Tertiary education expansion and access for disadvantaged women in Brazil and Mexico

Abstract

This paper seeks to identify if women from vulnerable, socioeconomic and ethnic/racially, backgrounds have been benefited from this process through the Maximally Maintained Hypothesis developed by Raftery and Hout (1993), in which vulnerable or less advantageous groups can access education only after the demand of the most advantaged group has been met. Using data from the National Household Surveys from Brazil (PNAD) and Mexico (ENIGH) both countries were studied for the 2004 and 2014 periods in order to observe the changes occurring through time, with a focus on the women population. As a result, this study found two different dynamics of inclusion: while in Brazil higher socioeconomic inclusion has been attained, there is a persistent stratification by race in tertiary education with an underrepresentation of non-white participants. On the other hand, Mexico has advanced in terms of including the population that describes itself as indigenous or understands an indigenous language, nonetheless underrepresentation from those that speak an indigenous language persist and socioeconomic stratification remains a factor of exclusion.