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By Héctor Pérez Brignolli

From the Introduction

Pérez Brignolli's paper elaborates a general framework in which to rethink the last hundred years of the Central American past. No one doubts that the present Central American crisis has deep historical roots. However, a rapid overview of the vast literature produced in the United States on this subject leads one to the conclusion that the historical considerations of the crisis are mostly superficial, and in some cases the historical data do not even exist. This is also true for the smaller quantity of literature produced in Central America. Undoubtedly, a reason for that situation is the underdevelopment of Central America historiography, and the fact that historiography studies have always focused on national topics and have neglected comparative analysis with the other countries.

In looking at the political scenario of the crisis in the last ten years, what catches one's attention is the sharp contrast between the political stability and the validity of the representative democracy in Costa Rica and the military coups, social upheaval, and popular insurrection which have afflicted the rest of Central America. The contrast is more surprising if one considers that Costa Rica and its four neighbors--Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras and Nicaragua-have many commqn traits: similar export economies, an industrialization process under the Central American Common Market, and a historical past that is, to a certain degree, shared. Thus, one wonders how the countries of Central America, while sharing similar traits, have striking differences in their political situations. In the pages that follow, we will consider the basic characteristics of export economies and their integration into the world economy during the second half of the nineteenth century. The type of production organization in Costa Rica historically has been different from that of Guatemala and El Salvador. Furthermore, the nature of the State and of the prevailing political regime is linked to peculiar characteristics of these economic structures. The cases of Honduras and Nicaragua are studied separately, to be able to render full justice to the incidence of international political factors and other "obstacles to development" which produce their "belated" and "frustrated" integration into the world market.

 

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