Paola Fajardo-Heyward, Ph.D.

fajardop@canisius.edu

Associate professor

Phone: 7168882601

Address: 2001 Main Street Canisius College

City: Buffalo, New York - 14208

Country: United States

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Research Interests

Human Rights

Latin American And Caribbean Politics

Publications:

Journal Articles:

(2015) Understanding the Effect of Security Assistance on Human Rights: the Case of Plan Colombia, The Latin Americanist

Existing large‐N research argues that governments that rely on their citizens for their revenue are more accountable to their citizens and thus have more incentives to protect human rights. This argument predicts that other sources of revenue fail to provide such incentives. Due to this, governments that rely on alternative sources of revenue will experience poor human rights conditions. This article is aimed at exploring this expectation by looking at one particular type of alternative source of revenue: security assistance. According to the argument, security assistance should negatively impact human rights conditions due to its effect on governments' efforts to protect and respect human rights. This article uses the case of Plan Colombia to assess this argument. By looking at the way in which foreign assistance interacts with domestic institutions, the case suggest that the negative effect is caused by the erosion on checks and balances and, most importantly, by changes in civil‐military relations.

(2014) Principals, Agents, and Human Rights, British Journal of Political Science

This article argues that human rights could be improved by motivating politicians and bureaucrats to put more effort into protecting human rights. It conceptualizes the production of human rights practices as the outcome of two principal-agent relationships that constrain politicians and bureaucrats. Reliance on taxes is a non-electoral, fiscal factor that makes politicians more willing to protect human rights. Increased government revenue, no matter the source, raises bureaucratic compensation and helps create a more accountable bureaucracy. Thus both a higher reliance on taxes and larger state revenues lead to the better protection of human rights. Each fiscal factor promotes a different type of accountability, both of which independently contribute to good human rights practices.