II. Diagnoses

To obtain knowledge of a contemporary society (Latin America in this case) is perhaps the real purpose of sociology. And the form the acquirement of this knowledge takes is to find out principles of guidance, which in the best of cases cannot dispense with a diagnosis, or at least a prognosis based on a series of alternative hypotheses. A diagnosis as an interpretation of a situation can only be achieved if one has an idea of its structure and the dynamic tendencies that are manifest in it. But both structure and tendencies come from a previous situation and perhaps point towards a new one, the possible attainment of which depends, among other things, upon the external condition of a certain set of circumstances. The path through contemporary considerations leads us back towards history, towards its permanent elements of continuity and circumstance or, we might say, contingency. In view of the concern now manifest to understand the contemporary situation in Latin America (a concern awakened by the idea of its economic development), it is important not to overlook the essential facts of its history which, have exerted an influence up to the present time.

If these are not borne in mind irreparable misunderstandings will result. Two of them are of special interest to us here. The first —it has often been necessary to point out— is that for centuries past Latin America has constituted a fragment, however marginal, of so-called Western culture and not merely in a passive way, but by taking an active part in many sectors. It is true that, for better or for worse, Latin America is the product of a gigantic process of "transculturation" which because of its very vastness is still not completed. But it was also so advanced in the main centres that the destiny of the region very soon became linked with that of the West. Sociologically, this means that there is a continuity, or a logic if you prefer, in the evolution of internal situations, so that present-day problems (problems of development, for instance) are not the result of the juxtaposition now of a foreign and a non-traditional culture. Or, to put it another way, there is no break in the historical consciousness.

This is no reason for applying to the cultural situation in Latin America the concern of some thinkers¹ who —in the age of decolonization— are convinced that the "Europeanization" of other regions or countries, whether achieved or in process, is a European problem. It cannot be maintained with regard to Latin America that what carries it on towards its future has no continuity with what has made it historically what it is. The second fact to which attention should be drawn is the tremendous impact on the history of Latin America (indeed, on the Hispanic world in general) of events taking place outside it more than once with adverse effects. As we know, the independence of the whole region, whether achieved peaceably or through violence, was due to Napoleonic ambitions. On the other hand, the consequences of its immediate antecedent (the French Revolution) are more difficult to specify and to assess although they may have been of incalculable importance. The immediate reactions provoked by the Revolution prevented the maturing of the Enlightenment movement, so full of promise, and led to the breakdown of a decisive phase in the historical continuity of Spanish America. The case of the Enlightenment —and of its failure— stands out as a clear example of the effects of an external set of circumstances. From that time onwards however, other influential circumstances of greater or lesser importance can be seen without difficulty. The stages in the politico-social history of Latin America are found to coincide with specific moments in European history² (the only, universal history at that time) until we reach the period of the world wars. The significance of the two "Great Wars" in relation to Latin American economic development and especially to its planning is a matter of common knowledge.

A. The So-Called Revolutionary Situation

The facts referred to above have a marked effect on the aspect of the contemporary situation in Latin America. Firstly, because her acutest problems arise from an internal evolution which puts to the test, above all, her capacity for building up a culture, her desire to go forward along her own particular lines. Secondly, because the need to find a solution has again become pressing on account of external circumstances and the almost unbelievable general speeding-up of the historical process; and (although this seems only to apply to Hispanic culture as a whole, and Latin American culture in particular on account of its slower rhythm and of reasons which it is not for us to examine here) the accumulation at one time of questions dealt with successively in other Western zones. Such problems could have been faced and solved at their own particular time, if it were not for the unavoidable fact of the acceleration of the historical process as a whole, an acceleration which is due not only, as it might seem at first, to technological change (the most obvious reason) but which is even more accentuated if that is possible in the sphere of awakened consciousness. Urgency —awareness of urgency— is therefore the essential characteristic of the Latin American scene today.

If we were asked to state in the briefest terms the decisive fact, in the present situation in Latin America, there would be only one possible answers the profound revolution through which the whole region is passing, The term is, of course, used in the non-violent sense in which it is applied to the Industrial Revolution, as a prolonged process which brings about changes in all the basic elements of life: in ideas and systems of production, living standards and social mobility, range of occupations and power structures.

While the industrial societies properly so-called are already in the second stage of their development, Latin America, caught within two periods, is still subjected to the stress of the first without being able to escape the repercussions (favourable and unfavourable) of the second. That this radical transformation in depth should here and there give rise to revolutionary situations (in the other sense of the term) is something that is perhaps not necessarily determined by the process itself, but that cannot be denied or prevented. In any case, it is not a matter for consideration here.

1. Validity and Limits of Structural Dualism

Recourse is often had nowadays to the idea of structural dualism³ for the purpose of providing an intelligible explanation of the situation described. But this interpretation, valid though it is, being highly evocative and descriptive, is none the less insufficient. According to this thesis, the structure of Latin America is in fact formed by the coexistence of two different societies, coetaneous but not contemporary, the modern and the traditional, the "progressive" and the "archaic"; and the distinction between these two areas of human activity (for the most part separate watertight compartments, or reciprocally influencing one another) explains by itself alone the sociological drama of the region.

The idea of dualism is very precise in the economic field, whence it may have originated and even drawn the terms used to describe it. It means the juxtaposition in a given country —especially as a result of colonization— of two technique-economic complexes infinitely remote from each other. But even in the economic field the theory is not clear or unanimously accepted, inasmuch as there are some who maintain that, in the "underdeveloped" countries, the mule will not be replaced in one generation by the aeroplane, but that both mule and aeroplane will continue, for a long time yet, to fulfil necessary economic functions. It would not be appropriate to embark here on a discussion of this highly technical and difficult question. Suffice it to quote the following opinion put forward by an economist: "...while dualism no doubt brings with it many social and psychological stresses, it has some compensating advantages and represents in a way an attempt by the economy of the underdeveloped country to make the best of its resources during a transitional phase."⁴

The concept of structural dualism is not sociologically inexact either if we base ourselves on an ideal image of the sociologically most advanced countries. These are characterized, in all their social aspects, by being free from abrupt breaks or sharp delineations, showing instead a continuous process of change and gradual transition. This continuum is found between town and country,⁵ between income levels, different classes or strata, degrees of education, etc. However, while there is in actual fact a continuum of the image, it appears that it is fully realized in only a few countries, so that all the rest are dualist to a greater or lesser extent.

It would then be inaccurate to identify the idea of structural dualism as a characteristic peculiar to Latin America, even if we ignore two points to which reference has already been made: first, that the distances between the traditional and the modern in Latin America are due to her own internal development process and not to the sudden introduction in a primitive society of the economic institutions of foreign powers; and second, that what is important is not so much the differences and tensions between two different ways of life, as the thread of their continuity —in other words— their interpenetration; the reactions of the backward sectors and the efforts towards expansion of the more advanced. Thus, in a good many Latin American countries, dualism is being weakened and dissolved to a considerable extent by the general spread of "modern" aspirations throughout all areas.

2. The Threefold Change

Without attempting to deny that something similar is happening in other parts of the world (although not, of course, in the same historical context), it may be said that the transformation in depth which Latin America is experiencing is the result of a threefold process of change supported by movements which in part coincide with it and in part are independent.

In the first place, the economic change itself. It is a fact that, from 1929 to 1959, the increase in Latin America’s total production followed an ascending curve, at a rate calculated by the economist to be 4 per cent per annum. It is true that the impression is less favourable when production is reckoned per inhabitant and that there are very marked differences between one country and another. But on the whole, during that period, Latin American development was sufficiently rapid to keep pace with population increase. It is true also that some dark patches begin to appear in the picture from 1953 onwards.

It is not our task here, without full competence in the matter, to set out the main features of the economic scene. Sociologically, the decisive fact is that this economic movement has existed and still exists, and has aroused a general consciousness sometimes confused, sometimes clear of the problems inherent in it. A further step forward would consist in finding out what form some of the components of this new consciousness have taken. And, although the economic indices appear to be obscure on the subject and do not of themselves indicate the social and cultural hypotheses of the phenomenon, a patient interpretation of some of them would disclose something of their sociological significance. Here are some indications by way of illustration. It appears that there is a change in the composition of demand, which implies, in addition to the lesser proportion of exports therein, a change in the composition of the exports. The question is an economic one and can be challenged both as regards its interpretation and the policy it calls for. But there is no doubt that behind the phenomenon there are not only certain changes of circumstances but also variations in attitudes and decisions, which imply changes in the collective economic conscience and the advent of new leaders. An economic index such as that of the long-term increase in current State expenditure in a good many countries, in addition to its strictly economic significance, also has a wide social significance, to which we shall have occasion to refer later. And, lastly, there is no point in stressing, the social value of the indices, or the changes in the propensities to, or composition of, consumption as they belong indiscriminately to both the subjects under discussion. If the indices were more complete, they would enable us to penetrate, through the changes in consumption "habits", to the psychological stratum of personality, the variations in which are always closely (and sometimes fundamentally) connected with other variations of an institutional nature.

The second factor in the threefold change which we are analysing is the conclusion of the process of national integration in the majority of countries. The fact that they can all count a century and a half of existence might make this statement appear incomprehensible or exaggerated. But if national integration is taken to mean that a considerable proportion of the citizens of a country are capable of taking part in some way in its collective activities, sharing, even to a small extent, in its common values and aspirations, it is obvious that some Latin American countries have not yet reached that stage, and for widely differing reasons; some because of the large numbers of their immigrants, others on account of that part of their original population which has resisted (or rather remained on the fringe of) the process of "transculturation" mentioned above.

For the latter type of countries it has been possible to speak of a cultural division into three sectors (the Indian sector, the sector in transition and the modern sector) and an attempt has been made to measure their significance in terms of volume and percentages. However, in the course of the last century, and especially within the last decades, the process of national integration has been very rapid and has sometimes been brought about through events promoted with other ends in view. One result of the Mexican Revolution was, unquestionably, to speed up the advance towards national homogeneity; according to the above-mentioned calculations, in 1940 the purely indigenous sector represented only about 15 per cent of the population. And, though the movement has been slower in other countries, the tendency is the same. In the not too distant future yearnings for the picturesque will be forced to seek satisfaction in literary descriptions, to this connexion other events and figures that are still highly controversial from other points of view —such as the name of Vargas or the phenomenon of "Peronism"— have made their permanent mark. And it must not be forgotten that this process as a whole is linked with the rate of economic progress, under conditions and with effects applicable to both.

The third stage in this continuous process of transformation in Latin America is that of its own supranational integration. It is a much less clear and less sustained movement than the previous ones, but it undeniably exists as a permanent aspiration vague perhaps, yet felt to be inevitable. It is due to complex reasons which we cannot examine here in detail, but which in their coalescence show very clearly that, at a certain moment, something which is the product of a heritage, a past, may unite with something which is an impulse towards a future determined by the stimulus of circumstance.

Nevertheless, the first point that must not be overlooked in considering this subject is the relative historical and cultural heterogeneity of the two great components of Latin America, Although the Portuguese sector does not stand entirely apart from this process, it is in the Hispanic sector that it has been most marked. The Hispanic nations are united in taking for granted their common bonds in the modern setting, though perhaps, they retain in their collective subconsciousness the painful scar of separation, and they still respond at every turn to the ideals of their heroes of the Independence, movement, epitomized above all in the lofty visions of Bolivar. But, with the passage of time, they have had to forge their own destiny as nations, in a sustained and as yet uncompleted effort, which at times led them into conflicts with one another, and more often than not made them act with their backs turned towards each other. Nevertheless, the idea of integration never entirely died out: it was taken up at varying time by this or that group of intellectuals, this or that group of national politicians and complicated in the latter case by aspirations, if not towards hegemony, at least towards leadership.

The details and vicissitudes of this whole movement are of course worthy of an attention which would be out of place here. Today, in view of the changing horizons opened up by the end of the Second World War and of the new dimensions taken on by world problems, the aspirations towards supranational integration in Latin America corresponds largely to the needs of the times. The shortening of distances due to the techniques of communication, the appearance of vast political configuration, the breaking-up of the nineteenth-century ideas of nationalism, the need (in a world tending towards uniformization) nevertheless to maintain the wealth and variety of the different cultural pattern, leads the Latin American countries to regard themselves once more as a unit, for the purpose of defending their interests, making their voice heard and asserting and showing the value of their own personality. However, in Latin America, as in other parts of the world, centuries of separation, together with certain deeply rooted ideas, place considerable difficulties in the way of political union. And any kind of integration would be impossible unless the idea of limited unions of a functional nature had already existed for some time. In one area or other of common problems (technical, cultural, economic, etc,) it has been found possible to enter into agreements which because of their technical nature do not arouse misgivings or offend long-standing emotional predispositions. A network of functional links of this kind is the efficient implement of integration, which would otherwise be impossible. In regard to what concerns us in this study, it is significant that it should have been problems of economic development which led to the setting in motion of this kind of integration machinery, making a viable instrument out of what had previously been mere pompous rhetoric. The quiet and lasting work for the economic integration of Central America and the creation, through the Montevideo Treaty, of the Free Trade Area (the first steps towards a Common Market) show the extent to which Latin America is passing from dreams to realities.

B. The Decline of the Old Structure

This examination of the components of the threefold fundamental change which Latin America is now experiencing is obviously too rapid to be adequate, but it does throw into relief two points that seems to delight in facing us simultaneously with manifold problems that others have been able to solve at different times; and there is a vast task before us, calling for the use of exceptional resources. Where are these resources to be found? What kind of leaders are capable at the present time of controlling and directing them?

1. From the "hacienda" to Commercial Organization

Every social structure is wont to show, in its most diverse sectors and its most unexpected places, the trace and influence of one particular prototype. Present-day industrial societies bear the stamp of the factory system in relationships and ways of life far removed from and without apparent connexion with the factory itself. For a long time every facet of the social structure of Latin America bore traces of the formative influence of one fundamental institutions the "hacienda" (large cultivated estate). All the economic, social and political history of Latin America is largely the history of the consolidation and transformation of that particular economic and social unit. And consequently the story of the gradual downfall of the traditional structure is interwoven with that of the slow decline of this ancient institution, We say "decline" rather than "disappearance" because it still exists and its influence is still felt. The hacienda, needless to say, was not the only economic and social unit of any significance. In the economic field, it shared its importance with the silver-mining towns and the mercantile export centres, and from its earliest times (sixteenth century) it formed part, with them, of that peculiar economic set-up which continued for centuries without substantial change until a few decades ago. In the cultural and political sphere, it had to reckon with the activities of State and Church, and to accept or endure the growing influence of the towns. The differences between the Portuguese and Spanish parts of Latin America are to be found precisely in the different influence exerted in the course of their history by one or other of these elements. But neither their specific character nor their particular line of development are of concern to us here.

If it were possible, a more interesting exercise would be to trace, from the point of view of the hacienda, the evolution of property rights from the time when they were first consolidated in the seventeenth century, through the failure of the eighteenth-century reforms, down to the liberal-inspired disentailing trends in the nineteenth century which were fatal to the residues of indigenous communal property and established the concentration of property in the hands of the latifundio owners even more rigidly than before. And perhaps still more interesting, in the context of the present work, would be the economic history of the haciendas, that is to say, the history of the successive variations in their main products, from the indigo of early times, and the sugar cane, to which nowadays constitute the basis of Latin American exports. But these points of interest are in fact accessory to our main subject.

It suffices to recall the decisive fact: the complete emergence of the hacienda, with all the characteristics which it subsequently maintained, occurred in the seventeenth century. In other words, the vast geographical entity of Latin America, which up to that time had only been touched from without by an impulse confined to a few widely separated towns, began to take shape from within. An excellent historical account tells us: "...around the hacienda, rural life —previously little known— began to acquire form and vigour...", and it adds in a paragraph highly significant for anyone desirous of understanding later history: "in opposition to the great city, the bastion of a State growing progressively weaker, the hacienda represented the power of the large landowners, whose authority in fact was measured by the number of workers and dependants they had around them, and the amount of land they possessed. At the end of the seventeenth century, the hacienda symbolized importance and extent of rural life to a degree which permits us to (compare it with the Roman villa during the decline of the Roman Empire".⁶

From the economic point of view, therefore, it was the hacienda that formed Latin America, which is still predominantly agrarian. And it did so in what was perhaps the only possible way, having regard to the geographical situation confronting a movement of colonial expansion which did not move forward in successive compact advances but which, within a very short time, manifested itself in dispersed settlements such as have persisted down to the present day. It formed Latin America, too, on a deeper plane: that of its social or, if preferred, its human substance. In Brazil, the work of Freyre gives an account of this formative process —sometimes lost sight of among the rich detail of the petite histoire— an account which has been accepted or criticized, according to differences of temperament or point of view, but which nevertheless paves the way for a continued analysis of this great task. There is nothing comparable in Spanish America though there are scattered fragments awaiting someone who will use them to build up a comprehensive picture. In what follows we shall merely attempt to give a very brief sociological outline as an aid in understanding the situation as it is today.

What has, in fact, been the sociological significance of the hacienda in the whole of Latin American life? What follows, we need hardly say, is in no sense an apology. As we know, a methodological requirement in the building-up of a type is purity of characteristics, which unfortunately, is never met with in practice. To begin with, the very term hacienda is a composite abstraction used to denote a richly diverse reality, varying, according to regions, periods, and types of activity and known, moreover, by different names: ingenio, rancho, fundo (plantation, ranch, rural property), etc.

Having made the above point, we can go on to look at the sociological features of the hacienda that concern us here, listing them first, for purposes of clarity: (a) the hacienda was a centre of political and military power as well as of economic power; (b) it formed the nucleus of a widespread patriarchal system; (c) it was authority’s epitome; (d) it gave rise to a particular human type or "character’’.

We can only touch very lightly on each of these features here. Since it first emerged in definite form, the hacienda has been something more than a unit of economic production. It was the means of establishing order in the vast empty tracts of agrarian land, and consequently became a nucleus of political power, tolerated, or used, according to circumstances, by the State authorities and sometimes granted or assuming on its own account a military significance. In frontier areas this military significance was inevitable, and in the Hispanic world the function in question was recognized from early times by various honorary titles: capitanes, maestres de campo, and the famous adelantados. This politico-military significance, which of course already, existed in the Kingdom of the Indies, persisted well into the Independence, Carranza, for instance, remained a powerful landowner. The debased forms which the phenomenon took at the time of caudillismo have received special attention, as does anything spectacular. But few people have analysed the significance of this politico-military nucleus as a factor making for stabilization and continuity when the governmental and bureaucratic machinery of the Empire collapsed and the social framework had to be kept together during long years of anarchy and of fluctuating political structure following the emergence of the new nations. For that reason it is worth mentioning here the pertinent "suggestions" of a foreign observer, Frank Tannenbaum, as yet awaiting systematic development —an undertaking which is doubtless rendered more difficult by the persistent academic traditions of political history.

The hacienda was also something more than a form of property. It was the support of a family and the symbol of a name. From his territorial redoubt, the head of the hacienda sought and concluded alliances with other heads of families, and these family federations, with their recognized chiefs, extended over whole regions and to some extent "organized" them. As we know, however, the owner of the hacienda did not remain all the time on his estate; both in the Portuguese and the Spanish zones he used to take up residence in a town which might be the nearest one or sometimes might be the distant capital. Family relations and federations by relationship were therefore not confined to rural domains but, through the towns, extended over the whole country.

The hacienda thus became the support of the kind of family structure which continues to exist in the Ibero-American countries in more or less attenuated form up to the present day and which so surprises and disconcerts the outside observer. This family structure, comprising not only close family relationships but also complex bonds of friendship could be studied in terms of the functional theory so dear to modem times. It might perhaps also be maintained that, while nepotism was one of the disfunctional factors in such a situation, the network of "personal" relationships and bonds of friendship which it also involved was, on the other hand, a functional element or at least a latent structure which made possible on more than one occasion the suppression or attenuation of violence in politics that were nearly always passionate. This point could be made without introducing into the serious question of sociological consideration the aesthetic factor of the "charm" of this system of "personal" association.

But, if we admit that the hacienda was an economic unit, a political nucleus and the material support of a family and its circle, this means that it must be regarded as a closed social group, when account is also taken of the large number of servants which formed its base. And, like any other social group, it can resolve itself into a web of continuously repeated human relationships with a system of functions and duties involving in each case specific rights and obligations. To detail these functions and duties is a matter for historical description. What concerns us here is the supreme, the principal function; that of authority. "Over each and all, from his eldest son to the least of his slaves, the chief of the hacienda exercises his authority, at once tyrannical and protective, in degrees varying according to complex factors and circumstances."⁷ "At once protective and tyrannical" signifies authoritarian and paternal. And this image of the relationships of subordination —protection and obedience, arbitrariness and graciousness, faithfulness and resentment, violence and charity— which in its origin is a replica of the characteristics of the far-off monarchical domination was maintained intact for a long time after the king had been replaced by a President of the Republic, The model of authority created by the hacienda spread and penetrated through all the relationships, of command, embodying in the paternalistic employer the notion of authority persisting in the popular mind.

No one would claim that this manifestation is peculiar to Latin America. The practical forms of domination (to describe it in Weberian terms) have always been a mixture of the legal, the traditional and the charismatic. Legal domination is now beginning to be fully achieved within the combination of "secondary systems" of the advanced industrial societies. And complete adaptation to the sentimental vacuum left by the extinction of the paternal authority is a universal problem which each and all must face. In Europe —to leave aside the exceptional case of the United States— the transition has been slow and it was attenuated, among other things, by the gradual interposition of the machinery of government bureaucracies, which accustomed the people little by little to the existence of impersonal, objective regulations. The greater rapidity of the process in Latin America left widespread traces of nostalgia for the lost, father-figure, and it is not surprising to see it still in the aspect of some of her political movements. The change was sometimes so abrupt that, as in Bolivia, it seemed to take place from one moment to the next. And one of the most fascinating sociological enigmas still awaiting investigation is to discover what happened in the minds of the good Quechuas and Aymarás who passed overnight from deep-rooted obedience to their paternalistic employer to intelligent compliance with trade union rules.

Lastly, the hacienda as social unit (or social system in the language of today) has its particular character. But we must not make too much of this point if, as we should do here, we wish to avoid entering the boundless domains of cultural sociology and philosophical anthropology. The subject is obviously linked with that of the hierarchy of values in the traditional Latin American world, and it naturally fascinates foreign observers. The hacienda system is often spoken of as "feudal" which, technically, is absurd. It would be less so if the much wider term " seigneurial" were used. Then the figure which indicates the character type is the seigneur (seigneur of the hacienda, the livestock ranch, the plantation, etc.) and he is endued with the special characteristics everywhere attributed to this type of man: a sense of being of the elect, even among devout Catholics; magnanimity and a noble bearing; dilettantism in the rare cases when he is a cultivated man; personal fearlessness; contempt of death; and a capacity for staking his life impassibly on a single card; all this to meet the demands of a duty held to be absolute. For the rest, compliance according to his status with the undefined requirements of noblesse oblige. The foregoing is, of course, an exemplary image; but when those qualities are deformed or debased, they serve to foment a vicious evil in Latin American society. Magnanimity becomes the ostentatious squandering of the señorito and virile indifference in the face of a noble death is transformed into an obsession for morally empty "masculinity".

Even if we take the highest expressions, aesthetic, moral and religious, of this seigneurial existence, they are clearly not the best suited to the requirements of modern economy. But their influence on the pattern of the economic ethics of the Ibero-American should be looked into more closely. Similarly, little is known about the extension of the Weberian thesis of the Latin American scene; in other words, a duly objective, impartial and rigourous investigation into the influence of the Catholic Church, both in the formation of these fundamental economic attitudes and in the actual development of Latin American economy, has not yet been made. The seigneurial way of life has gone beyond recall and with it some of its virtues and qualities. There may be some who deplore its disappearance and think that with it a brilliant streak in the spectrum of life’s colours has vanished. But this is not the case; for what they omit to say is that values which were at the origin of a form of life but do not serve to form the structure of a new one are not capable of handling on any originality of example. In Alfred Weber’s words, a culture dies only when it is incapable of reacting creatively in continuity of style to the "aggregate of life" which the general advance of the historical process inexorably presents.

It is impossible to trace in detail here the history of the dissolution of the hacienda system, or to be more precise, its transformation into other types of economic operation and social relations. Passing over the details we can, however, state that the causes were economic and proceeded from the foreign market as well as from home markets. We could trace the thread of known economic indices, relating either to exports or to changes in total demand. But we must confine ourselves here to making one affirmation and giving a few significant examples.

It is generally asserted that the hacienda broke up in proportion as it became more and more "commercialized" or, in other words, as it took on the characteristics of a profit‑making concern. From this distance in time we can see that the introduction of refrigeration in Argentina, in 1876, was the first modern impetus in the transformation of the hacienda of the pampas. A little later, the installation of freezing arrangements not only led to technical advances in stock-farming methods but also gave rise to a new social group which looked towards the towns and direct trade contacts with Europe and which rapidly acquired wealth and powerful political influence.

It would be out of place here to attempt to trace all the repercussions of this phenomenon. In another part of Latin America, far from the one mentioned above, and much later on, there was the appearance of cash-crop farming, arising out of a combination of economic and political circumstances, and its significance has been carefully analysed by R.N. Adams in his excellent study on Guatemala.⁸ In that instance, the main social effect was immediate: the uprooting from the haciendas of their permanent labour force, which became a part of the mobile proletariat, either rural or urban.

Lastly, among the studies of this kind in Brazil, a "type-study", has been produced on the changes in the structure of the traditional sugar plantation.⁹ In careful and concise sociological terms it explains the circumstances in which the old family plantation, managed by the seigneur, has become the modern factory operated by a limited company. The climax came with a crisis in the classic cultivation of sugar cane for export and the protective measures introduced by the Government with the establishment of the Instituto del Azúcar y del Alcohol (Sugar and Alcohol Institute). The main point was that the new commercial concern no longer had the total freedom of the old plantation it had in future to reckon with Government regulations (concerning volume of production, relations with contractors, market prices, techniques, etc.) with labour laws and with trade union action. This represents a complete transition from one age to another. Many such cases might be quoted, all related to the question of foreign markets.

But the home market, too, contributed towards the transformation of the hacienda by revealing everywhere its inadequacy. In many areas agricultural production under the traditional system was not enough to meet the continually increasing food requirements. The structural reforms we have mentioned (though we have spoken only from the economic point of view) were above all due to an awareness of this problem. The time for easy-going ways had passed once and for all. To realize something of this, it is enough at times to take a look at the actual situation. We give below the observations of one who, without need of statistics, saw with the clear, kindly and penetrating eye of the philosopher, and set down his thoughts, in passing, in very characteristic style, at the end of a brilliant philosophical and literary essay: "For, Argentineans, we must make haste. Time is flying and, for America, there is little doubt that colonial life, even in its most progressive forms, is at an end. Colonial economy is on its death-bed and so, too, is the rest of that way of life. And the end of colonial life means the end of living ex abundantia — the wide open spaces are becoming peopled. The population is increasing; there is no longer plenty of good and free land and much of the free land has been found to be not good. So long as there was land enough and to spare history could not begin... But now the history of America, in the full force of the term, is about to begin...".¹⁰

2. Paternalism, Anxiety, and Impersonal Organization

The German word Sachlichkeit is difficult to translate into Spanish and other European languages. "Objectivity" has many shades of meaning related to logic and gnosiology: coseidad (from cosa, thing) has a definitely metaphysical flavour. Yet some such word is needed to express at once the essence of the culture and of the social structure of the most advanced industrial societies: the pure and simple dominion of "things". Tasks are specifically defined within their material confines, as part of a comprehensive plan based on objective, and as far as possible, "scientific" data. Work, even in the most fragmentary or part-time form, is subject to precise regulations and failure to comply with them would break the whole chain of which it is a part. Human relationships are functionalized and they too depend upon the "thing" that each person does or represents. whole of life advances as though upon rails (Freyre), directed by almost automatic pointsmen. Man in the industrial societies accepts become accustomed to this rigidity, which is a direct outcome of "things", and, even if he does not "rejoice" in his work, he does exactly what his job requires of him. Protected by the guarantees afforded by a complex system of social legislation, he concentrates his interest on the "enjoyment" of his ever longer leisure time. It is questionable whether this represents real fulfilment, and cultural criticism strives to point out and overcome its shortcomings.

However, that is not our concern here. Latin America is far from being an "affluent" or a "consumer" society. Her problems are still those of a society of producers whose aim is greater productivity. But such transitional problems are not less serious, and may sometimes involve great dangers from the social point of view.

We have already given some indication of the transition, when we outlined the change from hacienda to commercial undertaking. What concerns us now is to draw attention, however briefly, to some of the basic human problems involved in that change. In a final analysis, they can all be summed up in one: the vacuum created by the extinction or deterioration of the traditional paternalism the unfortunate gap which occurs when one institution collapses before the next has come into being to replace it. The customs of the old paternalism afforded some sort of buttress (perhaps not very strong, but a support all the same) against psychological anxiety, the public or practically public organizations of today (whether State, municipal, or trade union) now provide assistance, unsentimental, impersonal, but perhaps materially more effective, because calculable and predictable. In the intermediate stage, which is not always short, there is nothing but anxiety and despair. The customs of the paternalistic structure were based on three main beliefs: (a) belief in the warm value of personal relationships; (b) belief in help that would not fail in a time of crisis, and (c) belief in the unknown and, therefore, unlimited power of the chief. When these conditions cease to apply men have to make the effort to build up out of their own experience ideas and intellectual guidance to take their place. Where are they to find the trust of the protector or the kindness of the neighbour? To whom can they go in anxious times of illness, difficult periods of unemployment, or troubles with authorities or with incomprehensible regulations? And above all, whom shall they follow, where shall they turn for advice in the disheartening chaos of a world in confusion? The best observers of the various countries of Latin America at the present time stress this fact, and all agree upon one word - "uprooting" - to indicate the psycho-social state of large masses of the population, both urban and rural.

One country, an especially important one, will serve as an example. Charles Wagley, in his admirable description of the Brazilian "revolution" since 1930,¹¹ rightly stresses the fact that the lower levels of urban labour, of which there are such vast numbers working in Rio and Sao Paulo in industry and in the building trade (which, incidentally, is on the increase), are not, strictly speaking, an "urban proletariat" in the European sense, that is to say, impregnated from head to foot with urban values, and that workers on the large plantations feel as uprooted as do urban employees, because they are now completely out off from their traditional ways of life. Nevertheless, in this context it is of interest to note one decisive factor (because of the possibility of its becoming widespread) which is expressed as follows by Wagley: "For the time being, however, it seems that the effects of the Brazilian revolution are filtering through from the cities into rural zones mainly through the channel of the workers on large plantations.¹²

Concerning the significance still pertaining to the old image of seigneurial authority, to which we shall have to refer again later, and since we have already mentioned Bolivia, let us quote the opinion of someone who knows that country well and has written what is probably the best study to date of its agrarian reform: "Even today the pattern of paternalism persists in the relations between campesinos and the government. The campesinos believe their problems will be resolved promptly if they can only set them personally before Don Herman or Don Victor"¹³ And it is no secret that the President of Mexico is an almost sacred, untouchable figure.

The theory of structural dualism still affords a good basis on which to seek a preliminary interpretation of the situation in Latin America. However, we have preferred to trace in a little more detail the three main components of the transition through which Latin America is passing. But, above all, we have yielded to the temptation to look long, in view of the brevity of this study structure determined by privilege.

3. "Accelerated Urbanization" and "Demographic Explosion"

It may be objected that, with all this, we have passed over in silence facts that are more important and that now deserve particular attention: the so-called "demographic explosion" and the phenomenon of "urbanization". But it so happens that neither can be fully understood without being seen in relationship to the characteristics and peripeteia of the hacienda system which we have briefly outlined.

The marked increase in the population of Latin America is an acknowledged fact. The main rates of this increase, as generally accepted, and a complete examination of all its different facets, constitute a technical problem which does not concern us. Its relation to economic development is equally well known, the rate of economic growth remaining higher than that of population increase. Up to now, and over a long period, this has been so; but there is no guarantee that it will necessarily continue so in the future if things are left to look after themselves.

At any rate, Latin America is certainly not for the present an over- populated continent, except for a few countries and areas. The increase in population in many parts still serves as a stimulus to economic expansion, provided of course that the economy continues to develop. There is no need therefore for heated arguments about Malthusian theory, though the subject, outside the present sphere, does need to be discussed. On the other hand, what is important in the present context, where attention has been centered on the traditional system of the hacienda, is to recall the nature of the parallel process of industrialization and demographic expansion in Europe. For, at least in some European countries the beginnings of industrialization coincided with the "liberation" of the peasant population as a result of land reform.

To embark on the much discussed subject of urbanization, the present rapid increase in the urban population in Latin America is due not so much to natural increase as to a mass immigration from the rural areas which it is sometimes almost impossible to absorb. This means that the masses in question are compelled to leave their rural environment more on account of the deficiencies in the agrarian structures than on account of the attraction (which does, however, undoubtedly exist) of the incipient industrial system in the towns. Consequently, the problem of urbanization can be studied from a purely economic standpoint, requiring a speeding-up of the creation of industrial occupations capable of absorbing the surplus agricultural population; starting with this simple proposition the problem would then be complicated by numerous questions of a technical nature. Or - as is not infrequently do ne - it can be studied as a social problem, inasmuch as it manifests itself in many structural changes. But if it is mainly the result of the "expulsion" of impoverished peasants (as is the case in Latin America) what is happening, in economic parlance, is a mere transference of the problems of poverty from the country to the town, giving rise to the variety of pitiful situations with which social welfare has to deal.

Nevertheless, the universal indices of urbanization and the hypothesis of a correlation (which cannot be proved) between urbanization and economic development tell us nothing about the past and present relationship between town and country, between urban centre and hacienda, in Latin America. The indiana town (founded by the early settlers from Spain or Portugal) was not in principle, and exclusively, an economic centre (in the sense used in Weberian typology). In the Spanish zone, especially, it was a political foundation and, although some of these towns were not without a commercial aspect, the town was a cultural centre. While the hacienda made Latin America materially, by organizing as best it could that vast geographical area, the town made Latin America by being the seat of its "spiritual power". And this is still the case today.

D.F. Sarmiento's brilliant book Facundo, in its sub-title "Civilization and Barbarie" with an exaggeration characteristic of every expressive formula -lighted upon the most absorbing and decisive theme in the whole political and social history of Latin America. To bring it up to date, with less passion and with the aid of modern research techniques (although its literary force would be lost in that way), is a task for future writers of social history, who will probably have to clear up a great many points. Here we can only use the theme as a link.

The indiana town, being more particularly an administrative entity, had from the beginning, alongside its resident members of the rural aristocracy, its civil servants and its "doctors"; it also had its traders, from the powerful ones of the consulados (commercial courts) to those on a lower level, who organized the considerable smuggling, and, lastly, the small artisans and shopkeepers. Throughout the history of Latin America, there was one group, comprising the owners of the haciendas, the doctors and the traders, whose influence was decisive. And if there was one other thing which, because of its political effects, accentuated the basic divergence, it was the division that came into being between the modern, cultural licenciados or university graduates, and the less cultured, traditionalist rural "chiefs". The history of these two rival forces is the history of the ideologies prevailing until well into the twentieth century.

C. The Ideological Disintegration

The gradual decline of Latin America's social structure, centred on the hacienda as its prototype and its symbol, was accompanied by a no less significant change in the sphere of thought: the change in a social configuration was paralleled by the disintegration of an ideology. When the former had completely collapsed, therefore, a complex intellectual perturbation was bound to set in and to spread.

1. Liberalism and Independence

The Independence movement was inspired by the desire for liberty, and for that reason, from the beginning, liberalism was identified with the substance and the raison d'être of the new States. Much was made of the libertarian and constitutional ideas that came in particular from France and North America, and in this way unfamiliar formulas (unfamiliar, having regard to the actual situation and the origins of the new historical organisms) were evolved, such as, for instance, the federal concepts that were destined sometimes to have a tragic influence in later years.

As we are not called upon here to trace the history of ideas, we may perhaps accept the above simplification, without dwelling upon a well-known fact: the term "liberalism" is in reality of Spanish origin, and in its formation, like that of its fellow constitutionalism, there are Hispanic strains, going back through the age of Enlightenment to the great scholastics and the age-old usages of some kingdoms of the Feninsula. But at the time of the Independence movement, "liberty", whether of the old or the new cast, was personified in the new political leaders and was the watchword adopted with one accord by the opponents of the "oppression" of metropolitan absolutism. The formative power of this initial stand has been decisive up to modern times for the destiny of Latin America. It is true that there" have been military revolts, coups d'état and numbers of constitutional changes; but it is also true that there has never been open denial of the ideals of the Independence movement, and that even under the most blatant adventurers the letter of the constitution still paid respectful tribute to the principles of liberalism.

The real history of Latin America takes place in the nineteenth century, and even up to then it was much closer than some people would believe to the history of the peninsula and yet the influence of the original climate of independent America is the only decisive difference. In the final count, for anyone who is familiar with national myths and how can this myth be disregarded? — it is the distance that separates the battle of Lepanto from the battle of Ayacucho. And yet, as myths are very far from being without foundation or influence, Spanish America, despite its periods of violence, has so far been able to avoid the tragic rupture between the two Spains announced in the well-known book by the Portuguese writer Fidelino de Figueiredo, inspired, perhaps, by another famous Portuguese, Oliveira Martins.

Now the fact that liberty, the democratic and constitutional aspiration, was one of the essential elements in the moral climate originally prevailing in Latin America gave rise to the first great paradox of her history: that for a long time she maintained side by side with each other in complete disaccord, the tenets of an ideology and the "beliefs" and actual behaviour of day-to-day life. Over a framework of agrarian structure and traditional life was spread the thin cleak of a predominantly liberal and urban doctrine. The hacienda owners, busy keeping order in their territories, for the most part followed the old ways; the "doctors" in the towns, for their part, strove to implant the grandiose visions taken from their books and, without of course despising the use of arms, preferred the printed and the spoken word.

The contrast was much less acute in Brazil, where a constant historical continuity made it possible to lessen the distances between the doctrines of the capital and the real life of the facenderos (hacienda owners). But in Spanish America, left to herself in the almost complete isolation entailed for the Americas by the Vienna treaties and the Monroe declarations, the contrast continued often breaking out into tremendous violence throughout the whole of the romantic era. In many parts, attenuations and compromises exerted a moderating influence; and where that happened (as in Chile) the real organization of the State began early. As a rule, however, the date of Monte Caseros is generally taken as marking the beginning of a new period.

The significance of this compromise, where it occurs (during approximately the same period), is the political formula in which it finds expression, namely, the distinction between the liberal and the conservative parties.

Around 1860, the scene began to change and Latin America as a whole entered upon a period of greater stability. Nevertheless, its original structure persisted almost intact. The isolation was finally broken, regular and continuous trade with the outside world began, and, with the importance of exports in the trade balance, there began also the influence on the internal economies of the price variations in foreign markets - caused by the alternation between lean years and fat years. a factor which, according to Siegfried, has had such an influence on the inclinations of the Latin American mentality, in its sometimes fatalistic, sometimes optimistic liking for games of chance (this subject has also been brilliantly treated by another Frenchman, R. Caillois). The profitable nature of exports changed the mentality of the hacienda owners and an increasing number of them allotted a small or large part of their land to agriculture and raising cattle for export in most cases, undoubtedly, in operational conditions that were - poor; economically speaking.

2. The "Traditional Political Class"

What concerns us in the present study is to recall how, during this time, a new "political class" was coming into being and alongside it a new intellectual élite. Especially in its early stages, the influences of liberalism were political and doctrinaire; they stimulated religious controversies (clericalism and anticlericalism, particularly on the Spanish side) and caused divisions on questions which seem futile and unimportant when seen from the distance of the present. But although the economic side was not. spared, the orthodoxy of the Manchester school spread much more easily, once the virulence of other doctrinal controversies had calmed down and, with the passage of time, other shades of European liberal opinion spread (especially English philosophical radicalism, and in particular the ideas of Bentham) ending up in the later years of the nineteenth century with the reign of positivism (whether or not of the purity of Comte) which had so great an influence on the "modernization" of Brazil, Mexico and Chile.

However, the decisive influence was the authority acquired by the "classic school" in economic science, with the result that both conservatives and liberals made their policies conform to the rules of this one orthodoxy. For this reason it seems unjust to forget that this new political class - born of the union or harmonious coexistence of liberals and conservatives not only pieced together the fragments of a State which, good or bad, had perished with the downfall of the Empire, but also, in a few decades, built up the economic infrastructure (ports, roads, railways, etc.) which has served Latin America almost up to the present day. It did so, of course, according to the ideas of the times, and by means of concessions which now seem like surrenders, and economic errors. Of course, too, disorder was rampant and privilege existed in certain interests. In some parts, the railways handed over to the States (Brazil) still constitute a problem because of the lack of interconnexion and the incredible variety of gauges, and in others, as in Argentina, the railways primarily served the private interests of the exporters.

With all its faults, this imperfect structure was the work of the "oligarchy" (using the term in its strict, neutral sociological sense) and it is still the basis for the undertakings of today. This must not be taken. as an apology. What we have been trying to do is to bring out the fact that, over a long period, people thought and acted within the confines of a doctrine which, whether we like it or not, was exact and clear cut. And this applied both to the "left" and to the "right". It was not for nothing that Garcia Moreno, the personification of the extreme right, was also responsible for the building of the high road between Quito and Guayaquil, a marvel of engineering skill in its day.

3. The Cosmopolitan "Élite" and the Moulding of the New Ruling Class

The opening-up of Latin America to the world, which was what occurred at this time, also brought with it a train of new ideas. The hacienda owners travelled; their children were educated by nurses and Fraülein; and—even if many of them squandered in Paris the wealth amassed by their labourers—a fair number helped to form or encouraged the existence of a cultural minority of physicians, engineers, professors and men of letters. Alongside this political class, or sometimes mingled with it, there arose the great cosmopolitan élite which has run Latin America and which, while it might at times have been snobbish, preferring French to Spanish, and have displayed little national feeling, nevertheless had considerable achievements to its credit.

It is easy nowadays to criticize the "thinkers" of that time for their incapacity for specialized work (they did not publish books on physics, logic or history in the limited, rigorous, German style, such as they might have written); but theirs was a different mission and they certainly carried it out faultlessly. Foreign observers are puzzled by the aesthetic dilettantism of these thinkers, but it is now clear from the work of José Gaos that they could not have acted otherwise and that they acceptea their lot in full awareness. They form the long sequence of magistri nationes, builders and educators of their peoples, which culminates in time at least with the Hispanic figure of Ortega y Gasset, and without them the patient work of specialization performed today by the new generations would not have been possible.

Towards the end of that epoch the cosmopolitan élite began to meditate on their own, and their meditations found expression in a brand of modernism evolved by certain brilliant poets and writers who happened to be members of the consular service and who thus carried into Europe their particular literary style (known, for this reason as literatura consular). The best examples of these "cosmopolitans" were not, however, oblivious of the anxieties and problems of their home countries. Alfonso Reyes was a cosmopolitan figure of world-wide culture and interests. and yet a Mexican through and through.

Little by little this cosmopolitan élite, of oligarchical origin, was first supplemented, then completely or almost completely replaced in the last few years of the immediate past, by a new group of leaders. To a large extent, this was brought by the action of these elements themselves, not merely through the influence of their personalities but also through the work of the universities, which from the beginning were striving for reform or innovation. But these new intellectual and professional groups differed from the previous ones for two reasons first, their very different origins and, second, the nature and quality of their education. The members of this new ruling class came from the new middle class that was then emerging the sons of other professional people (perhaps themselves of humbler origin), or of well-to-do families in industrial and commercial circles, or even, later on, from the more prosperous levels of the proletariat. In their childhood and adolescence, they did not receive their education from nurses and governesses but entirely from State establishments of secondary and higher education. This twofold difference could not fail to have marked influences. To begin with, it diminished the cosmopolitan tendencies of those whose fortunes had enabled them from their youth to be plurilingual tendencies fostered, moreover, by the frequency and ease with which they were able to travel abroad. Intellectual development was henceforward to be "of domestic origin" (if we may use in this connexion a current economic term), which meant, on the other hand, an accentuation of (even some times an exclusive concern with) the situation in the home country, as the only one known and experienced directly. But there is also no doubt that this education "of domestic origin" was bound to be slightly second-plan,¹⁴ i.e.,without direct contact with the original sources. And, except in special cases and where the greatest efforts are made, this cannot but result in a lowering of the educational level. To put it more plainly, the men in question were no longer of the class educated, as often as not, at Oxford, Paris, Berlin or Harvard; they were hard-working students (at least, the best were: the others, obviously, are of no interest, and are to be found everywhere) of the Universities of San Andrés or San Carlos, to mention only two among such institutions in the various capitals or in the provinces. This brief excursion into sociology, then, enables us to see that there are undeniably significant compensatory elements. What was lost on the one hand in quality of education was, indeed, gained on the other in awareness of and interest in everything pertaining to the home country.

The new ruling class, more "provincial" but perhaps more genuine than its predecessor, of course tries, at first, to be like the latter in every respect: in its tastes, its modes of thought and feeling, and its behaviour. In the course of time, thanks to the improved standard of living and also to the improved educational facilities afforded (especially in recent years) by the many systems of national and inter- national fellowships, this new class, too. was able to look directly towards the outside world, without, however, being "cosmopolitan" in the same sense as its predecessor. Its interpretation of that world, though doubtless fascinating, does not concern us here. But there is another matter which does concern us: the fact that this change, which at the beginning involved an almost universal desire for assimilation, was replaced by an impulse towards differentiation. Things began to be viewed from a different stand- point. This change of outlook, focusing on the situation inside Latin America, led to the discovery of inadequacies. The attitude of calm assent was shaken, the status quo no longer accepted; and criticism, disgust, and finally in some cases, revolt, began. In a word, the generations of "protesters" made their appearance on the social and intellectual scene throughout Latin America.

This protest movement, which varied in volume according to the country and the circumstances, seems to have become particularly strong in the years preceding the First World War and the date that naturally comes to mind is 1910, the beginning of the Mexican Revolution. In fact it was certainly some years later, after the war, that it reached its peak, when it spread throughout Latin America. as did the social novel at the time of its predominance. In this connexion, for those interested in the sociology of culture. the period of the social novel is of equal interest, in its profound significance, with the periods of modernism, romanticism or the baroque. Of course—and this is no matter for polemics with learned historians of Spanish American literature—there were also at that time dadaism, creationism and ultraism, just as years later there have been existentialism of different shades, surrealism and neo-classicism. But perhaps the sociologist, even though not, a Marxist, would try to explain these phenomena (the part that can be explained in sociological terms) as being the result of the same general and deep-rooted causes. In any case— to employ the terms in current usage—it is the "committed" literature rather than the purely literary writing that serves to describe a whole decisive period in the social history of Latin America.

This "committed" literature, what is known as the social novel, covers the whole of Latin America, without exception; but it is significant that it flourishes especially in the so-called "banana republics". As a typical example we may take Ecuador, one of the most beautiful and least-known republics of the whole continent, be it said in passing. Angel A. Rojas, in his Historia de la novela ecuatorian¹⁵ a the literary and strictly critical merits of which are outside our province, preceded his accounts of the various stages of the genre, by a few brief sketches of the political and social situation, which, assuming we accept them for the moment as good ones, are of obvious interest to the sociologist. The period of the social novel, therefore, provides us with plentiful data—subject to confirmation and criticism, of course—on the confused political, economic and—especially—cultural situation of those years, which is also to be seen, without difficulty, in other Latin American countries in the same period. For various reasons, we can hardly follow these situations step by step. But, on account of what we shall see later, it is appropriate to bear in mind that, alongside the internal and external events which disturbed or—in the case of the latter had repercussions on Ecuadorian life, there were never in the intellectual history of the republics so many widely differing spiritual and literary influences as at that time.

The result of this diversified experience was a splendid flowering of the social novel, its stylistic merits perhaps not entirely to our taste, but its powerful human qualities unquestionable. The chief authors, of the Guayaquil school especially (Aguilera Malta, Gil Gilbert, Gallegos Lara, Alfredo Pareja, etc.), are universally known and had a great influence throughout Latin America not only in political matters. The title Guasipungo became a symbol of the whole of this non-conformist generation pledged to transform Latin America from its very core. Ecuador, we repeat has been taken as a particularly representative example; aforesaid generation stood for can readily be seen, though perhaps in less concentrated form, in other countries

4. Digression Concerning the University and the "Intellectuals"

Needless to say, the members of the new ruling class were not all equally "protesters". Something should be said of the "constructive" ones, despite the ugliness of the term. It is also interesting to dwell for a moment on the sociology of the intellectuals, a subject which we shall have to consider later in another connexion. We have already had occasion to mention the university, which by its nature served as a minimum defence against one of the many unjustified accusations which used to be levelled with such ease against the old oligarchy. An institution like the university would in any case have to be considered in these pages, prompted by the widespread interest that is taken in the so-called social aspects of economic development. Indeed, a question which at the present time is in the fore- front of people's minds (and rightly so) is the connexion between the desired economic growth and institutions for higher education. - -

There is no point in stressing here the famous vicious circle of state of education and state of economic prosperity. Economic growth is inadequate because it does not receive the necessary technical and intellectual support from the university; the university, on the other hand, is inadequate because the country which maintains it is not possessed of enough wealth. For many reasons without quoting Galbraith's Affluent Society it may be said that the circle is not as vicious as it seems; and it is now and then necessary to cut the Gordian knot in the most classic and expeditious way. However, although acknowledged examples may be quoted of historical developments that, at their most vigorous, have had little need of support from the university, there is no denying that such cases hardly ever occur today. The vast "apparatus", compounded of a variety of technical and scientific knowledge together with ability for management and administration, that is required for the modern industrial or commercial undertaking is far beyond the sphere of improvisation, and not even the most brilliant entrepreneur of the old style would dare to rely on his own capabilities alone for setting it in motion,

There are a number of easily solvable problems in this connexion, for, as in the general field of education, it is not impossible to calculate sufficiently in advance the type and number of experts (including "all rounders") required for a specific development programme, given the hypotheses on which the plans are based. It is also not impossible to indicate, in general, the type of professions to which greater preference should be given, although it is well to avoid hasty conclusions prompted by some of the popular preconceptions of our times, which might oblige us on occasion to change the title of the well-known book by P. Calamdrei: instead of "Too many lawyers" we might, for instance, have to admit that there were "too many engineers", Lastly, there are questions relating to organization in the universities which bear some relation to economies. Work is being done and still remains to be done on this and similar questions at the present time. But in essentials one not infrequently comes across a number of absurdities, and it is to be feared that some of the views set out below will run counter to quite a few of the opinions expressed at the present time.

The university is a venerable institution in Spanish America. As the dates are in dispute, and as there is some slight national rivalry in the matter, it is expedient to shift the responsibility to an outside authority. "When the colleges were developing and growing, they aspired to become universities, Less than half a century after the discovery, in 1538, the college of the Dominican friars in the town of Santo Domingo was authorized to call itself the University of Saint Thomas Aquinas; in 1540 permission was granted for the creation of another university there the University of Santiago de la Paz In 1551, the Spanish crown decided to found universities in the capitals of the two vice-royalties then existing: .. one in Mexico City and the other in Lima; these were inaugurated in 1553.¹⁶

We will leave aside all controversial matters, which do not concern us here. It suffices to quote the approximate dates. These "traditional" universities remained intact until the time of the Independence, when an attempt was made to transform them, even in the prevailing circumstances of struggle and conflict. The task then begun could only be carried to an effective conclusion later on, in calmer times. The details are unnecessary. The main point is that this new European type of university was intended, in accordance with the educational ideals then obtaining (and those of Bello, for instance, are by no means too antiquated), to meet the needs of the professions considered most important at the time. That they benefited at the same time the political and the ruling classes should be no matter for surprise to a sociologist.

No institution can escape the aging process; thus in this case, too, the university belonging to an outmoded social system began to show signs of arteriosclerosis. About the second decade of the twentieth century, no one perceived these better than the students themselves. It was then that the famous Córdoba revolution took place, and the University Reform movement, which had started in Argentina, spread like wildfire through almost the whole of Spanish America. Now, while it is easy to put an end to an institution, it is by no means so easy to set it up again in stable and lasting form. The old mastodon fell to the ground at last. But that is no reason for concealing the fact that the results of the Reform were, and still are, problematical, and that since then the Latin American university with some exceptions - has been swayed to and from by many - different influences.

Latin Americans need not take offence at this statement. In our hazardous times it is a common occurrence for universities to pass through evil days, and this was foreseen some years ago by the philosopher Ortega y Gasset in one of his most completely fulfilled prophecies.¹⁷ The generation to which we belong has hardly known any university in its healthy moments. The present writer experienced the crumbling of long-cherished illusions at the time when he went to work at the ancient German university held in such high esteem by the Spanish-speaking peoples - -N and found it torn by the daily conflict between the clenched fist on the one hand and the arm uplifted in Roman fashion on the other. Thus then, the difficulties that beset the university (though the situation has improved in some quarters) cannot be easily remedied by mere organizational planning or surmounted by the hasty accumulation mainly on paper - of numerous research centres quite beyond the scope of practical possibilities. Still less can they be removed by frequent repetition of the word Science, with a capital S, and of the term "research worker".¹⁸ Nor can they be diminished by persistent announcements of meetings proclaimed beforehand to be at a high level, when both level and personality can only be assessed after the event, in the light of archievements. Nothing could be worse than such prior announcements in the style of advertisments for cosmetics. The university represents the reverse of fraud: it is the painful expression of the truth.

But we are living in an age of "experts", and experts, though often welcome, are also often disturbing elements. I remember being much impressed by a long report on administrative reforms, doubtless urgent, in the modest country I was visiting at the time. Not only Frederick the Great, but also the best modern administrative services in the most highly developed countries, would have considered the recommendations of that report Utopian fantasies. We must try not to let the same thing

happen with the university, which has been placed in too "functional" a relationship with the needs of economic development. The problem of the university is of course easy to solve in theory, but it is not so easy in practice. It is purely a question of putting it "into good shape", so that it may cease to live below par, just keeping going (expression called from the works of Ortega).¹⁹

To conclude this brief digression on a very important subject, it is appropriate, though it may not be essential, for the writer to affirm his full agreement with another professor in partibus, not because of identity of influences but because of undoubted similarity of experience. We must do all we can to raise the level of the university, so that it may be an effective instrument of economic and social development, but especially so that it may not cease to represent that pouvoir spirituel of which it can still be the concrete expression.

We should bear in mind that teaching is of the essence of the university and the two problems this circumstance poses are the level of such teaching, and the question of the teaching of the sciences, whose very numbers constitute a delicate problem (and there are more of them than those mentioned by Marias): "It is vital for the university to arrive at an appreciation of its dilemmas",²⁰ and it can only emerge from its half-life and attain to its full stature "through a complicated series of renunciations; renunciation of its independent existence in many cases, or of great sections of its own structure in others, of all the functions which it cannot perform with thoroughness, all the advantages (social, political and economic,, for instance) which it derives from living in an ivory tower or from its subservience to the State or to the Opposition". These words, with their Weberian ring, are particularly dear to the writer.

But, supported now by opinions from outside. certain heterodox attitudes towards current modes of thought began to appear. There was also a relative heterodoxy, connected with the foregoing, concerning the problems of the general relationship between education and economic development. Economists and teachers, demographers and sociologists are tackling the subject jointly nowadays in all the developed or developing countries. And, as a result of their efforts, there has even come into being what amounts to a new discipline, known as "Economics of Education".

As a common starting point, of course, there is the conviction that degrees of development and levels of education are closely connected. The differences begin when we have to determine which of the various types and levels in the generally accepted divisions primary, secondary, vocational, higher, etc.—are likely to be most decisive in archieving the aims of the desired economic development as quickly as possible. Here, demographers and economists can also offer us an image of the employment pattern required for a given future economic situation. As far as the "economics of education" are concerned, it is not difficult, either, to formulate its main content in outline, but not so easy to work it out in practice, or even in theory. On the one hand, education is, in economic terms, a capital "input"²¹ but, on the other, it is just as clearly an "output" of determined yield, a yield that is to be assessed in its strictly economic sense. Again, this connexion between "input" and "output" occurs not only in the relation between education as whole and a country's wealth, but within the educational system itself. Hence the existence of the problem to which we have been referring from the beginning that of the calculation and integration of these investments in the general framework of any economic plan or programme.

In the foregoing, no remark has been made from the sociological point of view. What follows is not meant to indicate any disagreement concerning the significance of what has been said but, rather, to provide some qualifications or warnings, which it is best to set forth now in summarized form, without further justification:

1. The sociologist is in full agreement with the teacher in considering that, despite the fundamental importance of education for economic development, it is not permissible to make the former a mere function of the latter, or, to put it another way, to assess education purely as an "investment". Moreover, the sociologist is inclined to say²² to the teacher that anything he the sociologist may have to suggest in the matter does not affect what has always been the particular classic, as it were – or permanent mission of the teacher, even vis-à-vis the most radical historicists.
2. Even in his official and strictly technical assertions, the sociologist warns us that nothing meaningful can be said on the subject of "education and economic development" unless we have beforehand a precise - at least relatively clear - or idea of the nature of the "industrial society" which is the aim in view or which may even be on the point of attainment. He would also be able to point to some dissident opinions certainly acceptable to the teacher for, in view of the nature of the industrial societies already existing or coming into being (the wealthy consumer societies), it is perhaps appropriate to draw attention to the efforts made by educationists to produce in those societies the largest possible number of people capable of intellectual and spiritual independence, and to guard, as far as can be done, against enslaving tendencies to extreme social conformity. We do not touch, apart from this brief reference, on the question of the training of those destined to occupy positions of authority; they are never the product of narrow specialization.
3. The sociologist, abandoning now his function of expert, in order to resume, even though only for a moment, his old, and nowadays despised, role of cultural critic, would also recognize the existence of two dangers which may arise simultaneously: one, inherent in current opinions concerning education, consists in the possibility that following such counsel may produce a half-education (Halbbildung, as the Germans have it), and the other in the possibility of a hasty "acceptance", at second hand, of educational systems and procedures that have become out of date in their country of origin.²³

Earlier in this study we touched on the human aspect of the intellectual. And we saw him, in the role of non-conformist or protester, which is by no means the only possible role for this kind of person. What may have been suggested in that reference is insignificant by comparison with what ought to be known about the subject in the Latin American world. The advisability of making a study of it was suggested some years ago in the ECLA programme study entitled Social conditions of economic development.²⁴ The present writer repeated that advice in other publications and in some of his academic activities. But little or nothing was done, until the list drawn up by the meeting of specialists held in Mexico at the end of 1960 again affirmed the usefulness of an investigation on the subject.²⁵

Meanwhile, not only has the subject been extensively dealt with in other parts, it has even in some cases been presented with a certain originality, and for that reason merits our attention. John Friedman, in an article, goes so far as to regard the role of the intellectual in the underdeveloped countries as something like the counterpart of the role of the entrepreneur, the importance of which is universally And merely because, as he believes, intellectuals acknowledged.²⁶ And merely because, as he believes, intellectuals are little inclined to talk about themselves—he is, of course, referring in particular to North Americans—²⁷ the significance of their participation in efforts towards economic progress has not been generally recognized. It is true that W. E. Moore so appositively called "intrepreneurial determinism" also exercises and influence.

In opposition to this "materialist" or economic determinism, Friedman offers a new, "idealist" or intellectual type of determinism. According to him, the intellectual has performed (and continues to perform) in the countries in process of development an important threefold function: (a) he makes known new social values; (b) he develops a new ideology of economic evolution; and (c) he shares in creating an image of the nation which can help to maintain a lively national consciousness and to promote vital enthusiasm throughout the whole social body, at every level. The author's experience leads him of course, to be primarily interested in those countries which are now in process of assimilating in a more or less individual fashion and more or less completely, Western culture, and especially its economic aspects. Not all his views apply to the Latin American peoples. must again emphasize the fact that they are not, experiencing, in any sense, this kind of cultural "transit". Nevertheless, his expositions, and some of his suggested outlines for research, are applicable to them.²⁸

Before and since this article by Friedman, which we have singled out because his exposition of the problems is novel (and for some people, no doubt, exaggerated, a considerable amount of work has been done, in a variety of places, on the subject of the intellectual, especially in his relation to economic development.²⁹

5. The Reshaping of Liberalism

At this point, attention should be drawn to the relationship between the history of events and the history of ideas, showing how changes in the structure of society are accompanied by equally important changes in the world of thought. The breaking up of the old landed estates, which had set the pattern of social life in Latin America, at the same time spelled the decline of an ideology. Once again, however, we have made over-ambitious claims, for we shall not be in a position to prove our point and, as hitherto, we shall have to rest content merely with throwing out a few suggestions and outlining a few problems.

One of the matters discussed in the foregoing has been the origin, development and subsequent difficulties of a comprehensive and integrated pattern of social, economic and intellectual life; we have also touched upon the part played by succesive generations and types of leaders; and the question of the past and present role of various groups of intellectuals has been raised as a subject for immediate and future study. Only indirect and passing reference has been made to the vital responsibilities devolving upon our universities as the last (or practically the last) bastions of intellectual influence in the the present-day world.

At a later date D but still with reference to the same set of problems - we shall discuss the political shape which the old system was bound to assume and the subsequent crisis (which has still not been overcome) arising out of the long-standing opposition between liberals and conservatives. This crisis was bound to arise sooner or later, if only for purely demographic reasons.

We should now make direct reference, though in summary form and by way of parenthesis, to be protacted process of ideological decline, which reached its nethermost point after the 1920s.

The victim of this whole process is so well known as scarcely to need naming. I refer, of course, to the crisis of liberalism. The fate that overtook this way of life and thought was by no means confined to Latin America: all parts of the world were involved, particularly Europe where it had first taken root. Some of the great writers of world history, which until very recently has been equated with European history as the main centre of interest, have endeavoured to reduce its meaning to the impact made by the idea of freedom, as carried into practice at various periods of all too brief duration, Scholarship is now felt to lead nowhere, but it is perhaps still worth fixing in our memories of the last and most exciting manifestations of the will to interpret the world.

Only in three parts of the world which rose to a high level of culture (China, India and the West) was life inspirited by freedom of the mind. But for us of the West, the Greeks, the people as a whole, were the first to serve once and for all as a classical model of man's striving for higher things. During later brief periods as well, man once again gave expression to these loftier impulses. This period of humanism was the decisive one in history. "But for humanism, there is no doubt that the history of the Botocudos, the Zulus or any other people would be on the same level of interest and importance and in the same relationship to God, but we would then fall into the error of exaggerated historical relativism. The purpose of the present work is to survey Western humanism against the background of world history".³⁰

Liberalism has been a basic tenet of the Latin American peoples since the days of Independence, and has shown a remarkable power of survival, but even at the outset it could not but be in a precarious situation, since it was an ideology in flat contradiction with the social system based on land ownership with its attendant customs and beliefs. It has therefore been claimed that this contradiction is the first, and perhaps the most striking paradox of the Latin American countries.

The frailty of liberalism in Latin America may be traced to such causes as the gulf between aspirations and the resources available for their fulfilment. But in all parts of the world the frailty of liberalism is the natural result of its Utopian character. However, the Utopianism of the liberal school of thought is at the same time its great attraction and sovereign asset. "Liberalism", as Ortega points out, "is the political principle whereby the public powers, even though omnipotent, impose restrictions on their own authority and endeavour, even at their own cost, to allow some latitude to those who do not think and feel as they do, i.e., as the majority, the stronger sector, does. Liberalism—a point that needs stressing today is the highest form of generosity; it is the right granted by the majority to the minority and in it can be heard the voice of man's noblest aspirations. It proclaims the resolve to live at peace with the enemy, even with an enemy weaker than ourselves. How unlikely that mankind should ever be permanently capable of so fine, so paradoxical, so elegant, so acrobatic, so unnatural an achievement. Small wonder, then, that mankind is so readily led astray from this achievement".³¹

For various reasons, the "fear of freedom" is liable to arise at any time, but is is not the purpose of this paper to rehearse well-known interpretations of contemporary history. Nevertheless, it must be remembered that liberalism, though Utopian in its most attractive form, was vitiated at the outset by serious failings, while its course of development has been marked by practically inevitable errors. Its original fault, dating back to the period of Enlightenment, was to have attributed a practically angelic character to human nature. As Alfred Weber would have put it, it has two aspects of optimism, one of which is fruitful and immoral; this is the "Christian" belief in the perfectibility of man, in his capacity to lift himself, through Enlightenment (Kant), above his "state of sinful immaturity" so as to attain the adult stage of spiritual maturity. But the other aspect of optimism was dangerous and, in the long run, fatal, for it overlooked the perverse and "demonic" aspects of human nature, the "dark powers" of evil. "It is perhaps the weakest feature of the eighteenth century that conceptually it never bridged the gap between its humanistic ideals about the remodelling of life and society and the brutal power- individualism of its States.³²

But apart from this original failing of liberalism or humanism, as a universal way of thought, it was inevitable that, in the course of the nineteenth century, its basic postulates should crystallize into a doctrine, with political, economic, educational aspects, etc., which were bound to become rigid and outdated with the passage of time bringing with it new sets of problems.

A typical case in point is economic liberalism and the orthodox The same is perhaps true and sometimes over-rigid forms it assumed. of political liberalism. Both cases may possibly be described as particular illustrations of the old problem of natural law being embodied in the course of time in positive legislation.

The fact remains that, at a very early stage, attacks were launched against both the basic postulates of liberalism and the various doctrines in which it found expression.³³ It is not our intention, nor, indeed, within our power, to tell the story of the attacks levelled against liberalism. However, so far as Latin America is concerned, mention should be made of the severest stage of the campaign against liberalism, when its detractors attacked not only one or other of its aspects, its achievements and failures, but its very essence. In short, we refer to the great surge of irrationalism which arose after the First World War. We shall single out only two of the most decisive ingredients of this irrationalism, both of which were calculated to discredit the two finest aspects of liberalism, On the one hand, an attack was made on the "enlightened belief" in the rationality of man, and, on the other, on the "concept of politics" as implying the peaceful coexistence of two schools of thought.

Man's rationality and his ability to rise through his own efforts above his state of sinful immaturity were regarded as a mere illusion. The many different forms taken by this negation are well known; they may be said to culminate in the exaltation of deception as exemplifies in myths (Sorel and his followers). The most extreme form of this negation is, however, to be found in Ernst Jünger's Heroischer Nihilismus, familiar to only a restricted circle of intellectuals, "One of the best means of preparing for a new and bolder life is to annihilate the values of the mind, which has finally become completely unfettered and interested only in its own narrow sphere, and to wipe out the educational work under- taken by man in the bourgeois period…The best answer to the treason of Mind against Life is the treason of Mind against Mind; sharing in the work of smashing all such false idols may be regarded as one of the supreme 38 and cruel delights of our age".³⁴

Quite naturally, such retentions going further than Nietzsche himself appealed little to the majority. Yet some of them found more widespread acceptance when watered down and expressed in more palatable form.

Let us turn once again to Ortega's contention that liberalism is the resolve to coexist with the enemy, or, in other words, the ability to see both sides and to compromise. Towards 1927 a doctrine was formulated which immediately had far-reaching repercussions and still has its followers in some parts on the world; this doctrine, based on the distinction between victors and vanquished and showing the influence of Fareto's thought, was put forward by a famous German lawyer who defined the essence of politics as the contraposition of friend and enemy: "The basic distinction in politics is the distinction between friend and enemy. It is this which vests human actions with political significance... The terms friend and enemy denote the extremes between mutual attraction and repulsion. The opposition between them may exist in both theory and practice without there being necessarily other types of opposition at the same time moral, aesthetic, economic, etc. The political enemy is not necessarily morally depraved, nor a competitor in the economic sphere, for it may even be profitable to trade with this enemy. The important point is that the enemy is always the Other, the Outsider.³⁵

Doctrines of coexistence with the weak are thus countered by doctrines of radical opposition to the enemy; the possibility of two-way contact and compromise (all of which are continuing processes) encountered by the vigorous affirmation of the irrevocable decision. The spirit of deliberation, the keynote of democracy and the standard guarantee of liberalism, is now challenged by the urge of rash minorities shaping the destinies of their peoples to take blind decisions. The consequences of this political irrationalism constitute one of the most painful experiences, one of the most ignoble spectacles, endured by mankind.

Europe, once the catastrophe was over, did not revert to the old Utopianism with its enthusiasms and hopes. Inevitably it rebuilt its existence on the ashes of liberalism or, as one of its thinkers has stated, on the remnants of a centuries-old culture which, after being salvaged at great cost from the earthquake, once again gave man something to which he could cling and a consciousness of basic values without which it is impossible to begin building the future.

During these anxious decades, Latin America, obliged to face up to its new and inescapable problems, and affected by ideas from abroad (it has continued and will continue to be influenced by Europe), went through the most troubled period of its ideological history. The doctrine on which reliance was ultimately placed, and with fruitful results, in Brazil, Chile, Argentina and Mexico, as can be gauged from the work of Leopoldo Zea, was positivism. This was the last doctrine which won general and widespread acceptance. Afterwards there set in a period, lasting almost to the present day, marked by the most varied, contradictory and extra- vagant idelogies and influences. An analysis of this great medley of intellectual movements would be one of the most difficult yet rewarding fields of research when there is time to undertake it and the movements can be viewed in proper perspective. In a study of present-day Bolivia which points out some of the difficulties impeding the success of its revolution, we find the following statement: "The very magnitude of the task is, for the time being, a natural excuse for the delay in under- taking it. But it is generally recognized that ideological vacillation on the part of many thinkers has been largely instrumental in this delay, even more than internal party differences. The vehemence implicit in the nationalism of any young country, the remnants of certain German influences, every brand of Marxist claim, along with traces of liberalism and technical goals common to all peoples at this period - all these formed an assortment of ideas difficult to translate into clear firm, practicable decisions"³⁶

We all know how absorbing any intellectual work can become. The author of the foregoing lines, summing up the situation so briefly, spent several months perusing a large number of books, pamphlets, manifestos, etc., which although their literary merits or arresting contents fired him with enthusiasm, very rarely supplied him with a stock of clear ideas, affording him simple, effective guidance. A study of the conflicting trends of thought in other countries or in Latin America as a whole would probably yield similar results.

We shall try to avoid ambiguities as far as possible. Page 65 However, in writing about intellectual movements, it is impossible not to cite terms and concepts which may appear exaggerated. It is not our intention to convey the impression of chaos and upheavals when we refer to the decline of ideologies. Nor do we cherish any romantic dreams of impossible "restorations". Let us be quite clear. When referring to the crisis of liberalism in Latin America, apart from affirming its basic postulates on which all Western culture finally rests, we have in mind the effort of re- elaboration and reconstruction necessitated by liberalism, in both the political and economic spheres, under conditions which, whether we like it or not, are very different from those obtaining in the nineteenth century. Such reconstruction may lead to completely opposite solutions in dealing with various points of doctrine or practical problems. This approach is to be found among many students of Latin American affairs. But it would perhaps be enough to cite only one author, a foreign observer who has endeavoured to analyse the latest political events in Latin America as deviations from traditional liberalism, in one or other direction; there are right-wing theories of the equidistant or third force, sinarquismo, Peronism, and so on, as opposed to the left wing Aprismo and Marxism.³⁷

b. the Great Paradox. From the Fondo De Cultura Económica to the Work of ECLA

Assuming that the above-mentioned trend has been correctly described as an ideological disintegration, attention should be drawn without delay to one of the most interesting paradoxes in present-day Latin America. the period marked by this weakening and dispersal of beliefs, and more particularly over the past few decades, we find an opposite and equally decisive trend towards the increase of real and potential knowledge.

Having regard to the purpose of the present work, there is no need to justify the fact that it is confined to one single branch of knowledge - economics. Furthermore, economics is a field in which far greater advances have been made than in other branches of the social sciences, with the possible exception of anthropology, particularly in Mexico. It also has more general applicability.

The younger generation today has access to an infinitely greater body of economic knowledge than was available to those who are not so very much their elders. Generally speaking, economics was previously studied in the Latin countries (France, Spain, Italy and some of the Latin American countries) as a rather "peculiar" subject included in the curriculum of the faculty of law. The present author still remembers the old classic by Charles Gide which was his first textbook in economics. He can hardly claim to have learnt a great deal mere since that time; but it must be acknowledged that this textbook had a fascination, an elegance and a clarity unequalled, alas, by those of today. Having paid this tribute, we must nevertheless admit that much ground has been covered since Gide's day. The reasons underlying the changes that have taken place in Latin America should be briefly listed, beginning with the statement that if any person of normal intelligence nowdays does not make a serious study of economics, this is merely because the subject has no attraction for him.

In the first place, mention should be made of the very large number of books that have been published in recent years. Whole collections of classic and modern works are now available in Spanish sometimes not of the highest standard and several specialist reviews keep the most exacting reader in touch with the latest problems and developments. In a humble office in Calle Madero, a group of Mexicans, under the leadership of a man of remarkable calibre, embarked some thirty years ago on the publication of short works on economics which ultimately came to be known as the Fondo de Cultura Económica, a very extensive collection that was able, in its most influential years, to break down the cultural isolation due to the war. Their example was followed in other countries, and even the title of the collection was taken over a fact bound to puzzle anyone unfamiliar with Mexican fiduciary institutions. The Fondo soon ceased to specialize in purely economic activities and took on other work which cannot be discussed here. However, mention should be made of certain publications, for some reason not entirely successful, which endeavoured to quicken the sense of Latin American unity, such as the Tierra Firme series or the less ambitious Jornadas issued by the Social Studies Centre of the College of Mexico. ³⁸ In the second place, the study of economics is no longer confined to one small department of faculties of law but is being expanded in one country after another, where independent schools are being set up to investigate all its ramifications and trends. Of course these schools vary considerably according to the country and the conditions obtaining there, but their very existence, regardless of the standard of teaching, denotes an awareness of economic problems and the resolve to train the required specialists.³⁹

Thirdly, mention should be made of the work done by ECLA. It will be readily appreciated why the present author would prefer to leave it to the economists to assess the technical aspects of this question.⁴⁰

However, our ignorance is not such as to preclude some reference to five separate aspects of this work, some of them not strictly economic.

1. A theoretical aspect, mainly taking into account the opinions of the above-mentioned experts.⁴¹ No specialized knowledge is needed, however, to claim that here for the first time a group of men succeeded in rising above our traditional "simple-mindedness" and, without any fear of other people's opinion, sought to do their own thinking on their own problems and to work out what they considered the most suitable approach for the understanding and interpretation of those problems
2. An aspect which I shall describe as monographic, involving the assembly of an impressive body of data and material on the economic situation in Latin America previously non-existent or difficult to bring together for consideration as a whole as in the annual or six-monthly Estudios Económicos, the surveys of the economic structure of different countries, and the ECLA Boletín, a periodical containing a variety of articles on statistical, demographic, social and other subjects.
3. A practical aspect, involving continuing training and information work; specialists are trained in programming and economic analysis, and technical advice is supplied, on request, for the studies of development conducted by the various governments.
4. A political aspect, a term used innocuously to cover ECLA's proposals for integration, in Central America or in the broader field of a future common market.
5. Last but not least, an educational aspect. For a professor in partibus, this aspect (may I be pardoned for the heresy) is perhaps the most important. It is my contention, regardless of the opinion of more learned experts, that, whatever the value, the success or the failure of the foregoing types of work, ECLA's educational work cannot be undone. The general public has gained awareness of a problem, and one of very great importance, and the most intelligent members have explored its essence. From now on there can be no sinking back into the blissful state of sancta simplicitas.

However, this defense of ECLA's educational work (in no way intended as self-praise) should not be pure eulogy. Some blame should be distributed as well. Our knowledge of economics. has grown considerable in the past few years but, in the process, this branch of study has taken on a highly esoteric character. A famous economist (Adolph Löwe) recently remarked that anyone looking up a few pages on the subject may not be quite sure that it is not some obscure work on physics or mathematics. This esoteric tendency is not peculiar nowadays to economics - it is true of scientific work in general, including sociology and the other human sciences.

This development must be accepted as an inherent part of scientific progress. But there are two problems to be cleared up. In the first place, a dividing line has to be drawn between the strictly necessary and the product of pedantry, pseudo-originality or sheer bluff. In a fine essay on modern universities, Alfred Weber complained that even the traditional humanistic studies were being corroded by a hair-splitting approach. There is yet another problem so far as the social sciences are concerned. The philosopher is not the only specialist who is required to be clear; the content of the social sciences is of interest to all persons with a desire to know what is happening in the world about us, but more particularly to the political and other leaders of a country, who have to translate into a practical and reasonably comprehensible body of ideas the teachings and guidance of precise scientific research. Precision is essential in such research, but from time to time scientists should make an effort, preferably direct, to bring their findings within the reach of the layman.⁴² Endeavours on these lines are absolutely necessary in the field of economics and sociology.

6. The Decline of Ideologies

Such endeavours are essential in economic and social studies since it becomes daily more necessary to draw a distinction between objective scientific advice (on questions of ever wider general interest) and the wishful thinking of the strictly sociological ideologies. This is a question that calls for a slight digression, though still on the subject of Latin America.

A point frequently made over the past few years, by Bell, Lipset, Aron, Landshut, Schelsky and others, is that we are living in a period opposed to ideologies, that we are witnessing the decline of ideologies. It will be observed that the authors who write of this decline are European or North American. This attitude towards ideologies thus possibly exists in Europe and the United States of America. But do we find it in other parts of the world and, in particular, in Latin America, which is our immediate concern?

Without going into over-lengthy details, it may be said that there will in all probability be a decay of ideologies where countries have gone through one or other of the following experiences:

1. Intellectual experiences, such as (a) mutual cancelling-out of ideologies as the result of a protracted process of mutual "unmasking"; (b) weakening of the ideological illusion born of the attainment of a turning-point in the development of the idea of progress or of the rise of a new conception of it; (c) disillusionment caused by a real and first- hand knowledge of the way of supposedly enemy peoples.
2. Experiences resulting from the enjoyment of a relatively high standard of living, which keeps uppermost in the individual's mind readily accessible goals of personal comfort and satisfaction. To state the problem in Marxist terms, these experiences lead to the general adoption of a uniform petit bourgeois culture which aroused the indignation of the old social democrat K. Bednarik when considering the attitudes and aspirations of young workers in his country.
3. Traumatic experiences resulting from an international or national catastrophe.

If we were to yield to the temptation to digress at greater length, it would be interesting to compare the above-mentioned and other authors to see where their ideas converge or differ. But to give a brief explanation for the so-called "post-ideological" phase in Europe and North America, it may be said that it is primarily due to the fact that on the spiritual plane Europe has to live on the ashes of the past, while on the material plane North America has to live on the affluency of the present. Of course this does not mean that the two cannot go together. But we should steer clear of any ideology of post-ideology, so reminiscent of the old "philosophy of philosophy" or "sociology of sociology".

What is certain, and needs stressing - so as to avoid being drawn into an over-academic discussion is that Latin America is not confronted with the same post-ideological situation. On the one hand it is still in the final stages of "colonialism" (or should I say in the last stages of early youth?); it has still not lost the desire to try out any line of thought which it considers novel and it retains all its old faith in progress. On the other, it does not happen to have lived through any calamitous experiences and is remote from the centres of conflict, which it can view dispassionately. Last but not least, it has not yet reached the stage of affluence which automatically tones down so many conflicts, and precisely for this reason it is pursuing the aim of economic growth. Accordingly, we can refer to very few works reflecting the decline of ideologies in Latin America where the famous "take-off" has already occured or is about to do so. Incidentally, "take-off" affords a good example to add to those already analysed by H. Freyre in discussing the growing influence of technology on everyday language.

7. Final Digression on Youth

Evidence of the survival of the ideological phase in Latin America would be found in any reasonably serious survey of Latin American youth. Research on this subject was advocated not long ago by Raúl Prebisch and its need has been urged by others of us, including the members of the Expert Working Group on Social Aspects of Economic Development at their meeting already mentioned.⁴³

We are not moved by any desire to bestow praise or blame on youth or to "put it in its place". We are merely interested in knowing what young people are like and what they want. We need to discover what is the attitude of young people between 14 and 21 years of age- "the transitional stage between two age-groups with differing attitudes towards society" with regard to certain major issues, such as work and leisure, family and careers, politics, religion and culture, and how they view their future, depending on their social origin urban or rural, middle or working class. The painstaking research conducted by Helmut Schelsky⁴⁴ on his own country is described in a valuable and widely discussed book, the contents of which are vividly conveyed in its title: "The Skeptical Generation: a Sociology of German youth".

What would a similar survey in Latin America reveal? Surely not a "sceptical" generation, though, seeking inspiration in Maimónides - after all an Iberian one might perhaps speak of a "perplexed" generation, or a generation that has lost its bearings. This, admittedly, is no more than a supposition or, to be more scientific, a hypothesis. However, it would be worth while trying to confirm the hypothesis or, better still, to reject it if it is disproved by research.

Notes

1. Joachim Ritter, "Europäisierung als europäisches Probleme", Europäisch-Asiatischen Dialog. Düsseldorf, 1956. ↩
2. As Latin America has been a creator of styles and has hitherto always kept to one style or another, it is significant that such phases could well be designated by artistic or literary names, sometimes representing whole ways of life; the baroque, the romantic, the modernist, the social novel. The dating of the periods, though not imprecise, would not of course be quite sharply defined. This is a subject (of enormous interest from the standpoint of the sociology of culture) that has not yet been developed.↩
3. The best book in this connexions J. Lambert, Le Brésil, Paris, Armand Colin, 1953.↩
4. A. O. Hirschman, The Strategy of Economic Devleopment, New Haven, (Conn.), Yale University Press. 1938, p. 132.↩
5. Herbert Kotter, Landbevölkerung im sogialen Wandel, 1958. (With relevant bibliography.) Diederichs, Köln, 1958.↩
6. See G. Céspedes del Castillo, "La Sociedad Colonial Americana en los Siglos XVI y XVII", in: J. Vicens Vives (ed.), Historia Económica de España y America, Vol. III, Barcelona, Teida, 1958.↩
7. G. Céspedos del Castillo,op. cit.↩
8. See "Social Change in Guatemala and U.S. Policy" in: Richard N. Adams et al., Social Change in Latin America Today, New York, Harper, 1961.↩
9. H.W. Hutchinson, "The Transformation of Brazilian Plantation Society", Journal of Inter-American Studies, April 1961.↩
10. José Ortega y Gasset, Meditación del Pueblo Joven, Buenos Aires, Emecé 1958, p. 80.↩
11. Charles Wagley. "The Brazilian Revolution: Social Changes since 1930" in: R.N. Adams et al., op. cit. p. 179-230.↩
12. Ibid., p. 217.↩
13. Richard W. Patch, "Bolivia: United States Assistance in a Revolutionary Setting", in: R.N. Adams et al., op. cit. p.141↩
14. This expression ought not to give offence; all culture, in the last analysis, is second-hand, and is becoming increasingly so.↩
15. México, D.F., Fondo de Cultura Ecónómica,. 1948.↩
16. Pedro Henriquez Ureña, Historia de la Cultura en la América Hispánica, México, D.F., Fondo de Cultura Económica, 1947, p. 41.↩
17. En el centenario de una Universidad. Lecture given by José Ortega y Gasset in 1932. The university in question was the Spanish University of Granada.↩
18. "Any idler who has spent six months in a German or North American laboratory or college, any nitwit who happens to have stumbled upon a scientific discovery (we quote Ortega, writing, of course, in Spain) returns to his country as a nouveau riche of science; a parvenu of research; and, without fifteen minutes' reflection on the mission of the university, he proposes the most extravagant reforms. On the other hand, he is incapable of teaching 'his subject because he does not even know it thoroughly." José Ortega y Gasset, "Misión de la Universidad", El Arquero popular edition, p. 42. Hard words, and yet so true. In future we should try to avoid weakening by misuse the serious term "research worker".↩
19. No apology is made for the quotations, for it happens that the best books on the substance of the university are still the following: Misión de la Universidad by the Spanish writer José Ortega y Gasset (Madrid, Revista de Occidente, 1930. El Arquero popular edition); which has been so often used and so often silenced; Karl Jaspers, (German) Die Idee der Universität, Berlin, Springer, 1946; and Sir Walter Moberley (English), The Crisis in the University, London, SCM Press, 1949.↩
20. Julián Marías, La Universidad, realidad problemática, Santiago, Cruz del Sur, 1953.↩
21. See the careful technical exposition by Mary Jane Bowman, "Human Capital: Concepts and Measures", offprint from the collective work edited by Hugo Hegeland, Money, Growth and Methodology, and Other Essays in Economics in Honour of Johan Akerman. Lund CWK Gleerup, 1961.↩
22. See Helmut Helmut Schelsky, Schule und Erziehung in der industriellen Gesellschaft, Würzburg, Im Werkbund, 1957.↩
23. It would be inappropriate to give a whole bibliography on this question. Frequent and varying expositions of the first problem are to be found, ranging (to confine ourselves to the extremities of this continuum) from the Cartesian clarity of J. Bergum ("The House of Intellect") to the cryptic Hegelianism of Th. Adorno ("Theorie der Halbbildung" in Soziologie und moderne Gesellschaft: Transactions of the 14th Congress of German Sociologists, 1959). The second point is well illustrated by Francisco Ayala in his book "La Crisis Actual de la Enseñanza", Buenos Aires, Editorial Nova, 1958. ↩
24. E/CN.12/374. See Chapter II of Social Aspects of Economic Development, Santiago, Andrés Bello, 1959.↩
25. See point 11 on that list: study on the Latin American "intelligentsia" in relation to economic and social development (attitudes, opportunities for leadership, etc.) in: "Report of the Working Group on the Social Aspects of Economic Development in Latin America", Boletín Económico de América Latina, Vol. VI, No. 1, March 1961, p. 65.↩
26. See J. Friedman, "Intellectuals in Developing Societies", Kyklos, Vol. XIII, fasc. 4, p. 513↩
27. In the Hispanic world, self-analysis by intellectuals, from the standpoint of national circumstances, seems from its abundance to be almost an endemic malady. For Spain, we have not only to recall the obsessed' 98 Generation; the tendency dates from much farther back, as Américo Castro has shown in this great book La Réalidad Histórica de España, México, D.F., Editorial Porrúa, 1954. As for the Latin American countries, although at time they disown the Hispanic tradition, at others they follow the tendency and show their full participation in it. In the last decades, the theme of "Mexicanism" started by Samuel Ramos, and later stimulated by the academic activity of José Gaos, has produced an extensive bibliography, with some books of great value, taking their inspiration from the most varied tendencies: Ortegan circumstantialism. Various manifestations of existentialism, psychoanalysis and other psychiatric trends. And similarly, with other countries. Let us mention one, apparently the farthest removed from this tradition of fault finding dissection, Brazil, and a few of her writers, who are moreover, well known: Gilberto Freyre, Casa Grande y Senzala, Buenos Aires, Imprenta Mercatali, 1942 and the rest of his work: Paulo Prado, Retrato do Brasil, Rio de Janeiro, Brigaiet, 1944; Jorge Amado, the famous novelist, O Paiz do Carnaval, Rio de Janeiro, Schmidt, 1932; and finally, a book of the comparative type (an Iberian obsession, be it said in passing) by Vianna Moog, Bandeirantes e Pioneiros, Rio de Janeiro, Editora Globo, 1955.↩
28. For that reason it is worthwhile reproducing in this footnote the author's proposed outline for research (J. Friedman, op. cit., p. 540-41). It is given below, for anyone who may wish or be in a position to use it:↩
1. Classification of types of intellectuals and quantitative analysis of their number, occupation, places of residence, etc.
2. Social and regional origins of intellectuals.
3. Attitudes of intellectuals both to popular traditions and to those of the advanced culture of their country.
4. Changes of social position of intellectuals in conditions of accelerated cultural change: prestige, mobility, "alienation", reactions to "alienation".
5. Intellectuals in relation to the outside world: contacts, travel, attitudes, fundamental outlook.
6. Intellectuals in relation to politics and government: degree of participation, political tendencies, solutions proposed for national problems, characteristic types of action.
7. Attitudes adopted by intellectuals in the conflict between modern and traditional: art, literature, music, philosophy, science.
8. Assessment of the reaction of intellectuals to Western influence: attitudes; self-appraisal, efforts to define traditional values in new form, archaism, social criticism, recommendations.
9. The "unemployed intellectual" as a potential source of disturbance and originator of social movements of a radical nature.
10. Changes in the intellectuals' idea of themselves.
11. Natural propensity of intellectuals; potential sources of intellectual conflict, influence on public policy, receptivity to Western ideas.
12. Ideologies concerning social transformation, economic development, nationalism and others; degree to which accepted; influence on public policy.
13. Expressions of opinion indicating their own idea of their nation.
14. Radicalism in intellectual thought.
15. Origins and sources of "traditionalism" in intellectual thought.
29. The standard works The standard works on the sociology of the intelligentsia in Europe are the studies written by Max Weber, Karl Manheim, T.H.Geiger, Ortega y Gasset which together form the whole of what is known as the sociology of knowledge and other authors, who need not be cited as they are all fully covered in Heinrich Stieglitz's book, Der Soziale Austrag der freien Berufe, 1960. At the present time the American sociologist, Edward A.Shils, is actively engaged on a study of this subject, applying the great gifts we associate with the author of that excellent work The Torment of Secrecy, glencoe (Iu.), Free Press, 1956. Further evidence is provided in the book Intellectuals between Tradition and Modernity: the "Indian Situation", Mouton, The Hague 1960, and in various articles that have appeared in periodicals, all of which might one day be brought together in a single volume, which would have to be of large dimensions. The periodical Comparative Studies in Society and History regularly publishes detailed articles on intelllectuals in the East such as, for example, Y.C.Wang, "Intellectuals and Society in China 1860-1949", Vol. III, No.4; Chanti S.Tangri, "Intellectuals and Society in ninettenth century India" Vol.III, No. 4; Serif Mardin, "Some Roles in an Early Phase in the Modernization of Communications in Turkey", Vol.III, No.3, etc. For contemporary France, see the special issue of the Revue Francaise de Science Politique, No. 9, 1959, entitled "Les intellectuels dans la Société Française Contemporaine". There is no comparable literature on this specialized branch of sociology in Latin America although material can be found scattered under the usual chapter-headings of historical and literary studies. Reference has therefore been made, without making any attempt at appraisal, to Angel A. Rojas 'book Historia de La Novela Ecuatoriana, op. cit., It is worth while mentioning an article which comes close to this kind of study, although it covers a short period only and deals with the "national image": the essay by Ezequiel Martínez Estrada, entitled La Literatura y la Formación de la Conciencia Nacional, which appeared in the Venezuelan periodical Politica, No.6, Frebruary 1960. Other similar works doubtless exist, which have escaped our notice.↩
30. Alexander Rüstow, Ortesbestimmung der Gegenwart, Vol. II, chapter on "The Road to Freedom", Rentsch, Zurich, 1952. Thinking along the same lines is to be found in the last great writings of Alfred Weber: Abschied von der bisherigen Geschichte (Berne, A. Francke, 1946) and Der dritte oder der vierte Mensch (Munich, R. Piper, 1953); and also in K. Jasper's philosophical theories expounded in his Vom Ursprung und Ziel der Gerschichte (Zurich, Artemis-Verlag, 1949)↩
31. José Ortega y Gasset, La Rebelión de las Masas, El Arquero, popular edition, p. 124.↩
32. Alfred Weber, Farewell to European History, London, Kegan Paul, Trench, Toubner, 1947, p. 49. (Translated by R.F.C. Hull from Abschied von der bisherigen Geschichte, mentioned above.) ↩
33. As Ortega has pointed out, the decline or liberalism has not yet been adequately described in any large-scale work. Some idea of the process may be gained from a few standard works, the best of which is perhaps that by J. H. Hallowell, The Decline of Liberalism as an Ideology, London, Kegan Faul, Trench, Toubner, 1946. It would be pointless to try to single out a few works on this subject, which in fact is associated with the whole of European and American history in the past hundred years.↩
34. Ernst Jünger Der Arbeiter, Hamburg 1932, p.40 Cf. Alfred von Martin, Der Heroische Nihilismus und seine Uberwindung, Krefeld, Scherpe-Verlag, 1948.↩
35. Carl Schmitt, Der Begriff das Politischen, Hamburg, Hanseatische Verlagsanstalt, 1933, p.7↩
36. "El Problema Social en el Desarrollo Económico de Bolivia", part of Chapter V of the report El Desarrollo Económico de Bolivia (E/CN.12/430 and Add.1/Rev.1), United Nations publication, sales N° 58.11.G.2. Also available in Aspectos Sociales del Desarrollo Económico, Santiago, Andrés Bello, 1959, p.100."↩
37. William S. Stokes "Democracy, Freedom and Reform in Latin America" in: Freedom and Reform in Latin America, 1959. The study, though somewhat discrete- it must be remembered that the author is a foreigner is to be commended for its excellent bibliography, incomplete though it is. A further point of interest is that it expounds views which, whether they be right or wrong, coincide with R. Aron's theories, to be discussed at a later stage.↩
38. The bibliography in J. Johnson's book comments as follows on these Jornadas: "The articles in the Jornadas provide valuable reference material on Latin America's external and domestic problems during the Second World War" (p.206).↩
39. Cf. the report on The Teaching of Economics in Latin America (E/CN.12/546/Rev.1) by Howard S. Ellis, Benjamin Cornejo and Luis Escobar Cerda of the joint ECLA/UNESCO/OAS mission. This report was later printed by the Pan American Union in its Studies and Monographs series (N° 111).↩
40. In the memoirs which we all plan to write when we reach the age of Mesonero Romanos (perhaps an unconscious urge to refute the demographers' prognostications of life expectancy) some attempts should be made to deal with one point the reasons for the out- standing work done by ECLA, particularly in its early years, despite the fact that, being an "organization", it had bureaucratic tendencies,↩
41. A technical account of this work and some of the above-mentioned points of criticism, though no assessment of its value, will be found in A, O. Hirschman's work, Latin American Studies, 1961, containing a bibliography. Another useful reference work is El Desarrollo Económico y América Latina, a collection of contributions edited by H.S. Ellis for the International Economic Association and published in Spanish by the Fondo de Cultura Económica,México, D.F., 1960; one of the contributions, by José A. Mayobre, sheds valuable light on one of the technical aspects of ECLA - programming techniques.↩
42. Tribute should here be paid to Jorge Ahumada Corvalán's book En vez de la miseria, (Santiago de Chile, Editorial del Facífico, 1958) which can be understood by any reasonbly educated person.↩
43. Op. cit., list of list of research projects, no. 12: "Estudio sobre el estado de la juventud latinoamericana (de los 16 a los 25 años). Su represen- tación del cambio economico-social y su actitud ante el mismo".↩
44. Helmut Schelsky, Die skeptische Generation, Duesseldorf, E. Diederich, 1957.↩