ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses the role played by violence as a key strategy to take power by the Latin American left after the triumph of the Cuban Revolution (1959) and the subsequent diffusion of certain political, social, and action readings emanating from the Cuban revolutionary process with high capacity to trigger mobilization in different countries and whose parent key was violence. The case studies selected are Uruguay and El Salvador which are interesting for their differences within the New Left wave, by the degree of the challenge posed by each mobilization process, and by the subsequent insertion into the political system. In each case understandings and justifications for the use of violence as well as the repertoires of action used are the main topics under scrutiny. The article concludes with a reflection on the closure of those experiences of armed struggle, the renunciation of violence and the achievements and limitations of the armed movements of this wave in the region.
