F e d e r a l i s m o s l a t i n o a m e r i c a n o s : M e x i c o , B r a s i l , A r g e n t i n a .

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Coordinated by m a r -
c e l l o CARMAGNANI. Mexico City: El Colegio de Mexico, 1993. Notes. Index.
416 pp. Paper.
Globalization, with the seemingly paradoxical forces of integration and disinte­
gration it unleashes, is causing a good deal of interest in federalism once again,
and not just in the United States, Canada, Brazil, and Colombia, which have the
strongest federal traditions in the Western Hemisphere. In Mexico and Argentina,
federalism has been downplayed throughout the twentieth century; but with pri­
vatization and state downsizing it has gained renewed interest. All the more reason
to welcome this volume, with its discussion of Mexican and Argentine federalism
in comparative historical perspective with the inescapable federalist traditions of
Brazil. Indeed, federalism has a long tradition in Latin America, as this impor­
tant book makes clear. And it is no mere copy or simplistic adaptation of the U.S.
model, as historians have often alleged in their efforts to explain centralism.
Divided into three sections, the book looks first at the origins of federalism in
the three countries, then devotes a section to the liberal period (1850 to the 1930s)
and another to the age of centralism, which is now ending. The contributors weave
in socioeconomic data and findings from other social sciences with varying degrees
of success, as might be expected from a multiauthor conference volume. Excellent
bibliographies are appended to each chapter. Organized by Marcello Carmagnani
at El Colegio de Mexico in 1992, the ambitious conference was both well timed
and well conceived. What, then, do we learn from the resulting book?
Perhaps the most interesting chapter in section one is Jose Murilo de Car­
valho’s discussion of Brazilian federalism, which lacked a civic base. Self-rule, one
of federalism’s objectives, produced not liberty but oligarchy; while monarchical
centralism, its counterweight, failed to promote a broad-based, educated citizenry.
In Argentina, the wonder is that sovereign provinces never abandoned the sense
of belonging to a nation and rather meekly knuckled under to centralization in the
1850s, while in Mexico nothing seemed to work until the catalyst of war with the
United States.
Carmagnani’s own chapter in section 2 delineates well the struggle to bal­
ance state power with liberty. He finds that a viable solution was achieved under
Mexican federalism until state power won out in the last decade of the nineteenth
century. Joseph Love’s excellent summary links Brazil’s decentralized institutions
of the period to the different regional economies. Natalio Botana’s brisk discussion
of Argentine federalism is a welcome guide through the political history of this
period.
Turning to contemporary history, section 3 describes how the three states,
each in its own way, were constrained to rediscover their federalist traditions
as centralized power proved inadequate to the tasks of incorporating new social
groups and producing economic growth in an increasingly global economy. Corpo-

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 ratist solutions have proved surprisingly short-lived, whereas federalist traditions
are surprisingly strong, at least to those of us who consumed a steady diet of
bureaucratic authoritarianism for so many years.
It seems that an era of federalist experimentation is upon us; and to this re­
viewer at least, the example of the United States, with its proven federal system,
is again highly relevant to Latin American political practice. Federalism, with its
flexibility and its ability, when functioning properly, to allocate funds and respon­
sibilities to the appropriate level of government, can accommodate tensions at least
within nation-states, if less surely in regions, in this age of NAFTA and other trad­
ing blocs. Comparison, even when limited to the three countries under review, can
reveal much about the underlying patterns as well as the strategies used in Latin
American statecraft. “Federalism Revisited” would have been a good subtitle for
this highly recommended collection.

JOHN D. w ir t h , Stanford UniversityWVUTSRQPONMLKJIHGFEDCBA

T h e B o liv a r ia n P r e s id e n ts : C o n v e r s a tio n s a n d C o r r e s p o n d e n c e w ith th e P r e s id e n ts

By Ro b e r t j. Al e x a n d e r .
o f B o liv ia , P e r u , E c u a d o r , C o lo m b ia , a n d V e n e z u e la .
Westport: Praeger, 1994. Bibliography. Index, x, 283 pp. Cloth. $59.95.

This book is the second of a four-volume series collecting the notes of personal
conversations and correspondence between the author and various Latin American
leaders. In more than half a century of active professional life, Robert Alexander,
now emeritus professor at Rutgers University, has known most of the region’s lead­
ing political figures. Perhaps best known himself for his writing on the Bolivian
national revolution, Alexander has also written extensively on Latin American
political parties and on such figures as Juan Domingo Peron, Arturo Alessandri,
Raul Haya de la Torre, Romulo Betancourt, and Juscelino Kubitschek. This vol­
ume offers 129 entries of correspondence or conversation from 22 leaders of the 5
nations. Not surprisingly, the Venezuelan and Bolivian entries make up the vast
majority.
The one theme that emerges is that of personalism in Latin American politics.
From the comment of Carlos Andres Perez that personalism is the factor respon­
sible for the great failure of democracy in all of Latin America to Walter Guevara
Arze’s observation that the whole cause of the MNR’s downfall was the person­
alism of Victor Paz Estenssoro, the power of the individual personality in Latin
American political life is apparent throughout the collected commentary.
A few colorful contrasts stand out. Peru’s Fernando Belaunde Terry insists that
nationalism must reflect a country’s own history, while Eduardo Santos of Colom­
bia condemns nationalism based on “national” culture rather than universal West­
ern culture. Although he was overthrown by his own military, Belaunde asserts
that all Latin American nations must maintain strong armed forces. Oswaldo Hur­

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