Family and the Person as Relation: Relational Public Policies in Latin America

• In Event: Alternatives to the Liberal Paradigm

Abstract

Family policies recently instituted in Latin American countries, such as Brazil and Guatemala, exemplify a mode of public policy design that recognizes and promotes the centrality of relationships for human development. Understood as “relational goods”, the family and the mediations it performs among its members and with society are fundamental building blocs of civilization, but remain hidden in the Modern state paradigm of subjective rights, be they political, civic, or social. A properly relational conception of the human person, which sees her relations as ontologically significant components of her being in the world, arrives at the concept of relational rights (such as the family itself) and thus reorganizes the role of the state and human communities for the promotion of human goods. The paper looks at specific policies that were designed within this relational paradigm, starting from the relational perspective of Pierpaolo Donati and the philosophy of Eric Voegelin.

Author

• Gustavo A. Santos, The Catholic University of America