State Building in Latin America diverges from existing scholarship in developing explanations both for why state-building efforts in the region emerged and for their success or failure. First, Latin American state leaders chose to attempt concerted state- building only where they saw it as the means to political order and economic development. Fragmented regionalism led to the adoption of more laissez-faire ideas and the rejection of state- building. With dominant urban centers, developmentalist ideas and state-building efforts took hold, but not all state-building projects succeeded. The...
State Building in Latin America diverges from existing scholarship in developing explanations both for why state-building efforts in the region emerge...
