Book Reviews: Caudillo: A Portrait of Antonio Guzmán Blanco. By GEORGE S. WISE. (New York: Columbia University Press. 1951. Pp. xvii, 190. $3.00.)
| Author | William S. Stokes |
| Date | 01 December 1952 |
| Published date | 01 December 1952 |
| DOI | 10.1177/106591295200500429 |
| Subject Matter | Articles |
688
except
in
cases
of
grave
national
emergency&dquo;
(p.
215).
Mexican
presidents
do
not
have
to
&dquo;persuade&dquo;
their
subservient
legislatures.
Furthermore,
the
Constitution
of
1917
already
prohibited
the
use
of
extraordinary
powers
other
than
in
a
national
emergency
and
the
proposed
amendment
was
redundant
and
virtually
meaningless.
CArdenas
had
asked
for
and
been
granted
such
powers
for
three
years
prior
to
the
amendment
and had
used
them
without
regard
either
to
the
prescribed
emergency
or
to
the
form
provided
in
the
Constitution.
There
could
have
been
a
more
objective
analysis
of
the
election
of
1940
and
of
CArdenas’
relations
with
his
political
party
(P.N.R.,
later
P.R.M.).
Nevertheless,
Mr.
Townsend
has
provided
Latin-Americanists
with
a
useful
volume,
full
of
detail
unavailable
elsewhere.
STEPHEN
S.
GOODSPEED.
Santa
Barbara
College.
Caudillo:
A
Portrait
of
Antonio
Guzmán
Blanco.
By
GEORGE
S.
WISE.
(New
York:
Columbia
University
Press.
1951.
Pp.
xvii,
190.
$3.00.)
This
more
than
a
biographical
sketch
of
a
nineteenth
century
Vene,
zuelan
caudiLlo
who
controlled
government
for
about
twenty
years
is
a
case
study
in
caudillismo
in
which
the
author
argues
that
generalizations
for
much
of
Latin
America
can
be
derived
from
analysis
of
the
life
and
times
of
GuzmAn
Blanco.
To
those
who
contend
that
there
are
too
many
ethnic,
historical,
and
cultural
differences
between,
say,
Venezuela
and
Argentina,
to
permit
even
broad
generalizations,
the
author
declares:
,
They
[the
Latin-American
countries]
had
a
colonial
heritage
which
had
restricted
and
channeled
their
economic
development
and had
given
them
little
scope
for
the
exercise
of
their
own
political
capacities;
a
class
structure
based
largely
on
colonial
domination
and
racial
diversity;
and
an
Iberian
culture
that
gave
great
scope
to
Catholicism,
to
landed
aristocracy
and
to
semifeudal
institutions.
Furthermore,
certain
underlying
con-
ditions
were
broadly
characteristic
of
the
Latin
American
terrain
as
a
whole
(p.
ix).
It
is
not
surprising,
then,
that
in
the evolution
of
their
political
behavior
a
common
pattern
or
tendency
should
emerge,
overriding
to
a
considerable
extent
the
differences
of
various
kinds
that
distinguished
one
country
from
another
(p.
ix).
In
analyzing
races,
classes,
and
social
institutions
in
the
colonial
period,
the
author
concludes
that
the
individual
was
conditioned
to
author-
itarianism.
Hence,
caudillismo
is
explicable
in
terms
of
historical
and
cultural
tradition,
and
the
conditions
for
democracy
did
not
exist.
His-
panic
attitudes
in
respect
to
government
and
politics
derived
from
the
colonial
period
prevailed
at
least
through
the
administrations
of
Guzmán
Blanco,
and
many
of
his
practices
find
their
modern
counterparts
in
most
of
the
Latin-American
countries.
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