[lbo-talk] Re: "Shining Path" Sandero Luminoso (was _The Dancer Upstairs_)

[Michael Pugliese]

On Mon, 26 May 2003 04:49:16 -0400, Luke Weiger <lweiger at umich.edu> wrote:

> Anyone up for discussion of the movie, the "shining path," revolution and
> counter-revolution?

   Excellent book on Sandero Luminoso by Peruvian journalist, Gustavo 
Gorriti, http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0807846767/ has sample pgs. 
Robin Kirk of HRW, translated. She has a new book on Columbia, the FARC, 
ELN, the Regime, peace negotiations w/Pastrana and AUC
These are also well worth a look see. (Cf. the blurb by Timothy Wickham- 
Crowley. He wrote the well regarded, " Guerrillas and Revolution in Latin 
America: A Comparative
Study of Insurgents and Regimes Since 1956 (Princeton: Princeton University 
Press, 1992.)
http://www.usip.org/pubs/catalog/latinam.html
Revolutionary Movements in Latin America
El Salvador's FMLN and Peru's Shining Path

Cynthia McClintock

"A spectacularly strong piece on a vitally important issue. Since these 
issues are so often treated in politically tendentious ways, it is a rare 
treat to find someone doing it so well. Someone once said that, when Aretha 
Franklin did a song, it stayed done. Likewise, now, with Professor 
McClintock's work."
--Timothy Wickham-Crowley, Georgetown University Why were El Salvador's 
FMLN and Peru's Shining Path able to mount such serious revolutionary 
challenges in the 1980s and early 1990s? And why were they able to do so 
despite the fact that their countries' elected governments were widely 
considered democratic? These two guerrilla groups were very different, but 
both came close to success. To explain why, the author examines the complex 
interplay among political and economic factors, the nature of the 
revolutionary organization, and international actors. McClintock emphasizes 
that the end of the Cold War does not mean the end of revolutionary groups, 
and that the United States can play an important role in determining the 
outcome of future confrontations. The book concludes with practical policy 
options for the U.S. government as it looks to foster peace and democracy 
in the western hemisphere.

Contents

Introduction  Analytical Framework  Two Revolutionary Organizations: The 
FMLN and the Shining Path  Democracy in Peru and El Salvador?  Economic 
Decline  United States Policy and Latin American Revolution  Why Did the 
Revolutionary Movements Emerge and Expand?  Conclusion  Appendices

About the Author

Cynthia McClintock is professor of political science and director of Latin 
American studies at George Washington University. A former president of the 
Latin American Studies Association, she was a fellow at the U.S. Institute 
of Peace in 1990-91.

Shining and Other Paths

: War and Society in Peru, 1980-1995
Steve J. Stern

 552 pages ( 1998)
22 b and w photographs, 4 maps


ISBN 0-8223-2201-3 Cloth - $69.95
ISBN 0-8223-2217-X Paperback - $23.95

Shining and Other Paths offers the first systematic account of the social 
experiences at the heart of the war waged between Shining Path and the 
Peruvian military during the 1980s and early 1990s. Confronting and 
untangling the many myths and enigmas that surround the war and the wider 
history of twentieth-century Peru, this book presents clear and often 
poignant analyses of the brutal reshaping of life and politics during a war 
that cost tens of thousands of lives

The contributors—a team of Peruvian and U.S. historians, social scientists, 
and human rights activists—explore the origins, social dynamics, and long- 
term consequences of the effort by Shining Path to effect an armed 
communist revolution. The book begins by interpreting Shining Path’s 
emergence and decision for war as one logical culmination, among several 
competing culminations, of trends in oppositional politics and social 
movements. It then traces the experiences of peasants and refugees to 
demonstrate how human struggle and resilience came together in grassroots 
determination to defeat Shining Path, and explores the unsuccessful efforts 
of urban shantytown dwellers, as well as rural and urban activists, to 
build a “third path” to social justice. Integral to this discussion is an 
examination of women’s activism and consciousness during the years of the 
crisis. Finally, this book analyzes the often paradoxical and unintended 
legacies of this tumultuous period for social and human rights movements, 
and for presidential and military leadership in Peru.

Extensive field research, broad historical vision, and strong editorial 
coordination enable the authors to write a coherent and deeply humanistic 
account, one that draws out the inner tragedies, ambiguities, and conflicts 
of the war

Providing historically grounded explication of the conflicts that reshaped 
contemporary Peru, Shining and Other Paths will be widely read by Latin 
Americanists, historians, anthropologists, gender theorists, sociologists, 
political scientists, and human rights activists

Contributors. Jo-Marie Burt, Marisol de la Cadena, Isabel Coral Cordero, 
Carlos Ivan Degregori, Ivan Hinojosa, Carlos Basombrio Iglesias, Florencia 
E. Mallon, Nelson Manrique, Hortensia Munoz, Enrique Obando, Patricia 
Oliart, Ponciano del Pino H., Jose Luis Renique, Orin Starn, Steve J. Stern


“A brilliantly conceived and executed study of the guerrilla insurgency in 
Peru. . . . This is exactly the kind of historically grounded work on 
Shining Path that we have long lacked and happily now have.”—Peter Klaren, 
George Washington University

“This collection of essays will bring to English-language readers the most 
comprehensive, most nuanced exploration of Shining Path—and of Peru during 
the last fifteen years—available.”— John Tutino, Georgetown University

Steve J. Stern is Professor of History and Director of Latin American 
Studies and Iberian Studies at the University of Wisconsin at Madison. His 
books include Peru’s Indian Peoples and the Challenge of Spanish Conquest: 
Huamanga to 1640, Resistance, Rebellion, and Consciousness in the Andean 
Peasant World, 18th to 20th Centuries, and The Secret History of Gender: 
Women, Men, and Power in Late Colonial Mexico