Please note: At your instructor's discretion,
there may be minor alterations to the reading
assignments listed below. One of the major advantages to
providing you with an on-line readings archive is that
timely articles can be added or substituted when
appropriate. Opening documents downloaded from this
website will require that your computer have
Acrobat Reader . You will also need the
class-specific password to open individual files.
Unit 3:
Latin America's Political Economy and Development
Some resources for the rest of the term:
Topic 6 (April 7, 9): An overview of
Brazilian political history and its political system
-
On Tuesday, much of our in-class time will be spent
watching Capital Sins, a documentary on Brazil
during military rule and at the start of its
democratic transition.
-
Read carefully most of this selectively edited version of an
alternative textbook chapter. For the sections
on Brazilian history, just skim up to the section on
Getulio Vargas; read carefully from there forward. You
may want to watch the video on Brazilian political
history first--it all depends on whether you are the
kind of person who gets more out of reading or
watching a video.
-
Here's a 20 minute video summary of Brazilian
political history: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8YyBcCNM3BM.
It stops at 2020, during Bolsonaro's presidency. As
with Mexico, you will not be expected to have a firm
grasp of Brazilian political history except as its
most recent period of authoritarianism shapes
contemporary politics.
-
Consider this film a substitute for much of a
political history lecture in class. You are welcome
to skip the first 8 minutes, which outlines Brazil's
distinctive colonial period (Portuguese settlement
-> African-slave-based economy (sugar) ->
peaceful separation from Portugal and ending of
slavery in 1888 (the last country in the hemisphere
to do so).
- Start paying close attention at 10m:40sec, which is
where the video lecture starts to talk about Getulio
Vargas, who is the Brazilian version of Mexico's
Lazaro Cardenas, Argentina's Juan Peron, or America's
FDR. We'll cover the 1964-1985 military regime in
detail in class (with a documentary), so focus on what
happened after the military regime stepped down.
-
Vanden and Provost, Chp. 12. "Brazil." This
reading is optional. This chapter provides more
in-depth detail on Brazilian political history than
you need. However, skimming sections 394-404 and
407-411 could be helpful if you're unfamiliar with the
country's key historical events. While a deep
understanding of the study countries' history isn't
required, this review will provide some context for
their current political systems and challenges. What
it won't provide is much information that you won't
have read in a more straightforward assignment above.
April 14: Honors Day, so there is no class. Even
though we will not be meeting, you are asked to watch a
film so that we can finish the unit on Brazil in time to
allow you to complete the Unit 2 paper before classes stop
meeting.
-
Please watch The Edge of Democracy
(2019). After you have done so, complete its quiz,
which is BlackBoard. You should be able to
access the film here, via BlackBoard:
https://echo360.org/media/21843209-314a-436a-8131-9b2a11f7d9eb/public.
The BlackBoard quiz is to be completed as though it
were an exam--no copying and pasting and no use
whatsoever of AI. Do not worry about grammar and
spelling. I want to see your original thoughts. You
will be asked to reference the film and perhaps this
assignment as part of your last test. Please take
notes as you watch the film, concentrating on the
extent to which the film perhaps presents a one-sided
view (which will become even clearer when you do the
next block of readings) as well as how and why the
structure of Brazil's political institutions and the
depth of political polarization in recent years has
harmed the quality of Brazilian democracy.
Topic 7 (April 16) Why is Brazil's democracy still
struggling so much?
- After you have completed the readings below, you will
need to take a multiple-choice quiz in BlackBoard.
Unlike your other quizzes to date, this one will focus
on the major findings in this block of readings--i.e.,
the kinds of information you should be remembering and
having handy as you take unit tests. You will be able to
take the quiz a couple of times if things don't go well
on some items.
-
James N. Green, "Brazilian Democracy
in the Balance" (NACLA 2022, 5pp). As in the US,
Brazil's right-wing populist fostered widespread
distrust with Brazil's electoral process ahead of the
election, urging his followers to see any future loss
as evidence of electoral fraud. In other words, his
argument was that the system works when he wins, but
is corrupt when his opponents do.
Topic 8 (April 21): Why has Latin America faced such
serious economic and social development issues, and how
is this related to politics?
-
Your unit 2 paper is due in hard and electronic
copy at the start of class.
- The material below is optional work that
will not be covered on the Unit 3 or final
exam. You will need to cover this material if you
are writing the optional essay (the one that can replace
half of one major assignment if you earned a D or higher
on that assignment).
-
Charles Blake, a
short excerpt from Politics in Latin America.
The most useful parts of this partial chapter are the
table summarizing three major economic development
models and the various charts exploring the
relationship between economic outcomes and political
liberties.
-
Vanden and Provost, Chp. 7, "The Political Economy of
Latin America." Skim very quickly the first sections
of this detail-oriented chapter, starting to read more
carefully only when you get to the section on
"Dependency and Underdevelopment." Don't get
overwhelmed by the details--just focus on a few key
topics. Know what dependency theory is and why it
matters that Latin American countries long had
difficulties building diversified, industrial
economies similar to those in the advanced industrial
democracies. Similarly, be able to describe what
import-substitution-industrialization is and what
problems it addresses and creates. Finally, be able to
explain what "structural adjustment" and
"neoliberalism" are and why these approaches to
economic development became so prevalent in Latin
America, starting in the 1990s.
-
Samples of the variation that we see in economic
freedom in Latin American economic systems (From The
Heritage Foundation's "Economic Freedom Index,"
which is widely used in academic work. Print out and
read closely (each of these is just one page):
- A documentary film on Chile's Chicago Boys:
https://echo360.org/media/71598764-107b-48ca-a866-cc4c351510c7/public
Final assignments of the
term:
-
Your final exam is
on Wednesday, April 29, from 8-11 am. The
exam will have two components: a Unit 3 test and a
long-essay item assessing what you learned this
semester. Graduating seniors will need to make
arrangements to take the exam early.
-
You have been emailed a message containing the topic
for the long-essay portion of the final exam as well
as other important information. Read that email
message carefully. You are permitted to bring use a
note-card memory-aid for each part of the test as long
they adhere the guidelines noted in the emailed
instructions.
- There is no unit
paper for the last course unit. If you choose to write
the optional paper, you must follow the instructions
that you were emailed on Thursday, April 16. The
optional essay is due no later than Sunday, May 3 at
noon (this due date is firm as it is the latest
submission time where I can meet the grading deadline
for graduating seniors).
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