This original study examines a vital but neglected aspect of the 1952 National Revolution in Bolivia; the activism of urban inhabitants. Many of these activists were Aymara-speaking people of indigenous origin who transformed the urban environment, politics and place of “indígenas” and “neighbors” within the city of La Paz. Luis Sierra traces how these urban residents faced racial discrimination and marginalization despite their political support for the Movimiento Nacionalista Revolucionario (MNR). La Paz's Colonial Specters reassesses the contingent, relational nature of Bolivia's racial categories and the artificial division between urban and rural activists. Building on rich established historiography on the indigenous people of Bolivia, Luis Sierra breaks new ground in showing the role of the neighborhoods in the process of urbanization, and builds upon analysis of the ways in which race, gender and class discourse shaped migrants interactions with other urban residents. Questioning how and why this multiclass and multi-ethnic group continued to be labelled by elites and the state as “un-modern” indigena, the author uses La Paz to demonstrate the ways in which race, class, and gender intertwine in urbanization and in conceptions of the city and nation. Of interest to scholars, researchers and advanced students of Latin American history, urban history, the history of activism and the history of ethnic conflict, this unique study covers the previously neglected first half of the 20th century to shed light on the urban development of La Paz and its racial and political divides.

The Creation of Modern Buenos Aires examines the impact of civic associations on the culture and the society of Buenos Aires and their ties to politics in the first decades of the twentieth century. The period saw the emergence of the modern political system with true appeals to the voters, tremendous urban growth, and the solidification of a barrio identity. Historian Joel Horowitz examines four types of organizations: football clubs, bibliotecas populares (popular libraries), sociedades de fomento (development societies that pushed for barrio improvements), and universidades populares (popular universities that provided practical training beyond the primary school level). All four types became important social centers and were connected to the political world. The book focuses on the period from the passage of a voting reform law in 1912, which made male-citizen voting obligatory and fraud more difficult, to the military coup of 1943. The book shows how civic associations helped create the social world of the city, focusing especially on the part they played in the development of the sense of barrio. It demonstrates how civic associations became vital links in the system of politics that emerged, creating spaces for politicians to build connections to different communities.

"Luis Sierra treads new ground in his authoritative research on the influence of indigenous migration and the subsequent political activism of La Paz's urban inhabitants upon the transformation of Bolivia in the first half the 20th century. Sierra examines the role of the neighborhoods in the process of urbanization, a shift from the current focus on individuals"--