ABSTRACT
The military-led revolution in 1968 was strongly influenced by a well developed tradition of anti-oligarchic thought in Peru stretching back nearly one hundred years. The radical critique of the Peruvian oligarchy began primarily with the works of Manuel Gonzalez Prada. Prada’s diagnosis of the superficiality of upper-class Peruvian culture also received corroboration in the early writings of the moderate conservative victor Andres Belaunde, a distinguished diplomatist and uncle of Peru’s constitutional president. There are many contemporary intellectuals in Peru who have developed positions on the nature of elite domination and the direction that reforms should take. The radical critique of the Peruvian oligarchy began primarily with the works of Gonzalez Prada. Born to an aristocratic family of the first order, Gonzalez Prada turned against his own class after Peru’s humiliating defeat in the War of the Pacific convinced him of the need for radical reform to forge a strong and unified nation.
