In low- and middle-income countries, studies on children's health focus primarily on their nutritional status, especially the presence of malnutrition. Child malnutrition is a major public health problem in Argentina. The objective of this research is to study the determinants and evolution of young children’s nutritional status in Argentina at the national level, and at different socioeconomic levels, between 2005 and 2019. We use data from the 2004-05 and 2018-19 National Survey of Nutrition and Health (ENNyS1 and ENNyS2). We use multivariate logit models, including household risk factors for childhood malnutrition, to estimate the likelihood of the occurrence of stunting and overweight in Argentinian children aged 24 to 60 months. Our results show that the prevalence of overweight among preschoolers has increased significantly between 2005 and 2019, from just below 10%, still a medium prevalence level, to more than 13%, a high prevalence level. The prevalence of overweight increased between 2005 and 2019 at all socioeconomic levels. The prevalence of stunting has not significantly changed in almost 14 years, remaining at around 7%, a low level. Except for the Cuyo region, which is close to the intermediate level, stunting prevalence in all regions remains between 5 and 8%. Understanding the determinants and evolution of young children’s nutritional status is key to implementing policies aimed at improving childhood nutrition.

The COVID-19 crisis has highlighted the importance of social support resources and the need to create and/or expand social networks that provide the necessary support. This has been evident as many people lost their sources of support in the most needed situations, including public support provided by formal institutions. Although the overall magnitude of the social impact is yet to be evaluated, many questions have been raised, as a result of this crisis, about improving the existing systems of support and using other possible social resources. This essay aims to shed light on the role of self-help groups (also called self-development or personal growth groups) as a significant resource of social support and resilience. Evidently, these groups have provided a space for people to connect with each other, to share useful information, to mutually give emotional and instrumental support, and to build capacity and resilience among its members. This has been more evident during the COVID-19 crisis as online self-help and mutual aid platforms played a key supportive role when movement was restricted. We argue that self-help groups represent an important social resource, not only as a buffer against crises, but also as tool for social change and improving quality of life.

This book explores the inequalities in the quality of life in Argentina from an interdisciplinary perspective. The text consists of nine chapters presenting contributions from disciplines in the social sciences (geography, economics, demography, history) and social medicine (mainly focused on non-communicable diseases). Each chapter covers the entire territory of Argentina, using two geographic scales (departments and provinces) and multiple time periods, from 1980 to 2013. A variety of data sources were used, from national censuses, vital statistics, and population surveys. The book can be divided into two parts. The firstconsists of the first three chapters, focused on the geography of living conditions (poverty, and human development index and its variants in Argentina). A second part is focused on the health geography of two demographic groups (women and adolescents) and on the risk factors and morbidity and mortality of non-communicable diseases. These health outcomes were related to indicators of the socioeconomic level of the provinces. This book constitutes an excellent opportunity for those who, not familiar with the Spanish language, are interested in the study of inequities in quality of life and, in particular, a current overview of the Geography of Health in Argentina.

This book review highlights the main themes of the Handbook of Quality of Life in African Societies (as edited by Prof Irma Eloff from the University of Pretoria), focusing on meaning and language, culture (and positive culture), and social responsibility. The interrelatedness of all five parts of the book (from a macro, meso and micro perspective) are discussed with specific mention of Ubuntu and its relevance in investigating the phenomenon of quality-of-life. The review emphasises the need for exploratory and indigenous research in communities where social association is of immense importance and to contextualise quality-of-life from this perspective. This book is recommended for scholars who wishes to utilise indigenous methodologies and to deeper understand the diverse influences and social impact on the quality-of-life of individuals south of the Sub-Saharan Africa.

En Naturaleza y Método de la Ciencias Económicas, Evidencia, Causalidad y Fines, Ricardo Crespo nos introduce a lo más profundo y tal vez menos explorado de la ciencia económica; su génesis y su método. Cuestiona alguno de los axiomas y explora los caminos de encuentro de las múltiples disciplinas que atraviesan la economía. Reconoce el campo del conocimiento como tributario de la episteme y de la doxa; abarcando desde los algoritmos hasta los valores humanos. El trabajo de Crespo propone una síntesis para el abordaje de la ciencia económica, cuyas múltiples perspectivas conforman apenas un boceto de los complejos espacios de la realidad social.

A microfinance organization in Paraguay has developed the “Poverty Stoplight” (PS), an innovative technological tool that allows families to self-assess their level of multidimensional poverty and start an integrated mentoring process whose goal is to empower families to eliminate multidimensional poverty based on what the participants value the most. During the program, a mentor works with participants to design a customized family plan to identify their most significant challenges in order to overcome their deprivations. The PS places human development and poverty elimination as the main objectives for the intervention. This paper has three elements. First, it presents the methodology for poverty intervention and the detailed tool (i.e. a multidimensional metric) used to encourage reflecting and promoting agency. Second, it uses the Capability Approach to explore the potential of the PS intervention to increase agency and decrease multidimensional deprivations. Third, it presents results from an ongoing research project that evaluates the program’s effectiveness in helping participants overcome poverty. This empirical part is based on data collected between August 2015 and June 2017 from over 9,000 microfinance clients and analyzed using the technique of OLS regressions. The results indicate that participation in the program is indeed associated with a higher probability of overcoming multidimensional poverty.

: Maldives is the smallest nation in South Asia in terms of population, area and GDP. Despite this, this small archipelago has great strategic importance, due to its location in the middle of international sea lines of communication in the Indian Ocean, and its proximity to the Indian mainland. The proposal of this article is to expose the changes that took place in the Maldives during the presidency of Abdulla Yameen in terms of internal politics and external relations, observing at what moment these two tendencies cross to be part of the same plot, and finally to analyze the consequences this has for the country and for the Indian Ocean Region. Numerous observers point out that since Abdullah Yameen came to power, domestic politics has been characterized by the deterioration of the young Maldivian democracy. At the same time, president Yameen has established strong political and economic ties with the People’s Republic of China. The convergence of these two trends occurred at the beginning of 2018, when the political crisis in the Maldives and the declaration of a state of emergency gave rise to speculation about a possible military intervention by India. China quickly positioned itself against such a possibility in the name of sovereignty and non-interference. The situation in the Maldives represents a serious challenge for India, since it opens the possibility for a future Chinese naval base in the archipelago, a few miles from Indian mainland. The democratic regression, moreover, is by itself a challenge to the status and credibility of India vis-a-vis the other States in its own backyard.

Articulo publicado en: Journal de Ciencias Sociales, Ano 12, nro. 7, Abril 2019. Disponible en

The objective of this article is to make an approximation towards gender equality, education and work in three countries such as Chile, Cuba and Finland. These three contexts have been selected because they have different economic and political models, thus it is hoped to identify their impact on equal opportunities for men and women. For the development of this article, the methodology of documentary analysis is used, through the juxtaposition of certain indicators such as these: Universality and gratuity, student training, teacher training and quality, investment in education, human development, family participation in education, gender gap, wage gap and labor participation. It is concluded that the ideological impact that operates through an economic model can affect equal treatment and opportunities, specifically, Chile stands out for achievements in terms of access and educational coverage, Cuba has better academic performance indicators and Finland has high gender equality indicators. In view of the above, it is extremely important to consider that some policies could be replicated in our country in order to contribute to the elimination of gender gaps.