The Politics of Modernization project, directed by David E. Apter, has as its goal the better understanding of comparative social and political structure of modern Latin American nations and the new forms of society developing in Argentina, Peru, and Chile. In the first of these new studies Miss Sarfatti undertakes the study of the Spanish colonial past to provide a framework in which contemporary Latin America can be viewed in later studies.
This work examines the imperial system of control which Spain exercised in the Americas from the sixteenth through the eighteenth centuries, a system which is described as a Castilian one legitimized by tradition in Spain and based on Thomist philosophical and political foundations. The model for this historieo-sociological explanation of Spanish bureaucratic patrimonialism is taken from Max Weber. In the introduction and first chapter of her work Miss Sarfatti constructs this Weberian model for Spanish America; and in the next three chapters she elaborates it, discussing the organization and practice of the imperial system, its effect on colonial society (especially on the growth of the urban town and the development of urban attitudes), and finally the revolutionary challenge to the system.
An appendix explores the position of the Indian within the traditional paternal hierarchical system. The book also contains a useful glossary of Spanish terms and diagrams of the interrelationships in the administrative and social hierarchies.
Though possibly more valuable to the sociologist and political scientist than to the historian, this study offers a fresh approach to well-known historical facts and contributes to our deepening knowledge of Spanish bureaucratic practice in America and its relevance for the problems that confront the modern nations of Latin America.
