Trials of Nation Making: Liberalism, Race, and Ethnicity in the Andes, 1810-1910

by Brooke Larson

Brooke Larson's interpretive analysis of the history of Andean peasants reveals the challenges of nation making in the republics of Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, and Bolivia during the volatile nineteenth century. Nowhere in Latin America were postcolonial transitions more turbulent than in the Andes, where communal indigenous roots grew deep and where the "Indian problem" seemed so discouraging to liberalizing states. The analysis raises broader issues about the interplay of liberalism, racism, and ethnicity in the formation of exclusionary "republics without citizens" over the nineteenth century.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Bolivia, Race, Latin American History

318 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2004

Reviews

[Kathryn Weis]

I love history and reading about history but this has to be the worst, driest book I have ever read on a subject.