Most of the critical commentary on Nicaraguan poet Rubén Dario has been called forth and shaped by his being a seminal pan-Latin American and an international literary figure. Less known is the fact that for more than a century, Darío has been the focus of a much contested discourse concerning national cultural identity within Nicaragua itself. Comprehending this more limited and focused discourse requires carefully analyzing the changing cultural-political constructions that Darío's fellow Nicaraguans have placed upon his life and work, and especially the role of ideology in those constructs. Such analysis can also offer insight into the role of focal Latin American cultural figures in the negotiation of national cultural identity, especially during periods of dramatic political transformation, crisis, and reconstruction like the Somoza era (1936–1979) and the Sandinista Revolution (1961–1989).

In 1970, as part of a comprehensive program of institutionalization, new economic policies were introduced in Cuba emphasizing more extensive use of material incentives, wage differentials, and piece rates to stimulate productivity. Those policies raised the incomes of Cuban workers and created new demands for a better diet and more consumer goods. Yet problems in the state-run domestic food sector made it difficult for Cubans to secure the higher standard of living promised by their increased salaries and wages. In May 1980, the mercados libres campesinos (MLCs) were introduced as part of a strategy aimed at harnessing the productive capacities of the peasant sector to help satisfy the resulting pent-up demand. The MLCs provided sites where agricultural producers (free peasants, cooperativists, workers on state enterprises, and owners of small plots and gardens) could sell their surplus production directly to consumers. The law governing the MLCs contained several significant restrictions, but the markets were “free” in regard to prices and quantities sold.

Since Mexico declared its independence from Spanish rule, the country has experienced two extended periods of political stability that are atypical of Latin American societies. The first, known as the Porfiriato, extended from 1875 to 1910. The second, which was heralded by the Revolution of 1910 and consolidated in the 1920s, still holds sway in the last decade of the twentieth century. The weaknesses of the Porfiriato have been analyzed amply, thanks in great part to the hindsight provided by the revolution that ended the era. Until recently, however, most works on twentieth-century Mexico have focused on the exceptional stability of the postrevolutionary regime. This approach has left largely unresearched (Knight 1989) or merely labeled as “crises” (Needier 1987) the recurrent episodes of union insurgency, popular protest, electoral opposition, and other signs of pressure for political change that have punctuated Mexican history since the Revolution. Consequently, analysts who have recently undertaken the arduous task of diagnosing at what points this imposing edifice might “give” have been unable to benefit from insights of work carried out in previous decades.

A large and influential body of work has been published on the recent transformation of Mexican agriculture, focusing on how the growth of linkages to the international economy has reallocated Mexico's land and labor resources in a way that threatens the survival of peasant forms of food production. Curiously, the working assumptions of this corpus have remained largely unchallenged in the academic literature. The thrust of this approach is well captured in an article published in LARR by David Barkin and Billie DeWalt a few years ago. These authors were seeking to explain the origins of Mexico's “food crisis” and made a series of recommendations for tackling the problem. Although many of Barkin and DeWalt's observations are irrefutable, the framework of their analysis begs a number of questions, and elements within it are mutually inconsistent. Their work merits close attention nonetheless because, unlike much of the literature on the “food crisis,” it goes beyond analysis of the problem to make fairly explicit policy recommendations. Because their recommendations are so out of line with the present thrust of Mexican policy, it is instructive to return to their article. Their contribution exemplifies a paradigm that, in rejecting trade liberalization, fails to lend itself to constructive criticism of the policies now being vigorously pursued in Mexico. In challenging Barkin and DeWalt's analytical framework and policy recommendations (from a standpoint that is sympathetic toward trade liberalization), this research note is intended to provoke a lively debate about new ways to conceptualize Mexican food issues.

The Nettie Lee Benson Latin American Collection at the University of Texas is internationally known as a major repository of primary source material on colonial and nineteenth-century Mexico. Specialists may also be aware of its collections of historical documents on the Río de la Plata and Central America. The best-known manuscripts were acquired before 1940 and have been described in widely distributed published guides.