Discusión Sobre Hamnett

journal of early american history 8 (2018) 231-258
brill.com/jeah
Book Forum
∵
Imperial Collapse or Revolution?
A Discussion of Brian R. Hamnett’s The End of Iberian Rule on the American
Continent, 1770–1830
Mónica Ricketts (review)

Temple University
mrickett@temple.edu
Eduardo Posada-Carbó (review)

University of Oxford
eduardo.posada-carbo@lac.ox.ac.uk
Clément Thibaud (review)

École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales, Paris, Mondes Américains
clement.thibaud@ehess.fr
Brian Hamnett (response)

University of Essex
brogerhamnett@hotmail.co.uk
Abstract
A book forum featuring The End of Iberian Rule on the American Continent, 1770–1830 by
Brian R. Hamnett. His 2017 volume argues that the origins of Ibero-American Indepen-
dence must be found in the interplay between the Spanish and Lusitanian monarchies
and the American empires ruled by them. It was internal conflict within these empires
that led to independence, not revolution, separatist sentiment, or the emergence of
American nation-states. Monica Ricketts, Eduardo Posada-Carbó, Clément Thibaud
strongly commend the work while offering constructive criticism and analysis. Re-
viewers raise questions about socio-cultural forces and changes, the role of politics,
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232 Ricketts Et al.
the exclusion of an Atlantic perspective, and the lack of attention to revolutionary

thought and nationalism. The book is celebrated for its breadth, its historiographical
contribution, and the strength of its argument for the continuities from the Iberian
monarchies and empires to the nation states that grew out of them. Hamnett responds
to the reviewers.
Keywords
Latin American Independence – Brazilian Independence – Ibero-American Indepen-

dence – Latin American Revolutions – Brazilian Revolution – Iberian Rule – Hispanic
Monarchies – Lusitanian Monarchies – Spanish Empire – Portuguese Empire
Brian R. Hamnett, The End of Iberian Rule on the American Continent, 1770–1830
(Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press, 2017), viii + 364 pp. isbn
978-1-107-17464-1 (hbk).
Review by Monica Ricketts
The End of Iberian Rule offers a reevaluation of independence in Latin Ameri-

ca. A scholar who has spent a good part of his academic career working on this
era, Brian Hamnett attempts in this book an ambitious and all-encompassing
overview of a history that remains convoluted. There are too many players tak-
ing on new roles and changing them quickly, elites breaking and recomposing,
armies rising and losing, scenarios shifting swiftly, and regional disparities so
large that one is left wondering if a survey of this kind is even possible. Brian
Hamnett thinks it is. He centers his analysis on two main propositions. First,
the forces of change originated in Europe, in the “disaggregation” of the old
monarchies. Hence, he attempts a history of the end of Iberian rule in America
and not of independence. Second, these forces of change primarily affected
the elites in America, provoking clashes among them. Disputes between old
and new groups followed, as well as struggles between old centers of power
and new ones. The result was unrest. Monarchical rule broke down in conse-
quence, independent new states rose, and, only later and subsequently, na-
tionalism developed.
The big question then is: what led to the disintegration of these old monar-
chies? His answer lies in the events that in his view provoked major changes and
revolutions in the Western world: international war and financial constraints.
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Imperial Collapse or Revolution? 233
The breakdown of rule in America is seen as the Iberian expression of a major

international crisis, not just an Atlantic one. In tune with Jeremy Adelman,
Hamnett argues that reforms in the metropolis and attempts at reconceptual-
ization of the monarchy as a centralized union produced the reaction of elites
in America.1 Disputes for preeminence among these elites arose, and the prin-
ciple of authority broke down. Tensions spread, causing regional disputes and
rivalries between American elites, which are the more specific foci of the book.
By the 1810s, it was no longer clear which were the centers of power or which
elites dominated. Unrest increased and persisted.
With this approach the book makes important methodological contribu-
tions and takes on long-overdue historiographical critique. First, breaking away
from a historiography that looked predominantly at local dynamics, Hamnett
discusses the breakdown of Iberian empires in an international framework. He
looks for common processes and patterns, trying to also account for particular
local differences. Hamnett’s other major contribution is his questioning of the
somewhat dominant view that the Spanish world underwent a constitutional
revolution in the era of Cádiz that brought down imperial rule. Again, he finds
the forces of change unleashed way before Cádiz, in the Bourbon program
of reform. Hence, parting with a Whiggish historiography that has mystified
Cádiz as the culmination of liberalism and the foundational moment for fu-
ture Latin American republics,2 Hamnett places the process of decomposition
in the Bourbon conceptualization of the monarchy as a unitary entity, which
disregarded its multiple and composite nature, provoking conflict and disrup-
tion. Lastly, Hamnett takes issue with the role that nationalism took in this
process. In opposition to Benedict Anderson, his followers, and a traditional
historiography that saw nationalism as a necessary condition for indepen-
dence, Hamnett considers nationalism not an essential but rather an ideology
that emerged as social and political changes were taking root.3
Turning away from these views, Hamnett brings back a socioeconomic
approach. He focuses on elites, their sources of wealth, their networks and
interests, and the clashes that developed between old and new groups. His
1 Jeremy Adelman, Sovereignty and Revolution in the Iberian Atlantic (Princeton: Princeton
University Press, 2006).
2 Perhaps the most influential scholar on the revolutionary nature of Cádiz is Jaime E. Rodrí-
guez O. Among his many works, for example, are Political Culture in Spanish America, 1500–
1830 (Lincoln, Nebr.: University of Nebraska Press, 2017) and The Independence in Spanish
America (Cambridge, uk.: Cambridge University Press, 1998).
3 For more extensive work on this line, see Hamnett’s The Historical Novel in Nineteenth-
Century Europe: Representations of Reality in History and Fiction (Oxford and New York:
Oxford University Press, 2011).
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234 Ricketts Et al.
detailed analyses of the city of Puebla, the communities of Peru and Chile, and
their responses to change are enlightening. These sections clearly show the ca-
pacity of these elites to change and adapt in their efforts to retain and expand
their status and power. Hamnett finds a strong integration of economic and
political power in America and questions the traditional view that resentment
drove Americans against Peninsulars and thus to independence. His analysis
of the Chilean case works best here, for this was a more homogenous and bet-
ter integrated group of elites. His examination of the understudied cabildos
stands out. Their role in organizing juntas and articulating the voices of local
elites is a crucial subject that demands more attention.
While Hamnett’s reclaiming of social-studies frameworks reinvigorates the
field, this choice should not take us back to the past. In recent decades, the
historiography on independence has made significant progress in the analy-
sis of politics, ideas, culture, and ideologies. We now count on a large num-
ber of works on liberalism, a crucial topic surprisingly omitted in this study,
regalism, reformism, absolutism, constitutionalism, etc. Historians from
the Spanish Peninsula in particular have taken on a vibrant history of ideas
for this period. Works on electoral practices have produced a subfield.4 The
book lags behind this latest historiography. Perhaps because of this, The End
of Iberian Rule leaves a major methodological challenge pending: how to in-
tegrate the socioeconomic processes so well described here with the crucial
political and ideological changes taking place at this time. For example, con-
sidering the dynamics of elites, the principal topic here, Hamnett offers an ex-
amination on the marginalization of grandees during much of Bourbon rule.
It is interesting to see them come back in the 1810s to challenge Bourbon reform-
ism and Cádiz’s liberalism, but here again I was left wondering about politics.
Was there a connection between these groups and specific ideas and ideologies?
Regarding elites in Peru—my area of study—I have found it very hard to iden-
tify one specific social or regional group as a dominant elite in the early nine-
teenth century. Castas and individuals from the middle orders were important
new players taking over leading positions of authority in Peru back then.
Where do they fall? What led them to these roles? There were certainly crucial
4 See, for example, the works of Javier Fernández Sebastián, Diccionario politico y social del
mundo iberoamericano. Conceptos políticos fundamentals, 1770–1870, vol. 2 (Madrid: Centro de
Estudios Políticos y Constitutionales, 2014) and La aurora de la liberad. Los primeros liberal-
ismos en el mundo iberoamericano (Madrid: Marcial Pons, 2012). The works of Roberto Breña
also stand out; see El primer liberalism español y los procesos de emancipaciónd e América,
1808–1824: una revision historiográfica del liberalismo hispánico (México, d.f.: El Colegio de
México, Centro de Estudios Internacionales, 2006).

history 8 (2018) 231-258
disputes between the provinces and Lima during the breakdown of Spanish
rule, but this was also a time when traditional elites lost power to new groups
who gained preeminence through means other than wealth, such as the mili-
tary. What groups constituted these Peruvian elites then, and whom did they
fight? Which leads me to the topic of violence and organized forces. Hamnett’s
attention to the role of violence during the wars of independence in chapter
five is a welcomed turn to a historiography that, again, has presented the 1810s
as an era of almost pure liberal revolution. These studies have forgotten the
continuous wars that not only impeded those liberal measures but also polar-
ized societies and created new political dynamics. Additionally, we still need
to explain what triggered this violence. The rivalries between American and
Peninsular Spaniards questioned in this book and others no longer stand as a
crucial factor. Taking the analysis to a center-periphery dichotomy that leaves
out specific local dynamics seems also insufficient. Institutional and political
history could be an important addition here. In 2002, Hamnett published a
book chapter on the role played by the army of Alto Peru the 1810s. In this
piece, the author brought the attention to a neglected institution that is key to
understanding the wars of independence in South America and, in my view,
the reconfiguration of political and social power in nineteenth-century Peru
and the Southern Andes.5 At a time when violence and war were taking over
and producing much violence, should we not pay attention to the military and
guerrillas?
The chapter dedicated to the Indian elites of the Andes unexpectedly takes
another route by focusing on religion rather than on social bases or ideas to ex-
plain these groups’ dynamics. Hamnett argues that Indian elites developed an
alternative vision of a Hispanic monarchy. They formed a rebellious movement
that demanded an articulating myth to communicate its unity. The myth was not
strong enough, and hence the movement weakened. This section requires further
analysis and discussion. If economic and political power were well-integrated,
as the book suggests, and if local elites were quick to adapt to reforms and
reinvent themselves to keep their status, why would Indian elites be different?
5 Brian Hamnett, “La política contrarevolucionaria del virrey Abascal: Perú 1806–1816,” in eds.
Marta Terán and José Antonio Serrano Ortega, Las guerras de independencia en la América
Española (México: El Colegio de Michoacán, Universidad Michoacana de San Nicolás de Hi-
dalgo, Instituto Nacional de Antropoloía e Historia, 2002), 183–192. This piece inspired in my
own work on the political and social role of the royalist armies of Peru. See Mónica Ricketts,
“The Rise of the Bourbon Military in Peru, 1768–1820,” in Colonial Latin American Review 22,
no. 3 (2012): 412–439; and chapter six of Who Should Rule? Men of Arms, the Republic of Letters,
and the Fall of the Spanish Empire (New York: Oxford University Press, 2017).

236 Ricketts Et al.
In that case, why would they and not the white elites need a foundational
myth? Scarlett O’ Phelan and David T. Garett have persuasively shown the frac-
tured nature of indigenous elites in Peru. Tupac Amaru’s rivals defeated his
movement, were rewarded for it, and assured Bourbon control of the region.6
Doesn’t this outcome prove that Indian elites did not really have or need an
alternative vision of a monarchy then?
Likewise, in its revisionist quest, the book discusses the category of “cre-
ole patriotism” embraced by Benedict Anderson and leading scholars in the
field.7 By now this category seems more a reality than an interpretation. Tak-
ing issue with the mechanical use of these terms and their importance, Ham-
nett wonders if this ideology or movement was perhaps just an expression of
regionalist sentiments. Despite his initial skepticism, he embraces them and
argues that “creole patriotism”: took different forms across America. Hamnett
cannot escape the category’s traps. He joins a large number of scholars who
have found it very hard to define this form of patriotism for Peru. “One of the
most problematic of the successor states” (p. 309), the Republic of Peru de-
veloped only a nationalist consciousness in reaction to foreign interventions,
Hamnett argues. If we assume that there was one way of developing a national
consciousness and transitioning to independence, as general surveys on inde-
pendence have tended to do, he is right. But perhaps if we get rid of categories
that constrain us more than help, such as that of Creole patriotism, then we
can have a more encompassing and inclusive analysis, one in which Peru does
not fall into the odd case category, Cuba is also included, and Mexico ceases to
dominate as the archetype.
In the other sections of this book, Hamnett consciously avoids general
interpretations that assume one case as a model. His goal is to account for par-
ticularities to explain the specifics of various processes. A historian who has
worked extensively on Peru and Mexico knows too well that one framework or
interpretation is not sufficient. His effort to include local dynamics suggests all
6 See Scarlett O’Phelan Godoy, La gran rebellion en los Andes: de Túpac Amary a Túpac Catari
(Cusco: Centro de Estudios Regionales Andinos “Bartolomé de las Casas,” 1995) and David
T. Garett, Shadows of Empire: The Indian Nobility of Cusco, 1750–1825 (New York: Cambridge
7 See Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of
Nationalism (London: Verso, 1991). David Brading led studies on Latin America aimed at
describing and explaining creole patriotism. See The First America: The Spanish Monarchy,
Creole Patriots, and the Liberal State, 1492–1867 (Cambridge, uk: Cambridge University Press,
1991). Another influential scholar in his subfield has been Jorge Cañizares-Esguerra. See, for
example, How to Write the History of the New World. Histories, Epistemologies, and Identities in
the Eighteenth-Century Atlantic World (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2001).

history 8 (2018) 231-258
kinds of possible comparisons and contrasts but makes the narrative at times
scattered and explanations stretchy. When we get to the 1820s and divergence
takes over, it is very hard to keep a common thread. The inclusion of Brazil is im-
portant, but assuming the struggles between centralism and federalism as the
common main challenge of the new countries at this time fits Brazil and Mex-
ico well but does not work for Peru, Chile, or Cuba. Once more, Hamnett won-
ders about the “absence of a strong federalist movement among the Peru elites”
(p. 294). But after years of centralization and the consolidation of centralized
armed forces that dominated politics, how could federalism have prospered?
To conclude, this general overview of independence is an important contri-
bution to the historiography. Its ambitious scope and attempt to balance inter-
national and local perspectives are impressive and illuminating; his attention
to social and economic factors and his effort to question established views of
this period are most welcomed.
Review by Eduardo Posada-Carbó
Some great historical topics never die. The independence of Latin America
or “the end of Iberian rule” (and the choice of words does matter) is a locus
classicus. Interest in the subject somewhat declined in the 1960s, particularly
among Latin Americans themselves, but it has never fully gone away and, fol-
lowing the bicentenaries in recent decades, the literature has just flourished.
Brian Hamnett’s latest book is an extraordinary contribution to the field. This
is not a mere text of synthesis. While Hamnett does a very good job at bringing
together the findings of old and young generations of scholars, he has plenty of
original material to add from his own wanderings in a good number of archives
in Europe and the Americas. He himself has written extensively on the region,
mostly on Mexico and Peru, but his intellectual curiosity crosses other bound-
aries, as demonstrated by his work on the historical novel.8 His book also offers
new interpretations, therefore contributing to ongoing debates on the causes
and significance of Latin American emancipation.
The End of the Iberian Rule in the American Continent is full of merits.
Looking simultaneously at the Spanish and Portuguese empires, their respec-
tive colonies, and the processes that led to imperial fragmentation and the
emergence of a plethora of new states by 1830 is in itself a remarkable achieve-
ment. Past attempts have been rare and limited. Jeremy Adelman’s superb
8 Brian R. Hamnett, The Historical Novel in Nineteenth-Century Europe: Representations of Real-

ity in History and Fiction (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010).

238 Ricketts Et al.
Sovereignty and Revolution9 stands out, among other reasons, because of his
joint examination of Brazil and Spanish America, but, as Hamnett notes, it
omitted New Spain (Mexico today). Hamnett also devotes attention to devel-
opments on both sides of the Atlantic, a central exercise to one of his main
arguments—that internal conflicts in the metropolis largely explain their im-
perial demise. The disputes among Spanish absolutists, after Ferdinand vii
returned to power in 1814, were a main “destabilizing factor” to the king’s pur-
poses of re-establishing his authority (213). In addition, Hamnett is especially
sensitive to local developments, rightly decentering what were after all a series
of parallel though closely interconnected movements; his “spotlights” tend to
be “on the local interest-groups and the provincial milieux” (6), as shown in
detailed examples of the City of Puebla, Cuzco, Cartagena, or Pernambuco.
Hamnett does not avoid academic debate. Quite the contrary, in his vari-
ous chapters he is once and again revising commonly held views, old and new,
and advancing thought-provoking observations. Against the “political” and the
“cultural” turns, he highlights the significance of war, while favoring socioeco-
nomic structures and interests around well-entrenched family networks as
explanatory factors. To those who believe that the Cádiz Cortes and the Con-
stitution of 1812 offered a viable option to the imperial crisis, he notes that they
were “last minute attempts to salvage … a Monarchy already in the process
of disintegration” (208), warning his readers that the Cádiz constitution was
not only “widely rejected across Spanish America” (176), but that Venezuela
and New Granada published their own constitutions months before the Cádiz
charter was approved by the Cortes. His overall interpretation serves as a wel-
come correction to recent trends that often seem to treat Latin American inde-
pendence as mainly caused by an external shock, the Napoleonic invasions of
1807–8 of the Iberian peninsula (“factors ultimately contributing to the break-
up of the Monarchies were perceptible well before,” 317).
Others better versed than I am on the independence period may be able to
identify more precisely where the novelty of his interpretation lies. Not that he
boasts about this. Hamnett himself had advanced some of his views in many of
his previous works. He duly recognizes the contributions of other scholars in
the field. The idea that independence was caused by long-term factors was cer-
tainly held by the nationalist historiography, but also by leading scholars such
as John Lynch, whose account of the Spanish American revolutions, originally
published in 1973, continues to stand the test of time.10
9 Jeremy Adelman, Sovereignty and Revolution in the Iberian Atlantic (Princeton: Princeton
10 The Spanish American Revolutions, 1808–1826 (New York and London: W.W. Norton &
Company, 1986, first edition 1973).

history 8 (2018) 231-258
In the spirit of the book forum, let me offer some reflections on four is-
sues raised by Hamnett that ought to be further discussed. The first pertains
to the “revolutionary” experience of independence. Hamnett generally avoids
the term. He thinks that the prevailing notion of “revolution” among Spanish
Americans “differed strikingly from the French experience of the 1790s” (148).
That may be the case. But the nature of the transformation, viewed from the
perspective of the contemporaries who ceased to be colonial subjects, still
needs to be more fully understood. Hamnett accepts that “a political trans-
formation” took place following the constitutional movement that attempted
to cut links with the peninsula in 1810, but “the social and juridical structures
were left untouched” (141). Instead of “social revolutions,” the Spanish Ameri-
cans preferred “restitution.” Moreover, in his view, the Spanish Liberals in the
peninsula sought wider transformations than the “Spanish American autono-
mists or even separatists” (148). He seems to identify their aims only with those
of “local élites’ right to participate in the government of their own provinces”:
“For the most part the revolution ended there: ended, that is, in the institution-
alization of control by the predominant families” (144).
Far from being a revisionist, Hamnett here wears to some extent a tradi-
tional hat—the predominant interpretation that since the 1970s denied the
Spanish American independence any revolutionary connotation, except in a
very narrow political sense. The political transformations had wider social and
cultural implications that Hamnett and a whole generation of historians do
not seem to recognize. And it is just simply wrong to say that “social and juridi-
cal structures were left untouched.” For one, hereditary titles were abolished
throughout the Hispanic American world that had severed ties with Spain.
Slavery was not abolished, but the end of slave trade, together with other mea-
sures, dealt a deathblow to the institution. And were not new constitutions in
themselves new juridical structures?
The revolutionary nature of independence in New Granada has been exam-
ined by Isidro Vanegas in a recent book that should be taken into account.11
Vanegas’s point of departure is François-Xavier Guerra, the late French his-
torian whose work injected so much life into the study of independence in
Spanish America.12 After acknowledging his significant contributions, Vanegas
11 Isidro Vanegas, La revolución neogranadina (Bogotá: Ediciones Plural, 2013). See also his
El constitucionalismo fundacional (Bogotá: Ediciones Plural, 2012).
12 Modernidad e independencias. Ensayos sobre las revoluciones hispánicas (Madrid: Mapfre,
1992); “The Spanish American Tradition of Representation, and Its European Roots,” in
Journal of Latin American Studies 26, no. 1 (February 1994): 1–36; and (with Marie-Danielle
Demélas), Orígenes de la democracia en España y América (Lima: Fondo Editorial del
Congreso del Perú, 2008).

240 Ricketts Et al.
takes issue with Guerra as the latter, in his view, fell short of appreciating the
full implications for the emerging republics of adopting new political regimes.
Based on a wealth of publications and archival documents, he explores the
new meanings acquired by the language of “revolution” following the rupture
that took place sometime in 1809. “Revolution” was not any longer equated
with catastrophe, but was instead identified with the aims of freedom and jus-
tice, accompanied by grandiloquence: it was praised by some as “wonderful,”
“the most active, mysterious and happiest [thing] ever seen.” Particularly rele-
vant to the revolutionary experience was the transformation of the social bond
following the radical displacement of the sources of power from God, embod-
ied in the King, to the people. For Vanegas, this resulted in a refoundation of
“local elites,” including a revamp of bureaucratic personnel and ecclesiastical
structures. The short- and long-term consequences of such redefinition of the
political order are yet to be grasped by historians.
The sort of revolution examined by Vanegas did not happen in imperial
Brazil. And the extent to which the New Granada experience was replicated
elsewhere is of course questionable—within New Granada such experience
was surely felt differently from province to province. Hamnett himself reiter-
ates the need to distinguish regional variations, indicating some of the differ-
ences between parts of New Granada and Venezuela, on the one hand, and
Peru on the other. He also acknowledges how destabilizing independence
was in the longue durée. But he seems to attribute it almost exclusively to war:
“foraging armies and irregular bands destroyed the legal structures and prac-
tices upon which the colonial system had been based” (150). Hamnett does not
dismiss ideas, culture, and politics altogether, but a narrative more attuned to
Vanegas’s account may help to provide a fuller picture of what were, after all,
extremely complex events.
The second issue I would like to raise in this forum is Hamnett’s approach.
He explicitly points out that he has not “adopted an ‘Atlantic history’ perspec-
tive,” which he then refers to as a “narrower … framework” (11). His empha-
sis is instead “on the Andean dimension,” and the “internal linkages” within
the continent where the “coastal trade focused on Lima” should provide some
important clues to the story. I am not so sure, however, that he manages to
deliver on what he promises. His narrative does offer rich details of Andean,
Meso-American and Brazilian developments. The “internal linkages” among
all these territories are, however, often missing (although the sections on Up-
per Peru contain some relevant examples) or in need of a stronger treatment.
What does an “Andean dimension” mean for the overall interpretation? This is
a question that, in view of Hamnett’s suggestive proposition, deserves a more
extensive discussion.

history 8 (2018) 231-258
Perhaps more significantly, why should an “Andean dimension” be so con-

fronted to an “Atlantic perspective”? Indeed, by dismissing the latter we may
be losing a sense of the whole; we risk getting instead a fragmented picture
of disjointed events, without many links, either internally or externally.13 Not
that this is what we get in Hamnett’s book. The connections with the Iberian
Peninsula are central to his account, as already noted. It is the relative mar-
ginalization of the wider Atlantic that seems problematic. Can we conceive
the developments leading to Latin American independence outside the Age of
Revolution? Hamnett does acknowledge some impact of the “British-American
Revolution”14 on the Minas rebellion in 1789, and of the French Revolution on
the Salvador conspirators in Brazil in 1798. He also refers to the possible influ-
ences of the United States in the constitutional developments of Venezuela
and New Granada, while rightly observing that their constitutions “were not
derivative of us or French models” (142–3). And in the introduction he does
place the independence of Latin America in the context of “the three great
revolutions of the western world” that dominated the period 1770–1830. But
I think a more systematic reflection on the extent to which events in the re-
gion related to the larger Atlantic was missing—some engagement with the
work of J.H. Elliott or David Armitage and Sanjay Subrahmanyam, for example,
would have complemented and indeed strengthened his Andean comparative
perspective.15
Part of the reason for neglecting the Atlantic may lie in his main argument
to explain the independence of Latin America—the third issue I am propos-
ing to discuss here. For Hamnett, “it was the metropoles that collapsed” (73).
They did so mostly for factors internal to the two empires, predating the events
13 Guerra noted the difficulties of treating what was both a plural and single historical
process. See his “De lo uno a lo múltiple: dimensiones y lógicas de la independencia,” in
eds. Anthony McFarlane and Eduardo Posada-Carbó, Independence and Revolution: Per-
spectives and Problems (London: ilas, 1999), 43–68.
14 And why is this called a “Revolution” and not the Latin American Independence requires
at least an explanation. For an interesting comparative perspective, suggesting that
the revolutionary character of the us “Revolution” has been overestimated, see Jack P.
Greene, “La primera revolución Atlántica: resistencia, rebelión y construcción de nación
en los Estados Unidos,” in eds. María Teresa Calderónand Clément Thibaud, Las revolucio-
nes en el mundo Atlántico (Bogotá: Universidad Externado, 206), 19–38.
15 J.H. Elliott, Empires of the Atlantic World: Britain and Spain in America, 1492–1830 (New
Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2006); David Armitage and Sanjay Subrah-
manyam (eds.), The Age of Revolutions in Global Context, c.1760–1840 (London: Palgrave
Macmillan, 2010); and David Armitage, The Declaration of Independence: A Global History
(Cambridge and London: Harvard University Press, 2007).

242 Ricketts Et al.
of 1807–8, both immersed in prolonged crises where family networks deep-

ly involved in webs of business and politics played a paramount role. In the
“collapse” theory, what matters is “the end of the Iberian rule” (thus the title
of the book). The movements for independence take the back stage, if at all—
independence happened, it would seem at times, almost by default. “Few de-
sired or foresaw” independence in 1808–10. For much of the time from the
Napoleonic invasion to emancipation, “the preference would have been for
some form of home rule within the Monarchies” (317–8). This line of reasoning
may help to explain why someone like Francisco Miranda is hardly mentioned,
or why Juan Pablo Viscardo y Guzmán’s Carta a los Españoles Americanos and
the Gual and España conspiracy of 1795 in Venezuela are plainly ignored.16
I am not suggesting bringing back the old narratives of the precursores that
dominated the national historiographies for so long but, even if they were
few, those who were developing ideas of independence deserve more atten-
tion. What needs to be properly examined is the process by which those ideas
emerged, took shape, were adopted by some, and then diffused among the
wider population. Consider the rapidly changing mind-set of Camilo Torres,
who, as noted by Hamnett, wrote the famous Memorial de agravios issued by
the city council of Santa Fé de Bogotá in November 1809. “Reform of grievances,
not separatism, was the aim” of the document, Hamnett argues. But only a few
months later, on 29 May 1810, in a letter to his uncle in Quito, Torres expressed
no doubts about the route to follow: independence from Spain, each province
adopting its own government, as in North America.17 In July that year, Santa
Fe declared independence in a movement whose developments were almost
immediately historicized by the Diario político, a newspaper devoted to the
cause. Hamnett does not deny agency to the Latin Americans altogether. He
makes good use of the revisionist historiography to highlight, for example, the
role of blacks and mulattoes in the independence of Cartagena. But neither
such episodes nor the forces driving them seem to carry much weight against
the theory of the “collapse.”
16 Miranda gets one marginal mention; see in contrast the several references to Miguel
de Eyzaguirre of the Conde de Montijo. In the last decade or so, Miranda has been the
subject of renewed interest among historians. See, for example, Karen Racine, Francisco
de Miranda: A Transatlantic Life in the Age of Revolutions (Wilmington, n.c.: sr Books,
2003); John Maher (ed.), Francisco de Miranda: Exile and Enlightenment (London: ilas,
2006); Manuel Lucena Giraldo, Francisco de Miranda. La aventura de la política (Madrid:
edaf, 2011). On the Gual and España insurrection, see Lynch, The Spanish American Revo-
lutions, 194.
17 The full text of the letter is published in “Los tres Torres. La familia Torres,” in Boletín de
Historia y Antiguedades 3, no. 28 (1905): 260–71.

history 8 (2018) 231-258
The fourth point worth discussing, among the many suggestive themes
raised by Hamnett, is his final reflection on the “national project,” or rather
the lack of it, in Latin America. In his view, “it is doubtful that any semblance
of national consciousness existed in Ibero-America in the pre-Independence
era.” “The disaggregation of the Iberian Empires on the American continent,”
he adds, “did not result in the automatic formation or emergence of ‘nation-
states,’” and “the Ibero-American Independence movements were not nation-
alist movements. Nationalist historiography developed after independence”
(304–12). These and other passages touch upon a fascinating and complex
subject, to which it is impossible to do justice here. Let me just venture a few
observations.
The proposition that there was no “semblance of national consciousness”
before independence requires some examination. Hamnett echoes Jonathan
Eastwood, whose book on nationalism in Venezuela he uses to frame the dis-
cussion.18 I wonder, however, if a better point of departure could have been
Lynch’s account of the origins of Spanish American nationality, where he traces
some of the significant “national” expressions during the eighteenth century in
what he calls a “uniquely American literature.” There was no doubt some ambi-
guity in them, but publications like Francisco Javier Clavijero’s Historia Antigua
de Mexico (1780–81) or El Mercurio Peruano showed that there was more than
a “semblance of national consciousness.” They were soon incorporated into
the national historiographies that developed not “after” but as the very same
processes of independence unfolded. Some episodes, like the unofficial Brit-
ish invasions of Buenos Aires in 1806–07, gave the protagonists, in this case
the Porteños who defeated the invaders, a sense of pride upon which to build
nationalist discourses.19 By the time the “Alocución a la poesía” by Andrés Bello
was published in 1823, the body of nationalist literature was extensive.20
Acknowledging these does not mean accepting a teleological narrative of
independence, even less of national identities. That the end of the Iberian rule
did not result in the “automatic” emergence of “nation-states” should not be
surprising. What still seems puzzling is that the “nation-states” that gradually
18 Jonathan Eastwood, The Rise of Venezuelan Nationalism (Gainesville: University Press of

Florida, 2006).
19 See Ian Fletcher, The Waters of Oblivion: The British Invasion of the Rio de la Plata, 1806–
1807 (Tunbridge Wells, uk: Spellmount Ltd, 1991); Klaus Gallo, De la invasión al recono-
cimiento. Gran Bretaña y el Río de la Plata, 1806–1826 (Buenos Aires: az Editora, 1994); and
Las invasiones inglesas (Buenos Aires: Eudeba, 2004).
20 See Iván Jaksić, Andrés Bello: la pasión por el orden (Santiago: Editorial Universitaria,
2001), 86–7. See also “Allocution to Poetry,” in ed. Iván Jaksić, Selected Writings of Andrés
Bello (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1997), 7–28.

244 Ricketts Et al.
took hold of the former colonial territories by and large coincided, in the case of
imperial Spain, with its administrative units, in spite of all the local and ethnic
divisions noted by Hamnett. Similarly, the centrifugal forces that threatened
the existence of Brazil as a unified polity during the first half of the nineteenth
century were to be expected. It is the survival of Brazil as a single nation-state
that needs a fuller examination. Indeed nations are not “natural” beings, and
some of the barriers to nation formation, so aptly identified by Hamnett, were
common to those experienced by the United States. Racial divisions might not
have been as significant to the development of nation-states in Europe at the
time, but religion, ethnicity, language, and class posed equally significant ob-
stacles, if not more. The idea that nations are constructed has now become a
truism, a commonplace equated with Benedict Anderson’s “imagined commu-
nities,” which nonetheless still offers key relevant elements. To the oft-repeated
observation that the state preceded the nation in Latin America, we should re-
ply by requesting a different sort of debate, one that starts by recognizing that
the nation-state emerged earlier in Latin America than in many parts of the
Western world, perhaps anticipating some of the problems of national forma-
tion, a never-ending process in which most countries find themselves today.21
Here are then four points for discussion, motivated by Brian Hamnett’s The
End of Iberian Rule, which I hope serve the purposes of this book forum. This is
not a book for amateurs; a hands-on editor might have suggested fuller intro-
ductions to some people and events to correct a narrative that tends to assume
knowledge from the reader. Hamnett’s erudition is at times overwhelming. In
his ambitious undertaking there are inevitably some minor errors, omissions,
and limitations. Yet his book no doubt represents a significant contribution
from an accomplished historian—not only an obligatory reference for future
scholarship on the subject but a source for renewing the debate, which is what
in the end keeps the discipline alive.
Review by Clément Thibaud
With The End of Iberian Rule on the American Continent (1770–1830), Brian Ham-
nett presents a major work that goes far beyond what its title indicates. The
author not only addresses Ibero-American independence, but also describes
21 For a suggestive discussion on the relevance of the history of Latin American political
thought on the current debate on multiculturalism, see Diego Von Vacano, The Color of
Citizenship: Race, Modernity and Latin American / Hispanic Political Thought (Oxford:
Oxford University Press, 2012).

history 8 (2018) 231-258
the concomitant fall of two empires that enabled the emergence of new
states—Brazil and the Spanish American republics—and the creation of two
European nations. It is indeed at this critical moment that Spain and Portugal
began their transformations into nations, following, rather than preceding, the
path taken by their former colonies. This development was still in its infancy
in 1830, as the author infers numerous times, since it would take until the last
third of the century to see the consolidation of these national entities and
their governing bodies. Consequently, Hamnett describes two intermingled
histories—both American and European—each presented with its own logic
and its own particular transatlantic relationships. This tour de force establish-
es the book’s originality.
It should also be noted that the chosen title includes neither the word “in-
dependence” nor that of “revolution.” This offers one of the keys to reading
the book, in which the sixty years framed by the period of Bourbon reforms
and Andean revolts (1770–80) and the precarious stability of the new states
indeed mark the end of European sovereignties in the southern regions of the
Americas, rather than the beginning of deep social and political transforma-
tions. Here it is both difficult to contradict or to agree with Hamnett, since
while the continuity of certain social and legal structures between the old and
the new regime is clear, the breach is strong in other areas, such as culture and
politics. The book offers an important milestone in the discussion of the scope
of Ibero-American emancipations since it concurrently asserts the importance
of the event in relationship to external elements, on the Atlantic and global
level, and the moderate character of these transformations from the internal
point of view of these societies. We will come back to this.
Another introductory aspect, before addressing more specific points of the
analysis, is that we must praise Hamnett’s continual focus on summarizing in-
ternational works and historiographical debates in several languages, which
abound to coincide with the bicentennial independence celebrations since
2008, in Latin America, Europe, and the United States. This rather exceptional
trait produces an optimal effect, since it provides a clear and open view of
its own assumptions, based on flawless scholarship that underpins a broad
perspective. The result is therefore a fascinating book from beginning to end,
where the little-known aspects of this story are developed in detail along with
strong general proposals. From this point of view, the book is undoubtedly des-
tined to become a classic, as it achieves an admirable balance between the
presentation of the facts, analysis, and conceptualization.
In the limited framework of this exercise in reading, I want to focus the
discussion on four themes addressed in the book in a particularly stimulat-
ing way: the value of comparison between the two Iberian empires, addressed

246 Ricketts Et al.
jointly in their European and American dimensions; the role of the constitu-
tional process; the issues of war and revolutionary violence; and, finally, the
diagnosis of the extent of changes triggered by the process.
1
The congruence of the crisis of both Iberian monarchies is an oft-commented,
observable fact. After 1807, in Portugal as in Spain, the invasion of Napoleonic
troops triggered a series of events that would lead to the end of Iberian sover-
eignties in America, with the exception of Cuba and Puerto Rico. However, few
historians have drawn all the consequences from this observation and associ-
ated the two processes in their analysis.22 This truly presents a great challenge
since it presupposes the prior definition of elements of comparison between
the two monarchies and the systematic approximation of the terms of their
collapse, while indicating the differences between the two processes. These
“Iberian homologies” relate to the importance of cities, and the centrality of
the Catholic religion, while the differences relate to the forms of institutional-
ization and the methods for governing the “others” (Indians, slaves, free men of
color). These two global monarchies, each in their own way, managed to create
powerful imperial networks—jointly commercial and political—and to give
coherence to gigantic inter-oceanic complexes, combining colonial interests
with those of the mother country with a great parsimony of resources. During
the Age of Enlightenment, they were subject to competition from the emerg-
ing maritime powers of France and Great Britain, and presented a parallel
story of enlightened reforms and crises, which the book describes beautifully.
At the end of the eighteenth century, these transformations led to violent re-
sponses in Hispanic America, while on the other hand Brazil seemed to absorb
the changes. The Napoleonic invasion of 1807–8 resulted in divergent respons-
es in the two kingdoms, but the history of the two empires converged after
1820 as both faced the crucial challenges of the constitutionalization of their
monarchies and of the representation of the nation. The book demonstrates a
thorough knowledge of the historiographies in the two areas, although, under-
standably, some are treated with more detail than others.
In fact, the Imperial and Iberian perspective makes it possible to provide
new answers to the riddle of independence. It is the military crises experi-
enced in the metropolises which precipitated the disintegration of monar-
chical structures—slowly in the case of the Portuguese, but more quickly for
22 One of the exceptions is the work of Jeremy Adelman, Sovereignty and Revolution in the
Iberian Atlantic (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2006).

history 8 (2018) 231-258
the Spanish. This point, highlighted by François-Xavier Guerra,23 poses the

question of the “causes” of the emancipations. If the latter represent the ad-
verse effects of foreign invasions rather than the extension of the identities or
structures, then what do we make of events such as the Andean rebellions of
the late eighteenth century? Where in this picture do we place the previous
American, French, or Haitian Atlantic revolutions who forged the consti-
tutional, liberal, and abolitionist forms, to which the new Ibero-American
regimes seem indebted? How can we articulate the elements of long-term,
internal crisis with more circumstantial aspects of that fall within the context
of “world” war between Britain, France, and their respective allies?
In fact, the book seems to me to hesitate in its answers, even though it clear-
ly assumes the idea that the end of Iberian sovereignty should, above all, be
understood in an imperial framework of long duration, as Halperin Donghi’s24
work does. The demonstration, however, adopts a new and ambitious line
in seeking to articulate the internal developments of every empire since the
end of the eighteenth century and the contingent events of the French Wars.
However, the link between the extensive Andean revolts of the 1780s and the
subsequent crisis is not obvious. As such, the comparison between two major
rebellions that marked the region of Cuzco—that of Tupac Amaru, related to
the Bourbon reforms, and that of Pumacahua, in the period of the indepen-
dence movements—is illuminating since it clearly illustrates the difficulty in
establishing a transitive relationship between the changes of the Age of En-
lightenment and the revolutionary moment without falling into retrospective
reasoning.25 In my opinion, the task remains of clarifying the articulation be-
tween the two historical sequences of crises related to the Bourbon reforms
and the collapse of 1807–8. From this perspective, the book takes rather an
“internalist” viewpoint, emphasizing the elements of long-term imperial crisis
rather than the influence of the “Atlantic revolutionary cycle.” The latter would
be limited to a set of intellectual references of which the superficial character
could not be imposed on the power of local or imperial interests. Wouldn’t
this be an underestimation of the concrete conjunctions, which, through war,
23 François-Xavier Guerra, Modernidad e independencias: ensayos sobre las revoluciones his-

pánicas (Madrid: Mapfre, 1992).
24 Tulio Halperín Donghi, Reforma y disolución de los imperios ibéricos, 1750–1850 (Madrid:
Alianza Editorial, 1985).
25 This problematic point—that of the relations between the Enlightenment and revolution—
has been extensively covered by the historiography of the French Revolution. See Roger
Chartier’s discussion in Les origines culturelles de la Révolution française (Paris : Seuil,
1991).

248 Ricketts Et al.
commerce raiding, or the circulation of “seditious papers,” have linked Franco-

Caribbean revolutions, for example, with many ports and coastal areas of the
Iberian empires? In other words, how do we express the interplay between
underlying trends and circumstances, and at the same time incorporate the
comprehensive changes of the Iberian monarchies in the eighteenth century
into the explanation of independence without giving in to teleology, the self-
fulfilling prophecy? How do we combine the analysis of developments within
each empire and the comprehensive transformation of politics following the
American and French revolutions? From this point of view, while the book is
persuasive in its analysis of the different local contexts, it also raises new ques-
tions, since it purposely refuses to give a general explanatory key to link the
outcome of the story of independence to structural “causes.”
In this masterful presentation, another observation aims at both the choice
of exposition and methodological approaches. The book is based primar-
ily on a comparative process between two imperial histories whose destinies
are linked by the concomitant fall of their European motherlands. The suc-
cess of such a parallel history paradoxically calls for even more, since the book
demonstrates so well the possibilities opened up by the comparison. Why not
also offer a connected history of the two monarchical crises, as João Pimenta’s
work does?26 The political and intellectual conjunction of the two processes is
well demonstrated concerning certain events, such as the Cisplatine conquest
(Uruguay), or two constitutional processes, the Spanish and the Portuguese.
Consequently, the commendable chapter on the violence of war could also be
a presentation of the dynamics of confrontation in Brazil, which had plenty,
since Brazil’s historiography has had to reconsider the irenic image of consen-
sual and peaceful independence. Important books characteristically suggest
promising avenues: this book makes clear that the fall of Iberian sovereignty
in America can only be understood in the light of comparison and connection
of the two processes.
2
One of the book’s most fascinating contributions is the way it interprets the
nature of the Spanish constitutional process, with the Cortes of Cádiz (1810–14)
and then of Madrid (1820–23), and the Portuguese model, with those of Lisbon
(1820–1822). Hamnett does not hesitate to go against the grain of historiogra-
phy nourished by what we may call the Cádiz Turn, best illustrated today by the
26 João Paulo G. Pimenta, Brasil y las independencias de Hispanoamérica (Castellón: Publica-

cions de la Universitat Jaume i, 2007).

history 8 (2018) 231-258
works of Jaime E. Rodriguez.27 This perspective, focused on the “liberal revolu-

tions” of Spain and then Portugal, includes the Ibero-American emancipations
as an inherited, though unintentional, effect of constitutionalism forged by the
deputies gathered in the Andalusian port of Cádiz. The Ibero-Americans broke
with their motherlands, despite a strong sense of belonging to the old empires,
by applying the principles of this political conquest, which turned “absolute”
Spanish royalty into liberal monarchy. Of course, the book does not ques-
tion the essential contribution of this historiographical rupture and rejects
any approach centered on the slow sedimentation of national identities that
would have found opportunities for expression during the crisis of 1807–08.28
It is nonetheless very critical of the constitutional process by showing that it
was a reaction to it that led Ibero-Americans to choose the path of indepen-
dence rather than autonomy or loyalty. This choice is all the stronger in that
Hamnett devotes an important place to the two capital regions of Spanish
America, New Spain and Peru, which remained the most loyal provinces of the
empire until the 1820s. For him, it is the inability of the constituents of Cádiz
and Lisbon to imagine plural political representation, capable of nourishing
American freedoms and reconciling the interests of the motherland with those
of the oversea provinces, which sealed the fate of separation. While it is neces-
sary to qualify the general explanation in terms of geographic zones and time-
lines, he is not wrong. It was indeed when the empire moved toward consti-
tutionalism, seemingly acceding to the demands of Spanish-American elites,
that the independence movements were achieved. From this point of view, the
work of Brian Hamnett is destined to become a reference because it enables us
to escape the apparent paradox by reconsidering the impact of constitution-
alism in the motherlands—although the latter relied on the participation of
many overseas members—to emphasize the local contexts that explain a re-
jection that opened the way to separatism. The explanation seems to me both
strong and decisive, significantly providing nuances to current historiography,
which insists on the centrality of the Cortes of Cádiz and Spanish liberalism. If
the constitution of 1812 was so popular and attachment to the Spanish monar-
chy so strong, how do we explain the independence movement?
On this point, however, there is a slight regret. In my opinion, the book does
not pay quite enough attention to the intellectual repertoires that justified and
27 Jaime E. Rodríguez O., The Independence of Spanish America (Cambridge, New York: Cam-
bridge University Press, 1998); The Divine Charter: Constitutionalism and Liberalism in
Nineteenth-Century Mexico (Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 2007).
28 John Lynch, The Spanish American Revolutions, 1808–1826 (London: Weidenfeld and Nicol-
son, 1973).

250 Ricketts Et al.
informed the political ruptures with Spain and Portugal. This skepticism about
the role of ideas in history is in contrast to the collective effort to better under-
stand the prose of Iberian revolutions, notably within the Iberconceptos29
group. Notwithstanding, it has the merit of taking a deeper look at most of the
other neglected topics. For example, I am thinking of international relations
and Britain’s role. And that of France, the direct cause of the Iberian collapse,
is covered too, despite a still fledgling historiography on this point. The strategy
of these empires and their agents is related in detail, from first-hand archives,
showing the decisive action of the British in their willingness to open up new
markets overseas. The other central issue—frequently overlooked, despite its
crucial impact—is that of taxation and finance, including for the conduct of
war. Taking these essential aspects into account contributes significantly to
the overall demonstration, incorporating these independence movements into
contexts related to the rivalries of the two great maritime monarchies of the
eighteenth century and the overall, final long-term victory of the United King-
dom at the end of the French Wars.
3
Another major theme is that of war and violence. Lawyers and priests certainly
set the tone in the first phase of the imperial crises, but it was soldiers who
won independence—an especially valid observation for Spanish America.30
As Hamnett quite rightly observes, the historiographical effort triggered by the
Cádiz Turn focused above all on cultural and political records, sometimes for-
getting that the independence movements were—above all perhaps—bloody
wars.31 This historiographical choice placed priority on the first decade of the
monarchical crisis—that of constitutional issues, at the expense of the 1820s,
in which, nevertheless, the decisive events favoring independence occurred.
The book corrects this imbalance to a great extent in two ways: by raising the
question of revolutionary violence and developing in detail the Brazilian case,
in which the conflictual dimension was evident, with the republican revolts of
Pernambuco (1817) and the Confederation of the Equator (1824).32
29 Javier Fernández Sebastián (ed.), Diccionario político y social del mundo iberoamericano: la
era de las revoluciones, 1750–1850 (Madrid: Fundación Carolina; Sociedad Estatal de Con-
memoraciones Culturales; Centro de Estudios Políticos y Sociales, 2009).
30 Anthony McFarlane, War and Independence in Spanish America (New York: Routledge,
2014).
31 It should be noted here, of course, a justifiable criticism of the works of Guerra and
Adelman.
32 As such, it would have been interesting to emphasize the comparison between the two
empires, since chapter 5 seems to be concerned only with Hispanic America, as its title
suggests: “Hispanic America – Violence Unleashed.”

history 8 (2018) 231-258
One of the major interests of the book is to describe the confrontation of the
two camps in a balanced way. This is original because the resistance to inde-
pendence at the time is generally underestimated and misunderstood. By de-
scribing both the motives and modes of organization of the royalists, or of the
absolutists, we understand why “liberalism” ended up being temporarily de-
feated in Spain and Portugal. We also perceive why it took nearly twenty years
for the independence movements to be consummated in Iberian America.
One of the book’s greatest virtues is to provide a summary and panorama of
the conflict between the two forces, without favoring either side, which stands
in contrast to the teleological—or simply patriotic—histories that focus on
republican, or separatist, troops.33
Hamnett’s ambition here is to understand why men and women chose to
die for a cause, and constitutional abstractions do not seem to be enough to
justify the price of blood. Who could argue with that? The history of military
polarization and violent dynamics consequently comes into full focus, rely-
ing on the revival of studies of this topic.34 As such, I would like to focus the
discussion on the general interpretation of war. The question is all the more
fundamental as it bears on the definition of the independence movements.
Whether they are considered to be “anti-colonial,” “revolutionary,” or “national
liberation” struggles, they necessarily entail a move to the extremes. But by
choosing a different orientation, as this book does, the often intense brutality
found on the battlefields, as well as among civilians, appears more enigmatic.
Therefore, why not use the notion of civil war more systematically? On this
point, I have found that the use of Patrice Gueniffey’s conceptual proposals
for French revolutionary terror has obscured the expression, rather that clari-
fied it.35 Should we see in the violence unfolding in the Ibero-American wars
the effect of a state policy that creates its own enemy in order to better ensure
its dominance over society, as this French historian suggests? It seems to me
that on this point the book follows a different interpretive approach, portray-
ing the interplay of mutual actions between the two opposing parties as the
33 I am not above criticism myself.

34 Juan Luis Ossa Santa Cruz, Armies, Politics and Revolution: Chile, 1808–1826 (Liverpool:
Liverpool University Press, 2014); Alejandro Martin Rabinovich, La société guerrière.
Pratiques, discours et valeurs militaires dans le Río de la Plata, 1806–1852 (Rennes, Presses
universitaires de Rennes, 2013); Rodrigo Moreno Gutiérrez, La trigarancia: fuerzas arma-
das en la consumación de la independencia: Nueva España, 1820–1821 (Mexico City: unam,
2016); Juan Ortiz Escamilla, Guerra y gobierno: los pueblos y la independencia de México,
1808–1825 (Mexico City: El Colegio de México, 2014); McFarlane, War and Independence in
Spanish America.
35 Patrice Gueniffey, La politique de la terreur: essai sur la violence révolutionnaire; 1789–1794
(Paris: Gallimard, 2003).

252 Ricketts Et al.
reinvestment of colonial society’s inner conflicts in the struggle for indepen-

dence, within the two parties. In this sense, the logic of brutality would be pro-
duced just as well by the dialogic between rebellion and repression as by the
replay of social fractures previous to the monarchical crises. And it may be the
weakness of the state or military institutions, more than their strength, that
explains the violence of confrontations.36 One of the book’s virtues is how it
shows the complexity of singular situations and moments, in social and politi-
cal patterns. The only small regret is that less attention is given to the general
account of the violence at the intersection of political and cultural dynamics
of sovereign crises and social and economic conflicts with socio-racial dimen-
sions of which Hamnett is well aware. It is true that approaches to these wars
in terms of social history are still rare, except to delve into local and regional
monographs that have proliferated on the occasion of the interest generated
by the celebration of the bicentennials. It is probably at this micro-local level
that it will be possible to answer simple questions about the forms of popular
engagement in the struggle, war experiences, and the human, material, and
symbolic impact of societal conflict. A great renewal is taking place, which
Hamnett’s book accompanies and illuminates with such skill and clarity.
4
If we now jump to the conclusions of the book, Ibero-American independence
movements are interpreted here, primarily as a moderate political process, in
terms of both intentions and achievements. This is clearly a fair assessment,
and the demonstration of this point wins support. If I fully agree with the idea
that most of the players in the emancipation movements supported modera-
tion, it is because of their concept of revolution as a constitutional change, or
because of their near-universal refusal of the excesses of the French Revolu-
tion. There is no doubt that the underlying structures of these societies of the
former regime and colonial organization were maintained in the first republi-
can century and demonstrate the scale of the continuities: hegemonic domi-
nation of the Catholic religion, the retention of slavery until 1888 in Brazil,
preservation of the government by justice, and the persistence of nonliberal
forms of property until the twentieth century. And it is probably in the social
sphere that continuities were the strongest, as the hierarchies based on eth-
nicity and color reproduced those that were based on blood purity (pureza de
sangre).
36 Jean-Clément Martin, Révolution et Contre- Révolution en France de 1789 à 1989. Les rouages
de l’histoire (Rennes: Presses universitaires de Rennes, 2015).

history 8 (2018) 231-258
However, the transformation of two empires, which, while not absolutist,

had no representation for the provinces or nobility (“estates”), into a constitu-
tional and liberal empire for Brazil, on the one hand, and into a dozen republics
based on the constitutional ideal of civil equality, on the other hand, in itself
represents a major upheaval in the political world map. Hamnett underlines
the importance of these events many times, adding that they were probably
underestimated in the global history of the nineteenth century. Beyond the
desire of elites, and even popular groups who, for many, were defending tradi-
tional values and customs, we should consider that the end of Iberian domina-
tion in the Americas triggered a process of transformation that presented cer-
tain features similar to those in other areas, such as Europe, the United States,
and the West Indies, particularly Saint-Domingue/Haiti. The intention of the
players is not the only consideration here, and issues, for example, of the era-
sure of blood purity, or native grievances (even if they most frequently were
expressed in the royalist camp), often gave a radical coloration to indepen-
dence in some parts of Iberian America. This is probably the case in Venezuela
and Colombia, with the commitment of many black and mulatto fighters, in
the case of war to the death. In the Río de la Plata, the determination to break
with the former regime was sharp, particularly in Montevideo, with Artigas. If
we set aside commercial interests, geopolitical issues, and elite circles, to turn
to the full mobilization of societies in the process of political transformation, it
seems to me that many arguments illustrate a violent conflagration. This issue
merges with the regional variations in the fall of these empires—a theme dear
to Hamnett—since it was probably far from the heart of the Spanish and Por-
tuguese empires (Mexico City, Lima, and Río) that the most radical question-
ing of the “colonial system” was revealed. And it is also in the long term that
we will be able to appreciate the changes, given that “political modernity”—an
expression purposely avoided in this book—formed at an extremely slow pace,
in Iberian America as elsewhere, when it did occur. The issue remains open
today, in the light of the political and social crises that many countries of this
region are going through, and which makes Brian Hamnett’s fine book such an
essential and exciting read.
Response by Brian Hamnett
I am glad to receive these detailed reviews of my book. They suggest many

points that can be developed subsequently. The book sought to break away
from traditional and national-oriented interpretations, reassess the issues
in question, and indicate ways in which our understanding of the period,

254 Ricketts Et al.
1770–1830, could be advanced. We might then reassess related questions, such

as (1) the nature of government in eighteenth-century Spain and Portugal, its
social and economic context, and the reforms projected or enacted with the
purpose of rescuing the Hispanic and Lusitanian Monarchies from collapse;37
(2) why the nineteenth century in Latin America was characterized by ongo-
ing struggles between networks of power dominated by powerful personalities
or groups, on the one hand, and, on the other hand, the different factions at-
tempting to codify the law, establish constitutional systems on firm founda-
tions, and diminish the scale of violence accompanying the transfer of power.
These are challenging themes of study. Among the great questions of all
historical study are the rise and fall of empires, their interrelation, and why
empires have characterized humanity’s historical experience more than na-
tion-states. I should like to have explored those topics more explicitly in the
first part of the book, but reasons of space and word count precluded that.
Nevertheless, I hope that my book still contributes toward grappling with such
questions.38
In many respects, this book and its virtual companion volume on the En-
lightenment reflect my view on the study of history over the past decades. I
would say that the two most formative influences on me as a young historian
were Steven Runciman39 and C.R. Boxer,40 both specialists on subjects never,
37 I attempted to address some of these questions in The Enlightenment in Iberia and Ibero-
America (Cardiff: University of Wales Press, 2017).
38 See, for instance, J.H. Parry, Trade and Dominion: The European Overseas Empires in the
Eighteenth Century (London: Cardinal, 1971); Paul Kennedy, The Rise and Fall of the Great
Powers: Economic Change and Military Conflict from 1500 to 2000 (London: Unwin Hyman,
1988); C.A. Bayly, Imperial Meridian: The British Empire and the World, 1780–1830 (London
and New York: Longman, 1989); James D. Tracy (ed.), The Rise of Merchant Empires, 1350–
1750 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990 and 1991); John Darwin, The Empire
Project: The Rise and Fall of the British World-System, 1830–1970 (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 2009); Timothy H. Parsons, The Rule of Empires: Those Who Built Them,
Those Who Endured Them, and Why They Always Fall (Oxford: Oxford University Press,
2010); Jane Burbank and Frederick Cooper, Empires in World History: Power and the Politics
of Difference (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2010).
39 Runciman’s bibliography is immense. See also Minoo Dinshaw, Outlandish Knight: The
Byzantine Life of Steven Runciman (London: Allen Lane, 2016).
40 I discovered Boxer as a Cambridge University student of the “Expansion of Europe”
course in 1963–64. See, for example, The Golden Age of Brazil, 1695–1750: Growing Pains of
a Colonial Society (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California, 1962); Portuguese
Society in the Tropics: The Municipal Councils of Goa, Macao, Bahia, and Luanda (Madi-
son: University of Wisconsin, 1965); The Portuguese Seaborne Empire, 1415–1825, (London:
Hutchinson and Co., 1969).

history 8 (2018) 231-258
at the time, regarded as “mainstream.” I was naturally attracted by their scope

and depth. Boxer’s Lusitanian studies brought together Asia, Africa, and the
Americas, linked through Portuguese expansion from the fifteenth century.
Unlike Runciman, I chose to study not the Byzantium of the East but the “Byz-
antium of the West.” In effect, we historians of the Hispanic and Lusitanian
Empires have been global historians long before what is called “Global History”
came into vogue in universities.
Monica Ricketts’s essay accurately identifies the focus of my argument to be
the collapse of the Iberian Empires rather than a stirring account of Indepen-
dence movements. I would stress also that I see this breaking-down process
as substantially antedating the Napoleonic intervention in Iberia in 1807–8,
which was by no means the initiating factor. My view is that François-Xavier
Guerra has over-emphasized its significance. Ricketts is correct to argue the
case for greater attention to the changing composition of the Lima élite—her
particular example for this general point. Perhaps historiographical stress on
the southern Andes (including my own) has tended to frustrate such an inves-
tigation. Peruvian scholars, with readier access to primary sources, might be in
a strong position to undertake this work, which, I firmly believe, must encom-
pass the composition of the provincial elites as well, and their relation to both
the Lima elite and the socio-ethnic groups below them. The Australian scholar
David Cahill had already made considerable strides in this direction, particu-
larly with respect to Cuzco. Similarly, northern Peruvian historians are illumi-
nating more of that neglected area’s important history. This suggests historical
studies rooted in sociology and prosopography, which would also enable cross-
regional comparisons both within Peru and with other areas of Latin America.
I disagree profoundly with much of Eduardo Posada-Carbó’s critique. In the
first place, he takes issue with that fact that I have not written the book that
he thinks I ought to have. My book reacts against precisely the perspectives
he appears to advocate. However, I do understand what he is saying and why
he is saying it. Even so, if I had followed his kind of interpretation, I would
have regarded that book as a travesty. As I understand it, his critique can be
summarized thus: that there should be an appreciation of a developing proto-
nationalist sentiment in the Americas before the imperial crisis of 1808; that
I diminish the role of Latin Americans in shaping the events of the 1810s and
1820s; that I have not recognized the “wider social and cultural implications” of
political transformation; that there is a “relative marginalization of the wider
Atlantic” in the book; and that I ought to have engaged more with the number
of authors he mentions.
From its first appearance in 1973 (with revisions in 1986), I have disagreed
with John Lynch’s The Spanish American Revolutions, where primary emphasis

256 Ricketts Et al.
focused on the revolutionary movements in Caracas and Buenos Aires. This set
New Spain and Peru at the end of the text, as though they represented a kind
of aberration. I thought this approach was a gross distortion of the period and
needed rebuttal. New Spain and Peru were Spain’s oldest established territo-
ries, and, for a long time, different combinations of their populations success-
fully resisted revolutionary and independence movements. That should have
been the starting point, not Caracas and Buenos Aires, which were of lesser
significance in the overall imperial structure as it developed over three centu-
ries. We needed to know what explained this long-lasting loyalism, which cut
across ethno-social groups.41
I had not engaged with J.H. Elliot’s Empires of the Atlantic World: Britain and
Spain in America, 1492–1830 (New Haven and London: Yale University Press,
2006) because the British-American dimension (and comparison) played no
part in the subject matter of the book that I was writing. In my view, that distin-
guished Hispanic scholar has written the wrong book. If he had exercised his
wide knowledge in the construction of a comparison between the Spanish and
Portuguese Empires—still conspicuous by its absence—then we should have
had the benefit of an undoubtedly magnificent work. My more recent teaching
career opened the subject of “Comparative Spanish and Portuguese Empires,
1500–1750,” and that approach, and the question of the methodology involved,
has been a major preoccupation of mine for some time. An excellent example
of how the Portuguese field should be approached in the Revolutionary and
Independence era is Gabriel Paquette, Imperial Portugal in the Age of Atlan-
tic Revolutions: The Luso-Brazilian World, c. 1770–1850 (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 2013). This is a work with which I have been ready to engage.
My concern had been to examine together Spain and Portugal’s internal po-
litical and economic life and to identify the explanations for imperial failure
therein.42 This has rarely been attempted, since each has usually been regarded
apart from the other by specialists in separate compartments.43 Furthermore,
much attention has been given to the supposed influence of ideas and foreign
examples. For that reason, I downplayed them in the book. There seemed to
41 Marcela Echeverri, Indian and Slave Royalism in the Age of Revolutions: Reform, Revolution,
and Royalism in the Northern Andes, 1780–1825 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,
2016), goes a long way to enlighten us about this with regard to New Granada.
42 I would argue for a revised analysis of the reign of Charles iv (1788–1808) in the Hispanic
Monarchy.
43 Among the few exceptions are James Lockhart and Stuart B. Schwartz, Early Latin Amer-
ica: A History of Spanish America and Brazil (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,
1983), and Lyle N. McAlister, Spain and Portugal in the New World, 1492–1700 (Minneapolis:
University of Minnesota, 1984).

history 8 (2018) 231-258
me to have been too many suppositions about the “influence” of the British
North-American and French Revolutions on events in Spanish and Portuguese
America, and lesser emphasis on what was happening in concrete terms with-
in those territories. I am not among the historians enthused by courses on the
“History of Ideas” or the “History of Political Thought.” Clément Thibaud’s re-
port notes my “skepticism about the role of ideas in history,” commenting that
I pay insufficient attention to “intellectual repertories.” I am prepared to ac-
knowledge that this may well be the case. Our three readers point to the social
and economic dimensions, which I have brought into the core of my argument.
I am far more interested in family groupings, interconnections, patron-client
relationships, financial collapse, and political breakdown than in ideas. Never-
theless, I have no problem in agreeing that a closer integration of cultural and
political factors with social and economic factors remains to be articulated.
They should not, however, be regarded as juxtapositions.
I have a slight attack of conscience about giving scant attention to “precursors,”
particularly to Miranda or Vizcardo, in both this book and my Enlightenment.
I have always seen historiographical stress on precursors as a construction of
ex post facto justifications.
Thibaud, whose work on northern South America I greatly admire, does
not share Posada-Carbó’s view. On the contrary, he highlights both my integra-
tion of European and American experience of imperial crisis and reconstruc-
tion, and my insertion of Latin-American emancipation within the Atlantic
and global contexts without ignoring regional variants. I viewed the two Ibe-
rian empires in both their European and American dimensions. These global
monarchies developed institutions and practices, reinforced by religion, that
lasted for centuries. They also created their own interlocking networks, cutting
across continents. Career patterns and business activities demonstrated this.
The constitutional systems introduced in Spain and Portugal after 1810 and
1820, respectively, sought to preserve these monarchies from disaggregation by
transforming them into forms of representative government and altering the
focus of sovereignty. A number of different constitutional and republican sys-
tems preceded and accompanied this across Spanish America. These signifi-
cantly modify the centrality accorded to the Cádiz experiment in some recent
historiography.
Revolutionary and counterrevolutionary violence accompanied that pro-
cess. I felt strongly that the extent and duration of violence should not be
ignored or underplayed, as it has been by Guerra, Rodriguez, and Annino.44
44 François-Xavier Guerra, Modernidad e independencias. Ensayos sobre las revoluciones

hispánicas (Madrid: Editorial mapfe, 1992); Antonio Annino (compiler), Historia de las

258 Ricketts Et al.
On the contrary, it should be the object of considered historical analysis, as

Thibaud himself has been doing for Venezuela and New Granada.45 There are
many cases of the outbreak and escalation of violence to investigate, whether
perpetrated by insurgents, governments, or soldieries of one side or another in
Spanish America and in Brazil. Spanish history alone provides many instances
in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.
All the tensions and contradictions I have mentioned throughout this re-
sponse should indicate the degree of change that resulted during the years 1770
to 1830, as I have argued in this book. Yet, a number of significant elements did
remain, though not necessarily unchanged. Among them were the municipali-
ties (transformed during the constitutional periods), as Ricketts has pointed
out, and the Natural Law tradition expressed at universities, colleges, and sem-
inaries, as the Argentinian historian José Carlos Chiaramonte has indicated.46
This continued alongside contemporary influences from abroad, the constitu-
tional experiment from Iberia, and the republican constitutions adopted in the
independent American states. Ibero-Americans took what they needed from
all of these sources, as they saw fit. We need, as Thibaud reminds us, to coun-
terbalance the continuities with the discontinuities in what I should prefer
to regard as the “successor states” to the Hispanic and Lusitanian monarchies
on the American continent. Much of the colonial inheritance still remained:
Catholic exclusivity, slavery, hierarchies of ethnicity and color, dominant fam-
ily networks, territorial redoubts resistant to institutional incorporation, am-
biguous rights of property ownership and labor relations, and diffuse systems
of juridical status despite adopted principles of equality before the law.
elecciones en Iberoamérica, siglo xix (Mexico City: Fondo de Cultura Económica, 1995);
Jaime E. Rodríguez, The Independence of Spanish America (Cambridge: Cambridge Uni-
versity Press, 1998).
45 Clément Thibaud, Repúblicas en Armas. Los ejércitos bolivarianos en la Guerra de Inde-
pendencia en Colombia y Venezuela (Bogotá and Lima: Institut français d’études andines,
Editorial Planeta Colombiana s.a., 2003).
46 For instance, José Carlos Chiaramonte, “The Ancient Constitution after Independence
(1808–1852),” Hispanic American Historical Review 90, no. 3 (August 2010): 455–89.

history 8 (2018) 231-258

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journal of early american history 8 (2018) 231-258

Mónica Ricketts (review)

Eduardo Posada-Carbó (review)

Clément Thibaud (review)

Brian Hamnett (response)

© koninklijke brill nv, leiden, 2018 | doi 10.1163/18770703-00803005

the exclusion of an Atlantic perspective, and the lack of attention to revolutionary

Latin American Independence – Brazilian Independence – Ibero-American Indepen-

Review by Monica Ricketts

The End of Iberian Rule offers a reevaluation of independence in Latin Ameri-

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The breakdown of rule in America is seen as the Iberian expression of a major

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Review by Eduardo Posada-Carbó

8 Brian R. Hamnett, The Historical Novel in Nineteenth-Century Europe: Representations of Real-

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journal of early americanDownloaded

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Perhaps more significantly, why should an “Andean dimension” be so con-

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of 1807–8, both immersed in prolonged crises where family networks deep-

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18 Jonathan Eastwood, The Rise of Venezuelan Nationalism (Gainesville: University Press of

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Review by Clément Thibaud

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the Spanish. This point, highlighted by François-Xavier Guerra,23 poses the

23 François-Xavier Guerra, Modernidad e independencias: ensayos sobre las revoluciones his-

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commerce raiding, or the circulation of “seditious papers,” have linked Franco-

26 João Paulo G. Pimenta, Brasil y las independencias de Hispanoamérica (Castellón: Publica-

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works of Jaime E. Rodriguez.27 This perspective, focused on the “liberal revolu-

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33 I am not above criticism myself.

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reinvestment of colonial society’s inner conflicts in the struggle for indepen-

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However, the transformation of two empires, which, while not absolutist,

Response by Brian Hamnett

I am glad to receive these detailed reviews of my book. They suggest many

journal of early american history 8 (2018) 231-258Downloaded from Brill.com11/14/2020 12:07:08AM

1770–1830, could be advanced. We might then reassess related questions, such

journal of early americanDownloaded

at the time, regarded as “mainstream.” I was naturally attracted by their scope

journal of early american history 8 (2018) 231-258Downloaded from Brill.com11/14/2020 12:07:08AM

journal of early americanDownloaded

44 François-Xavier Guerra, Modernidad e independencias. Ensayos sobre las revoluciones

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On the contrary, it should be the object of considered historical analysis, as

journal of early americanDownloaded

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