> Simon Bolívar tried valiantly to carry out a bourgeois-democratic > revolution in Colombia, Venezuela and Ecuador, but the cowardly and > unpatriotic bourgeoisie would not lead it, let alone cooperate. > civilian political rule, divided between the two major parties, Liberal and > Conservative, who would betray Colombian national interests until the > present day. > The two parties saw each other as rivals, but their real rival were the > popular classes. The Liberals sought to modernize the state and reduce the > influence of the Catholic Church, while the Conservatives sought to > maintain the status quo. > Louis Proyect as some - Bolivar and San Martin, in particular - understood, declarations of independence would be meaningless so long as colonial power remained on the continent...while liberals were anti-clericals promoting 'modernization' by opening the region to free trade and foreign investment, they generally consolidated state power (where and when they were able to do so) through maintenance of a traditional, autocratic political system based on socio-economic status and military force...allowing for specific national experiences, liberals were interested in achieving goals and sustaining economic growth without significantly altering existing social structures, class relations, and forms of power... there was a great deal of continuity between colonial and post- colonial periods... emerging Latin American bourgeoisies were caught beteen conflict with metropolis over their share of economic surplus and their own laboring classes over conditions of surplus production... extent to which divided elites were willing to go in making alliance with laborers before preceiving common class threat was limited... the Winter 1986 issue of *Latin American Perspectives* includes several articles about above...regarding Colombia, see Nola Reinhardt, 'The Consolidation of the Import-Export Economy in Nineteenth Century Colombia,' pp. 75-98... Michael Hoover
