This small volume of fewer than a hundred pages, written simply and with great clarity, is essentially for the lay reader who desires an introduction to the facts and problems concerning economic developments in Latin America. It should be of considerable value for general education, but it adds little to our knowledge in the fields discussed. It relies heavily on data presented in the CEPAL publication, El desarrollo económico de América Latina en la postguerra.
Professor Baltra Cortés of the University of Chile, who is also a senator and a figure of some political importance, follows a concrete factual approach describing the underdevelopment of Latin America in terms of comparative income, food consumption, housing, health, and educational statistics. The first six of twelve chapters offer a comprehensive description of the relative underdevelopment in Latin America. Succeeding chapters discuss foreign commerce, the institutional obstacles to economic development, agricultural reform, foreign investment, the Alliance for Progress, and the common markets.
Perhaps the chief significance of this book lies in some of the author’s well-balanced opinions. For example, he believes that the unequal distribution of income in Latin America is very important in limiting the purchasing power of lower- and middle-income groups which is needed for economic development, but that this cannot be remedied by drastic equalization (presumably through heavy progressive taxation). Instead he favors measures to reduce consumption and increase investment among those with higher incomes. He places commendable emphasis on the role of institutional structure in affecting development and on the need to reform the structure, broadly defined, as a prerequisite for economic progress. He also emphasizes structural analysis in his discussion of the common markets and the Alliance for Progress. As he says: “El proceso de desarrollo no es sólo de cambio económico. Es la sociedad entera la que debe ponerse en movimiento. Fundamentalmente, el cambio debe ser social.”
