Trickling down or brimming over gains from remittances? Local processes of economic levelling in rural highland Ecuador

Resumen

This article analyses the processes of economic levelling attached to the reception of international remittances in rural Ecuador. It contributes to the debate on remittances and inequality by exploring the specific mechanisms through which socio-economic differentiation is neutralized or established in two villages of Andean Ecuador. Remittances do not occur in a socio-economic or cultural vacuum. Instead, they stem from specific economic and socio-cultural configurations, inserting into and changing pre-existing structures. The effect of remittances at the village level is dependent on conditions prior to migration. Remittances do not create previously non-existent differentiations, but economic inequalities prior to migration are reproduced and exacerbated as a result of international migration and financial remittances.