Carolina Gallo Garcia
Banting Postdoctoral fellow (April 1, 2024 - March 31, 2026)
Carolina (she/her) holds a doctoral degree in Social Sciences from Universidade Estadual de Campinas, Brazil. Her research focuses on the relationship between neoliberalism and new forms of social organization of work, examined through critical intersectional and transnational feminist lenses. Her doctoral research introduced the concept of “empowerment economies,” a moral economy shaped by the transnational circulation of empowerment narratives aimed at integrating Brazilian women into labor and entrepreneurial markets. Through a multi-sited ethnographic study of a corporate-sponsored nationwide project to train women in entrepreneurship, she analyzed how international organizations and corporate discourses frame women from the Global South as an untapped resource for economic development. Her work reveals how deeply classed and racialized discourses are embedded in neocolonial dynamics that reproduce social inequalities while constructing idealized economically active female citizens.
Current postdoc research
Carolina's postdoctoral research employs an intersectional framework to explore the multifaceted factors influencing the successful civic and economic integration of self-employed and entrepreneurial migrant women. Her work underscores the interconnectedness of racial, ethnic, gender, religious, and class power relations as foundational elements in examining how migrant women navigate opportunities and constraints to build "good" citizenship through entrepreneurial activities in Québec. By considering both micro and macro-social contexts, her research aims to provide insights into how life trajectories are shaped within the framework of economic integration, highlighting the broader implications of different social locations in shaping the experiences of migrant women.
