In 1949 the Hispanic Foundation of the Library of Congress published A Guide to the Art of Latin America (gala), an annotated bibliography of the literature on Latin America since the Conquest; it covered the years up to 1942, when the Handbook of Latin American Studies (hlas) had begun its annual bibliographies. “It is a startling fact” the Introduction begins, “that no single work deals comprehensively with the history of art in the Latin American countries.”

Within a number of disciplines such as anthropology, demography, economics, history, and sociology, renewed interest recently has been manifested in research on family and domestic groups. In contrast to traditional studies that sought universal patterns of family structure and function, contemporary research tends to devote greater attention to the diversity of historically specific patterns (Yanagisako 1979). Many scholars are currently focusing on the relationship between changing forms of production and the domestic group formations through which the immediate material needs of most individuals are met.

The Peruvian military government of 1968-80 defied the expectations and categorizations derived from academic work on the character and performance of its counterparts, past and present, in other Latin American countries.1 A key anomaly is the fact that labor and the left were not eclipsed, but instead emerged strengthened by the period of military rule in their mobilizing capacity and electoral presence.2 The purpose of this article is to explain the legacy of the military government for labor and the left by elucidating the processes that led to their strengthening, with particular emphasis on the policies of the Velasco regime.

This report presents the results of a preliminary survey of North American firms that operate in Latin America. Its purpose was to uncover sources for economic historians and economists in an area that is largely unknown and unused. Firms that have deposited their materials in public archives in the United States have not been included in the survey; they will be described in the forthcoming Guide to Latin American Historical Materials in the United States, which is being organized by Gunnar Mendoza.

Throughout the world, the Catholic Church has been in ferment since the Second Vatican Council. In Latin America, traditionally a Catholic region, the application of the council's ideas has stimulated dramatic changes in the outlook and practices of Church groups. These changes are particularly visible in the development of a new language for describing and evaluating temporal action (“the world”), and in the emergence of novel perspectives on the Church's proper relation to “the world.” What is the import of such changes for the student of politics?

The overthrow of Nicaraguan strongman Anastacio Somoza Debayle by the Frente Sandinista de Liberación Nacional in mid-1979 promises to stimulate academic research on contemporary Central America just as the rise of Fidel Castro and Salvador Allende did for Cuba and Chile. As scholars and policymakers contemplate the future of post-Somoza Central America, they will inevitably consider the role of the armed forces in each country. In recent years the military institutions have occupied key positions in national politics as the Central American nations have attempted to reconcile the often conflicting demands of economic development, political order, and social reform. This note is intended to serve as a guide to the existing social-science literature on the Central American militaries. Costa Rica, having replaced its army with a civil guard or police force in 1948, is mentioned only in passing. Although historically considered a part of South America, Panama is included here because it shares many characteristics with the Central American countries. Not surprisingly, the available literature is sparse in comparison with the sophisticated studies of the armed forces of Brazil, Peru, Argentina, Chile, and Mexico. Only Guatemala has inspired a significant output of scholarly analysis. Millett's work (1977) on the Nicaraguan national guard is the only published monograph concerning one of the Central American military institutions, although several unpublished dissertations have appeared and at least one valuable article exists for each country.

Much of the focus of, indeed much of the impetus for, the current discussion of science and technology policy for the Latin American industrial sector has involved comparisons of foreign and domestic ownership. While such traditional concerns as the quantity of repatriated profits and interference in domestic politics (in the case of foreign firms) continue to be important, much of the recent literature is on comparative financial performance, growth, technology, and the interrelationships among these elements. The following conclusion is ubiquitous: Domestic enterprises, due largely to “technological” shortcomings, are simply unable to compete with the foreign firms and are therefore restricted both to secondary positions within individual product markets and to the less profitable sectors.