CV

Welcome to my site.

I am an associate professor of sociology and development studies at the Université libre de Bruxelles, where I head the center for development studies (CECID). I received a Ph.D. in sociology from the University of Texas at Austin and a master’s degree in comparative politics from Sciences Po.

I focus on the politics of disenfranchised labor. I did my dissertation fieldwork in São Paulo, Brazil, researching street vendors. My book The Edge of the Law: Street Vendors and the Erosion of Citizenship in São Paulo was recently published with the University of Chicago Press. It won the International Political Sociology section book award from the International Studies Association (ISA).

The best case I can make for my book is that we live in an age of disenfranchisement. Several groups, including workers, foreigners, and minorities, are losing rights. My book is about street vendors, but it tells what it is like to see your rights come under threat or being taken away to the point where your livelihood is at risk and the state starts to question your personhood.

You can order a copy here or on Amazon.

Book talks

Montreal Aug. 14, 2025

Room R-3465, UQAM, 315 rue Sainte-Catherine Est

Time: 2:30 PM – 4:30 PM

Brussels Sept. 18, 2025

Salle de Réception, Maison des Sciences Humaines (MSH), Rue Antoine Depage 1

Time: 10 AM – 12 PM

Rio Oct. 16, 2025

Sala 408, Instituto de Filosofia e Ciências Sociais, Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro, Largo São Francisco de Paula, 1

Time: 5 PM – 6H30 PM

São Paulo Oct. 21, 2025

Sala 14, Prédio da Facultade de Filosofia, Letras e Ciências Sociais, Universidade de São Paulo, Av. Prof. Luciano Gualberto 315

Time: 11 AM – 1 PM

Ciudad de Mexico Nov. 13, 2025 (remote, in Spanish)

Aula Centenario, Institutos de Investigaciones Jurídicas de la UNAM, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM), Mario de La Cueva s/n, C.U., Coyoacán, 04510 Ciudad de México, CDMX, Mexico

Time: 12 PM – 2 PM

Quito Dec. 15, 2025 (in Spanish)

Paraninfo Telmo Hidalgo, Facultad de Ciencias Económicas, Universidad Central del Ecuador. Av. Universitaria y Av. América.

Time: 9 AM – 11 AM

The next move

After finishing the book, I turned my attention to the personalization of state power. The run-off in the 2022 presidential elections in Brazil pitted Lula Da Silva, the founder of the well-known cash transfer program Bolsa Familia, against incumbent president Jair Bolsonaro, who expanded and renamed the program before the elections. I teamed up with a colleague and a postdoc from ULB to probe the effectiveness of such personal claims to programmatic policies using survey data. I am also working on the ways in which charismatic actors shape bureaucratic bodies in Peru and Ecuador. An article on this subject came out this year in the Latin American Research Review.

Peer-reviewed publications

2025. The Edge of the Law: Street Vendors and the Erosion of Citizenship in São Paulo. The University of Chicago Press. 

2025. “Charismatic State-Building: The Reform of SUNAT in the Early 1990s.” Latin American Research Review. First view. Open access. 

2022, with Kimsa Maradan. “The Fitting Process: Getting a Formal Job at a Luxury Hotel in Vietnam.” Sociology of Development. Publisher website, Version of record (available for download).

2021, with Camille Budon and Christian Suter. “The New World of Work: Current Trends and Uncertain Prospects” in The Future of Work edited by Christian Suter, Jacinto Cuvi, Philip Balsiger, and Mihaela Nedelcu. Seismo Verlag.

2019. “Symbolic Capital, Informal Labor, and Postindustrial Markets: The Dynamics of Street Vending during the 2014 World Cup in São Paulo.” Theory & Society, 48(2), 217-238. Accepted manuscript, version of record. 

2019. “The Peddlers’ Aristocracy: Social Closure, Path-Dependence, and Street Vendors in São Paulo.” Qualitative Sociology, 42(1), 117-138. Accepted manuscript, version of record.

2016. “The Politics of Field Destruction and the Survival of São Paulo’s Street Vendors.”Social Problems, 63(3), 395-412. Accepted manuscript, version of record.

2015. “Santos: The Gold Hunter” in Invisible in Austin: Life and Labor in an American City, edited by Javier Auyero, pp. 42-58. Austin, TX: University of Texas Press. Project website,  chapter.

Contact 

jacinto.cuvi [  at  ] ulb.be