Delivered. This is the story of a child from Tarn, a native of narrow horizons in the old lands of the Causses and the Cévennes, as he writes, who studied in Lyon, put up posters for peace in Algeria, in Millau, meets Pierre Bourdieu, rue d'Ulm, in Paris, and Roland Barthes (1915-1980) in his Paris office, before becoming the best French connoisseur of Latin American societies. These are the Memoirs of a man whose life is intimately linked to that of a subcontinent that he knew how to embrace, going through all kinds of university and field experiences, holding several positions of ambassador, while dedicating around fifteen books to it, all of which have become references.
Usually, the books of social science authors, who, at the turn of their life, examine their disciplinary practices, tell, with more or less happiness, long personal stories related to their discipline. None of this, or so little. Alain Rouquié is revealed in small touches. Modest and discreet, it fades over the pages in front of its object, this "Far West" which he discovered thanks to a grant in 1964, and which he invites the reader to take stock of today. great assets, at a time when globalization is ruthless for the weak.
Alain Rouquié holds a special place. Ferryman and thinker. When its sum was released in 2013 Mexico. A North American state (Fayard), The world kindly called him "Career Latino". With his latest installment, the current president of the House of Latin America poses more like a peaceful diplomat-researcher, a kind of free-thinker with fertile analysis, but who does not thunder.
We can read this summary book as a formidable comparative sum of the twenty republics of Latin America: "I have always tried to avoid the ghetto of monographs and preferred case studies. " On his first trip, he traveled through Argentina, Venezuela and Mexico. What to discover right away "The three Americas: immigration and European, the African and mixed Caribbean, finally Indian America". The dies are in place. Her "Existential curiosity for politics" will do the rest.
Then came the lead years where "The welfare state turns into a garrison state". The transition and the restoration of democracies. The weight of inheritance and the horrors of clientelism. These abyssal inequalities also that persist.
