Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of figures
- List of tables
- Dedication
- Preface
- List of acronyms
- Table of official exchange rate parities to US dollar
- Map: Central America
- 1 A century of independence: foundations of export-led growth
- 2 Central America in the 1920s: reform and consolidation
- 3 The 1929 depression
- 4 Economic recovery and political reaction in the 1930s
- 5 Central America and the Second World War
- 6 Post-war economic recovery
- 7 The struggle for democracy, the Cold War and the Labour movement in the first post-war decade
- 8 The foundations of modern export-led growth, 1954–60
- 9 The illusion of a golden age, 1960–70
- 10 External shocks and the challenge to the social order, 1970–9
- 11 The descent into regional crisis
- 12 Conclusions
- Methodological Appendix
- Statistical Appendix
- Notes
- Bibliography
- Index
- CAMBRIDGE LATIN AMERICAN STUDIES
1 - A century of independence: foundations of export-led growth
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 03 February 2010
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of figures
- List of tables
- Dedication
- Preface
- List of acronyms
- Table of official exchange rate parities to US dollar
- Map: Central America
- 1 A century of independence: foundations of export-led growth
- 2 Central America in the 1920s: reform and consolidation
- 3 The 1929 depression
- 4 Economic recovery and political reaction in the 1930s
- 5 Central America and the Second World War
- 6 Post-war economic recovery
- 7 The struggle for democracy, the Cold War and the Labour movement in the first post-war decade
- 8 The foundations of modern export-led growth, 1954–60
- 9 The illusion of a golden age, 1960–70
- 10 External shocks and the challenge to the social order, 1970–9
- 11 The descent into regional crisis
- 12 Conclusions
- Methodological Appendix
- Statistical Appendix
- Notes
- Bibliography
- Index
- CAMBRIDGE LATIN AMERICAN STUDIES
Summary
To much of the outside world, Central America in 1920 was a source of amusement. O. Henry's unflattering description of ‘banana republics’ in Cabbages and Kings (Henry, 1917) had caught the foreigners' imagination and even those who had travelled widely in the region (e.g. Cunningham, 1922) could not resist the lure of characters like Lee Christmas, the former United States railway engineer, who was widely credited with making and breaking governments in the northern republics of Central America. The US occupation of Nicaragua since 1912 did little to encourage the outside world to associate the region with progress and development and the fact that a Nicaraguan President had invited the US marines in the first place probably only made matters worse.
Central Americans, however, viewing the progress of the region in the century since independence, had reasons for feeling a sense of satisfaction. The turmoil of the first fifty years had given way to a half-century (1870–1920) of steady, if not unbroken, economic progress. This was based above all on the solid foundations of two export crops (coffee and bananas), which appeared to be well suited to climatic conditions in Central America and which were absorbed in increasing quantities by the world market. The introduction of crops to Central America of permanent utility to the world market ended a search which had been going on fruitlessly since colonial times (McLeod, 1973). It also solved the problem of how to integrate the region into the world economy (a goal considered desirable by all Central American leaders in the nineteenth century).
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- Information
- The Political Economy of Central America since 1920 , pp. 1 - 24Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 1987