LATIN AMERICAN POLITICS

Unit 1. How did contemporary Latin American political life come to be?

Week 1
Topic 1 (January 7)—Why is getting to know about Latin American politics worth your time?

• Please take some time this week to review a handful of on-line handouts that will help you to get the most out of this class:
  

• The syllabus

• A handout on how your class participation grade will be assigned, 

• Test grading criteria
  

• Paper grading criteria
  

• Citation instructions
  

• The High Point University Honor Code.
  

• To enable you to better participate in class, you will have a couple of map quizzes next week coming week. Please take the time over the first weekend of our class to become familiar with the location of a set of select countries in South and Central America, which I have noted the blank practice map that I have placed on-line for your convenience.
  

• Finally, I have put a draft study guide in the PPT file. It will help you identify what you should be looking for as you read through the materials related to each topic covered in the first course unit. Because the readings change every time I teach this course and it has been a couple of years since I last offered it, I will be making revisions to this document as the term unfolds. However, the big themes covered in the final, pre-test version of the guide will be the same, and I think it will be useful for you to have a guide earlier than later.

Topic 2 (Jan. 9)—Does it make any sense to compare countries across a large, highly diverse setting like Latin America?

• Get a flavor of the region and politics that you will be studying for the next few months by watching this early episode in the Brazilian television series City of Men (Cidade dos Homens, Episode 3): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1gdEI3Zp8cs. If you are interested in knowing more about the series, see this link.
  

• Vanden and Provost, Chp. 1, "An Introduction to Twenty-First Century Latin America" (18pp). Read this quickly and use the study guide to help you understand what data and facts you to should be concentrating on so you don't get get bogged down in the details. 

Week 2: Colonial legacies that shape contemporary politics

Topic 3 (Jan. 14)—How in the world did a few hundred Spanish Conquistadores topple two Latin American empires, and why does what happened centuries ago have any political relevance today?

• You will have your first map quiz 1 (10 minutes): You need to be able to match select countries in South and Central America up with their name. I have placed a map and a hand out containing a blank practice map in the PPT/Assignments folder. This exercise is meant to help you better participate in the class as the semester continues, and it will be one of just a few graded quizzes .

In class, we will be looking using the LatinoBarometer's online data analysis tool (https://www.latinobarometro.org/latOnline.jsp) to compare Latin Americans political attitudes and behaviors. Before you come to class on Tuesday, review the short screencast that I will post in this area soon. It explains what the LatinoBarometer and will give you a summary of the kind of work you will doing in class.

Note: We won't address the day's focus question or any of the readings listed below until Thursday or perhaps even a day later; I am assigning them now so that your workload for the week is split up into two blocks so that you don't have too much assigned for Thursday:

• Vanden and Provost, Chp. 2, "Early History." Read the opening chapter pages up to the section "Early Colony." 
  

• Jared Diamond, "The Arrow of the Disease" (Discover, 29pp). Read very quickly to get the main idea and to highlight evidence you could use on a test or in a pa per; the article expands on Diamond's documentary's explanation for why the effects of disease on the outcome of the Conquest was so one-sided.

• Optional if you want to know more: Watch a documentary on why the Europeans decimated the existing political structure with their arrival: Guns, Germs, and Steel, episode 2: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cF8x-8xnTeI (55 minutes; or around 36 minutes if you change your YouTube settings to watch at 1.5x speed)

Topic 4 (Jan. 16, 21)—What can the colonial period tell us about why Latin American politics is the way it is now? 

• Vanden and Provost, Chp. 2, "Early History." Read the rest of the chapter,   
  

• John Chasteen, short excerpt from Born in Blood & Fire: A Concise History of Latin America, 2nd ed. (New York: Norton, 2007)

Week 3: Why did democracy fail to take root in post-colonial Latin America?

Topic 5 (Jan. 21, 23)—Why didn't independence lead to democracy in Latin America like it did in the US? 

• You will have your second map quiz 1 (10 minutes): There is a (second) blank map in the PPTs folder that has a list of selected countries and cities. For the quiz, you will put the countries names in the right place on the map. For the cities, you will put each city's number in the right place on the same map.
  

• Ahead of this class, use the LatinoBarometer's "Online Analysis" tool to complete the back side of the grid handout from class. You don't need lots and lots of detail. Try to get a sense of the overall distribution of each variable for the six countries as a whole and note countries where a given variable (i.e., support for democracy, trust for one's fellow citizens, etc.) is especially high or low.  In class, I distributed a one-page guide on using the Online Analysis tool; a copy of that document is in the PPTs/assignments folder.
  

I am guessing we won't get much further than Latin American independence in this class, but reading these assignments now will help to space out the week's reading load:

• John Chasteen, short excerpt.  This reading will help you to understand the causes and outcomes of Latin America's independence movements.
  

• Howard J. Wiarda, "Independence and After." Read up to the section, Problems of New Nationhood. Wiarda's writing is older than you, but it is the best reading I have been able to find that examines the political development of Latin America in a way that is easily compared to the US as counter example. As you read this chapter, make a note of the many ways in which the Latin American pathway to independence and the key characteristics of the conflict differ from what you know about the US's separation from Britain. The dynamics and leadership of America's non-revolutionary but liberal separation put it on the pathway toward democracy and development; in Latin America's case, the characteristics of its independence stalled development and especially democracy for many decades.
  

Topic 6 (Jan 23)—Why did underdevelopment and antidemocratic politics persist into the 20th C.?

• Howard J. Wiarda, "Entering the Modern World," Don't get bogged down it the details. This chapter's main point is that, in the aftermath of Mexico's Revolution, the Bolshevik (Russian) Revolution, WW1, and the Great Depression, Latin American countries begin to follow distinct pathways in trying to incorporate urban workers and an emerging middle class into modern political and economics systems. You want to focus on the big picture.
  

If there is time in class, we will spend some time with the LatinoBarometer's Online analysis tool, to look at public opinion toward the religion and the military.

Week 4
Topic 7 (Jan 28, 30)—Religion: A force for change at last?

• In class, we will watch outtakes from Romero (a feature-film focusing on Óscar Romero).  This film will transition the focus of the course from Latin American political history as a whole to a several-class discussion of how the distribution of power among a handful of important political actors has changed in the last few decades.

• Quickly review the outakes from Chasteen's description of the central role Catholicism played in colonial Latin America. Except in places where (classically) liberal governments stripped the Church's power and assets, the conservative, elite-reinforcing role of the Church largely remains the same until midway through the 20th century. 

• After Spring 2025, V & P Chp. 6 is optional. Read this more accessible article on why and how the Catholic Church's role in Latin American society and politics changed and then decreased: José Darío Rodríguez Cuadros, "The religious shift in Latin America" (Hérodote, 2018, 15pp)

• For Spring 2025: Vanden and Provost, Chp. 6, "Religion in Latin America" (20pp). Focus on the sections up to page 155 (i.e, the sections on Catholicism, liberation theology, and Protestantism because the vast majority of religious Latin Americans belong to these two traditions).

• For additional insights on Romero, liberation theology, and the Catholic Church's current views on liberation theology, review this Vox article on the canonization pf (i.e., sainthood for) Oscar Romero: https://www.vox.com/2018/10/15/17977944/oscar-romero-new-catholic-saint.

•  The Economist, "Latin America is becoming more secular"

• Optional after Spring 2025:  Mark Setzler, "Does Religion Bias Individuals Against Female Political Leadership in Latin America?" (The Latin Americanist, 2015, 25pp). Read these two sections carefully: "Three Perspectives on the Relationship between Religion and Attitudes toward Female Politicians" (pp. 48-54) and "Discussion and conclusion" (pp. 64-66). Also take a look at the figures on pages 62 and 63, but skim the rest, including all of the statistical analyses except for the results reported in the figures. I assigned this article mostly so that you can get a sense about what kinds of political attitudes religion affects (see the intro) and also to provide you with an overview of how country-level differences (i.e., how much competition Catholicism has from Protestantism and secularism) shapes the influence of religion on people's behavior. 

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Week 5
Topic 7 (Feb 4, 6, 11),—Why has the military always been so influential in Latin American politics? 

For Tuesday:

• We will finish up the discussion on religion and then take a look at some more LatinoBarometer data specific to the military. If you need to review how to use the survey's online analysis feature to analyze cross-tabular data (e.g., how does religiosity vary by gender) or over time (e.g., are Latin Americans getting more supportive of military rule), here's summary of how to do this kind of work:
  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sC1g59qMKGw (15 minutes; or 10 at 1.5x speed if you just need a quick refresher)

For Thursday:

• A textbook chapter on the history of the military in Latin American politics (30 or so pages).
  

For Tuesday:

• Bring a copy of your complete LatinoBarometer grid assignment (the grad is in the LatinoBarometer subfolder in the PPT folder and is labeled 5.1--i.e., Week 5)
  

• The rest of the readings are the equivalent of one article; they are assigned to provide you with more context and to give you as sense of what the military has been up to most recently:

• The (Chilean) Government Junta/Augusto Pinochet, selected proclamations and speech excerpts (7pp). Skim this reading very quickly, focusing almost exclusively on the first speech and Pinochet's explanation for why he thinks the military can be justified in taking over an elected civilian government. The idea here is for you to get a grasp of why conservative military regimes thought they were entitled to topple governments, rule, and--in Chile's case--completely overhaul the economy

• Read the first few pages of Chapter 8, "Democracy and Authoritarianism" in Vanden and Provost textbook: Up to the section "Democratic Deficit."

• Read also, the texbook's one-page section in chapter 8 on "Military Rule and Bureaucratic Authoritarianism"
  
  Be familiar arguments about whether additional military intervention is likely in Latin America's future:
  

• Adam Isacson, "What is Latin America’s Political Turmoil Doing to Civilian Control of the Military? (Washington Office on Latin America, 2020, 3pp)\
• Frank Moral and Brian Fonseca, "It’s Not the 1970s Again for Latin America’s Militaries. Here’s Why." (Americas Quarterly 2019, 5pp).
• https://english.elpais.com/international/2024-01-28/bukele-the-cool-dictator-unrivaled-at-el-salvadors-elections.html
  
  

And here are some optional films you might watch if you have a keen interest on the topic::

• I'm Still Here, which received an Oscar nomination for best feature film, is based on real events and shows day-to-day life and political repression under Brazil's military dictatorship in the 1970s.  

• Argentina 1985 (produced by Amazon). This feature film tells the real-life story of the prosecution of Argentina's former military leaders for human rights violations.

• No (trailer, description, rent on Amazon) details how Chilean society came together to remove General Pinochet from power in a plebicite vote would have allowed him to stay in power for another 8 years (in addition to the 16 years he'd already been in power) if it had passed. 

• The Judge and the General (description, rent on Amazon) also is available on-line; it examines the prosecution of Pinochet.

Looking ahead. your first exam will be on Thursday, February 13. The paper for the first unit will be due at the start of class a week later (i.e., on Thursday, Feb. 20). The topic and instructions for the paper will be placed in the online PPTs/Assignments folder at least a week before your test.