ABSTRACT
The Nicaraguan insurrection of 1977-1979 has roots in the eighteenth century. During the eighteenth century, this region experienced intense social change due to administrative and economic reforms under Spain's Bourbon monarchs and to the introduction of the reformist ideology of economic liberalism. Among other things, liberalism advocated the freeing of trade from monarchical controls and thus appealed to interests that sought to circumvent established economic monopolies and concessions. Nicaraguan independence came in two stages, the first beginning in 1821 when the captaincy general was separated from Spain as an appendage of the Mexican Empire. The armed struggle between Mexico and Spain occurred primarily within Mexico itself, and little fighting touched the Central American isthmus. The continuing civil war, marked by widespread atrocities on both sides, eventually destroyed the Central American Federation and completed the second step of Nicaraguan independence.
