Nicholas P. Cushner is one of a long line of Jesuits who have produced histories of the Order and in particular of the Jesuit missions in America. He is best known for his economic histories of the Jesuit missions in Peru, Ecuador, and Argentina. In these empirical studies Cushner investigates the links between Jesuit missions and larger economic developments and patterns. The studies are notable for their unbiased approach in which the author does not attempt to explain away contradictions (between the Jesuits’ vow of poverty and their enormous collective wealth, or their use of slaves, to give two examples). In the book under review, Cushner abandons economic history for ethnohistory and cultural analysis. His subject is the “clash of cultures” between the Jesuits and the American Indians they wished to convert. Instead of a tightly focused view, his approach in this work is broad and comparative. The goal is...
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