An interview with Carlos Gradín

Carlos Gradín is associate professor of economics at the University of Vigo. He is trying to apply polarization measurements to development economics.

[Q] How did you get involved in P&C studies?

[CG] I made my Ph.D. at the Universidad Autónoma de Barcelona. I was interested in income distribution in general, and I had the opportunity to made the research on polarization because I got in touch with Joan Esteban, one of the authors who started this research field in economics. The issue was really interesting and innovative as well, so I thought it was a good idea to have it as a dissertation topic.

[Q] You are yourself an economist. Where would you place P&C in the general domain of the social sciences?

[CG] I think polarization is something relatively new. There is some consensus about what is inequality and how to measure it, the relationship between inequality and development, and so on. Polarization is innovative because it is a different notion. There is no such a consensus about what polarization is and its relationship to conflict, development, etc. so there is a lot to investigate. It is an emerging topic, indeed, and is more multidisciplinary than other economic domains: it involves political scientists, sociologists, etc. It is multidimensional, it can be applied not only to the distribution of income, but also to political opinions or to social attitudes, for instance.

[Q] At the Summer School, you have presented an application of the P&C approach to development studies. What does it add to our conventional wisdom?

[CG] I have analised the evolution of income distribution in a developing country, Uruguay. There is a need to investigate this phenomenon in other countries, and study the polarization patterns in them. It is probably more relevant to study polarization for there is a lack of a middle class in this type of countries, or it is weak. Problems concerning political stability, and how it affects their economic growth are much more serious than in our countries, so I think it is crucial for development studies to take into account these variables.

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