Legal Empowerment of Informal Workers: Alternative models of regulation for street vendors in Bogota, Colombia
(2013) Regulating For Decent Work- Abstract
- Many street vendors live under constant fear of eviction and harassment because the law does not recognize their businesses and they work outside the rule of law. Furthermore, in some cities street vending is a criminal offence to public order and vendors can be sent to prison. Using the empowerment theory, defended by Hernando De Soto, this article will examine to what extent formalization - understood as gaining legal status - can serve to empower informal vendors to increase their capital and economic development. Based on 169 interviews conducted in 2012 among street vendors in the city of Bogotá, Colombia whose businesses were formalized, this research was able to observe improvements in the vendors’ working conditions and income.... (More)
- Many street vendors live under constant fear of eviction and harassment because the law does not recognize their businesses and they work outside the rule of law. Furthermore, in some cities street vending is a criminal offence to public order and vendors can be sent to prison. Using the empowerment theory, defended by Hernando De Soto, this article will examine to what extent formalization - understood as gaining legal status - can serve to empower informal vendors to increase their capital and economic development. Based on 169 interviews conducted in 2012 among street vendors in the city of Bogotá, Colombia whose businesses were formalized, this research was able to observe improvements in the vendors’ working conditions and income. However this improvement was not because of access to formal credit, as stated by the theory of formalization but instead due to the ability of the vendors to improve their working conditions and be protected from bad weather. The results illustrate that formalization is more than access to credit; it is a tool to improve the autonomy, self-esteem, and empowerment of the poor. (Less)
Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
https://lup.lub.lu.se/record/3954825
- author
- Vargas Falla, Ana Maria LU
- organization
- publishing date
- 2013
- type
- Contribution to conference
- publication status
- unpublished
- subject
- keywords
- Empowerment, Rule of Law, Street Vendors, Formalization, De Soto, Poverty, Informal Economy.
- conference name
- Regulating For Decent Work
- conference dates
- 2013-07-03
- project
- Outside the Law: An Ethnographic Study of Street Vendors in Bogotá
- language
- English
- LU publication?
- yes
- id
- c06ae26a-73e0-42f7-9f14-f4c4a8e8df12 (old id 3954825)
- date added to LUP
- 2016-04-04 13:38:41
- date last changed
- 2024-02-16 09:13:18
@misc{c06ae26a-73e0-42f7-9f14-f4c4a8e8df12,
abstract = {{Many street vendors live under constant fear of eviction and harassment because the law does not recognize their businesses and they work outside the rule of law. Furthermore, in some cities street vending is a criminal offence to public order and vendors can be sent to prison. Using the empowerment theory, defended by Hernando De Soto, this article will examine to what extent formalization - understood as gaining legal status - can serve to empower informal vendors to increase their capital and economic development. Based on 169 interviews conducted in 2012 among street vendors in the city of Bogotá, Colombia whose businesses were formalized, this research was able to observe improvements in the vendors’ working conditions and income. However this improvement was not because of access to formal credit, as stated by the theory of formalization but instead due to the ability of the vendors to improve their working conditions and be protected from bad weather. The results illustrate that formalization is more than access to credit; it is a tool to improve the autonomy, self-esteem, and empowerment of the poor.}},
author = {{Vargas Falla, Ana Maria}},
keywords = {{Empowerment; Rule of Law; Street Vendors; Formalization; De Soto; Poverty; Informal Economy.}},
language = {{eng}},
title = {{Legal Empowerment of Informal Workers: Alternative models of regulation for street vendors in Bogota, Colombia}},
url = {{https://lup.lub.lu.se/search/files/6170681/3954828.pdf}},
year = {{2013}},
}