Moving up, reaching back

Upward mobility and kin support in contemporary Chile

Bibliographic Data

ID4875562
AuthorsMalik Fercovic (0000-0003-4522-9661, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, corresponding author)
Year2025
Volume24
Issue1
Pages27-49
Publication date2025-09-10
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueSocio-Economic Review (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1475-1461 • E-ISSN: 1475-147X
PublisherOxford University Press (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1093/ser/mwaf059
OpenAlexW4414149691
LanguageEN
References cited60

What drives upwardly mobile individuals to support their families of origin, and what are the consequences of such support? This article examines how upward social mobility intersects with kin support in contemporary Chile. Drawing on sixty interviews with individuals who have attained high-status professions, it finds that such support is driven by a deeply internalized sense of duty to maintain close family ties. Kin assistance takes financial, occupational, and caregiving forms, often extending beyond the nuclear family. Yet these obligations carry significant emotional, financial, and professional costs-particularly for women. In response, individuals develop strategies to manage and delimit kin demands. By shedding new light on the normative drivers and multifaceted consequences of kin support, the article contributes to a relational understanding of social mobility and calls for a broader, comparative agenda on how mobility unfolds in contexts marked by high inequality, weak welfare provision, and strong familistic norms

Duty · Interpersonal ties · Next of kin · Normative · Social mobility · Social support · Welfare · Employment and Welfare Studies · Intergenerational Family Dynamics and Caregiving · Migration and Labor Dynamics

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