The Magical State: Nature, Money, and Modernity in Venezuela - Softcover

Coronil, Fernando

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0226116026 ISBN 13: 9780226116020

Publisher: University of Chicago Press, 1997

Synopsis

In 1935, after the death of dictator General Juan Vicente Gómez, Venezuela consolidated its position as the world's major oil exporter and began to establish what today is South America's longest-lasting democratic regime. Endowed with the power of state oil wealth, successive presidents appeared as transcendent figures who could magically transform Venezuela into a modern nation. During the 1974-78 oil boom, dazzling development projects promised finally to effect this transformation. Yet now the state must struggle to appease its foreign creditors, counter a declining economy, and contain a discontented citizenry. In critical dialogue with contemporary social theory, Fernando Coronil examines key transformations in Venezuela's polity, culture, and economy, recasting theories of development and highlighting the relevance of these processes for other postcolonial nations. The result is a timely and compelling historical ethnography of political power at the cutting edge of interdisciplinary reflections on modernity and the state.

About this edition

• Publisher: University of Chicago Press
• Publication date: 1997
• ISBN 10: 0226116026
• ISBN 13: 9780226116020
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 465