ABSTRACT
In the 1970s, Peru was a highly unequal society with a rapidly growing economy. It had great economic, cultural and ethnic diversity combined with a high concentration of power and wealth. Historically, Peruvian society was polarized between two main classes: the ‘oligarchy’—a set of urban-based elites linked by kinship, landownership and political power—and the peasants. These class divisions were intertwined with ethnicity, and with cultural, linguistic and regional differences.
