ABSTRACT
In the past two centuries, the region we know as Latin America has experienced immense changes, generally following the patterns of the rest of the Western world. These changes include the shift from colonial status to independence; from monarchy to democracy; from agricultural, pastoral, and mining economies to industrial ones; from rural to urban residency; from traditional cultures to multifaceted ones; and from simple to complex societies. Historians usually emphasize continuities over long periods, but in the case of modern Latin America, the changes clearly overwhelmed lingering inheritances from the past. The earliest economic boom in Latin America coincided with the last round of fighting for independence, and it was not experienced uniformly throughout the hemisphere. Most of the generation of the populists after World War II followed Economic Commission for Latin America (ECLA) strategies to industrialize and gain a degree of economic independence from the industrialized world.
