Armies and Politics in Latin America
Author: Abraham F. Lowenthal
Publisher:
Published: 1976
Total Pages: 382
ISBN-13:
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For la Patria
Author: Brian Loveman
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers
Published: 2004-09-08
Total Pages: 366
ISBN-13: 0585282072
DOWNLOAD EBOOKDefending 'la patria,' or 'homeland,' is the historical mission claimed by Latin American armed forces. For la Patria is a comprehensive narrative history of the military's political role in Latin America in national defense and security. Latin American civil-military relations and the role of the armed forces in politics, like those of all modern nation-states, are framed by constitutional and legal norms specifying the formal relationships between the armed forces and the rest of society. In actuality, they are also the result of expectations, attitudes, values, and practices evolved over centuries-integral aspects of national political cultures. Military institutions in each Latin American nation have resulted from that country's own blend of local and imported influences, developing a distinctive pattern of civil-military relations as defender of the fatherland and guarantor of security and order. Written by Latin American specialist Brian Loveman, For la Patria includes tables, maps, photographs, and a glossary that will assist the student in better understanding the military's intervention in politics in Latin America. This new text will give students a thorough and accessible history of Latin American armed forces and their actions in Latin American politics from colonial times to the present.
The School of the Americas
Author: Lesley Gill
Publisher: Duke University Press
Published: 2004-09-13
Total Pages: 308
ISBN-13: 9780822333920
DOWNLOAD EBOOKDIVTransnational ethnography and history of the School of the Americas, analyzing the military, peasant, and activist cultures that are linked by this institution. /div
Rank and Privilege
Author: Linda Alexander Rodríguez
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
Published: 1994
Total Pages: 268
ISBN-13: 9780842024334
DOWNLOAD EBOOKThe power of the military in Latin America has become well known in recent decades, as coups have brought numerous military regimes into office since 1960. Yet too often it is assumed, for example, that the region's armed forces have had no legitimate defence functions, or that military professionalism is only a recent development.
Military Missions in Democratic Latin America
Author: David Pion-Berlin
Publisher: Springer
Published: 2016-06-01
Total Pages: 229
ISBN-13: 1137592702
DOWNLOAD EBOOKThis book demonstrates through country case studies that, contrary to received wisdom, Latin American militaries can contribute productively, but under select conditions, to non-traditional missions of internal security, disaster relief, and social programs. Latin American soldiers are rarely at war, but have been called upon to perform these missions in both lethal and non-lethal ways. Is this beneficial to their societies or should the armed forces be left in the barracks? As inherently conservative institutions, they are at their best, the author demonstrates, when tasked with missions that draw on pre-existing organizational strengths that can be utilized in appropriate and humane ways. They are at a disadvantage when forced to reinvent themselves. Ultimately, it is governments that must choose whether or not to deploy soldiers, and they should do so, based on a pragmatic assessment of the severity and urgency of the problem, the capacity of the military to effectively respond, and the availability of alternative solutions.
Predatory States
Author: J. Patrice McSherry
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers
Published: 2012-07-10
Total Pages: 321
ISBN-13: 0742568709
DOWNLOAD EBOOKThis powerful study makes a compelling case about the key U.S. role in state terrorism in Latin America during the Cold War. Long hidden from public view, Operation Condor was a military network created in the 1970s to eliminate political opponents of Latin American regimes. Its key members were the anticommunist dictatorships of Chile, Argentina, Uruguay, Bolivia, Paraguay, and Brazil, later joined by Peru and Ecuador, with covert support from the U.S. government. Drawing on a wealth of testimonies, declassified files, and Latin American primary sources, J. Patrice McSherry examines Operation Condor from numerous vantage points: its secret structures, intelligence networks, covert operations against dissidents, political assassinations worldwide, commanders and operatives, links to the Pentagon and the CIA, and extension to Central America in the 1980s. The author convincingly shows how, using extralegal and terrorist methods, Operation Condor hunted down, seized, and executed political opponents across borders. McSherry argues that Condor functioned within, or parallel to, the structures of the larger inter-American military system led by the United States, and that declassified U.S. documents make clear that U.S. security officers saw Condor as a legitimate and useful 'counterterror' organization. Revealing new details of Condor operations and fresh evidence of links to the U.S. security establishment, this controversial work offers an original analysis of the use of secret, parallel armies in Western counterinsurgency strategies. It will be a clarion call to all readers to consider the long-term consequences of clandestine operations in the name of 'democracy.'
The Politics of Antipolitics
Author: Brian Loveman
Publisher:
Published: 1978
Total Pages: 328
ISBN-13:
DOWNLOAD EBOOKFirst published in 1978 and here updated from the 1989 edition to include more information on the origins of antipolitics and its history in the 19th and early 20th centuries, to emphasize the often illusory transitions to democracy from 1965 to 1995, to explore why and how military rulers accede to elected civilian governments, and to document the military's generally successful defense against accusations of human rights abuses. The 28 essays find that the civilian governments blossoming throughout Latin America are dressing authoritarian institutions in the trappings of protected democracy in order to suppress popular movements and to privilege the market. No index. Paper edition (unseen), $23.95. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR
Arms and Politics in Latin America
Author: Edwin Lieuwen
Publisher: New York : Published for the Council on Foreign Relations by Praeger
Published: 1961
Total Pages: 366
ISBN-13:
DOWNLOAD EBOOKSoldiers, Politicians, and Civilians
Author: David Pion-Berlin
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Published: 2017-07-31
Total Pages: 384
ISBN-13: 9781316604434
DOWNLOAD EBOOKAre interactions between soldiers, politicians, and civilians improving? Every nation has to come to grips with achieving a more enduring harmony between government, the armed forces, and society if it aspires to strengthen its democracy. While there is an abundance of studies on civil-military affairs, few examine all three of these actors, let alone establish any standards with which to assess whether progress is being made. This ambitious book devises a novel framework equipped with six dimensions, each of which opens a unique window into civil-military affairs, and which form a more integrated view of the subject. Those dimensions are accompanied by a set of benchmarks and metrics that assess progress and compare one country against another. The framework is applied to case studies of Argentina, Brazil, Chile, and Uruguay, with the conviction that insights could be gleaned that may be relevant elsewhere. Ultimately, by unpacking the civil-military relation into its various dimensions, this study has shed light on what it takes to transform what was once a politically-minded military into an organization dedicated to serving a democratic state and society.
Latin America’s Cold War
Author: Hal Brands
Publisher: Harvard University Press
Published: 2012-03-05
Total Pages: 408
ISBN-13: 0674055284
DOWNLOAD EBOOKFor Latin America, the Cold War was anything but cold. Nor was it the so-called “long peace” afforded the world’s superpowers by their nuclear standoff. In this book, the first to take an international perspective on the postwar decades in the region, Hal Brands sets out to explain what exactly happened in Latin America during the Cold War, and why it was so traumatic. Tracing the tumultuous course of regional affairs from the late 1940s through the early 1990s, Latin America’s Cold War delves into the myriad crises and turning points of the period—the Cuban revolution and its aftermath; the recurring cycles of insurgency and counter-insurgency; the emergence of currents like the National Security Doctrine, liberation theology, and dependency theory; the rise and demise of a hemispheric diplomatic challenge to U.S. hegemony in the 1970s; the conflagration that engulfed Central America from the Nicaraguan revolution onward; and the democratic and economic reforms of the 1980s. Most important, the book chronicles these events in a way that is both multinational and multilayered, weaving the experiences of a diverse cast of characters into an understanding of how global, regional, and local influences interacted to shape Cold War crises in Latin America. Ultimately, Brands exposes Latin America’s Cold War as not a single conflict, but rather a series of overlapping political, social, geostrategic, and ideological struggles whose repercussions can be felt to this day.
