scholarly journals The State in Latin America. The Military in Latin American Politics

1978 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
pp. 133
Author(s):  
Mauricio Dias David
Keyword(s):  
Latin America ◽  
Latin American ◽  
American Politics ◽  
The State ◽  
Latin American Politics ◽  
The Military

Political Development and Military Intervention in Latin America

1966 ◽  
Vol 60 (3) ◽  
pp. 616-626 ◽  
Author(s):  
Martin C. Needler
Keyword(s):  
Latin America ◽  
Latin American ◽  
Political Development ◽  
American Politics ◽  
Military Intervention ◽  
Political Community ◽  
Military Coup ◽  
The Political ◽  
Latin American Politics ◽  
The Military

It is noteworthy that the recent spate of writings in the field of “political development” has shown a pronounced tendency to omit consideration of Latin America. Thus the “communications” and “bureaucracy” volumes in the SSRC political development series are totally innocent of Latin American data, as is an excellent recent treatment of—of all things!—the political behavior of the military in developing areas.The Latin Americanists, for their part, have largely stressed those key features of the area's politics which have long remained constant—executive predominance, military intervention, and the influence of the peculiarities of Hispanic culture. At the same time, it is clear that the social changes usually collectively termed “modernization”—urbanization, technological borrowing, and the development of mass communications grids—together with their political correlate, the expansion of the political community to include hitherto excluded social elements, are proceeding in Latin America too. Accordingly, it becomes desirable to reexamine the “statics” of Latin American politics in the light of the “dynamics” of the processes of political development and social mobilization.The present article attempts this reexamination with respect to the most characteristic feature of Latin American politics, the coup d'état and the establishment of a de facto military government.A priori, mutually contradictory theses about the relations of the military coup to social development can be constructed—and indeed the literature on the subject abounds in such contradictory theses, evidence to support each of which is always available.

Elites, Elite Settlements, and Revolutionary Movements in Latin America, 1950–1980: Introduction

1994 ◽  
Vol 18 (4) ◽  
pp. 543-574
Author(s):  
Timothy P. Wickham-Crowley
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Latin America ◽  
Latin American ◽  
American Politics ◽  
Social Revolution ◽  
Latin American Politics ◽  
Revolutionary Movements

Social revolutions as well as revolutionary movements have recently held great interest for both sociopolitical theorists and scholars of Latin American politics. Before we can proceed with any useful analysis, however, we must distinguish between these two related but not identical phenomena. Adapting Theda Skocpol’s approach, we can define social revolutions as “rapid, basic transformations of a society’s state and class structures; and they are accompanied and in part carried through by” mass-based revolts from below, sometimes in cross-class coalitions (Skocpol 1979: 4; Wickham-Crowley 1991:152). In the absence of such basic sociopolitical transformations, I will not speak of (social) revolution or of a revolutionary outcome, only about revolutionary movements, exertions, projects, and so forth. Studies of the failures and successes of twentieth-century Latin American revolutions have now joined the ongoing theoretical debate as to whether such outcomes occur due to society- or movement-centered processes or instead due to state- or regime-centered events (Wickham-Crowley 1992).

True Crimes: Rodolfo Walsh and the Role of the Intellectual in Latin American Politics

2002 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael McCaughan
Keyword(s):  
Latin American ◽  
American Politics ◽  
Open Letter ◽  
Latin American Politics ◽  
Dirty War ◽  
Death Squad ◽  
The Us ◽  
Own Name ◽  
The Military

Rodolfo Walsh was a writer of crime novels, a tireless investigative journalist who uncovered real political crimes, an instant historian of a turbulent and violent era in Argentinian and Latin American politics. He was in Cuba in 1960, participating in setting up the first revolutionary press service in Latin America, "Prensa Latina", when a coded telex arrived in their offices by mistake. After sleepless nights and with one cryptography manual, Walsh deciphered the plans for the US invasion of Cuba being planned in Guatemala by the CIA. Walsh was active in the Montonero guerrilla in Argentina, co-ordinating information and intelligence work. In that capacity he made public the existence of ESMA, the Naval Mechanics School which was the main military torture centre. In his own name he wrote an Open Letter to the Military Junta, a year from the coup and a day before his death, denouncing the dirty war. He was gunned down in the streets of Buenos Aires by a military death squad. This is an account of Rudolfo Walsh's life. It includes extended excerpts from his varied writings.

Revolution or Contribution? Rational Choice Approaches in the Study of Latin American Politics

2002 ◽  
Vol 44 (03) ◽  
pp. 1-28 ◽  
Author(s):  
Evelyne Huber ◽  
Michelle Dion
Keyword(s):  
Rational Choice ◽  
Latin American ◽  
American Politics ◽  
Power Relations ◽  
Social Groups ◽  
The State ◽  
Structural Constraints ◽  
Latin American Politics ◽  
Over Time

Abstract This article assesses the contributions of studies in the rational choice (RC) tradition to scholarly understanding of Latin American politics. It groups some representative works according to their use of RC assumptions, and also reviews some of the major works in the institutionalist tradition. It argues that works in the RC tradition have neither forced a major rethinking of established theories nor filled major lacunae, although they have illuminated some phenomena that were only partly understood. The RC approach works best for narrow questions in which power relations and structural constraints are stable, whereas its essential assumptions become untenable in questions that involve shifting power relations among social groups and the state over time.

The Limits of Functional Differentiation under Populist Rule in Latin America

2018 ◽  
Vol 23 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 47-67
Author(s):  
Dr. Aldo Mascareño
Keyword(s):  
Latin America ◽  
Latin American ◽  
American History ◽  
American Politics ◽  
Functional Differentiation ◽  
Institutional Framework ◽  
Latin American Politics ◽  
Latin American History ◽  
The People ◽  
Three Phases

Abstract Populism has been one of the most outstanding features of Latin American politics throughout the 20th century. By controlling political and economic operations and appealing to the semantic construction of pueblo (the people), populism has succeeded in shaping a regional variant of functional differentiation. This process is analyzed along three phases of Latin American history, the pre-populist age of caudillos, the classic populism in the 20th century, and the neo-populist period in the 21st century. The article concludes with a reflection on the consequences of populism for the institutional framework in Latin America.

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