We explain the history of Latin America in the 20th century, as well as the international context.
Latin American developmentalism had one of its milestones in the construction of Brasilia.
What was the history of Latin America in the 20th century?
Latin American countries were heavily involved in the international economy throughout the 20th century.The production of raw materials for export in exchange for imported manufactures characterized the first decades of the century.
The Great Depression of the 1930s opened a period of import substitutionwhich in countries such as Argentina and Brazil was linked to military coups that disrupted democratic institutions. Import substitution industrialization deepened after the Second World War (1939-1945).
In the early years of the Cold War, Latin American political regimes frequently implemented populist or developmentalist programs. After the triumph of the Cuban Revolution in 1959, the United States government increased its intervention in Latin America to prevent the spread of communism. This included a program of economic and social aid, known as the Alliance for Progress, and military advice to Latin American governments facing guerrilla organizations.
In the seventies there were new coups d’état that established dictatorships in countries such as Ecuador, Chile, Uruguay and Argentina (an important exception was Mexico, which from 1930 to 2000 was governed by the Institutional Revolutionary Party). These dictatorships were added to others that already existed in countries such as Paraguay and Brazil. In general, these dictatorships were characterized by the systematic violation of human rights and led to transitions towards democratic regimes in the 1980s.
The economic problems caused by the international recession and the heavy external debt of many Latin American countries led to a financial crisis in the 1980sThis situation led to the implementation, in the following decade, of political measures identified as neoliberal (privatizations, opening to trade, reduction of public spending), in the context of the end of the Cold War.
Latin America at the beginning of the 20th century
At the beginning of the 20th century, Latin American countries had an economy based on the export of raw materials to Europe (cereals, meats, coffee, sugar, cocoa, minerals, etc.) and the import of European manufactured products (textiles, machinery, among others). In addition, They had foreign capital investmentsespecially from the United Kingdom but increasingly from the United States.
In the political arena, many Latin American countries began to consolidate their democratic regimes, some through peaceful means (such as the Sáenz Peña law in Argentina in 1912) and others through revolutionary means (such as the Mexican Revolution that began in 1910).
When the First World War (1914-1918) broke out, most Latin American countries remained neutral, with some exceptions such as Brazil (which aligned itself with the Entente). The war reduced trade between Latin America and Europe for several years.since European countries oriented their industry towards arms production (and not towards export manufacturing) and temporarily reduced the demand for raw materials (although the need to feed the troops soon led to the Latin American recovery of food exports).
Another relevant fact of these years was the construction of the Panama Canal, inaugurated in 1914 and administered until 1979 exclusively by the United Stateswhich enabled navigation between the Atlantic and Pacific oceans in Central America and facilitated American trade.
Latin America in the interwar period
In 1930, a tradition of coups d’état and military dictatorships began in Argentina.
After the First World War, the American city of New York displaced London as the international financial capital. During the 1920s, US banks and companies invested significant sums of capital in Latin America.both in productive activities (such as oil in Venezuela) and in loans to governments.
The export of raw materials once again favoured economic growth in Latin America, which participated greatly in the “Roaring Twenties”, especially in cities such as Buenos Aires, Mexico and Sao Paulo. When the New York Stock Exchange crashed in 1929 and the Great Depression began, which affected much of the world in the 1930s, The reduction in international trade affected Latin America’s exporting economies.
This led to the implementation of import substitution policies and other state intervention measures that generally went hand in hand with the disruption of democratic institutions through military coupssuch as those that took place in Argentina and Brazil in 1930.
In the 1930s, the US Good Neighbor Policy was also launched, under which President Franklin D. Roosevelt encouraged relations with Latin America. This policy was based on the commitment to stop US interventions on Latin American soil (such as those that had taken place in the 1910s in Mexico, Panama, Cuba or Nicaragua) and had the objective of promoting US economic influence in the region.
Latin America during World War II
During the Second World War (1939-1945), Several countries in Central America and the Caribbean aligned themselves with the Allies after the Japanese attack on the US base at Pearl Harbor in December 1941. In 1942 Brazil and Mexico also joinedwhich sent expeditionary forces to Italy and the Pacific, respectively.
Onwards, The other Latin American countries were breaking relations with the Axis powers. and declaring war on Germany and Japan. Argentina broke relations with the Axis only in 1944 and declared war on Germany and Japan in March 1945, a few weeks before the end of the war in Europe.
The international effects of the two world wars and the Great Depression, coupled with the impetus of nationalist movements, They promoted an economic policy more oriented towards internal development from 1945 onwards. than external dependence. This led to the deepening of import substitution industrialization (ISI) policies in countries such as Argentina, Brazil and Mexico.
Latin America from the postwar period to the seventies
The Cuban Revolution inspired other guerrilla groups and alerted the United States government.
After the Second World War, in various Latin American countries regimes were established that some historians identified as populistthat is, focused on the figure of a charismatic and authoritarian leader, with nationalist, anti-imperialist and generally anti-communist speeches, and oriented towards industrialization, the nationalization of companies and the application of social reforms favorable to some sectors, such as urban or rural workers.
A precedent of these regimes was that of Lázaro Cárdenas in Mexico (1934-1940), followed in the 1940s and 1950s by governments such as Juan Domingo Perón in Argentina (1946-1955), Luis Batlle in Uruguay (1947-1951), Getúlio Vargas in Brazil (1951-1954), Víctor Paz Estenssoro in Bolivia (1952-1956 and 1960-1964) and José María Velasco Ibarra in Ecuador (five times president between 1934 and 1972).
In general, these regimes depended on maintaining external demand for raw materials (such as oil from Mexico and agricultural products from Argentina), so changes in international conditions generally led to economic stagnation.
In the fifties and sixties, development projects also gained importance, which They defended the state’s drive for industrialization without excluding the use of foreign capital. to promote the economic development of underdeveloped economies.
This type of project was implemented by the governments of Juscelino Kubitschek in Brazil (1956-1961), Arturo Frondizi in Argentina (1958-1962) and Marcos Pérez Jiménez in Venezuela (1952-1958). However, political instability (including coups d’état) and dependence on foreign capital or international prices of raw materials (such as oil in the case of Venezuela) placed limits on these economic programs.
A key fact of the 20th century in Latin America was The Cuban Revolution of 1959, which overthrew the dictatorship of Fulgencio Batista and established an anti-imperialist regime that, in 1961, openly declared itself communist and aligned itself with the Soviet Union (USSR). This fact inserted Latin America into the Cold War, although in 1954 the CIA (US intelligence agency) had already contributed to a coup d’état against the president of Guatemala, Jacobo Árbenz, who had implemented an agrarian reform.
In several countries, rural and urban guerrilla groups inspired by the Cuban Revolution were formed. and sometimes trained by the Cuban government. Latin American governments generally reinforced their armed forces and received military advice from the United States, which sought to prevent the spread of communism in Latin America through what was called the National Security Doctrine.
In Brazil, a coup in 1964 established a military dictatorship that ruled until 1985. In Chile, a leftist government led by Salvador Allende came to power democratically in 1970 but was overthrown by a coup in 1973.
Other dictatorships were established through coups d’état in countries such as Ecuador (1972), Uruguay (1973) and Argentina (1976). On the other hand, In Nicaragua, the Sandinista National Liberation Front overthrew the Somoza family dictatorship in 1979. and established a government aligned with the Soviet Union and Cuba.
Latin America at the end of the 20th century
The transition from military dictatorships to new democratic regimes It occurred between the late 1970s and the 1980s: Ecuador in 1979, Argentina in 1983, Uruguay and Brazil in 1985, Paraguay in 1989 and Chile in 1990. In Nicaragua, free elections were held in 1990 which gave victory to a coalition opposed to the Sandinista Front.
In the 1980s, a global recession that reduced international prices for Latin American raw materials was combined with a strong external debt, which had increased in the previous decade, which caused an economic crisis in much of Latin AmericaIn countries like Argentina and Brazil this led to hyperinflation.
In the nineties there was a shift towards privatization policies and cuts in public spending.often called neoliberal, which…