Glossary

Agrarista (agrarian): Those who demand land be distributed to peasants. Term used principally in Mexico.
Altiplano: A region of high mountain plateaus. Term used in the Andes.
Austerity measures: Fiscal policies implemented to reduce government debt and spending relative to GDP, usually at the behest of the International Monetary Fund.
Authoritarian government: System where the will of leaders tends to override civil society. Banana republic Central American and Caribbean nations where a dependence on just a few commodity exports makes the country extremely vulnerable to external pressures. Baroque catholicism A tradition in which elaborate symbolism and ornate decorative practices were used to project the authority of the Catholic Church.
Bourbon reforms: A general term describing economic and political reforms undertaken by the House of Bourbon, which came to power in Spain after the end of Habsburg rule in 1700. Overall, changes undertaken during the course of 80 years were intended to improve defense, make administration more efficient, and generate more revenue for the crown.
Cabildo: A town council.
Cariocas: Residents of Rio de Janeiro.
Carnivalesque: Describes moments of social inversion, when marginalized and oppressed groups symbolically place themselves on top of society, subverting the social order.
Castas: Colonial term describing people of mixed racial (and cultural) origins. Caste system Colonial system that enforced social position through caste status. Caudillo (caudillismo) Military strongmen.
Clientelism: A political system in which political networks work principally to dole out political favors to friends and allies of office holders (distributing the spoils provided by the state).
Cocalero: A peasant coca grower. Term used in Bolivia.
Cold War: The period from 1948 to 1989 characterized by global competition between the United States and U.S.S.R. Regions like Latin America were the settings for numerous proxy battles.
Compadrazgo: A notion of fictive kinship, in which god-parents and close friends effectively become family members.
Comunero: Peasants with a strong connection to community and long history of resistance against outsiders. Term used in the Andes.
Conservatives: A nineteenth-century term describing groups that sought to maintain colonial-era political, social, and cultural hierarchies. Conservatives generally believed the end of the old order would produce chaos.
Corporatism: Systems in which one participates in political and social life as a member of a corporate group (as a member of an indigenous community, a union, or a professional association, for instance).
Coup d’état: The overthrow of a government by a small elite, usually led by members of the military.
Criollos: Persons of European origin born in the Americas.
Crony capitalism: An economic and political system where businessmen rely on close connections with the state to prosper, and where those without such connections are deeply disadvantaged.
Debt peonage: A labor practice in which workers are tied to their employer through debt, and generally cannot leave that employer until debts are paid.
Dependency theory: An economic theory that posits that poor regions remain impov- erished because of asymmetrical relations with more prosperous regions.
Descamisados: Literally “shirtless ones,” Eva Perón’s term for her supporters.
Dirty wars: Refers to conflicts (1960s–1990s) that involved state-sponsored violence meted out against largely unarmed groups identified as “subversives.” Torture, summary execution, and forced exile were relatively common strategies for silencing regime opponents.
Enganche labor: A labor contracting system, common in plantation agriculture, in which workers sign a contract (often under duress) and are forced to work until the contract ends.
Estancia (estancieros): Large rural estates. Term used commonly in Argentina.
Favela: Urban slums. Term used in Brazil.
Feminicide: The murder of women because they are women.
Finca (finqueros): A rural estate, sometimes a plantation. Term used in Southern Mexico, Central America, and parts of South America.
Gamonalismo: The Andean system in which large landowners exploit and dominate the indigenous and other poor peoples on their estates.
Golpe de Estado: The overthrow of a government by a small elite, usually led by members of the military.
Gross Domestic Product (GDP): The value of all goods and services produced in a given country during a single year.
Haciendas (hacendados): Large rural estates. Term used in Mexico.
Hegemony: The domination of one group over another. Hegemony suggests that domina- tion is not simply a function of military influence, but of cultural and social practices as well. The concept imagines that systems of domination are contested and negotiated, and not simply coercive.
Historietas: Graphic novels (comic books).
Import Substitution Industrialization (ISI): An economic policy, popular from the 1930s to the 1960s, that promoted industrial growth by supplanting imports with domestically produced manufactures.
Junta: A small group of military leaders (sometimes including some civilians) who dominate the state, often in the aftermath of a coup.
Kataristas: A political tendency in the Andes that emerged during the 1960s, which sought to empower a radicalized indigenous peasantry in part through the defense of indige- nous cultures.
Latifundia: A system in which large agricultural estates rely on workforces that are tied to or dependent on the estates.
Ley fuga: “Shot while trying to escape.” A policing practice in which criminal suspects are executed without first being tried and convicted.
Liberals (liberalism): Nineteenth-century term describing those who favored some array of individual rights, free market capitalism, and limited democracy. Liberals opposed monarchy and special privileges (fueros) for the monarchy, the aristocracy, Indian villages, the church, and the military.
Libertos: Former slaves.
Limpieza de sangre: “Cleanliness of the Blood.” Term used to denote the amount of European blood in any given individual, which in turn played an important role in personal prestige during the colonial and later periods.
Machista: A term used to describe contexts in which characteristics considered to be aggressively heterosexual and masculine are valued.
Manichean: Practices and belief systems that tend to divide the world into extremes of good and evil.
Manumission: The act of freeing an individual slave.
Maoists: Aficionados of Mao Zedong. Maoists advocate a revolution in which peasant guerrillas overwhelm the cities.
Marshall Plan: Plan by the U.S. government to speed the reconstruction of Europe at the end of the Second World War through aid and investment.
Mass politics: Political movements based in the widespread mobilization of popular groups through mass communication techniques.
Media luna: The eastern lowland departments of Bolivia.
Mestizo: A person with both European and indigenous ancestry. It may denote race, but is principally a cultural signifier.
Millennarianism: Popular movements that coalesce around the belief that a major trans- formation in the world is pending. Millennarian movements are generally informed by a deep religious sensibility that in turn spurs dramatic political acts.
Misery belts: The impoverished, often ad hoc communities of rural migrants that emerged on the fringes of Latin America’s largest cities, beginning in the 1960s. Rural migrants continue to move to these communities, but they are now the home to multiple generations of the urban poor.
Monocrop economy: An economy that is dependent on the export of a very limited number of commodities.
Mulatto: A person of African and European ancestry.
Narcotraficante: Individuals who earn income in the illicit drug trade.
Neo-liberalism: Sometimes called neo-conservatism, describes the belief (increasingly popular after 1970) that governments needed to reduce spending, regulation, and taxes, and promote foreign trade and investment.
Oligarchy: Political or economic system in which power rests in the hands of a small elite.
Orientalism: The practice of representing non-Western cultures as irreconcilably different from those of Western Europe and the United States, and implying that this difference indicates inferiority.
Peninsular: An individual born in the Iberian peninsula.
Plantations: Agricultural estates in semi-tropical and tropical environments that cultivate a limited number of high value commodities.
Populism: Political practices in which leaders appeal for support from a broad community of supporters, defined as the folk, citizens, or the people, usually with the aid of mass communication.
Porteño: A resident of Buenos Aires.
Positivism: A nineteenth-century ideology, informed by the writings of Herbert Spencer and Auguste Comte, which posited that society needed to be governed by scientific principles rather than democratic practices. “Order and Progress” was a key positivist claim.
Radionovelas: Radio soap operas.
Relics: In Catholic tradition, the physical remnants of a deceased saint, venerated as a representation of that saint.
Rentier states: A state that derives most of its incomes from rents (i.e. royalties from mineral concessions and hydrocarbons), making it less reliant on other forms of taxation. Political theorists suggest that, because they do not rely on a broad citizenry for tax revenue, rentier states tend to be less democratic.
Rondas campesinas: Peasant self-defense committees, which played a critical role in the Peruvian civil conflict of the 1980s and 1990s.
Samba: A popular Brazilian musical form, rooted in a mixture of African and European traditions.
Serrano: A person from the high desert regions of Northern Mexico. Used to describe the followers of Pancho Villa in Mexico’s 1910 Revolution.
Shock treatments: The sudden imposition of economic austerity measures (i.e. cuts in government spending), meant to “shock” the economy into health.
Tango: An Argentine music and dance form, originally popular among poor residents of Buenos Aires.
Testimonio: A literary practice that emerged during the 1980s, which relies on the testimony of persons who self-identify as members of marginalized or oppressed groups (e.g. indigenous peoples, women, victims of torture).
The Two Republics: The Spanish colonial practice of attempting to divide the population into two distinct communities, indios and españoles.
Usos y costumbres (customary law): A right claimed by many contemporary indigenous groups, to preserve their customary governance, judicial, and other practices.
Vanguard: A small, committed elite, which endeavors to shape a mass of followers to reflect its ideals.