Crossroads of Intervention: Insurgency and Counterinsurgency Lessons from Central America (Terrorism, Counterinsurgency, and Irregular Warfare) (Hardcover), by Todd Greentree. Praeger Security International General Interest-Cloth (March 30, 2008).
The challenges that vex the United States today in Iraq, Afghanistan, and elsewhere are not altogether as new and unique as they seem. U.S. involvement in Central America during the 1980s clearly demonstrated the costs, risks, and limits to intervention and the use of force in internal conflicts. Much can be learned today about the nature of irregular warfare from the experiences of the United States and the other protagonists in Central America during the final phase of the Cold War. The U.S. perceived a threat to national security in these wars from determined insurgents with a compelling revolutionary ideology and powerful allies that linked them to other conflicts around the world. This strategy and policy analysis makes a new contribution to irregular warfare theory through an examination of the origins, strategic dynamics, and termination of the Sandinista insurrection in Nicaragua, the decade long counterinsurgency of the Salvadoran government against the FMLN guerrillas, and the concurrent Contra insurgency against the Sandinistas. Many of the lessons about the fundamental and recurring nature of irregular warfare are being rediscovered in the current challenges of radical Islam, Iraq, Afghanistan, and elsewhere, despite the great differences in circumstance, culture, and geography. In the Central American case, three successive Presidents encountered serious domestic controversy over U.S. policies and refrained from sending U.S. combat troops to intervene directly. Most importantly, they prudently heeded warnings that internal wars of all types are rarely subject to military solutions, because their natures are equally and fundamentally political. Greentree presents his argument as a strategy and policy case study of the civil wars in Nicaragua and El Salvador during the final decade of the Cold War. The book comprises an examination of the origins, strategic dynamics, and termination of these wars from the points of view of the main participants--Nicaragua, El Salvador, Cuba, the Soviet Union, and the United States. It also develops a general conceptual framework for understanding the nature of insurgency, counterinsurgency, revolution, and intervention that builds on classic strategic theory and contemporary thought on irregular warfare. From the perspective of global superpower conflict, the wars in Central America were peripheral "small wars" or "low intensity conflicts". However, for the internal protagonists these were total and bloody wars for survival. Involvement in such wars has been cyclical in the U.S. experience, and it is misfortunate, if not tragic, that the greatly similar problems encountered across widely varying circumstances are quickly forgotten.  Information

Endangered Peoples of Latin America: Struggles to Survive and Thrive (The Greenwood Press "Endangered Peoples of the World" Series) (Hardcover), by Susan C. Stonich (Editor). Greenwood Press (February 28, 2001).
Endangered Peoples of Latin America: Struggles to Survive and Thrive offers rare insight into indigenous and marginalized groups in Mexico, Central America, and South America. This volume focuses on more than 13 endangered peoples, from the Mayans of Central Quintana Roo, in Mexico, to the Quechua of the Peruvian Andes. Globalization has had negative effects on local economies and environments, on health and nutrition, and on control of land and other natural resources, and students and other interested readers will learn how these groups have responded to the various threats. The chapters are written by anthropologists based on their recent fieldwork, which guarantees unparalleled accuracy and immediacy. Latin America comprises varied biophysical environments and diverse populations living in widely disparate economic circumstances. Endangered Peoples of Latin America: Struggles to Survive and Thrive includes peoples hit hardest by the current globalization trend. Each chapter profiles a specific people or peoples with a cultural overview of their history, subsistence strategies, social and political organization, and religion and world view; threats to their survival; and responses to these threats. A section entitled "Food for Thought" provides questions that encourage a personal engagement with the experiences of these peoples, and a resource guide suggests further reading and lists films and videos and pertinent organizations and web sites. As the curriculum expands to include more multicultural and indigenous peoples, this unique volume will be valuable to both students and teachers. Information

Forgotten Continent: The Battle for Latin America's Soul (Hardcover), by Michael Reid. Yale University Press (January 3, 2008).
 This book argues that rather than failing the test, Latin America’s efforts to build fairer and more prosperous societies make it one of the world’s most vigorous laboratories for capitalist democracy. In many countries—including Brazil, Chile and Mexico—democratic leaders are laying the foundations for faster economic growth and more inclusive politics, as well as tackling deep-rooted problems of poverty, inequality, and social injustice. They face a new challenge from Hugo Chávez’s oil-fuelled populism, and much is at stake. Failure will increase the flow of drugs and illegal immigrants to the United States and Europe, jeopardize stability in a region rich in oil and other strategic commodities, and threaten some of the world's most majestic natural environments.  Information

Good Governance in the Era of Global Neoliberalism: Conflict and Depolitization in Latin America, Eastern Europe, Asia and Africa (Routledge Studies in the Modern World Economy, 47) (Hardcover), by Jolle Demmers. Routledge; 1 edition (August 31, 2004).
By making use of a wide range of in-depth case studies from various developing countries and post-communist states, this book analyzes the causes and effects of neoliberal restructuring and the process of depolitization that went with it. The contributors critically examine the contradictory nature of good governance and the consequences that have been seen to go with it. This important book provides a refreshing contribution to the literature on good governance. It will provide and interesting read for those with an interest in economics and development studies as well as being useful to policy makers and non-governmental organizations. Information

Introduction to Latin America: Twenty-First Century Challenges (Hardcover), by Peadar Kirby. Sage Publications Ltd (May 27, 2003).
Introductory text on Latin America discusses the liberalizing reforms taking place in the economies of virtually all the countries of the region. Assesses their impact on the lives and livelihoods of Latin Americans, and offers some diagnosis of the region's prospects as it entered the new millennium. For upper level undergraduate and graduate students. Information

Land, Power, And Poverty: Agrarian Transformation And Political Conflict In Central America, Second Edition (Thematic Studies in Latin America) (Paperback), by Charles D Brockett. Westview Press; 2 edition (April 30, 1998).
Land, Power, and Poverty explores the development of the rigid and unequal structures of rural Central American society, the challenge in recent decades to those structures by a restive peasantry, and the role in these conflicts of five governments of the region—Guatemala, Costa Rica, Honduras, El Salvador, and Nicaragua. The author also assesses the role of international actors, especially the United States, in Central America.The second edition of Land, Power, and Poverty provides a comprehensive and current analysis of the relationship between agrarian structures and political turmoil in Central America. Each country chapter is brought up-to-date, and the author covers recent scholarship and events since 1986, including the decreasing militarization in the region. Discussion of the environmental consequences of agrarian change is also expanded. Information

Militarist Peace in South America: Conditions for War and Peace (Hardcover), by Felix E. Martin. Palgrave Macmillan (August 6, 2006).
Despite rivalries, crises, and notoriously violent internal political processes, South American states have paradoxically avoided a major intraregional, interstate war since 1935. Martin examines why and how intraregional, interstate relations in South America remained relatively peaceful. This analysisis theoretically and empirically interesting because in this region, the conditions for war assumed by political realism were present, yet a major war did not erupt. Conversely, the conditions for interstate peace presupposed by international liberalism were absent, but intraregional peace prevailed for over sixty-five years. Martin derives several realist and liberal propositions on the causes of war and peace and tests them, utilizing evidence from the peace in South America, as well as developing and discussing the "Militarist Peace" hypothesis.   Information

Political Violence and the Construction of National Identity in Latin America (Hardcover), by Chris McNab and Peter Lambert (Editos). Palgrave Macmillan (November 28, 2006).
This highly topical volume seeks to analyze the intimate but under-studied relationship between the construction of national identity in Latin America and the violent struggle for political power that has defined Latin American history since independence.  The theoretical framework is complemented by a series of tightly structured and fascinating case studies, written by an international team of specialists and spanning a range of Latin American countries. The result is an original and fascinating contribution to an increasingly important field of study.  Information

The Legacy of the Monroe Doctrine: A Reference Guide to U.S. Involvement in Latin America and the Caribbean (Hardcover), by David W. Dent. Greenwood Press (January 30, 1999).
Ideal for student research and debate, this is the first single-volume reference work to examine, country by country, the history of U.S. involvement in 24 Latin American and Caribbean nations. It will help students to understand and debate the role of the United States in Latin America since the Monroe Doctrine in 1823 and whether in the long run U.S. intervention in the internal affairs of Latin American governments has been counterproductive. Each country and its relations with the United States is analyzed succinctly in an individual chapter. Dent, a noted expert on inter-American relations, organizes each chapter around major themes that illuminate both historical and contemporary issues, and shows how in recent years U.S. concerns have been transformed from issues of security and economic interests to drug trafficking, immigration, and trade pacts. Discussion of key events--wars, revolutions, and dictatorships--and lively accounts of the role of powerful individuals illustrate the causes and consequences of U.S. involvement. Each chapter features a timeline of events in the history of U.S. involvement in that country and a list of suggested readings on the country and its relationship with the United States. A glossary explains key terms used throughout the book. A number of comparative tables and charts put inter-American relations in perspective. A selection of editorial cartoons from the 1980's offer biting commentary on U.S. relations with its Latin American neighbors. Designed to meet the information needs of high school and college students and the general public, this reference work will guide the user to an understanding of the richness and complexity of the inter-American relationship over the last two centuries and provide both historical perspective and timely analysis of current problems confronting the United States and its neighbors to the south.  Information

The Most Dangerous Area in the World: John F. Kennedy Confronts Communist Revolution in Latin America (Hardcover), by Stephen G. Rabe. University of North Carolina Press (February 1999).  Information

The School of the Americas: Military Training and Political Violence in the Americas (American Encounters/Global Interactions) (Paperback), by Lesley Gill. Duke University Press (July 2004).
The U.S. Army maintains a center at Fort Benning, Ga., formerly known as the School of the Americas. It has reportedly trained 60,000 South and Central American military elites since the end of WWII and reportedly counts among its graduates former dictators Manuel Noriega of Panama and Leopoldo Galtieri of Argentina. Curricular materials involving torture techniques were found at the school in the early '90s, resulting in a small scandal that apparently led to a name change (to the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation) and a fight over the school's existence that continues. Though she doesn't catch anyone learning about the various uses of nudity and black hoods, American University anthropologist Gill (Precarious Dependencies) was able to examine the school's folkways and rhetoric, thanks to glasnost-like levels of administrative cooperation. Lessons in thinking in terms of how to "kill and maim" opposition and to "dehumanize" those who persist. Gill then traces the paths of various graduates of the school and links their activities directly to the torture and death of "Latin American peasants, workers, students [and] human rights activists"—i.e., "opposition."  Information

Understanding Central America: Global Forces, Rebellion, and Change, Fourth Edition (Paperback), by John A Booth, Christine J. Wade and Thomas W. Walker. Westview Press; 4 edition (July 28, 2005).
Extensively revised and updated, Understanding Central America: Global Forces, Rebellion and Regime Change explains how domestic and global political and economic forces shaped rebellion and regime change in Costa Rica, Nicaragua, El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras from the 1970s. Providing the authoritative, comprehensive coverage students of Latin America, political science, and international relations require, John A. Booth, Christine J. Wade, and Thomas W. Walker explore the origins and development of the region’s political conflicts and efforts to resolve them. Through this comprehensive textbook, students can explore Central America’s political and economic development from the early 1800s onward, providing a background for understanding rebellion and regime changes in the 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s. This revised edition brings the Central American story up-to-date, with special emphasis on globalization, public opinion, progress toward democratic consolidation, and U.S. pressures on political and economic processes. The authors offer a thorough analysis of how global forces act on these small nations. A useful introduction to the region, organized to facilitate classroom discussion, and a model for how to convey the complexities of the region in language students will comprehend, Understanding Central America stands out as must-have resource.  Information   0813341957

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