An original account of contemporary US-Latin American relations, this book utilises neo-Gramscian and historical materialist approaches to build a novel conceptual framework for analysing US hegemony, extending critical theory in new and exciting directions. It disaggregates US power into distinct forms (structural, coercive, institutional and ideological) to convincingly argue that the United States is remaking its hegemony in the Western hemisphere. The first decade of the new century saw the ascendancy of leftist and centre-left forces in Latin America. The emergence and consolidation of the ‘New Latin Left’ signalled a profound challenge to the long-standing hegemony of the United States in the region. This book details the ways in which US foreign policy responded: defining hegemony as a dialectical relationship patterned by multiple and overlapping forms of power, it situates US policy in the context of the Post-Washington Consensus. Making considerable use of confidential diplomatic cables published by Wikileaks, it examines the interplay of different facets of US hegemony, which are inextricably bound up in the neoliberalisation of the region’s political economy. This book brings clarity to what remains an open and contested process of hegemonic reconstitution, and promises to be of interest to scholars working in a number of overlapping subject areas, including International Relations (IR), US foreign policy and Latin American studies.

“Latin America” is a concept firmly entrenched in its philosophical, moral, and historical meanings. And yet, Mauricio Tenorio-Trillo argues in this landmark book, it is an obsolescent racial-cultural idea that ought to have vanished long ago with the banishment of racial theory. Latin America: The Allure and Power of an Idea makes this case persuasively. Tenorio-Trillo builds the book on three interlocking steps: first, an intellectual history of the concept of Latin America in its natural historical habitat—mid-nineteenth-century redefinitions of empire and the cultural, political, and economic intellectualism; second, a serious and uncompromising critique of the current “Latin Americanism”—which circulates in United States–based humanities and social sciences; and, third, accepting that we might actually be stuck with “Latin America,” Tenorio-Trillo charts a path forward for the writing and teaching of Latin American history. Accessible and forceful, rich in historical research and specificity, the book offers a distinctive, conceptual history of Latin America and its many connections and intersections of political and intellectual significance. Tenorio-Trillo’s book is a masterpiece of interdisciplinary scholarship.

This book concerns the form taken today by US imperialism in Latin America, with reference to the projection of US state power as a means of both advancing the economic interests of the US capitalist class in the region and maintaining its hegemony over the world capitalist system. In Part I the book delves into the complex relationship that exists between imperialism and capitalism as the system that dominates the world economy. Part II elaborates on the economic and political dynamics of imperial power in Latin America and the forces of resistance that these dynamics have generated. Part III focuses on the relationship between the United States and Venezuela, which has assumed the leadership in the anti-imperialist struggle.

This volume explores the repercussions of a changing world order on regional security in Latin America. It examines how global and regional power shifts impact on the evolution of regional institutions as well as on state policies adopted in response to regional security challenges such as border conflicts, political instability, migration, drug-trafficking, organized crime, and terrorism. Contributions to this volume analyze the topic from three angles: power dynamics and its effects on regional security governance; the contribution of regional institutions to the management of security challenges; and the impact of power dynamics on states’ shifting security priorities. Written by specialists from Brazil, Argentina, Colombia, Mexico, the United States and Europe, the chapters weave theory and case studies to provide a rich description of the impact of power and politics on regional security in Latin America. This book is an invaluable resource for students, scholars and practitioners interested in Latin American politics, regional cooperation, and war and conflict studies, as well as international security and international relations in general.

Provides insight into U.S. and Chinese involvement in aid, trade, direct investment and strategic ties in Latin America In recent years, China has become the largest trading partner for more than half the countries in Latin America, and demonstrated major commitments in aid and direct investment in various parts of the region. China has also made a number of strategic commitments to countries like Nicaragua, Cuba, and Venezuela which have long-standing policies opposing U.S. influence in the region. China, the United States, and the Future of Latin America posits that this activity is a direct challenge to the role of the U.S. in Latin America and the Caribbean. Part of a three-volume series analyzing U.S.-China relations in parts of the world where neither country is dominant, this volume analyzes the interactions between the U.S., China, and Latin America. The book series has so far considered the differences in operating styles between China and the U.S. in Central Asia and Southeast Asia. This third volume unpacks the implications of competing U.S. and Chinese interests in countries such as Brazil and Argentina, and China’s commitments in Nicaragua and Venezuela. This volume draws upon a variety of policy experts, focusing on the viewpoints of South American and Caribbean scholars as well as scholars from outside states. China’s new global reach and its ambitions, as well as the U.S. response, are analyzed in detail.A nuanced examination of current complexities and future implications, China, the United States and the Future of Latin America provides readers with varied perspectives on the changing economic and strategic picture in Latin America and the Caribbean.

In January 1927 Gus Comstock, a barbershop porter in the small Minnesota town of Fergus Falls, drank eighty cups of coffee in seven hours and fifteen minutes. The New York Times reported that near the end, amid a cheering crowd, the man's "gulps were labored, but a physician examining him found him in pretty good shape." The event was part of a marathon coffee-drinking spree set off two years earlier by news from the Commerce Department that coffee imports to the United States amounted to five hundred cups per year per person. In Coffee, Society, and Power in Latin America, a distinguished international group of historians, anthropologists, and sociologists examine the production, processing, and marketing of this important commodity. Using coffee as a common denominator and focusing on landholding patterns, labor mobilization, class structure, political power, and political ideologies, the authors examine how Latin American countries of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries responded to the growing global demand for coffee. This unique volume offers an integrated comparative study of class formation in the coffee zones of Latin America as they were incorporated into the world economy. It offers a new theoretical and methodological approach to comparative historical analysis and will serve as a critique and counter to those who stress the homogenizing tendencies of export agriculture. The book will be of interest not only to experts on coffee economies but also to students and scholars of Latin America, labor history, the economics ofdevelopment, and political economy.

Most current analysis on Latin American politics has been directed at examining the shift to the left in the region. Very little attention, however, has been paid to the reactions of the right to this phenomenon. What kind of discursive, policy, and strategic responses have emerged among the right in Latin America as a result of this historic turn to the left? Have there been any shifts in attitudes to inequality and poverty as a result of the successes of the left in those areas? How has the right responded strategically to regain the political initiative from the left? And what implications might such responses have for democracy in the region? The Right in Latin America seeks to provide answers to these questions while helping to fill a gap in the literature on contemporary Latin American politics. Unlike previous studies, Barry Cannon’s book does not simply concentrate on party political responses to the contemporary challenges for the right in the region. Rather he uses a wider, more comprehensive theoretical framework, grounded in political sociology, in recognition of the deep social roots of the right among Latin America’s elites, in a region known for its startling inequalities. Using Michael Mann’s pioneering work on power, he shows how elite dominance in the key areas of the economy, ideology, the military, and in transnational relations, has had a profound influence on the political strategies of the Latin American right. He shows how left governments, especially the more radical ones, have threatened elite power in these areas, influencing right-wing strategic responses as a result. These responses, he persuasively argues, can vary from elections, through street protests and media campaigns, to military coups, depending on the level of perceived threat felt by elites from the left. In this way, Cannon uncovers the dialectical nature of the left/right relationship in contemporary Latin American politics, while simultaneously providing pointers as to how the left can respond to the challenge of the right’s resurgence in the current context of left retrenchment. Cannon’s multi-faceted inter-disciplinary approach, including original research among right-leaning actors in the region makes the book an essential reference not only for those interested in the contemporary Latin American right but for anyone interested in the region’s politics at a critical juncture in its history.

This ambitious book offers a clear and unified framework for understanding political change across Latin America. The impact of U.S. hegemony and the global economic system on the region is widely known, and scholars and advocates alike point to Latin America's vulnerability in the face of external forces. In spite of such foreign pressure, however, individual countries continue to chart their own courses, displaying considerable variation in political and economic life. Looking broadly across the Western Hemisphere, with examples from Brazil, the Southern Cone, the Andes, and Central America, Arceneaux and Pion-Berlin identify general rules that explain how international and domestic politics interact in specific contexts. The detailed, accessible case studies cast new light on such central problems as neoliberal economic reform, democratization, human rights, regional security, environmental degradation, drug trafficking, and immigration. And they consider not only what actors, institutions, and ideas matter in particular political contexts, but when, where, and how they matter. By dividing issues into the domains of "high" and "low" politics, and differentiating between short-term problems and more permanent concerns, they create an innovative typology for analyzing a wide variety of political events and trends.

The book tackles the subject of the military and politics in Latin America from a broad historical perspective, drawing on literature in the field and other information based on personal interviews with officers.

Integrates gender and sexuality into the main currents of historical interpretation concerning Latin America.