ABSTRACT
My aim in this paper is to explore those limitations on the effectiveness of central planning and national development policies that result from small-scale political and economic activity in provincial areas. Since I see this local level activity as being an integral part of contemporary development processes in Latin America, I also question government emphasis on centralized organization and planning in producing social and economic development. Such an emphasis contains a centralist bias which overlooks the extent to which national development continues to be influenced by the particular history of local populations and by their relative autonomy in social and economic organization.
