From Development to Dictatorship

Bolivia and the Alliance for Progress in the Kennedy Era

Nonfiction, History, Americas, South America, United States, 20th Century
Cover of the book From Development to Dictatorship by Thomas C. Field, Cornell University Press
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Author: Thomas C. Field ISBN: 9780801470448
Publisher: Cornell University Press Publication: May 8, 2014
Imprint: Cornell University Press Language: English
Author: Thomas C. Field
ISBN: 9780801470448
Publisher: Cornell University Press
Publication: May 8, 2014
Imprint: Cornell University Press
Language: English

During the most idealistic years of John F. Kennedy’s Alliance for Progress development program, Bolivia was the highest per capita recipient of U.S. foreign aid in Latin America. Nonetheless, Washington’s modernization programs in early 1960s Bolivia ended up on a collision course with important sectors of the country’s civil society, including radical workers, rebellious students, and a plethora of rightwing and leftwing political parties. In From Development to Dictatorship, Thomas C. Field Jr. reconstructs the untold story of USAID’s first years in Bolivia, including the country’s 1964 military coup d’état.

Field draws heavily on local sources to demonstrate that Bolivia’s turn toward anticommunist, development-oriented dictatorship was the logical and practical culmination of the military-led modernization paradigm that provided the liberal underpinnings of Kennedy’s Alliance for Progress. In the process, the book explores several underappreciated aspects of Cold War liberal internationalism: the tendency of "development" to encourage authoritarian solutions to political unrest, the connection between modernization theories and the rise of Third World armed forces, and the intimacy between USAID and CIA covert operations. At the same time, the book challenges the conventional dichotomy between ideology and strategy in international politics, and it engages with a growing literature on development as a key rubric for understanding the interconnected processes of decolonization and the Cold War.

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During the most idealistic years of John F. Kennedy’s Alliance for Progress development program, Bolivia was the highest per capita recipient of U.S. foreign aid in Latin America. Nonetheless, Washington’s modernization programs in early 1960s Bolivia ended up on a collision course with important sectors of the country’s civil society, including radical workers, rebellious students, and a plethora of rightwing and leftwing political parties. In From Development to Dictatorship, Thomas C. Field Jr. reconstructs the untold story of USAID’s first years in Bolivia, including the country’s 1964 military coup d’état.

Field draws heavily on local sources to demonstrate that Bolivia’s turn toward anticommunist, development-oriented dictatorship was the logical and practical culmination of the military-led modernization paradigm that provided the liberal underpinnings of Kennedy’s Alliance for Progress. In the process, the book explores several underappreciated aspects of Cold War liberal internationalism: the tendency of "development" to encourage authoritarian solutions to political unrest, the connection between modernization theories and the rise of Third World armed forces, and the intimacy between USAID and CIA covert operations. At the same time, the book challenges the conventional dichotomy between ideology and strategy in international politics, and it engages with a growing literature on development as a key rubric for understanding the interconnected processes of decolonization and the Cold War.

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