Article

Patricia Oliart
In the 1990 presidential election, political unknown IAlberto Fujimori conducted a deliberately simple campaign, in sharp contrast to the multimillion- dollar media blitz of Mario Vargas Llosa. Fujimori visited dozens of remote Andean villages in the "Fujimobile," a makeshift cart pulled along by a tractor.
Ana Carrigan
Prosecutor General Alfonso Valdivieso has set himself the goal of separating Colombia's political elite from its murderous friendships and entanglements with drug mobsters. The "ruling class" is being out-smarted and humiliated at every turn.
The Enrique Guzman y Valle University, widely known as "La Cantuta," was occupied by the Peruvian army in May, 1991 as part of President Fujimori's effort to combat Shining Path. Located just east of Lima, La Cantuta is the country's leading teachers' college.
Marjorie Agosín
After years of silence imposed by the military, Isla Negra, the fabled home of poet Pablo Neruda, is once again a blossoming cultural center. The island is an oasis in a dark and confusing post-coup history of consumerism.
Guillermo Rochabrún
How can we understand the many enigmas sur- rounding the presidency of Alberto Fujimori? Emerging practically out of nowhere, he defeat- ed novelist Mario Vargas Llosa in the 1990 presidential race. While previous administrations had suffered one policy failure after another in dealing with the country's economic and political crises, Fujimori had notable "success" stabilizing the country's erratic economy and defeating the Shining Path guerrilla insurgency.
Manuel Castillo Ochoa
Peru's business community has been a key pillar of support for Fujimori's neoliberal economic program. In recent months, however, some Peruvian industrialists have begun to grumble about high interest rates, the weak domestic market, and dumping by big foreign companies.
Enrique Obando
Fujimori needed the military to sustain his new government. In turn, the military wanted to gain greater control over the counterinsurgency war.
Disarmament in Haiti The Taking Note editorial enti- tied "The 'Violence' of Aristide" [Jan/Feb, 1996] con- demns the U.S.
U.S.
Manuel Castillo Ochoa
The government's attempt to derail opposition to the proposed privatization of Petro-PerO is a pal- pable demonstration of the contradiction in which: the government finds itself enmeshed. On the one hand, the government talks up the neoliberal dis- course of a new open institutional model; on the other hand, however, it acts in exclusionary, anti- democratic ways when things don't go as desired.
Peru in the 1990 the year Alberto Fujimori was elected president was a country bordering on collapse. Spiraling hyperinflation had devastated the economy, guerrilla violence was on the rise, and widespread corruption was eroding the government's credibility.
Judith Adler Hellman
Tunnel to Canto Grande: The Story of the Most Daring Prison Escape in Latin American History by Claribel Alegria and Darwin Flakoll, Curbstone Press, 1996, 193 pp., $12.
Carlos Reyna Izaquirre
After Guzmhn proposed a peace agreement with the government, Shining Path split into two factions. Both seek to resolve the same problem: how to keep the organization alive and relevant after suffering numerous defeats.
DM
Consorting with Tyrants U.S.
Guillermo Rochabrún
Fujimori takes great pride in not being beholden to the interests of any particular group. He did not, for example, take power by cutting deals with politi- cal parties or the business class.
Nelson Manrique
A new law has opened up the fertile lands along the coast to the market. In the Andean highlands, however, the fear of a Shining Path revival has led the government to beef up a rickety clientelistic system.