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SOCIAL JUSTICE IN LATIN AMERICA 357

Table 24.1 ‘What are the main injustices in this country?’
EL SALVADOR HONDURAS
WORD TF PF Z WORD TF PF Z
health 112 70 13 health 105 70 14
hospitals 15 15 8 education 106 68 13
employment 21 16 5 access 46 35 10
lack 29 20 5 doctor 22 21 10
access 18 13 4 application 32 26 9
problem 49 26 4 lack 66 41 8
impunity 19 14 4 services 39 27 7
doctors 19 13 4 insurance 33 24 7
causes 12 8 3 service 18 16 7
fees 14 10 3 hospitals 13 12 6
conditions 55 26 3 distribution 11 11 6
services 35 19 3 illnesses 24 18 6
poverty 36 19 3 population 43 27 6
months 18 12 3 perpetrate 26 19 6
wages 30 16 3 wealth 13 11 5
justice 43 23 3 countryside 39 24 5
day 45 22 3 children 25 18 5
budget 16 11 3 attention 19 15 5
perpetration 15 10 3 protection 13 11 5
maquilas 45 23 3 hospital 11 10 5
university 44 22 3 area 26 18 5
coffee 16 11 3 justice 74 39 5
area 44 22 3 city 33 21 5
education 130 54 3 hours 20 15 5
system 76 34 3 hands 19 13 4
conditions 59 30 4
housing 30 19 4
privatization 12 10 4
rural 27 17 4
wages 43 21 3
cities 12 9 3
poverty 56 27 3
man 12 9 3
production 31 18 3
industry 15 10 3
model 12 9 3
bad 30 16 3
TF: Total Frequency – number of times a given word appears in the activists’ discourse as a whole;
PF: Partial Frequency – number of times a given word is used by activists to respond to a specific question;
Z: Level of significance of the difference between the expected partial frequency and the observed partial frequency

ideas, such as the national interest and the We also see in the vocabulary a particular
common good, most of them make an focus on the accessibility of medical services
explicit connection with the subjective con- through terms, such as ‘access’, ‘doctors’,
cerns of ‘ordinary people’. They might have ‘hospitals’, ‘insurance’, and ‘services’. In El
given similar answers to the question Salvador, as in most Central American coun-
‘What’s wrong with this country?’ but the tries, public services, including basic govern-
notion of ‘injustice’ clearly elicited the focus ment functions such as policing and the
of their discourse on social issues that have a administration of justice, are generally
direct bearing on everyday life. The most dis- scarce, if not simply absent in rural areas.
tinctive notion in both samples is ‘health’. This statement is an example of this sense of