ABSTRACT
THE PHILOSOPHER HANNAH Arendt (1963: 27) argued that revolutions have two things in common: they are characterized by a striving for freedom against repres-sion, and this quest for freedom must be connected to “novelty”—that is, an attempt to create a new social order. Since Marx wrote in the mid-1880s, said Arendt, these themes have been tied to the “social question”; that is, the makers of revolution seek freedom but believe that it cannot be fully achieved without radical changes in social and economic conditions (55-61). Latin America’s break from colonialism brought about a political revolution accompanied by violence and social upheaval, but in the end it would not qualify as a revolution in the terms defi ned by Arendt. Bolívar’s frustration and bitterness refl ect that fact.
