Abstract, Puerto Rico’s Summer 2019 Uprising and the Crisis of Colonialism

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Puerto Rico’s Summer 2019 Uprising and the Crisis of Colonialism

by Pedro Cabán

July 22, 2019, was a watershed moment in Puerto Rico’s history. On that day Puerto Ricans by the hundreds of thousands marched and demanded the resignation of Ricardo Rosselló Nevares, the colony’s inept and ethically bankrupt governor. On August 2 the pro-statehood governor became the first elected governor of Puerto Rico to resign his office.

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Political Report # 1393 Puerto Ricans Are Resisting Policing as a Solution to Crisis

By Anton Woronczuk, Truthout

In Policing Life and Death: Race, Violence, and Resistance in Puerto Rico, author Marisol LeBrón shows how Puerto Rico’s colonial relationship with the U.S. has shaped policing in the archipelago as a form of “colonial crisis management.” Her new book exposes the ways policing harms marginalized communities and deepens social inequality. In this interview, LeBrón discusses the legacy of punitive “solutions” and the various ways Puerto Ricans are challenging state violence and building alternative forms of justice. Truthout: Policing Life and Death begins with the history of a series of anti-crime measures introduced in Puerto Rico in 1993 called mano dura contra el crimen. What exactly was mano dura and why is it central to understanding the legacy of policing in Puerto Rico? Marisol LeBrón: Mano dura contra el crimen, which translates to “iron fist against crime,” was a series of crime-reduction measures introduced by Puerto Rican Gov. Pedro Rosselló in 1993. As part of mano dura, police and military forces raided and occupied public housing and other low-income spaces around the archipelago, but primarily across the big island, in an effort to eliminate drug trafficking. The activation of the Puerto Rican National Guard as part of mano dura’s “war against crime” remains one of the longest “peacetime” mobilizations of a National Guard unit under U.S. jurisdiction. The willingness of the Puerto Rican government to unleash military tactics and technology against public housing and barrio residents really showed the extent to which some of Puerto Rico’s most vulnerable citizens had been marked as internal enemies of the state.

Abstract, Indigenous Intellectuals in Contemporary Ecuador: Encounters with “Seven Erroneous Theses about Latin America”

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Indigenous Intellectuals in Contemporary Ecuador: Encounters with “Seven Erroneous Theses about Latin America”
by  Blanca Soledad Fernández


The indigenous intellectuals who were part of the foundation of the Ecuadorean indigenous movement of the 1980s contributed to the theoretical and political grounding of the concept of the plurinational state that is now recognized in the country’s new constitution. This concept constitutes a critique of the idea of nationhood that developed in Latin America throughout the twentieth century. A comparative reading of these intellectuals’ work on the occasion of the fiftieth anniversary of the publication of Rodolfo Stavenhagen’s “Seven Erroneous Theses about Latin America” reveals two themes: colonial continuity and historical continuity. Both can be seen as a “settling of scores” with colonialism understood both as a historical period and as an analytical term for understanding the social reality of Latin America.

Abstract, Applying Stavenhagen’s Analytical Approach to Research on Argentine Agrarian Social Structure

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Applying Stavenhagen’s Analytical Approach to Research on Argentine Agrarian Social Structure
by  Adriana Chazarreta


Rodolfo Stavenhagen’s analytical approach, as laid out in his 1965 “Seven Erroneous Theses about Latin America,” prioritized a dialectical perspective and relationships of functionality between two dynamics within a single structure and crystallized in fundamental conceptual proposals such as internal colonialism and a focus on the analysis of agrarian social structure. Application of the approach to current research problems in Argentina sheds light on the changes in agrarian social structure that have taken place in recent decades, in particular changes in dominant forms of land tenure, the relations of production, and the functional relationships between areas at different levels of development.

Abstract, Development in Southern Mexico: Empirical Verification of the “Seven Erroneous Theses about Latin America”

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Development in Southern Mexico: Empirical Verification of the “Seven Erroneous Theses about Latin America”
by Carlos Alberto Jiménez-Bandala


An analysis of underdevelopment and poverty in the Papaloapan Basin of southern Mexico shows that, despite the use of different development models in the neoliberal pattern of accumulation, structural conditions still promote a form of internal colonialism that enables the growth of one region at the expense of another. Recent public policies meant to support development in the region seem to be based on the dominant twentieth-century perspectives that Stavenhagen called “erroneous theses about Latin America.”

Political Report # 1145 Puerto Rico: The Crisis Is About Colonialism, Not Debt

By Linda Backiel, Monthly Review

Tourists are fascinated by the heavy blue cobblestones that pave the streets of Old San Juan. Why they are there is as good an explanation as any for Puerto Rico's current crisis. In the days of Spanish colonialism, they were ballast to keep the ships crossing the Atlantic from tossing about and blowing over. The ships came empty, and left for Spain full of gold, silver, and other riches stolen from the indigenous Taínos. The ballast left behind was used to pave the streets. Puerto Rico has been sacked by colonial powers for half a millennium. Is it any wonder it is in dire straits? Today, it is $73 billion in debt. As a point of comparison: Greece recently asked for about $82 billion from the European Union. The German finance minister thought it was funny when he proposed to U.S. Treasury Secretary Jack Lew that the Eurozone exchange Greece for Puerto Rico. This is not funny; it is not even a good analogy. Neither the Germans nor the Eurozone have the power to "trade Greece" to anyone; its citizens can tell their prime minister what they think about EU debt proposals. Of course, they have to weigh their choice against the threat of being kicked out of the Eurozone.1

Political Report # 1134 No More Colonialism Disguised as Financial Assistance: The US Must Relinquish Puerto Rico By Nelson A. Denis, Truthout

Puerto Rican Congressional Delegate Pedro Pierluisi speaks during a National Day of Action for Puerto Rico during a news conference on Capitol Hill in Washington, December 2, 2015. The impoverished island turned to hedge funds to stave off collapse; now someone has to pay. (Photo: Zach Gibson / The New York Times) By Nelson A. Denis, Truthout

This year, 2016, marks a new era in Caribbean colonialism. The US Congress is preparing a "Financial Control Authority," which will supervise the finances of the entire government of Puerto Rico -- its legislature and courts, public authorities, pension system and all leases, union contracts and collective bargaining agreements. The authority will also restructure the entire public workforce (including teachers and police), freeze public pensions and ensure "the payment of debt obligations." Then it will issue its own debt, spend the funds as it sees fit and leave Puerto Rico to pay the bill. Congress can veto any law passed in Puerto Rico. The authority will also have prosecutorial powers. It will be empowered to "conduct necessary investigations" into the government of Puerto Rico, or in other words, be empowered to hold hearings, secure government records, demand evidence, take testimony, subpoena witnesses and administer oaths -- under penalty of perjury -- to all witnesses. Any witness who fails to appear or to supply information will be subject to criminal prosecution and removal from office. This includes any elected official on the island: even the governor and attorney general. All of these powers are enumerated in the 157-page Senate Bill 2381, also known as the "Puerto Rico Assistance Act of 2015," which is currently under review in the US Senate. The bill is supported by banking lobbyists in Washington, DC, since it will ensure the repayment of $72 billion in public debt and exclude any bankruptcy protections. It is opposed by many of the island's journalists, union leaders and independence advocates, who view the looming "authority" as nothing more than a hedge fund collection agency. They also fear the imposition of a de facto dictatorship in the Caribbean: created in Washington, operated from Wall Street, all disguised as a "management assistance authority." But the problem in Puerto Rico is not its debt, the vulture funds or even the Financial Control Authority. The problem is that Puerto Rico, a tiny island in the Caribbean, is staring into the rifle barrel of the entire US capitalist system. Sooner or later, there will be an explosion.

Political Report # 1057 Puerto Rico's Economic and Fiscal Crisis: Made in the U.S.A. by Victor M. Rodriguez, CounterPunch

By Victor M. Rodriguez, CounterPunch

On Tuesday June 23, the Special Decolonization Committee of the United Nations heard 30 petitioners who came to denounce from various perspectives the colonial situation of Puerto Rico. For the 34th time the UN committee approved a resolution requesting that the United States allow Puerto Rico to exercise its right to self-determination and independence. In 1953, the U.S. and colonial administrators lied to the U.N. in order to get Puerto Rico off the list of territories which still had not achieved self-determination. They told the UN that Puerto Rico in 1952 had drafted a constitution and now was exercising self-determination. This despite the fact, as Jose Trias Monge who was the Attorney General of Puerto Rico from 1953 and 1957 and a central actor in the colonial government, revealed in his book Puerto Rico the Trials of the Oldest Colony in the World (1997) that the government of the United States, through the state department and the department of the interior said "Puerto Rico should still be considered a territory."  Through political pressure in a smaller United Nations, the US petition to remove Puerto Rico from the list was approved with 26-16 and eighteen abstentions.