This article analyses, first, the principal features of Spain's commercial policies towards Spanish America in 1797–1820, and, second, the value, nature and distribution of the trade that survived in this period, despite prolonged international warfare, the admission of neutral shipping, and internal strife from 1808 in both Spain and America. Like the author's earlier studies of ‘free trade’ in the period 1778–96, its principal sources are shipping registers and associated inter-ministerial correspondence in the Archivo General de Indias of Sevilla. Its main conclusions are that: (1) despite ambivalence and uncertainty in Spain about commercial policy, trade with Spanish America was more buoyant in 1797–1820 than previously realised; (2) nevertheless, by the first decade of the nineteenth century most parts of Spanish America were enjoying de facto, if not de jure, free trade with foreigners; (3) consequently, commercial discontent was not a key factor in the process of emancipation from Spain, particularly in the viceroyalties of New Spain and Peru which received some 70% of exports from Spain in this period.

Employing new archival sources, this article reappraises the role of human rights in the opposition to Brazil's repressive military regime. While most interpretations pinpoint the protest against the 1975 murder of journalist Vladimir Herzog as the opposition's great awakening, this research focuses on a similar outcry against the 1973 killing of University of São Paulo student Alexandre Vannucchi Leme. His death led students and clergymen to defy riot troops and gather 3,000 people for a memorial service that was the first large-scale anti-regime demonstration of the 1970s and a decisive step in the Roman Catholic Church's development as leader of the opposition.

‘In all matters of importance, style and not content is the important thing’: Oscar Wilde, The Importance of Being Earnest.

Populism is a concept which, despite repeated critiques, refuses to disappear from Latin American studies. This article reviews some of the literature, suggesting that populism is best defined in terms of a particular political style, characteristically involving a proclaimed rapport with ‘the people’, a ‘them-and-us’ mentality, and (often, though not necessarily) a period of crisis and mobilisation; none of which makes it exceptional, abnormal, ‘unmediated’ or irrational. Mexican – among other – examples are invoked. The article questions some received opinions: that populism is typically urban, relates to particular historical stages of development, or distinctively derives from either multi-class alliances or elite manipulation. It also queries the fashionable notion of ‘economic populism’. Finally, the article notes the recent phenomenon of ‘neo-populism’, embodied by Salinas, Menem, Fujimori, etc., which a suitably loose (‘stylistic’) definition can usefully accommodate, thus suggesting the continued, if limited, utility of the concept.

This article examines political ideology, cultural nationalism and the contesting of identity in early twentieth-century Chile. It does so by tracing the emergence of a unique cultural construct – the huaso cowboy – in the literary sphere and by exploring a ‘rural idealist’ discourse employed by middle-class, reformist intellectuals who hoped for the mitigation of the ‘social question’ and the displacement of traditional oligarchs from cultural and political centrality. It also seeks to explain how the fiction genre known as criollismo challenged elitist conceptions of ‘nation’ and ‘culture’ in the context of dramatic socio-political, economic and demographic change.

This study examines Emperor Maximilian's efforts in using public rituals, patriotic symbolism, and the emblems of nationalism to devise an appropriate past for his Mexican empire. The ‘republican’ celebration of independence and its heroes formed the cornerstone of an effort to reconcile feuding political factions, build social cohesion, and ultimately legitimate his regime. The article concentrates on the independence ceremonies, speeches, and statuary employed by the empire. Ultimately, the political dissension existing in Mexico could not be surmounted by symbols alone. Nevertheless, the attempt reveals the creative use and limits of public rituals in the political realm.

This article employs previously unused data sources and techniques in order to estimate labour productivity and total factor productivity in the Mexican cotton textile industry over the period 1850–1933. Our findings indicate: (1) substantial productivity growth prior to the Porfiriato; (2) rapid productivity growth throughout the Porfiriato; (3) a swift, though incomplete, recovery from the Revolution during the 1920s; and, (4) an insignificant impact on productivity from the Great Depression. We also find evidence that the large, joint stock, limited liability firms that were founded during the Porfiriato had higher levels of total factor productivity than privately owned firms, but only for a short period of time, which suggests that these firms might have been sub-optimally large. Our results also indicate that labour markets in Porfirian Mexico were efficient. This suggests that manufacturers may not have had the monopsony power in labour markets that the literature indicates.

Throughout the Mexican Revolution, the ebb and flow of conflict in the north-central Laguna region (see Map 1) fed directly into the mainstream of national politics. From 1900, the Laguna's workers and peasants expressed economic and social discontent through insubordination, theft, banditry and sporadic – sometimes organised – demands for better wages and working conditions. Following the lead of a discontented, highly competitive and fractious landholding elite, they were among the first to revolt against the Porfirio Díaz government and continued to influence the direction of the revolution as the region was alternately fought over and administered by each of the north's principal factions. The ultimate triumph of any faction in the revolution required control of Mexico's north, and that required controlling the Laguna.

By mid-1940, the Argentine economy seemed to be heading for a major crisis because many of her traditional export markets had suddenly become inaccessible. In response, Finance Minister Federico Pinedo and his team developed a wide range of initiatives. These aimed to overcome the crisis and restructure the Argentine economy in order to accommodate it to a changing and difficult international environment.

This article analyses the nature, successes and failures of these policies. It argues that while Pinedo's initiatives certainly entailed visionary elements which anticipated major problems of the Argentine and Latin American development of the post-war era, they should not be regarded as some ‘golden opportunity’ for sound economic modernisation that was missed only because Pinedo and his fellow conservatives failed to win political approval and were later pushed aside by the rising force of populism.

This article examines the creation of an Indian ideal within Indigenismo in the years 1920–40. While scholars argue that Indigenismo described a degenerate Indian ‘other’, this article shows that it often represented the Indian as a model for revolutionary politics and culture. This is evident first in Indigenista celebrations of Indian cultures during the 1920s, and in their valorisation of Indians as rational political actors with modern sensibilities during the 1930s. In validating this ‘modern’ Indian, Indigenistas created a limited framework for legitimate ‘Indian politics’ which took place within the national culture. However, they also labelled Indians who challenged revolutionary programs as ‘primitive’ and ‘pre-political’.

An analysis of the seven daily newspapers with the widest circulation in Argentina, including the Peronist La Epoca, shows the humanisation of capitalism and social justice as the main topics of discussion in Argentine society between 1930 and 1946. Newspapers and parties debated the foundations of a much desired democratic revival and depicted the government of F. D. Roosevelt as a model to be followed. By 1946 most Argentines supported the implementation of policies similar to those of Roosevelt. In the light of this, Perón and the Unión Democrática competed to present themselves as the Argentine version of the US president. The deciding factor in the 1946 elections was not the defence of national sovereignty but rather the impression of which candidate would be capable of developing a democratic system which included economic and social concerns.

This paper studies the participation of an important group of Mexican postrevolutionary intellectuals, leaders of the cultural-educational project during the early 1930s, in the construction of two closely related concepts: the ‘peasant problem’ and its nucleus, the ‘revolutionary peasant’, both central to the political and ideological consolidation of the new regime. It discusses the approaches that lead them to propose a new ‘peasantness’, suitable for the political and economic interests that dominated the process of formation of the postrevolutionary State. It also considers the struggle that developed within the group between the ‘productivists’, linked to Marxism-Leninism, and the ‘cultural-populists’, more concerned with the cultural survival of the Indo-campesino groups, for the right to define these concepts. The analysis is based on El Maestro Rural, edited by the Secretaría de Educación Pública since 1932.

The United States reacted to the revolution which brought General Maximiliano Hernández Martínez to power in 1931 by refusing to recognise him under a 1923 treaty. Martínez broke precedent by entrenching himself in the presidency. The State Department first attempted to subvert him. The outbreak of a peasant rebellion, supposedly under communist leadership, then caused Washington to seek a face-saving accommodation. The bargain failed because of the general's duplicity. Eventually the United States was forced to abandon the 1923 treaty and recognise Martínez. This opened the way to habitual recognition of non-communist dictators in Latin America.

This article analyses Adalberto Tejeda's agrarian experiment in the state of Veracruz, Mexico, during the years 1928–32. This experiment was unique in two respects. First, disregarding the central government's policy, which sought to end agrarian distribution completely, it parcelled out land to the peasants on an unprecedented scale; secondly, it proved, contrary to the prevailing wisdom of the time, that agrarian reform implemented through the full range of channels offered by the 1917 federal constitution could serve as a tool of social justice and equality, and hence as a central factor in the advancement of social welfare and democracy in Mexico. This article seeks to show that the failure of the Veracruz experiment offers an explanation – perhaps a cardinal explanation – for the perceived failure of Mexican agrarian reform in general.

In the ‘pre-history’ of Argentina's labour movement lie the mutual-benefit societies. Although these associations embraced almost half of the workers of Buenos Aires at the time of the Centenario (1910) little is known about them. The article explores the main parameters shaping the development of the mutual benefit societies, their relationship to the immigrant communities and their role in relation to social security. It traces, finally, the ambiguous relationship between the mutual benefit societies and the emergence of Peronist trade unionism in the mid-1940s.

This study challenges the widely held belief that the peasant rebellion of 1932, and the massive military response to it, marked the demise of Indian ethnic identity. Working from documents that have become available only recently, we demonstrate that the Indian population was not decimated by the military repression. The percentage of Indians in the population remained steady and in some regions even increased. We show that the bedrock of Indian identity, the cofradías and the communities, survived the repression as well. We propose that these survivals are due, ironically, in part to the military. Despite their willingness to employ violence on a colossal level, military leaders believed that order in the countryside was to be achieved through reform as well as repression. The military's reformist ideology and reform programme worked to defend individual Indians and Indian communities from ladinos anxious to avenge their losses in the uprising.

During an economic crisis in Ecuador, three models of and solutions to the agrarian problem were proposed. A peasant path of agricultural development was formulated by peasant leaders and socialist activists. A large-landholder model was promoted by modernising large landowners. A medium-landholder model was advanced by promoters of European immigration and urban mestizos seeking land through state colonisation projects. The adherents of each approach identified certain groups as the cause of low agricultural productivity and national crisis, articulating racial ideologies by defining those groups as inherently ‘traditional’, and thus debating the boundaries of inclusion to the national community.

The current productive restructuring in Central America is creating significant changes in the region's labour markets. New sectors of tradeables are emerging which, from the point of view of labour, cannot be characterised as formal. Indeed, formal employment is currently in a state of decline while the informal sector is redefining its internal heterogeneity. This article focuses on the new expressions of informality. Three scenarios are identified: the economy of poverty, subcontracting, and the agglomeration of small dynamic enterprises. Various analytical aspects are considered in each of these three scenarios: the context of the globalisation process; the type of informality; the resources which are mobilised; the challenges faced; and the identities generated. The analysis is based on the evidence supplied by three case studies. The first refers to the former public employees of Managua (Nicaragua) who, in the aftermath of state reforms, presently pursue informal activities. The second example concerns a group of women in the community of Puente Alto (Honduras) who work as subcontracted producers for an industrial export firm. Sarchí, Costa Rica's principal artisan centre, illustrates the third scenario.

The statistical evidence surveyed suggests that as an indicator of development the Human Development Index is directly related to the level of per capita income; that inequality is countercyclical; and that economic growth is poverty reducing. In the case of Guyana the data suggest that nearly 43 per cent of the population were below the poverty line (approximately US$1 per day per person); that poverty is predominantly rural; that most of the poor seek employment in agriculture or in the informal (self employed) sector; and that there is a direct relationship between the level of education, health and poverty.

This article, inspired by a TV interview with the Nobel Prize-winner Gabriel García Márquez, revises the ways that the fiction in One Hundred Years of Solitude has been accepted as history. In particular, it raises some questions about how literary critics and historians have accepted as history García Márquez's rendition of the events during the strike that took place in Colombia in 1928. It examines the repressive nature of the Colombian regime and of the strike itself; it also examines the idea that following the strike there was a sort of ‘conspiracy of silence’ to erase the truth from the nation's history.