Twisted Roots: Latin America's Living Past

Why has Latin America, rich in resources and culture, remained an “unfulfilled promise” within the West? This penetrating study traces the roots of Ibero America’s chronic underdevelopment to decisions, institutions, and mind sets forged at the very birth of the region.

Beginning with the conquest, the author reviews the “illegitimacy of power” in the New World: theological justifications for domination, legal fictions such as títulos justos, and the way fraud and sophistry were used to convert armed takeover into supposedly moral rule. He reviews how the Spanish Crown and Church organized the colony — viceroyalties, audiencias, and the encomienda system — creating a state that managed to dissatisfy rulers and ruled alike.

The book then addresses three enduring fault lines: race, gender, and economic structure. It recounts the harsh realities of slavery, both in Spain and in the Americas, and how racism embedded itself in law and custom. It examines gender roles inherited from Greece, Rome, and Christian doctrine, showing how patriarchal assumptions shaped family life, property rights, and public life. Finally, it analyzes how an economy “twisted at birth” — dominated by rent seeking, legal privilege, and suspicion of innovation — left the region without the basic institutional tools that would later drive development elsewhere.

Throughout, the author juxtaposes Iberian patterns with countries that eventually broke out of poverty, such as Spain and Portugal after the European integration project, and the East Asian “tigers.” The result is a clear, historically grounded answer to a crucial question: what kept Ibero America from following the same upward path?

Scholars of Latin American history and politics, policy makers, development practitioners, and engaged citizens will all find in this volume a concise, thought provoking guide to the long shadow of colonial foundations.

Syndicated columnist and novelist Carlos Alberto Montaner is a frequent lecturer and part-time instructor at the University of Miami (FL), the University of Guatemala, and others.

Born in Cuba, Montaner has lived in Madrid since 1970. Dozens of newspapers in the U.S., Spain and Latin American run his weekly column.

He has published two books with Algora Publishing. His books in Spanish include Fidel Castro y la Revolución cubana, No Perdamos tambien el siglo XXI (Let's Not Lose the 21st Century Too), the novels Perromundo and Trama, and, in collaboration with Plinio Apuleyo Mendoza and Alvaro Vargas Llosa, Manual del perfecto idiota latino americano and Fabricantes de miseria.