1406309

The New Nationalism in Latin AmericaAuthor(s): Arthur P. WhitakerSource: The Review of Politics, Vol. 35, No. 1 (Jan., 1973), pp. 77-90Published by: Cambridge University Press for the University of Notre Dame du lac on behalf ofReview of PoliticsStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1406309 .Accessed: 15/05/2014 17:31

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The New Nationalism in Latin America

Arthur P. Whitaker

R USSIA'S new naval presence in the Caribbean creates a situation somewhat like the Cuban missile crisis of 1962. This time, however, the problem confronting the United States,

though less urgent, is more difficult in the sense that it is more complex. Its complexity arises mainly from the fact that, as regards the Latin Americans, Russia's main objective must be political. Its use of military force to coerce them is out of the question, and the scale of its trade with all of them except Cuba is too small to provide economic leverage. On the other hand, its naval penetration of the Caribbean could reasonably be expected to help promote Soviet prestige and political influence throughout Latin America.

Moscow's best instrument for this purpose is nationalism of the variety now on the rise in Latin America. More than most other varieties, this one heightens tension in foreign relations, especially with the United States. On the home front it is proving itself a born troublemaker in most Latin-American countries and a potential cause of civil war in some.

Of the many widely different varieties of modern nationalism- dynamic or nostalgic, revolutionary or reactionary, inward- or outward-oriented, and so on-the kind now on the rise in Latin America is one of the most dynamic and revolutionary. It is often called "new," as I have referred to it here. In fact, however, it is a blend in almost equal parts of two long-familiar doctrines. One is an anti-imperialism aimed at freeing Latin-American countries from foreign controls of all kinds, beginning with the conquest of economic independence. The other is the thesis that all these countries must undergo a structural revolution in the interest of social justice and at the expense of the privileged classes.

This doctrinal blend has been anticipated more than once in Latin America, most clearly by Argentine Peronism in the 1940's. Its meaning to the present generation of the faithful has never been stated better than by Vivi(an Trias, an Uruguayan Marxist, in his book attacking the Alliance for Progress, El Plan Kennedy y la revolucion latinoamericana. Though now a decade old, the Trias

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78 THE REVIEW OF POLITICS

formula could just as well have been written today. The "new nationalism," says Trias (pp. 184-186), is "a revolutionary nationalism of the colonial periphery"-"revolutionary" because it aims at a transformation of the social and economic as well as the political structure of each country, and of its foreign relations too; "colonial periphery" because that is the term he and other Marxists apply to the underdeveloped countries of Asia and Africa as well as Latin America, all of which (the argument runs) are still economically colonial even when politically independent. This course of reasoning leads to anti-imperialism, and although Trias gives social justice priority over it, he recognizes that the two are inseparable. Without liberation from foreign control, he maintains, underdevelopment cannot be overcome, and until it has been overcome the central problem of abolishing mass poverty and achieving social justice can never be solved.

As thus defined, Latin America's new nationalism seems made to order for the Kremlin, whose current objective in this area, the experts say, is the relatively modest one of disrupting the Organiza- tion of American States, intensifying Yankeephobia with the hope of provoking another Yankee intervention, and otherwise souring Latin-American relations with the United States, at heavy cost to our national pocketbook and international prestige. Moreover, the new nationalism has a built-in bias in favor of Moscow and against Washington. It is rooted in Marxism; its anti-imperialist fire is directed almost entirely against the United States; and on the principle that "the enemy of my enemy is my friend," Latin- American nationalists of this persuasion look to the Soviet Union as their natural supporter against the United States.

In this situation the Kremlin no longer needs to assume commit- ments and risks of any great moment, as it did in the case of Castro's Cuba. It can keep a free hand to feed the fires of Latin-American Yankeephobia at times and places of its own choosing, as it has been and is doing with good effect in various countries, among them Mexico, Costa Rica, Panama, Colombia, Bolivia, Uruguay and above all, most recently, Chile. Stimulation of ferment on the Latin- American homefront too is useful to Moscow in the present circumstances, and such a stimulus is amply furnished by the new nationalism, for its stated purpose of revolutionizing social and economic structures is in effect a declaration of war on the upper classes.


NEW NATIONALISM IN LATIN AMERICA 79

At the present writing the new nationalism has become official doctrine in only two Latin-American countries, Cuba and Chile, and it is strongly opposed by the military government of Brazil, which is the biggest of the Latin-American Big Three. But the Brazilian military's opposition is directed against its domestic, social revolutionary aspect, not against its anti-imperialism; and outside government circles both aspects are endorsed by now-submerged elements whose populism provoked the establishment of the present dictatorship in 1964. Official attitudes in the other two members of the Big Three are less clear. In Argentina, as we shall see, the military dictatorship seems to be moving towards an accommodation with the new nationalism. Mexico, some think, was immunized against it by its own populistic, xenophobe Revolution of 1910, but the immunity is obviously wearing off, as witness such recent signs as student upheavals, guerrilla activities, a resurgence of anti-Amer- icanism and the government's defensive swing back to the left. In several smaller countries the new nationalism has shown a rather impressive potential for growth. Military regimes in Panama and Peru have embraced both aspects of it. So too did a recent Bolivian government, which is said to have been toppled with aid from socially conservative Brasilia. Even in more stable Colombia ex- dictator Rojas Pinilla, a distant echo of Juan Per6n, lost a bid for rehabilitation at the polls on a populist platform in 1972 only after alarming the entrenched Conservative-Liberal coalition by the strength of his popular appeal despite his age (past 70) and in- firmity (diabetes).

But the most striking examples come from three countries in the southern cone of South America: Uruguay, Chile, and Argentina. It is no mere coincidence that, in the first half of this century, all three countries were among the Latin-American vanguard in economic growth, political democracy and cultural advancement, but since World War II have fallen into economic stagnation and political and cultural confusion. In all three, conventional remedies have failed and the new nationalism is gaining ground.

The case of Uruguay is quite remarkable. The pioneer welfare state in the Western Hemisphere, Uruguay had by the 1930's come to be regarded as a model polity, an American Utopia. Yet, in recent years hostility to the Montevideo Establishment has continued to mount throughout the country. In 1971 it was attacked on two fronts: by urban guerrillas, calling themselves Tupamaros, whose



acts of terrorism against both nationals and foreigners made head- lines all over the world, and by the Frente, Amplio (Broad Front), a coalition of left-wing splinter parties for whom the existing welfare system was not enough and the continuing foreign economic control far too much. In the national election of early 1972 the Frente Amplio copied Chilean Salvador Allende's tactics and much of his platform without repeating his success at the polls. But its defeat simply unleashed the Tupamaros' terrorism, which had been sus- pended during the political campaign, and at the present writing the government of Latin America's quondam "model democracy" is fighting for its life.

The best evidence of the workings of the new nationalism comes from Chile under its new Socialist-Communist administration headed by President Salvador Allende Gossens. Allende was elected late in 1970 as the candidate of Popular Unity--a coalition of his own Socialist Party, the Communist Party, and splinter groups- and on a platform that promised to make Chile over into a Marxist society. Considerable progress has already been made towards this goal, notably by breaking up large landholdings and nationalizing key banks and industries, some domestic but the largest foreign- owned, such as the Anaconda and Kennecott copper mines and a subsidiary of International Telephone and Telegraph. Yet Allende was and still is a minority president. He was elected with just under 37 per cent of the popular vote as against 63 per cent for the can- didates of the other two major parties, both of which were strongly opposed to him and his program. These opposition parties gained control of both houses of Congress in that election and have strengthened it by winning three of the four subsequent by-elections to date.

That Allende has accomplished so much in the face of these obstacles is not a little remarkable. He is not what one thinks of as the charismatic type or any specifically Latin-American type of caudillo. Not a heroic warrior, not a spellbinder, not a mystic, he is an aging physician (born in 1908) who practices politics more than medicine and was defeated in bids for the presidency in the three preceding elections (1952, 1958, 1964). His upper-class status might seem a further handicap, but a close observer assures us that his fellow Socialists only prized him the more as "a man of means with a social conscience."

Part of the explanation of Allende's success as President lies in



the vigorous use that he and his lieutenants have made of the broad powers of a chief executive under the Chilean constitution, which is still in force. But another large part lies in the nature of Chile's chief interest groups and the impact of the new nationalism on them. There are four such groups: the upper-class oligarchy, the Catholic Church, organized labor and the armed forces. A fifth group, the intellectuals, with university faculty and students as its core, has occasionally exerted great influence in Chilean public affairs, but at the present time it is too deeply divided to rank in the same category with the other four.

The first two of these four have been seriously weakened in recent years, though their potential is still high. The formerly powerful oligarchy, as the leaders of the interrelated business, financial, and landowning sectors are styled by their critics, helped the revolutionary Christian Democrat Eduardo Frei Montalva win the presidential election of 1964, in which he was the only alternative to the even more radical Allende. Undeterred by the support the oligarchs had given him, President Frei proceeded to clip their wings during his six-year administration. In the election of 1970 they retaliated by offering a ticket of their own instead of supporting Frei's party again; but this only gave Allende the victory by dividing the opposition, and now he is moving to complete the destruction of that class in the name of social justice and national independence.

The weakening of the Catholic Church's role in public affairs has been accompanied by a reversal (not peculiar to the Church in Chile) of whatever direct influence it exerts. Before the separa- tion of Church and State by the new constitution of 1924, that influence was exerted by the hierarchy on the conservative side. Thereafter, for a third of a century, the hierarchy remained conservative and continued to speak for the whole Church in Chile but abstained from direct participation in politics. In the last dozen years or so, however, the Church has been split by the con- version of many of the clergy, including some prelates, to the view that social justice requires revolutionary change in Chile and that the Church has the right and duty to help bring it about. The other wing, still conservative, abstains as before from political ac- tion. To this extent, then, the Church, which some decades ago left the political arena as a conservative force, has now returned to it on the radical side. Though the moderately revolutionary Chris- tian Democrats are not a confessional party, they reflect this shift,



for most of them are left-wing Catholics and many of their guiding ideas are derived from the encyclicals of the so-called radical Pope John XXIII. But they do not have a united Chilean Church behind them.

More significant for the new nationalism are the other two main interest groups, organized labor and the armed forces. They are highly responsive to it, though for different reasons, and they are now the country's two principal power groups. Organized labor is attracted to the new nationalism chiefly by it promise of social justice. This they interpret as a commitment to raise their standard of living sharply and even faster than Allende himself thinks feas- ible. What attracts the armed forces is the new nationalism's other main plank, its summons to the defense of an allegedly imperilled national sovereignty, for its defense is their chief function and the summons glorifies their role. But even this incentive does not make their support of Allende's regime unconditional. The social sym- pathies of their officers, who make the decisions, are more often with the upper than the lower classes and their patience is being tried by labor's interpretation of social justice and the regime's interpretation of the constitution. So far they have adhered to their traditional abstention from politics, and for this Allende is much indebted to the new nationalism. But will they continue to abstain? This is probably the most crucial question in Chile today.

Chile is so different from all the other Latin-American countries in many ways that the question naturally arises whether the Chilean experience has any transfer value for them. I think it does, if only because conditions similar to those that explain the strong appeal of the new nationalism in that country are almost universal in the rest of Latin America. Foremost among the conditions are these two: first, widespread poverty among masses of people piled up on each other in madly growing cities and rendered increasingly resentful of their lot by rapidly expanding means of communication. Through these channels they are constantly reminded in various ways, as by the preachments of Moscow, Peking, the Alliance for Progress, and local organizations, that there is a better life in which, but for social injustice, they could share.

The second condition is underdevelopment in various degrees, combined with the domination of key elements of the several national economies by foreign countries, foremost among them the United States. A corrupt alliance, it is widely believed, unites these



foreign imperialists with upper-class Latin Americans identified as the vendepatria ("country-selling") oligarchy. Exploitation by this alliance is resented as a badge of colonialism and blamed for the misery of the masses, both urban and rural.

So it is not surprising either that the new nationalism is a blend of primarily Yankeephobe anti-imperialism with revolutionary populism, or that this brand of nationalism is spreading and may even become the one true faith of Latin America's popular parties. What may seem puzzling is that it did not do so long ago, for the basic conditions just described have existed for many years; even the great preponderance of the United States, which was the last to take shape, dates from World War II. A clue to the answer is provided by the fact that the new nationalism was anticipated in the 1940's and 1950's by Juan Per6n of Argentina and by others elsewhere, but that all of them failed. A major reason for Per6n's overthrow in 1955 was that he had recently retreated from the new nationalism in both its domestic and foreign aspects and was even coming to terms with the United States, for instance, by accepting aid from the Export-Import Bank and negotiating a contract with Standard Oil of California. Before the contract could be completed, he was overthrown without his once devoted descamisados ("shirt- less" masses) striking a blow in his defense.

Besides the failures of its pioneers, two general factors in the Latin-American situation were unfavorable to the spread of the new nationalism in the decade following Per6n's fall. One factor was the relative prosperity of a considerable part of Latin America in the 1950's. The other was the hope of improvement held out in the early 1960's by the creation of the Latin American Free Trade Association and the Alliance for Progress. But by that time special circumstances in Cuba had already opened the way to the most successful exponent of the new nationalism before Salvador Allende. This is, of course, Fidel Castro.

A comparison of these two cases provides an excellent example of the way in which the diversity of Latin America alters the application of the same doctrine in different countries. Of the many re- semblances and differences between the two, the most striking is the probably crucial difference between the two leaders' treatment of their respective countries' armed forces when they came to power. In Cuba, Castro promptly liquidated the old army, had scores of its officers executed by firing squads, created a new army and so



was able to carry out his radicalized revolution virtually without internal opposition.

Allende, on the other hand, has courted the Chilean armed forces all along, both during the presidential campaign of 1970 (as did both his opponents) and since he took office. Consequently, while so far supporting the new regime, they have remained intact as guarantors of the constitution and its democratic prescriptions, and as a potential threat to the regime if it acts unconstitutionally. As a further result, Allende has had to cope with organized political opposition, as Castro never did, and, despite Allende's substantial achievements, he is still far from his goal and, as Castro never was, in constant danger of overthrow.

How shall we explain such wide differences in the application of the new nationalism in two countries that have so many features in common? Among these are the Spanish language and cultural background, export-oriented economies and populations of approxi- mately the same size. Furthermore, at the beginning of their respective revolutions they were much alike in indices of development such as literacy, means of communication, and per capita wealth, which placed both countries in the more advanced group of Latin-Ameri- can nations.

The question is less puzzling than it may seem at first sight. When Castro came to power in 1959, he had only to complete the destruction of an army that was already defeated, demoralized and discredited, and of a political system, personified by ex-dictator Fulgencio Batista, that was in like disarray. In the Chile of 1970, the situation was far different. Its armed forces had long enjoyed public respect and, as already noted, had been courted by all the principal parties, including Allende's, up to and through the election that made him president. Chile's political system, too, was far sounder than Cuba's. In sharp contrast to Batista, Allende's last two predecessors, Christian Democrat Frei and Conservative Jorge Alessandri, had been noted for their rectitude and devotion to duty, and the attachment of the Chilean people at large to orderly and democratic processes was outstanding in Latin America. Finally, Allende, unlike Fidel Castro, could not claim with a straight face to be the voice of the people. In the election of 1970 the proportion of voters to total population was the highest in the country's history, and nearly two-thirds of their votes were cast for his opponents.



Allende's election could not have been made final -as it was by a resolution of the Congress- without the aid of one of the opposition parties, the Christian Democrats. Their support was gained only by his pledge to respect the existing constitution and certain additional limitations on his power. The latter relate particularly to control of the armed forces, which are still there to haunt him.

In view of all these facts, one can understand why even those high priests of quick and violent revolution, Fidel Castro and R6gis Debray, who visited Chile in, respectively, late 1971 and early 1972, admitted that Allende's comparatively slow-paced via pacifica (peaceful way) is the right way for Chile.

Contemporary Argentina provides an example of the new nationalism that is especially interesting on two counts. First, it links that country's Peronist past with the new nationalism. Second, the latter appears to have contributed to the breakup of the short-lived marriage of convenience between the military dictatorships of Ar- gentina and Brazil, which, being South America's two strongest states and contiguous, are natural rivals.

The three threads of a revived Peronism, the new nationalism, and international rivalry were brought together in mid-March, 1972, at a meeting in Brazil's new national capital, Brasilia, of the two countries' presidents, Generals Alejandro Lanusse (Argentina) and Emilio Medici (Brazil). The military dictatorships that they headed (and still head at the present writing) were set up several years ago to put an end to civilian misgovernment. High on the agenda of both was the curbing of populistic mass movements: Peronism in Argentina and its counterpart in Brazil.

These family likenesses might have been expected to bring about close cooperation between the two military regimes, and so they seem to have done until quite recently. There were even rumors that they planned a joint intervention against left-wing forces in Uruguay, near whose border they did in fact carry out joint military maneuvers. But by the time of their summit meeting in Brasilia it was obvious that their entente cordiale had turned sour, and when it broke up, words like "icy" and "irritated" were used to describe the feelings on both sides.

To account for this seemingly sudden rupture of the Buenos Aires-Brasilia axis most reports invoke only such factors as the traditional power rivalry and current differences, mainly over economic relations and Brazilian dam-building on the ParanA River upstream



from Argentina. These explanations are no doubt good as far as they go. In the preceding eight months, for example, President Lanusse had met at least once with the presidents of all the other Spanish South American countries (twice with Allende), reportedly in order to press Argentina's claim to continental leadership, while Brazil had developed a foreign-aid program that seemed to counter Argentina's claim. And at a banquet in Lanusse's honor during the March meeting, he shocked his Brazilian hosts by a speech in which he brought the power rivalry into the open: Argentina, he declared, would never "under any circumstances accept a second- rate destiny."

So rivalry, jealousy, and perhaps fear contributed to the rupture. Yet there is reason to suspect that it owes something to Lan- usse's determination to find a solution to Argentina's oldest, most difficult and most dangerous domestic problem. This is the problem of what to do about the maladjusted mass of populistic Peron- ists. Aided by the workers' fears that their "social gains" made in the Per6n period would be wiped out, the Peronist (also called Justicialist) movement made a quick recovery after his fall. It has been a major but muzzled contender in public life ever since. It comprises nearly one-third of the politically active population and the great bulk of the country's labor organizations, which are reputedly the strongest in Latin America. If the Peronists were united and permitted to campaign, they would be Argentina's largest political party. This permission has been granted them in only two national elections, those of 1962 and 1965, and they won them both, only to have their victories cancelled by military coups. In this and other ways the anti-Peronists, usually under military leadership and in control of the government, have sought to sup- press the movement. All their efforts have failed and the chief result has been to keep the country in turmoil and cripple its economy.

The conviction that this long and ruinous conflict must some- how be brought to an end has recently gained ground among military as well as civilian anti-Peronists. So also has support for the new nationalism, which may for once promote peace rather than strife by bringing together on common ground enough elements from both sides to heal the great schism of the Argentine people.

Whether or not General Lanusse's thoughts are taking this



course, and whether or not his faction remains in power, he and the nation are apparently being propelled along it by what we fondly call the logic of events. The two main domestic components of the new nationalism, state socialism and social welfare, are strong and growing stronger in Argentina. It has already moved closer to state socialism than any other South American country except Chile, and social welfare has its chief support in Peronism. And this party, after withstanding its numerous and powerful foes for many years, is now promised by President Lanusse that its political rights will be restored in the national election scheduled for early 1973.

If that happens, the already strong Peronist movement will probably gain new adherents, for the bandwagon effect works in Argentina too. And if the Peronists should recover political ascend- ancy and follow a neonationalist line, a cycle would be complete. For, although history never repeats itself verbatim, the prospect just sketched sounds much like a description of the Per6n regime in its sunshine years of the late 1940's, when its main pillars were organized labor and the armed forces and when, as already noted, it produced a prototype of today's new nationalism.

The military rulers of Brazil can hardly fail to be disturbed by the seeming trend or drift of Argentina towards the new nationalism. They have always opposed its domestic, populist aspect, and they have at least two reasons for disliking the prospect that it may be adopted by the Buenos Aires government. The first is that the con- tagion from it might spread to Brazil, as happened with Peronism two decades ago; the second, that it might smooth the path towards the entente that President Lanusse is suspected of seeking to arrange with Chile as well as the other seven Spanish South American states. Since these nine states ring Portuguese-speaking Brazil on all sides except the Atlantic, the rulers of Brazil look askance at any move towards such a coalition and are apparently trying to counter it by extending their influence in the countries-Uruguay, Paraguay and Bolivia-that border on both Brazil and Argentina. Here, then, we have another link between the new nationalism and the current ferment in Latin America.

This ferment has other sources as well. One of the most produc- tive is agrarian reform, but more closely related to the central theme of this article are communism and the development-modernization syndrome.

There are splinter groups of Maoists and Trotskyites in Latin



America and they are not negligible, but all the main Communist parties, though small in numbers, are, by Latin-American stand- ards, strong in organization, discipline and experience, and they are following the Kremlin's line. This is well adapted-much better than Peking's-to the present situation there. Unlike Peking's line, the Kremlin's calls for cooperation with other political parties, as the best, if not the only, means of coming to power. The Kremlin also endorses populistic nationalism, but with a counsel of suaviter in modo. In Chile, for example, it sides with Allende against left- wing Socialists who are impatient for the millennium now. On bal- ance, however, Latin America's Communists are making a contribution to the current ferment out of all proportion to their numbers.

Probably an even larger contribution comes from the urge to develop and modernize. In Latin America the two terms, though not synonymous, often seem so because they have so much in common. Both aim at a comprehensive betterment of the nation's life. Why, then, does this benevolent design provoke bitter dissension? One of many reasons is Latin America's matchless population ex- plosion. Production increases in some sectors, but so does reproduc- tion in nearly all. As a result, the larger product has to be shared among so many more people that progress in most countries lags far behind rising expectations, and frustration builds up. To make matters still worse, when progress is achieved, it widens the already yawning gap between the favored few and the masses. The Inter- American Development Bank's report for 1971 notes an increase of per capita income in most of the Latin-American countries. Yet long-range studies show that, even when these statistical increases continue substantially for several years, as they have done in a few countries (notably in Mexico and, of late, Brazil), the actual bene- fits have accrued very largely to the minority of about 20 per cent in the upper income brackets. Here lies a main reason for the growth of impatient populism, which is an essential ingredient of the new nationalism.

In addition to such essentially domestic frictions, others arise in foreign relations when the neonationalist model is followed. Accord- ing to advocates of this model, as we noted at the outset, development is impossible without liberation from foreign control; and true believers interpret the term "foreign control" very broadly, including in it such matters as foreign press services, radio broadcasts, aid to universities, and even loans from international organizations, as well as the more familiar targets of nationalist antagonism, foreign



private investments and enterprise. Seizure of the latter is the chief cause of foreign friction. This always spreads to the home front, for there are always some nationals (the so-called vendepatrias) whose interests suffer along with those of their foreign connections, and others who dislike such seizures on ideological or practical grounds. At times, as in Chile since 1970, nationalism is too strong for domestic friction over primarily foreign issues to become a major factor, but at least it contributes its mite to the turmoil arising from other concerns.

In Latin America at large this turmoil is very serious-more serious and widespread, probably, than in any period since the early nineteenth-century wars of independence and the ensuing long generation of alternating caudillo rule and civil war. Yet we have good reason to doubt the prophets of doom who have been warning us for the last dozen years that all Latin America will inevitably ex- plode in violent revolution tomorrow unless it is peaceably and thoroughly revolutionized today for the benefit of its oppressed masses. As specialists have long known, there are in Latin America formidable obstacles to rapid and substantial change. Several years ago convincing proofs of their existence were brought together in a book edited by Claudio V6liz, a Chilean; that Vdliz is an advocate of sweeping change makes the proof all the more persuasive. These obstacles to change unquestionably put a brake on any revolutionary movement, whether peaceful or violent; to change the figure of speech, they are as likely to defuse revolution as the frictions are to detonate it. Even xenophobia, which gives the new nationalism its widest and most explosive appeal, has its limits. The military rulers of Peru, for instance, have already backed away from the hard line apparently indicated by their seizure of the International Petroleum Company's properties and are now bringing in other foreign firms to develop their country's recently discovered and extensive petroleum resources in the Amazon basin.

Moreover, what could become a new moderating factor in the Latin-American situation is Brazil's entry in 1971 into the foreign aid field, once a near-monopoly of the United States. So far, according to a report in the New York Times for April 5, 1972, Bra- zilian aid has been largely confined to neighboring countries such as Uruguay, Paraguay and Bolivia. Its effect, however, has been noted as far away as Guatemala, whose foreign minister, according to the same report, "compared Brazil's extension of credit lines to finance her exports to Central and South American countries to the



United States Marshall Plan." A slight exaggeration on the minister's part, but it made his point clear.

If Brazil's new policy turns out to be more than just another move in the power politics of the Plata basin, and if the will and resources can be summoned up to press it forward on a broader front, its net effect might be to reduce the present Latin-American ferment, in both foreign and domestic affairs. In Argentina, and possibly in Venezuela, it will be resented as a bid for South Ameri- can hegemony, and in Allende's Chile it will be seen as a threat. Elsewhere, however, it could have the doubtless unintentional side effect of helping the United States to lower its profile in Latin America and thereby taking some of the fire out of Yankeephobia, which is a chief source of neonationalist agitation. On the domestic front, too, Brazil's new aid policy could have a tranquilizing effect, at least in the recipient countries, by encouraging a revival of the hope that a better life can after all be achieved without a structural revolution.

That this irenic mood will spread over all Latin America is one of the last things we should expect. The revolutionary potential remains high in much of Spanish America and is not negligible even in booming Brazil. In both areas the retarding effect of the obstacles to change referred to above is strong, but it has not repealed history's only certain law, which is the law of change. Yet, unless the historical record and present signs are completely misleading, the heterogeneous countries comprised in Latin America are not headed for one grand revolution, either all at once or, like a pack of firecrackers, in rapid succession. Structural revolutions in Mexico after 1910 and in Cuba under Castro failed to ignite the rest, and there is no reason to believe that the transformation now under way in Chile will have a different sequel.

If revolution comes to the other Latin-American countries, it will probably do so by violence in some of them, by peaceful means in others, by a mixture of the two in still others, and at different times in all. Even the new nationalism, despite the potency of its combined appeal to resentful masses and to xenophobes of all classes, shows no signs of producing uniformity in either the domestic affairs or the foreign relations of highly diversified Latin America. It does, however, augur enough piecemeal successes for the Kremlin to confront Washington with hard problems, which the accords reached during President Nixon's recent visit to Moscow did nothing to alleviate.


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Issue Table of ContentsThe Review of Politics, Vol. 35, No. 1 (Jan., 1973), pp. 1-144Front Matter [pp. 1-2]The Uses of Tradition [pp. 3-16]Grenville Clark and the Origins of Selective Service [pp. 17-40]New Ways and Old to Talk about Politics [pp. 41-60]Latin American Catholicism's Opening to the Left [pp. 61-76]The New Nationalism in Latin America [pp. 77-90]ReviewsThe Founder of "The Review of Politics" [pp. 91-92]New Gods in America [pp. 92-93]A Guide to Tillich [pp. 93-95]A Study of Buber [pp. 95-96]The Political Sterility of Democratic Socialism [pp. 96-99]Ideology: Philosophical Difficulties [pp. 99-101]The Concert of Europe [pp. 101-103]How to Underdevelop Underdeveloped Countries [pp. 103-106]Defining Nationalism, Asian and African [pp. 106-110]Islam Reconsidered [pp. 110-113]Nasser's Egypt [pp. 114-115]Campaigning for Congress [pp. 115-116]The American: Innocent, Experienced and Obsolete [pp. 117-120]Revolution and Intervention [pp. 120-121]Johnson: The Last Hundred Days [pp. 122-123]Deterrence in the 1970's [pp. 123-125]Democracy and Citizenship [pp. 125-128]Review: untitled [pp. 128-130]Wiseman, House and Wilson [pp. 130-131]Conservative Opponents of Appeasement [pp. 131-132]German Rightist Nationalism and "Adapted Fascism" [pp. 133-136]The German Constitution [pp. 136-140]Sixty Years of Philosophical Experience [pp. 140-141]The Chinese Proteus [pp. 141-144]

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