Until mid-June of 1961 when Life magazine’s millions of readers saw Gordon Parks’s photographic essay on poverty in Rio’s hillside slums (favelas), the American image of the life of Rio’s poor was based largely on Marcel Camus’ moving film fantasy, …
Most rural Latin Americans have a standard of living no better than that of the Indians who were found on the land by the European colonizers or of the slaves that subsequently were imported into parts of the continent. In …
Hunger, illiteracy, unemployment, an exploding population, race conflict, strife between the oppressive oligarchy and the miserable masses, with no middle class to stabilize a backward economy: are these the familiar problems of all Latin America? Then, a powerful case must …
Latin America had a population of 199 million in 1960, according to a United Nations estimate. Of this total, 108 million or 54 per cent live in rural areas, and of these 2812 million are economically active. All rural dwellers …
Clashes between democracy and dictatorship have punctuated the history of Latin America for 150 years, ever since it won its political independence. Formal democracy, with all its trappings, was adopted by the new republics at the very moment of their …
I hadn’t seen Mario since he fled Cuba. “Hola, Mario,” I said. “It’s been a long time.” “Manuel!” he said, hugging me. “What brings you to New York? I just asked Raul Chibas last week why I hadn’t heard from …
We should like to make a proposal which might not solve the problems of Latin America but might remove an obstacle to good relations within the Western Hemisphere. The problem haunting U. S. policy makers is, to use professional language, …
At first, there seemed to be two Alliances for Progress: One, resounding and rhetorical (see above); the other, more limited and practical, with realistic aims which anyone could decently, if critically, support. Now—October 1962—here seems to be no Alliance for …
We have done all we could to keep alive in our minds the main problems that in the course of centuries have troubled theologians, although today we formulate them in a somewhat different way. Philosophy has never freed itself from …
The problem of disarmament goes to the roots of society. Military force has been the right arm of the nation-state; it is as yet difficult to discern the power bases that will replace it. The social investment that both Russia …
A RADICAL’S AMERICA, by Harvey Swados. Atlantic—Little, Brown, 1962, xvii + 347 pp. In his introduction to this collection of essays, Harvey Swados writes that he has “attempted to maintain a a tension between skepticism and idealism.” The skepticism is, …
Editors: The Congress for Cultural Freedom protests an implication in Paul Goodman’s interesting article, “The Devolution of Democracy.” It denies the implication of…
A Protest and Reply Editors: The Congress for Cultural Freedom protests an implication in Paul Goodman’s interesting article, “The Devolution of Democracy.” It denies the implication of being anybody’s “instrument.” Its activities (and publications) are the result of precisely the …
BLOSSOMS IN THE DUST, by Kusum Nair. London: Gerald Duckworth & Co., 1961, 201 pages. In Western countries, the phrase, “revolution of rising expectations” has suddenly become very popular in regard to newly emerging countries in Africa and Asia. It …
THE PRESS, by A. J. Liebling. Ballantine Books, 1961. From his “Wayward Press” articles in the New Yorker, A. J. Liebling has put together a damning book. But it will hardly surprise his readers who, after all, also read the …
