Latin America and the World Economy
(HIST 200G)
Marcelo Bucheli
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Since their independence in the 19th century, Latin American countries
have participated in the world economy. The countries
specialized in the production and export of raw materials to the
industrialized world, and opened its doors to foreign investors.
This was encouraged and endorsed by the local elites of the newly
created countries, who upheld the goals of modernization and "progress"
through participation in an emerging global economic system. This
process of integration, however, was not smooth. The relationship
between foreign markets and local societies generated different kinds
of conflicts and movements of resistance that shaped Latin America in
the 19th and 20th century. This course explores the relationship
between Latin America and the world market, attempting to answer the
following questions: Was the peculiar insertion of Latin American
countries into global capitalist markets to blame for the region's
widespread poverty? To what degree did foreign investors change
local societies? How has the relationship between Latin American
societies, foreign investors, and the world market evolved in the last
two centuries? We will study a body of literature analyzing the
political economy of foreign direct investment in Latin America,
including studies on oil, agriculture, mining, and manufacturing.