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distinct as to make the gulf between the aforementioned nations pale in
comparison. In short, the notion of Latin America itself must be
explored as perhaps little more than a convention, if not an invention.
You will feel the bitterness of Indians toward Brazilian settlers; of
native Portenos for Italian migrants in Argentina, of peasants from
Chiapas for bourgeois of the Capital Federal, etc. The notion of a
shared cultural agenda may exist, but only as a remote and distant
consideration. In this, perhaps Claudio is more the intellectual than he
imagines; or better, less a student of Latin actualities than he imagines.
The array of questions: global, national, and regional, remain. How do
they play out on specific cultural canvases? How can one make
predictions about the behavior of nations within this context much less
policies for a region writ large?
Finally, we must consider the distinction between capitalism and
developmental ism. Even in the post-Soviet, post-socialist world, the
bureaucratic administrative state does not necessarily require a Smithian
or Keynesian environment to survive. There is a great deal of "top–
down" activity in Latin American life that has little to do with
entrepreneurial drives, and much to do about statism. The struggle about
whether to maintain traditional cultural forms, or adopt modern forms,
may be a side-show. While we sit and discuss the modern economy in a
cultural context, the politicians and savants of these countries are
compelled to take up more urgent questions about the relation of
developmental impulses to bureaucratic structures. Again, this might well
be the next round - we have gotten beyond raw militarism in the
region, but not so refined culturalism. That may take place. But for the
moment, the examination of Latin America pathways to development
are less lofty, even less noble than the course outlined in Claudio's book.
These comments made, overall Claudio has struck on tremendously
important and sensitive issues. His work may make some chauvinists quite
angry because he is so close to the marrow. His work is not unlike
responses to Joseph Needham's
Science and Civilization
in
China.
Why
does science not develop, or atrophy, in China after the modern period
of discovery and invention begins in the West? Claudio has every right
to raise fundamental questions: Why, if the Western hemisphere has such
wide commonalties, do its nations and cultures have such disparate
outcomes? There are going to be people who are unnerved by this
book. For if his work will prove disturbing to traditionalists for whom
Latin America is a dream unfulfilled and pure, it will be no less unnerving
for those modernists who are convinced that the North American idea is
sui generis
and cannot be transmitted or transposed. One hopes however
