The Democratic Revolution In Latin America

In contrast to previous studies that have centered on the institutionalization of revolution in Latin America and the Caribbean, Modern Latin American Revolutions, Second Edition, introduces the concept of consolidation of the revolutionary process?the efforts of revolutionary leaders to transform society and the acceptance by a significant majority of the population of the core of the social revolutionary project. As a result, the spotlight is on people, not structures, and transformation, not simply revolutionary transition.The second edition of this acclaimed book has been revised to include new information on the cases of Bolivia, Cuba, Nicaragua, and Grenada, assessing the extent to which each revolution was both institutionalized and consolidated. This edition also boasts expanded coverage on Chuevara's visionary leadership and an all-new section that addresses the future of revolution in Latin America and the Caribbean. Dr. Selbin argues that there is a strong link between organizational leadership and the institutionalization process on the one hand, and visionary leadership and the consolidation process on the other. Particular attention is given to the ongoing revolutionary process in Nicaragua, with an emphasis on the implications and ramifications of the 1990 electoral process. A final chapter includes brief analyses of the still unfolding revolutionary processes in El Salvador and Peru.

Analyzes the common heritage shared by all the major Latin American revolutions.

State and Society in Spanish America during the Age of Revolution calls into question the orthodox split of Latin American history into colonial and modern, arguing that this split obscures significant economic, social, and even political continuities from 1780 to 1850. In addition, the book argues that the colonial-modern division makes it difficult to appraise historical changes in a comprehensive way. The book covers an unconventional period-1750 to 1850-and looks at the continuities over this longer, more comprehensive timespan. The essays discuss late colonial and postcolonial developments in gender, racial, class, and cultural relations across Latin America and in specific regions, including Mexico, Colombia, Argentina, and Chile. By bridging these two eras and looking at the "Age of Democratic Revolution" as a whole, the book allows readers to see the coming of Latin America's struggle for independence from Spain and Portugal and the changes after independence. Written by established Latin American scholars as well as up-and-coming historians, these essays are published in this volume for the first time. This book is ideal for courses on Latin American history, including colonial history, national history, and the "Age of Revolution."

By emphasizing Latin American reformers' decades-long struggle to defeat authoritarianism, this transnational history challenges the timeworn Cold War paradigm and recasts the region's political evolution Scholars persist in framing the Cold War as a battle between left and right, one in which the Global South is cast as either witting or unwitting proxies of Washington and Moscow. What if the era is told from the perspective of the many who preferred reform to revolution? Scholars have routinely neglected, dismissed, or caricatured moderate politicians. In this book, Allen Wells argues that until the Cuban Revolution, the struggle was not between capitalism and communism--that was Washington's abiding preoccupation--but between democracy and dictatorship. Beginning in the 1920s, the fight against authoritarianism was contested on multiple fronts--political, ideological, and cultural--taking on the dimensions of a political crusade. Convinced that despots represented an existential threat, reformers declared that no civilian government was safe until the cancer of dictatorship was excised from the hemisphere. Dictators retaliated, often with deadly results, exporting strategies that had been honed at home to guarantee their political survival. Grafted onto this war without borders was a belated Cold War, with all its political convulsions, the aftershocks of which are still felt today.

Shows how Cuba and Venezuela provide inspiration for anti-capitalist movements -- and how the Left must win power on a democratic basis.