Liberalismo tropical’: cómo explicar el auge de una doctrina económica europea en América Latina, 1780-1885 .

Abstract

The article traces the processes through which the northwest European doctrine of economic liberalism achieved dominance in nineteenth century Latin America. It focuses on transmission channels, domestic and foreign interest groups, institutions, civil society, economic structures and conjunctures, and political cultures to account for the spread on economic liberalism in various countries of the region between the 1770s and 1890. The doctrine was dominant in Latin America for a shorter time than commonly thought, only between ca. 1850 and 1890, and underwent multiple changes and adjustments in each of the region’s countries. After 1890, promotion of externally lead growth went hand in hand with a gradual turning away from economic liberalism.

Keywords

• Economic liberalism
• Enlightenment
• classical political economy
• book trade
• interest groups
• national political cultures
• Latin America
• Nineteenth-Century.