Forgotten Continent: The Battle for Latin America's Soul [Paperback]

Written by one of the leading editors of Economist magazine, Michael Reid's Forgotten Continent exalts the relative triumph of the free market and democracy in Latin American. His thesis follows that these successes (Brazil, Colombia, Chile etc.) however are in danger from far left populism in the region: Chavez's Venezuela and Morales' Bolivia. Further, Reid argues that contrary to popular opinion, most of Latin America's existing problems are combination of firstly historical factors linked to the continent's colonial past, and secondly the inability of its recent governments to manage their economies sufficiently. Rejecting that the United States has had much input into the direction of Latin America in recent years, he departs from the writings authors like Uruguay's Eduardo Galeano who remain deeply sceptical of capitalism.
His interpretation is somewhat refreshing, but there are a number of issues with this book:
1) Reid's admiration of Colombia. On page 277 (hardback) Reid even goes so far as to say, "[Colombia's] generals tenaciously resist submitting their officers accused of human rights abuses to civilian courts. They argue, plausibly enough, that they are fighting an internal war - one on a scale that none of the dictatorships faced."

This is utterly shocking. Is the author really saying that the argument used to justify the barring of officers from being held accountable for human rights violations by the army is a plausible one?? If Reid indeed means this, then he is de facto admitting that he believes human rights violations by the army in Colombia are justifiable.
Perhaps he would do well to read some Human Rights Watch reports on this topic.

2) On page 304 Reid flatly states, "Alongside old-fashioned farm protectionism, concern over climate change is adding a new version: opposition to 'food miles'. Yet growing food efficiently is good for the environment; the idea that food should not be traded internationally is no more logical than opposition to 'manufacturing miles'."

Here Reid appears to twist words a little bit. Indeed, GROWING food efficiently may be good for the environment, but Reid fails to mention that 'food miles' also include exports such as beef, poultry, pork and so on which contributes to environmental degredation. His argument falls flat because on the previous page (page 303) he boasts that Brazil is one of the world's largest exporters of precisely these things! Reid cannot really believe what he is saying.

3) The question of sources. For a book about Latin America, surprisingly few Latin American sources are cited in the bibliography. There are a few (mostly journal articles) But the majority of the sources used are English; produced in Europe or the United States. I do not understand why Reid has not drawn more material from Latin American academics themselves. Further, Reid makes frequent reference to Samuel Huntington and the latter's more or less defunct 'clash of civilizations' theory. Whether he agrees with this idea or not is unclear, although he writes that Huntington believes Latin America to be a separate civilization.

4) On page 108 Reid states that the argument that the United States helped organise the military coup in Brazil which brought twenty years of dictatorship to that country is "[not] well founded." He does not explain exactly why it is not well founded, but merely describes the (very real) internal political situation at the time. Reid's assertion runs contrary to the ample evidence that exists illustrating that the United States did play a significant role in the coup.

These are the biggest issues I have with the book, although there are plenty more. It's nicely written and easy to read, and the view is somewhat refreshing. But Reid's biases are clearly visible and I cannot deem this an especially reliable book.

This book provides an excellent introduction to economic and social developments in South America. The book aligns history with current political changes, and it written in an engaging and interesting way. A good starting book for anyone wanting to know more about the continent or starting academic study of Latin America.

This book is excellent as an introduction to the history, politics and economics of Latin America. Written by a former journalist for the Economist, it has a quick, catchy and seemingly neutral language, reading like any article of the British magazine, and making craftful use of statistics and examples of different countries and people. It gives an idea of the complexity of a continent that is still struggling to find itself in this world, thereby also the somewhat grandious title.

The book does nevertheless not do justice to its grandious title; its strengths ennumerated above are also its weaknesses: trying to cover such a vast subject in a journalistic manner can only make too many of the examples as superficial at most (some of the smaller Latin American countries can only be treated in a few lines), and simplistic at its worse (the complex relations between Latin America and its mighty northern neighbour are grossly simplified, although the author admits it is a much vaster subject).
More often than not, the author does not bother to argue for things that he presents as "obvious", but are surely not obvious in such a complex setting as in Latin America. In this respect, the author does have an almost explicit ideological standpoint that he does not diverge from: a neo-Liberal right-wing approach. Although a book is not necessarily judged by this (I have read numerous great books of particular political views that I am not in agreement with), the problem is that he does not want to see things from another side. He is apologetic of regimes with questionable human rights records, as long as they have lead the "right" economic policies, and does not even try to go into depth with "the other side"; the "alternative" of the battle he says is going on in Latin America is openly dismissed.

Therefore, the book should be read with caution and ideological scepticism, but is still worth a good and challenging read (it took me only a few days to get through it!).