The democracies of Latin America and the Caribbean have been the target of attacks and challenges over the past decade. The challenges posed by democratic vulnerability (such as political polarization, institutional erosion, and threats to the rule of law) include building state capacity and developing public policies to combat inequality, especially intersectional inequality.

This is because there is a recurring gap between the formal and the real; despite the legal framework, there is a need to redefine citizenship, a social democratization. (Garretón, 2002). The "democratic deficit" is linked to social vulnerability, as citizens feel invisible to the extent that large sectors of society are excluded from decision-making and effective access to rights, producing feelings of invisibility among citizens.

Returning to Oszlak, who warns that "the process of emancipation constitutes a common starting point in the national experience of Latin America, but the act of breaking with imperial power did not mean the automatic replacement of the colonial state by a national state" (1997, p. 5), it is possible to argue that state bureaucracies in Latin America were configured on matrices inherited from the colonial order.

Thus, inequalities are not only the expression of failed or dysfunctional policies, but are anchored in the very structure of the State, limiting its democratic character and reinforcing inequalities and exclusions in access to rights, which punish indigenous and Afro-descendant populations more profoundly.

Therefore, the Observatory adopts a critical perspective from the Global South, understanding democracy and public administration as fields of symbolic, political, and material struggle against the colonial, patriarchal, and racist legacies that structure inequalities in Latin America and the Caribbean. Citizenship is understood not only as a legal status, but also as the effective recognition of rights and the capacity to influence the public agenda, overcoming historical and institutional exclusions.

The Observatory's overall objective is to investigate, monitor, and influence state capacities and the quality of democracy in Latin America, producing scientific evidence, training activities, and audiovisual content that empowers civil society and public managers in defending intersectional policies to address structural inequalities, considering the scenario of democratic vulnerability in the region.

This Working Group (WG) aims to analyze the complex and persistent inequality in Latin America and the Caribbean through comparative analyses and case studies on state capacities (or their absence) developed for the reduction of inequalities from an intersectional perspective in the context of vulnerable democracies.

The central focus is the investigation of the state capacities necessary for the implementation of intersectional public policies, with an emphasis on social participation and the strengthening of citizenship and democracy. This is because the region is experiencing a scenario of 'democratic vulnerability,' where the legitimacy of institutions is eroded not only by political crises, but also by the state's inability to provide effective responses to populations in situations of multidimensional vulnerability.

The public problem of inequality is concrete and increasingly complex, with growing demands for participation, mainstreaming, and intersectionality in the definition of more inclusive public policies. (Ospina, 2024)

The dimension of intersectionality develops, above all, at the level of the individual citizen, within their differentiated identities and social contexts, encompassing multiple aspects of individual identity (Collins, 2021; Crenshaw, 1989). The source of inequalities is not merely economic, but also includes other dimensions, always linked to the matrix of domination and social practices related to the exercise of power (Pires, 2019).

However, just as hegemonic feminism has historically failed by trying to be 'universal' without being intersectional, making invisible those who flee from the norm (the white, cisheteropatriarchal and property-owning subject), the Observatory will not seek to assume a universal being, because that defends the universality of practices of oppression and exclusion.

In regional contexts, such as Cuba, where there is a political project explicitly oriented toward social justice and equity, but where contemporary socialist foundations coexist with more orthodox ones, intersectionality poses a theoretical and practical challenge: the risk that the struggle against class inequality may subsume or consider other forms of oppression as secondary. Dialogue between traditional critical thought and intersectionality is vital to avoid this reductionism.

In these types of political systems, economic, social, and cultural policies must be evaluated for their differentiated impact, taking into consideration not only the absence of capitalist exploitation, but also the capacity to identify and dismantle intersecting oppressions in everyday life. (Fundora, 2020)

This is the predominant characteristic in the region, demonstrating the persistent invisibility of vulnerable and excluded subjects, and intersectionality will be used as a decolonizing tool in the research conducted by the Working Group, dismantling colonial power structures. This represents a radical critique of the colonial epistemologies that underpin the universal subject and exclusionary democracies. Thus, the reconfiguration of democratic models desired by the Observatory depends directly on breaking with the modern colonial matrix.

In turn, the cross-cutting dimension mobilizes other policy fields, impacting the intersectional individual to explore various areas of state action, including the coordination of diverse sectors. Therefore, cross-cutting analysis is horizontal, recognizing that the citizen is a multifaceted and intersectional individual, capable of being reached across the various fronts of state action.

Thus, there is a diversity in inequality, and transversality takes on different meanings: subjects of specific agendas (women, older persons, LGBT population, indigenous population, children and adolescents, etc.), issues to be addressed (gender, race, generation, etc.) and management practices (horizontal coordination of actions, intersectorality, south-south cooperation, etc.).

Understanding the intersectionality and transversality of structural inequality in Latin America and the Caribbean will enable the development of systemic and organizational capacities in the region's public policies. South-South cooperation will also be discussed, given that capacity building in the field of public policies aimed at reducing inequality is a common demand in the Latin American and Caribbean region.

In this context, democracy is another relevant issue. State institutions can reproduce inequalities in the region, but they can also be strategic spaces for resistance and social transformation. The Observatory's theoretical perspective combines intersectional approaches, the concept of public policy and state capacities, within the context of Latin American critical studies and the specific characteristics of democracy in the region.

Although Latin American constitutionalism has expanded rights, prompting the State to act to reduce inequalities through public policies, normative provisions do not alter reality on their own, demanding other factors: a multiplicity of actors (organizational and individual), procedures and actions.

In this sense, the recent transformations in the political-institutional environment of Latin America and the Caribbean have mobilized the literature of state capacities to seek to understand the skills, competencies and bureaucratic-institutional resources of a State to implement public policies in complex and plural contexts, and of democratic vulnerability.

The group proposes strengthening regional networks that monitor the erosion of democracies, investigating how the dismantling of public policies affects marginalized groups. The aim is to enhance public debate and empower society to defend rights and implement intersectional public policies. Therefore, monitoring democracy (the Observatory's objective) requires monitoring how these categories are used by the State to maintain colonial hierarchies.

Investigating the state's capacity to respond to intersectional inequalities is not just an academic exercise, but a requirement for the consolidation of democracies that overcome their current deficits in representation and legitimacy.

This is the proposal of the Observatory Intersectionalities, Politics and Democracies, and its theoretical, social and intellectual relevance for studies in Latin America and the Caribbean in the context of democratic vulnerability.