Open Veins of Latin America

Section 1 Summary: “A Declaration of Independence Hailed by British Warships”

While Spain had an early presence in the exploration and initial colonization of Latin America, the British quickly rose to dominance. Britain’s Industrial Revolution coincided with the introduction of raw materials from Latin American exports that fueled the development of such technology as the internal combustion engine that modernized navigation and enabled ships to travel to farther territories. This expanded Britain’s colonial domain. The British celebrated when Argentina experienced a revolutionary junta in 1810. The junta permitted the British to preside over Argentina’s economy, forcing out Germany and France as competitors in the textile trade. Through British imposition, Argentina purchased textiles from Britain alone and stopped producing textiles domestically. Britain enforced its exports, such as textiles, upon Argentina, ultimately affecting the development of local artisans, skills, and labor in those affected industries.

Section 2 Summary: “The Dimensions of Industrial Infanticide”

In this section, Galeano observes how the British usurped the development of textiles and local artisanry from Latin American countries. While Bolivia was once a significant center of the textile industry, it quickly dissolved due to the takeover of British textiles. In Argentina as well, Britain replaced products once made locally with British-made materials to such an extent that the country “even received the stones for its sidewalks from Britain” (195). They even emulated the style of Argentinian-made items such as ponchos in their designs and sold them to Argentinians. The British also established its products as luxury goods that encouraged Latin American middle-class people to covet and purchase them. By establishing a dependent relationship with Latin American countries where they were reliant on British exports, the British economy continued to benefit from extracting Latin American copper, iron, and other raw materials.

Section 3 Summary: “Protectionism and Free Trade: The Brief Flight of Lucas Alamán”

The British economy thrived from free trade, which necessitated its ties to Latin America in the capitalist market. According to Galeano, “Britain was organizing a worldwide system and becoming the great factory supplying the planet: the entire world supplied it with raw materials and received its manufactured goods” (197). The British relied on this system of production and trade to flourish. This meant that protectionist policies from other countries greatly threatened Britain and limited its ability towards free trade.

This had a detrimental impact on Mexico, which saw the deterioration of artisan work and rapid unemployment due to the imposition of British-made products in the country. When Vicente Guerrero came to power in 1829, he could not stop the flow of British products to the country though it was clear that the reliance on these foreign products took away from domestic production.

In 1830, conservative politician Lucas Alamán saw that the current capitalist system of free trade could not sustain itself, so he proposed a banking and loan system that would promote industrialization. For instance, Mexico could take out a loan to purchase machinery abroad to supply its own needs in cotton and cloth. Mexico could produce its own cloth and train workers in the textile industry domestically. Yet this entry into independent production was short-lived once the US and British renewed their interests in mining and extracting Mexico’s raw materials. 

Section 4 Summary: “The Montoneros and Juan Manuel de Rosas’s Legacy of Hate”

Due to Buenos Aires’s accessibility as a port, the city became a prosperous place for free trade. Unfortunately, it led to the unequal development of its inland provinces, which did not receive the same attention and wealth. In the early 1800s, the import of dried meat transformed the Latin American market, particularly for Argentinians who saw the taxation of their internal meat production and the removal of meat from their exports. The gaucho, who had previously roamed and worked freely in cattle ranches, became little more than a servant under the 1815 decree that every countryman without property had to carry identification cards checked by their masters regularly. Many gauchos joined the rebel Montoneros, regarded in history as a group of bandits, but which Galeano describes compassionately as a community of displaced ranchers.

During the Juan Manuel de Rosas administration in Argentina, Rosas issued a protectionist tariff and banned imports of tinplate and iron manufactures, riding equipment, ponchos, belts, cotton cloth, and other materials that the country produced domestically. This action promoted internal trade but imploded 10 years later when Britain and France invaded the interior waterways that Rosas kept closed and installed a blockade. Galeano argues that Rosas’s trade law was short-lived not because of foreign intervention alone but because he was a cattle ranch owner who protected the interests of the property-owning class. He is critical while also sympathetic to Rosas in his determination that at that time “the big ranch occupied the center of the economic stage, and no industrial policy could be independently and vigorously undertaken without destroying the omnipotence of the exporting latifundio” (203). Ultimately, the interests of the oligarchy reigned, and Rosas’s protectionist policies made him a traitor in the memory of the ruling class.

Section 5 Summary: “How the War Against Paraguay Wrecked the Only Successful Attempt at Independent Development”

A century ago, Paraguay was a successfully thriving and independent country that did not rely on foreign exports. However, as it is a country situated between Brazil and Argentina, two major countries of US and European foreign intervention, it ultimately succumbed to the pressures of participation in the world market. While it was Brazil, Argentina, and Uruguay that formed the Triple Alliance that waged war on Paraguay in 1864, it was British banks that financed the violence that the Triple Alliance countries enacted on Paraguay.

Previous to the War of the Triple Alliance, the dictator Gaspar Rodríguez de Francia controlled Paraguay from 1814 to 1840. Francia maintained Paraguay’s “womb of isolation” (207) when it came to participation in global trade, concentrating the country’s efforts on internal development instead. He also rallied the peasant masses to eliminate the oligarchy, ensuring that there was no big wealth division in the country.

After his administration, Carlos Antonio López and his son Francisco Solano both extended this isolationist approach to governance. Through their rule, Paraguay had access to telegraphs, railroads, and other markers of industrial development without foreign reliance. They supplied products to other parts of Latin America and to Europe on their terms, producing a trade surplus that was unusual for many Latin American countries.

While the War of the Triple Alliance appeared to be a battle between Latin American countries, Galeano insists that “the financial bankruptcy of [Brazil, Argentina, and Uruguay] deepened their dependency on Britain” (212), pushing the three countries to wage war on Paraguay as an isolationist country vulnerable to the evolving circumstances of global trade. Brazil, Argentina, and Uruguay divided up Paraguay for their personal benefits, including its people for slave labor.

British-trained military leader Alfredo Stroessner took over rule of Paraguay after the war and ensured that the country would remain “a colony of other colonies” (214). Since the war, Paraguay’s population decreased severely, and the remainder left to find work in neighboring countries.

Section 6 Summary: “How Loans and Railroads Deformed the Latin American Economy”

Throughout Western colonization of Latin America, there had always been deep fluctuations in prices of Latin American exports while Western import prices remained stable. This led many Latin American countries to rely on loans to sustain their economic development with foreign trade. For Argentina, this once constituted a request for £1 million pound loan in 1824 from British bank Baring Brothers. Argentina received only £570,000 in paper, though Argentina had to pay back the loan in gold. To receive this loan, Argentina also had to mortgage its public lands. Galeano constitutes this pattern of loan and debt creation as “an instrument of blackmail” (218) that only furthered Latin American countries’ dependency on Western powers for sustenance.

Many of these loans were requested to purchase materials to construct railroads that would link the internal territories of Latin American countries to ports for foreign trade. Galeano describes the structure of this railroad system as “the fingers of an open hand” (218) where the fingers reached for US and British entry. Paraguay constructed the first tracks, which the British took over after the War of the Triple Alliance. This railroad system stretched across Argentina, Mexico, Brazil, Chile, Guatemala, and Uruguay, connecting these territories for the purposes of streamlining transport to ports for British access. It was not until after World War II when dividends for railroads fell that the railroads returned to public authorities.

Section 7 Summary: “Protectionism and Free Trade in the United States: A Success Due Not to an Invisible Hand”

Despite the US and European animosity towards Latin American protectionist policies, the US rose to dominance through a protectionist stance of its own. As a former colony of Britain, the US differed from its Latin American counterparts in that it did not deliver the same richness of exports as countries such as Argentina or Brazil did. When the US was comprised of thirteen colonies in its earlier years, there was no luxury-seeking ruling class that sought European exports. As a neglected colony, the US followed a distinct political path comprised of two views. Alexander Hamilton favored one view, advocating for industrialization with state protection of domestic industry. Viscount de Cairú upheld the other view. He believed in Adam Smith’s “invisible hand” (223), which dictated that the domestic market would flourish without state intervention.

According to Galeano, the US Civil War emblematized the split values between Hamilton and Cairú. The northern states believed in industry and abolition of slavery while the southern states relied on free trade of its cotton and textiles, produced through slave labor. For Galeano, this represented “two antagonistic philosophies of the national destiny” (223) through which the northern states of industry and protectionism won.

After World War II, the US emulated Britain’s navigation of free trade while retaining its protectionist policies. The nation erected tariffs to guard its domestic products while engaging in exploitation of Latin American exports for its benefit. The US’s double identity as a protectionist and free trade country allowed the country to protect its interests and prevent it from becoming a victim of capitalist exploitation as other European colonies had endured.