Latin American state building in comparative perspective : social foundations of institutional order / Marcus J. Kurtz.

Includes bibliographical references (p. 251-269) and index.

1. The difficulties of state building — 2. The social foundations of state building in the contemporary era — 3. State formation in Chile and Peru : institution building and atrophy in unlikely settings — 4. State formation in Argentina and Uruguay : agrarian capitalism, elite conflict, and the construction of cooperation — 5. Divergence reinforced : the timing of political inclusion and state strength in Chile and Peru — 6. The social question and the state : mass mobilization, suffrage, and institutional development in Argentina and Uruguay — 7. Conclusions, implications, and extensions : social foundations, Germany-Prussia, and the limits of contemporary state building.

Latin American State Building in Comparative Perspective provides an account of long-run institutional development in Latin America that emphasizes the social and political foundations of state-building processes. The study argues that societal dynamics have path-dependent consequences of two critical points: the initial consolidation of national institutions in the wake of independence, and at the time when the 'social question' of mass political incorporation forced its way into the national political agenda across the region during the Great Depression. Dynamics set into motion at these points in time have produced widely varying and stable distributions of state capacity in the region. Marcus J. Kurtz tests this argument using structured comparisons of the post-independence political development of Chile, Peru, Argentina, and Uruguay.