependent variable. Despite the effect that the interviewer had on the research, it was not strong enough to bias our initial results when the interviewees and their features are considered.

Date of Award	1 Aug 2023
Original language	English
Awarding Institution	The University of Manchester
Supervisor	Nicholas Shryane (Supervisor) & Yaojun Li (Supervisor)