Atendência para polarisar dialeticamente as situações socio-culturais chegou a conquistar dentistas do calibre de Georges Balandier, que investiu ha algum tempo contra os estudos de mudança cultural e contra a antropologia prática ou aplicada. Este trabalho, embora não se preocupe com “choques entre civilizações”, tem como presuposto a possibilidade da mudança cultural e se contem nos limites da etnopsiquiatria e da etnopsicologia.

This paper posits the thesis that the age-old conflict between the agricultural and pastoral ways of life continues to be a major obstacle to agricultural and rural development throughout Latin America; and the same probably is true in many other of the so-called “underdeveloped” portions of the globe. A quarter of a century of professional involvement with Latin American societies has convinced me that improvement that is designated as “type of farming” in the sociocultural system is an indispensable part of the modernization of agriculture. I firmly believe that in most places it is of the utmost importance to combine both livestock and crop enterprises in a close symbiotic relationship in individual farm units. This definitely is not the case throughout Latin America, and this conclusion is exemplified by the fact that neither by personal observation, nor by reading, nor by questioning others have I been able to discover a single instance in which a farmer grows a crop of corn and then uses it to fatten his cattle for the market.

Students of slavery and the plantation system long have realized that there were differences between the forms taken by these institutions in the New World colonies of the peoples of the Iberian Peninsula and those of the Anglo-Saxon nations of northwestern Europe. Several attempts have been made to compare selected areas of Iberian and Anglo- American plantation societies in the hope of specifying the nature of the differences. Unfortunately, these comparisons, rooted at times in the best techniques of historical and, in cases, sociological analysis, have focused on the Spanish colonies—and most often on the Cuban case—as the example of the Iberian pattern, arid the southern part of the United States, or parts of the British West Indies, as representative of the Anglo-American form.

En los últimos días de julio de 1963, el que escribe estas líneas, durante una breve visita al Perú, tuvo ocasión, una vez más, de presenciar un cabildo abierto. Por cierto que el entonces recién inaugurado, ahora ya depuesto, Presidente Belaúnde Terry, se suponía iba a asistir al acto. Pero una avería en el helicóptero que le conducía le impidió llegar más allá del Cuzco. La ocasión de aquella asamblea, verdaderamente popular, era el elegir al alcalde y regidores de la pequeña villa de Chinchero, situada en plena Sierra peruana. Reuniones semejantes se estaban celebrando aquel mismo día, último domingo de julio, en los demás pueblos, cabezas de partido. Dato interesante es que las discusiones se condujeron en la lengua quechua, única que comprendían los asistentes al acto, en su totalidad indígenas.

The ways in which societies change and adjust to change are determined largely by cultural and historical factors, by long-standing customs and traditions. Cultural values differ widely from one society to another; each solves its problems according to its own values, and value systems, though they may work well for one society, cannot be expected to work as well for another. This is true even of colonies that become independent nations, although the characteristic stamp of the common mother country remains visible. What is unique in the case of Spanish America is the inability of the new nations to shed this stamp, despite determined efforts to do so. To understand the process of change of any country or group of related countries such as those of Spanish America, it is necessary to examine the major cultural characteristics and values, and to consider social and political action in relation to these, rather than to any external standard.

Una crítica superficial, más combativa que filosófica, ha puesto de moda un irrevocable desdén para el pasado. Se le condena sin misericordia, como si fuera el origen de todos los males y el manantial de todas las injusticias. Se le niegan sus rasgos de bondad o de hermosura, exhibiendo con morbosa delectación lo que tuvo de perversamente sombrío. Se echa en olvido cuanto le debemos, para gustar la ilusión de que en nuestras obras no palpita una sola molécula de los que nos precedieron en la senda angustiada del vivir. Sin embargo, nada significamos, ni nada perdurable nos es dado realizar, desvinculados de ese conjunto de fuerzas misteriosas y espléndidas que las generaciones han ido acumulando a través de los siglos, y que los iconoclastas se empeñan en destruir con la torva piqueta que sabe del polvo de los escombros, pero no del goce inefable de los momentos creadores.

On July 2, 1967, Mexican voters elected representatives to the Chamber of Deputies, the lower house of the national legislature. By law the Chamber is completely renewed every three years, and members cannot succeed themselves. Throughout the country, the elections took place smoothly and without serious disturbances. The State of Yucatán, remote and isolated from the major political and economic centers of the country, quietly participated following an election campaign that was reserved and orderly.

The main purpose of this article is to outline and discuss the role and potential importance of multi-national enterprises in the process of Latin American integration. As such it is essentially a reflection upon work done at the Institute for Latin American Integration (INTAL) by the author, and upon the opinions and impressions gathered through conversations and interviews with businessmen, politicians, técnicos, and public and private personalities from many Latin American countries during 1966 and 1967. It is a compilation of viewpoints and major assumptions, and its main purpose is to open up the field for further discussions and research—indeed, to serve in this manner as a future guideline in action programs. Finally, it should be said that this paper reflects the style of thinking as well as the prejudices that its writer, a political scientist, has brought with him.

La Constitución reformada de 1860 dejó a Buenos Aires, nuevamente, sin capital. La Constitución de 1853 había convertido a Buenos Aires en capital de la república; pero los reformadores de 1860, como es sabido, tuvieron sus razones para postergar la señalación de una ciudad como capital del país. El estudio de estas razones corresponde a otras páginas. Aquí consignamos la protesta, la indignación de Alberdi. Sus principales escritos que se refieren a este hecho aparecieron entre 1875 y 1877. Tienen la valentía de costumbre. Son la voz del hombre que había propuesto a Buenos Aires como capital, que la había visto convertida en cabeza de la nación y, de pronto, encuentra otra vez al país sin capital, como en tiempos de Rosas. Mitre y Sarmiento, según Alberdi, habían sido los culpables de este retroceso. Los dos habían sido el azote de la nación y de Buenos Aires. La reforma reaccionaria de 1860 había restaurado el régimen económico con que Rosas había despotizado y empobrecido al pueblo de Buenos Aires durante veinte años. Rosas había vuelto el país al tiempo de los virreyes. Florencio Várela había demostrado que Rosas había restaurado el sistema virreinal.

Research on the presidency in Latin America offers one of the most promising sources of contributions to be made to the study of comparative government. With the exception of a few articles in journals, and chapters on the presidency in political science texts and readers, no general work on the Latin American chief executive is to be found in English. Also lacking are general works on the presidency in individual countries. With more than 700 Latin American presidents in office since the twenty republics were formed in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, investigation seems not only possible but desirable in building modest or middle-range theories of development and modernization in the behavior of Latin American chiefs of state. Given the fact of presidential domination of the political process throughout much, if not most, of the republican period in Latin America, the presidency is an obvious and important focus of study.