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The Making of Modern Colombia: A Nation in Spite of Itself. By David Bushnell. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1993, 4.x + 334. $42. ISBN 0 520 08289 3
Colombia has in recent years acquired a formidable reputation for drug-trafficking, political and criminal violence, and endemic corruption. The dire images projected by the international media have not, however, generally been supported by close knowledge of the country and its history; nor has there been an up-to-date general history of Colombia o which the English-speaking reader might readily turn for the basic information and explanation of the country's past. This book is therefore very welcome. In it, Professor Bushnell draws on his long experience as historian and sympathetic observer of Colombia to provide an informative, lucid and balanced guide to the main events and developments in Colombian history since independence.
His account is organised chronologically, and cast into periods which reflect the major structures and themes of Colombian development from colonial to contemporary times. In a book devoted to modern Colombia, attention to pre-Hispanic and colonial times is necessarily peremptory. Bushnell's crisp summary of native and Spanish...