Miguel Izard’s comparative history of Venezuela and Colombia is the first such dual analysis to appear since Harry Bernstein published Venezuela & Colombia in 1964 as part of the Prentice-Hall series, “The Modern Nations in Historical Perspective.” Both books offer narrative surveys suitable for undergraduates as well as scholars looking for a perceptive overview. Bernstein treated each country separately, and following one of the conventions of the 1960s began with chapters on “Venezuela Today” and “Colombia Today,” before moving hack to the conquest and settlement era. Izard proceeds chronologically, examining first Venezuela and then Colombia in seven chapters: “Aborígenes,” “Invasión europea: 1498-1548,” “Encomenderos y esclavistas: 1548-1750,” “Crisis de la sociedad criolla: 1750-1830,” “Azarosa gestación republicana: 1830-1870,” “Engarce en el mercado mundial: 1870-1929,” and “Limitaciones del modelo exportador: 1929-1985.” Dependency theory forms the theoretical underpinning. Discounting humanitarian motives of the Spanish crown and missionaries, Izard shows how the Europeans ruthlessly exploited the Native Americans, and locked the region into a perpetually subordinate economic position vis-à-vis the North Atlantic world.
Izard is a professor at the University of Barcelona who has published important studies on Venezuelan independence, caudillism, and the llaneros. He is at his best in discussing the institutional structure of that colony, and its social and economic transformation sparked by the Bourbon reforms and the War of Independence. His chapter on pre-Columbian cultures reflects the considerable amount of recent research that has been carried out about these formerly neglected peoples. Likewise interesting (to a Colombianist, at least), is Izard’s assessment of the two great dictators of the national period, Antonio Guzmán Blanco and Juan Vicente Gómez. Less stimulating are the Colombian sections, where he relies on secondary works available in Spanish and candidly acknowledges his debt to Germán Colmenares, Jorge Orlando Melo, Marco Palacios, and Antonio García.
In this day of microspecialization, Izard deserves high praise for placing in parallel context two important South American republics routinely omitted from North American textbooks. Writing in a lively and somewhat contentious style, he fulfills his promise to expound on some speculative hypotheses that he has been developing since he began teaching the history of America in 1972. Nevertheless, one wishes that he had carried his analysis one step further to draw concrete comparisons at the end of each chapter about the contrasts and similarities in the historical evolution of Venezuela and Colombia. In this book, much as in Bernstein’s written more than 20 years ago, the author lays out the history of each country. The reader seeking innovative cross-national generalizations must draw his or her own conclusions.
