A Sacrificial Llama? The Expulsion of the Peace Corps from Bolivia in 1971 by James F. Siekmeier & note on Yawar Mallku
A Sacrificial Llama?
The Expulsion of the Peace Corps from Bolivia in 1971
By JAMES F. SIEKMEIER
(The author is a member of the history department at Angelo State University. This article is from the Pacific
Historical Review, Vol. 69, No. 1 (Feb., 2000), pp. 65-87 This article consists of 23 pages. Footnotes are at the
bottom of the article.)
The Peace Corps just won't be stopped. Like young love, or spring plants, or the south wind in
Kansas, it comes on despite all opposition, in fact thrives on it. Hutchinson (Kansas) News.
"At least we did not get nationalized." Gerald Baumann and Fred Caploe, respectively the
director and deputy director of the U.S. Peace Corps in Bolivia, 1967-1971, notifying Corps
personnel that Bolivia wanted them out.
In the last few years, scholarly interest in the U.S. Peace Corps has greatly increased, yet no
works have systematically examined any host nation's decision to break the initial agreement that
invited the Peace Corps inside its borders1. This article aims to fill that void by looking at the
case of Bolivia. That Andean nation asked the Peace Corps to leave because of rising anti-U.S.
sentiment stimulated in part by the release of a popular 1969 movie, Blood of the Condor.
Because some members of Bolivian society (most particularly, left-wing Bolivians) saw the
Peace Corps as an infringement on their country's sovereignty, and Bolivian President Juan Jose
Torres agreed, the Peace Corps suffered the disgrace of expulsion from Bolivia in 1971.
In her recent book on the history of the U.S. Peace Corps, Elizabeth Cobbs Hoffman argued that
in most cases the Peace Corps significantly improved U.S. relations with the developing world.2
In Bolivia, however, the opposite occurred. The Peace Corps brought Bolivian-U.S. relations to a
historic low by the early 1970s. In fact, the Peace Corps came to symbolize the degeneration of
relations between the two nations, despite the good intentions of many Peace Corps volunteers,
and even though the Peace Corps' development projects helped poor, rural Bolivians. Under
pressure from the Bolivian left, government officials eventually concluded that they then had to
do something to show that the United States was not controlling Bolivian economic and social
development. The Peace Corps was a casualty of anti-U.S. sentiment and its expulsion a sign of
just how widespread that sentiment was. As such, the story of the Peace Corps in Bolivia during
the 1960s helps us to understand more clearly the complex, multifaceted nature of recent
Bolivian history, as well as that nation's ties to the United States.3
To understand why Bolivia forced the Peace Corps to leave, this article proceeds in four steps.
First is a brief overview of the 1952 Bolivian Revolution. Second, the article explains the origins
of the Peace Corps as an experiment in U.S. foreign policy. Third, the study summarizes the
cultural, social, and political history of 1960s Bolivia, which produced a strong critique of the
Corps (and the U.S. presence overall) and ultimately the Corps's expulsion. Last, the article
summarizes some of the ramifications and legacy of the Corps's forced exit.
A brief background on Bolivia’s 1952 revolution partially explains the Peace Corps's highprofile presence in 1960s Bolivia, as well as its later dismissal. Before the revolution, only small
Bolivian elite benefited from the Andean nation's wealth. Going back at least as far as the
nineteenth century, the distribution of income, even by Latin American standards, had been
shockingly unequal. In 1952, however, a revolutionary organization offered hope for the
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impoverished masses and Bolivia’s small middle class. In that year, in a four-day military battle,
the Movimiento Nacionalista Revolucionario (MNR) forcibly took power and reordered Bolivian
society in very significant ways, producing one of only four twentieth-century social
revolutionary upheavals in Latin America (the others were in Mexico , Cuba , and Nicaragua ).
The MNR had been a political movement, and later a party, for about a decade before it took
control in 1952.4 A middle-class and working-class coalition, the MNR found it repugnant that
military regimes and elitist political parties served the interests of the oligarchy only. In Bolivia,
the most hated members of this class were the "tin barons," three mining magnates whose
companies were largely foreign-owned and together produced 80 percent of the nation's
considerable output of metals. These mine owners ranked among the richest people in the world,
whereas the miners whom they employed often lived in dire poverty.
On taking power, the MNR quickly implemented many reforms that radically transformed the
country. Three of the most significant mandates included giving women and Indians the vote,
redistributing land from wealthy rural elites to poor Bolivians in the countryside (agrarian
reform), and nationalizing the holdings of the despised "tin barons." For the first time, Bolivia
appeared to be on the road to democracy. This meant, among other things, that women and
Indians, at least theoretically, could demand equal treatment under the law. The agrarian reform's
effects reverberated beyond simple redistribution of land. By breaking up the large haciendas,
the reform effectively ended the centuries-old practice whereby many landless Indians worked
essentially as serfs (colonos or pongos) for the large landholders.
Tradition and legal strictures forced the poor to provide a panoply of feudalistic services,
including handing their daughters over to the landowner as mistresses. Finally, nationalization of
the holdings of the "tin barons" undercut their political influence. The expropriated mines were
now to produce income that the government planned to use for a variety of purposes, among
them curtailing the Bolivian economy's dependence on mining. Economic diversification, the
MNR hoped, would provide the Andean nation a modicum of self-sufficiency.5
From the beginning, the MNR leadership thought it necessary to ensure amicable relations with
the United States. The leaders of the revolution, notably President Victor Paz Estenssoro, placed
great importance on good foreign relations with the rest of the world.6 Because of the radicalism
of the revolution, Paz understood that he would have to work very hard to convince the United
States that Bolivia opposed communism and favored private property, democracy, and, most
importantly, the United States. Paz and other Bolivian leaders were successful in this regard. The
United States not only refrained from opposing the Bolivian revolution but gave the Andean
nation a significant amount of economic aid-about $200 million over the course of the 1950s.
U.S. officials feared that, without some economic assistance, Bolivia would slide into chaos-and
then, perhaps, into communism.7
In a sense, the United States had little choice but to support the MNR. After all, the revolutionary
coalition was a broad- based party with a great deal of public support. In part due to the extreme
power of the oligarchy, the political system had atrophied in the early twentieth century -- with
the sole exception of the MNR. Therefore, as the oligarchy lost its political power during the
revolution, no other viable groups could govern Bolivia.8
In addition, the MNR was willing to work with the United States, most importantly by accepting
U.S. financial assistance. Washington leaders understood their leverage: Given the poverty of the
majority of the Bolivian people, the Bolivians' acceptance of foreign aid would -- and eventually
did -- give the United States a great deal of influence. U.S. foreign policymakers used this power
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to prod Bolivia to enact legislation facilitating the investment of foreign private-sector capital, a
move that Washington officials argued would provide a propitious environment for economic
growth and, eventually, pro-United States stability. This predicted outcome, however, did not
obtain by the end of the 1950s, nor even by the early 1970s.9
Even though significant numbers of Bolivians grew to dislike U.S. policy by the late 1950s and
early 1960s, relations between the MNR and its North American "neighbor" remained generally
good during the MNR's first twelve years, 1952 through 1964. Harmonious relations were
important to both Bolivianos and norteamericanos. lO Although few Washington officials during
the early Cold War period argued that U.S. credibility in world affairs rested on its Bolivian
policy, in some respects Bolivia proved critical for U.S. foreign policy in the 1950s and 1960s.
As Bolivian Ambassador Victor Andrade Uzquiano phrased it in 1956, [t]he case of Bolivia is a
"test case" of economic cooperation and technical assistance which can help to assemble the
present factors toward a successful conclusion: a major crisis, potential riches to develop, and a
government and people willing to develop them. If technical assistance and aid do not work in
Bolivia, they will not work in the rest of Latin America.
Andrade's statement summarized the importance of Bolivia as a foreign policy test case for the
United States -- if U.S. diplomats could not promote a free-market economy and a stable
democratic government that benefited middle- and lower-class Bolivians, norteamericano policy
would be called into question throughout the Americas. However, U.S. officials maintained that
Bolivia could become a showcase. Economic assistance provided a way for the United States to
show that it supported democratic reform abroad, as well as a means by which Washington could
demonstrate that even one of the poorest nations in the world would benefit from close,
harmonious relations with the United States.12
The norteamericanos' lofty goals required economic development in the nonindustrialized South
American nation. When the Kennedy administration established the Peace Corps in 1961.
Bolivia, therefore, seemed a good laboratory for the intelligent, young, energetic Peace Corps
workers, and over 100 volunteers were sent there in the first two years of the program. 13 This
contingent was one of the largest in Latin America and offered a way for the United States to
show its support for a noncommunist, pro-norteamericano, democratic country that many
perceived as having a progressive leadership. Sending so many volunteers would thus signal to
Latin America that the United States did not support only repressive dictators but had a sincere
interest in the success of progressive democracies trying to implement social change. For a
decade, both nations saw the benefits of a Corps presence in the Andean nation.14
Although the Peace Corps is now an accepted part of U.S. diplomacy, it was an experimental
institution in the 1960s. For the first time, U.S. citizens, nonexperts in foreign relations, were
thrust onto the stage of U.S. diplomacy.15 The Corps intended to tap the energy of well-educated
young people to promote economic development in poorer areas of the world. For nearly all
Corps volunteers, often idealistic youth in their twenties, it was the first time they had lived
abroad -- and in cultures that contrasted sharply with the U.S. way of life. At the same time, for
residents of the small, isolated villages in nonindustrialized nations in Asia , Africa , and Latin
America , where volunteers were often stationed, Peace Corps volunteers were (perhaps with the
exception of missionaries) the first norteamencanos they had ever met.
Congress set forth the goals of the Peace Corps in 1961. Above all, the Peace Corps was to help
people of nonindustrialized countries to meet their nations' needs for trained manpower. The
lawmakers also stipulated that the Peace Corps was to promote a better understanding of
Americans on the part of the peoples served. Finally, Congress hoped the members of the Peace
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Corps would, after their tours of duty, educate the U.S. citizenry on Third World affairs.16
President Carlos Lleras Restrepo of Colombia touted the Corps in high-flying rhetoric: The
organi- zation would "awaken the civic spirit. . . orient the community in the realization of its
own effort. . . overcome the problems of ignorance, sickness, and backwardness. . . introduce
new aspirations and new ideals to the popular masses, all with the desire to start forming a more
equal society, more identified with the same purposes of excelling."17
In the end, officials in the U.S. State Department -- indeed, throughout the executive branch as a
whole-proved to be much more hard-headed when it came to setting up the Peace Corps. The
Peace Corps was to solidify relations between the United States and its traditionally close allies
in the developing world -- such as the Philippines, the first nation that received Peace Corps
volunteers. In addition, the development work of the Peace Corps would serve as an important
tool in the worldwide fight against communism, promoting "Western economic influence,"
especially in rural areas.18 In Latin America, and particularly in Bolivia, the Peace Corps
focused on health, agriculture, and community development in the countryside, and on education
in both rural and urban areas.19
The Peace Corps harmonized well with existing U.S. programs for Latin America.20 The
Alliance for Progress represented the largest distribution of economic assistance to the
nonindustrialized world in history up to the 1960s; in that decade it totaled $20 billion dollars in
U.S.-sponsored aid (an- other $10 billion was to come from the Latin American governments).
But despite the efforts of both Latin American and norteamericano officials, by the end of the
1960s the Alliance for Progress was widely considered a failure.21 Nonetheless, at the decade's
start, the U.S. government and its citizenry thought that economic aid could help the
nonindustrialized world develop along Western, capitalistic lines and stem the spread of
communism in the developing world.
The U.S. public thought the same about the Peace Corps. Yet the Peace Corps represented
something else for many in the United States, particularly those who did not work in the U.S.
government. Domestically during the early 1960s the Peace Corps fulfilled a need among many
U.S. citizens to feel that at least one part of their foreign policy was helpful to the world. The
Cold War forced many Americans to come to terms with aspects of the dark underside of U.S.
diplomacy, most notably the threat to use nuclear weapons and the increasing reliance on covert
and paramilitary operations in the developing world. Many in the United States wanted to feel
good about their nation's relations with other countries, and the Peace Corps provided them such
an opportunity. To many, the Peace Corps implemented the nation's best ideals and sent abroad
some of its smartest people -- a great example of the world's wealthiest nation serving the
world.22
But was the Peace Corps really for the benefit of the poor in the nonindustrialized world or
mainly for the benefit of the volunteers and their sponsors, the U.S. government and citizenry?
Was its primary purpose to soothe the nation's conscience? Important recent studies of the Peace
Corps in the 1960s give different assessments. One study has maintained that top Peace Corps
officials did not care whether the Corps developed the host nation's economy or not. Only U.S.
interests mattered. 23 Other recent commentators have presented more positive views of the
Peace Corps.24
In the case of Bolivia, available evidence shows that Peace Corps workers "on the ground" (both
Peace Corps volunteers and Bolivian nationals working for the Peace Corps), thought that
serving the interests of poor campesinos was important. Although U.S. volunteers received only
a few months of training before being sent out into the field, for most a relative lack of
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understanding of the place of assignment proved to be no significant problem. 25 The volunteers
learned a great deal in their stints overseas, and their host villages benefited from their work. As
it did around the world, the Peace Corps undertook a wide range of activities in Bolivia : helping
Bolivians tap their natural resources for economic use, improving health care, and stimulating
community development.
The idea of community development proved difficult to define or to agree upon. A good
definition of this concept comes from Richard Poston, the first head of the Peace Corps's
community development program in Colombia :
"In community development. . . we are trying to reach in to the local community. . . to deal with
the community as an entity in itself, or as a social unit. . . . We are trying to help the people
fashion themselves into an organized civic body that will make it possible for them to do things
for themselves and enable them to improve their life situation. . . We are trying to build into the
community a set of social skills that will help the community acquire a greater ability to diagnose
intelligently and discover its needs. . . [so] they will be able to identify and deal with problems -human problems, social problems, physical problems."26
In the Peace Corps's early years, some of its top officials argued for the inclusion of community
development as an integral part of the Peace Corps's overall agenda. R Sargent Shriver, the first
director, and Frank Mankiewicz, country director of the Peace Corps in Peru from 1962 to 1964
and Latin American regional director from 1964 to 1966, both posited that community
development should actually be revolutionary, empowering "the people" who lived in poor, rural
regions. Other top officers, most notably Brent Ashabranner and Charles Peters, vehemently
disagreed, rejecting the idea of volunteers' trying to teach self-government to poor Latin
Americans or getting them to question the rigid social stratification of the region. These two
camps clashed over how much direction local volunteers should be given in the area of
community development. Mankiewicz thought the volunteers should have near-total leeway,
while the opposing group wanted to impose more structure on their activities.27
Despite these disagreements, volunteers managed to implement many development projects:
increasing agricultural production, improving health care, and teaching were examples. Even
though the majority of the Peace Corps workers in the early years were inexperienced in the field
of enhancing economic growth, Bolivian and U.S. officials, as well as volunteers themselves, all
assessed the Peace Corps's activities as successful. The volunteers seemed by all accounts to
have been doing a good job developing the Andean nation's vast natural and human resources
and promoting public health. Poorer members of Bolivian society were, seemingly, benefiting
from Peace Corps activities.28
Volunteers generally did not work in the mining sector, so their efforts proved beneficial in
diversifying the Bolivian economy, a key goal of the MNR revolution. With their involvement in
agriculture, Peace Corps volunteers helped implement one of the key goals of the revolution,
agrarian reform.29 In turn, the volunteers appreciated the learning experience they received and
believed their efforts had a significant effect on the Andean nation.30
One important reason for the Peace Corps's success in Bolivia was the relaxed yet productive
working relationship between the Peace Corps and the Bolivian government. The Peace Corps
closely consulted President Victor Paz Estenssoro regarding Bolivia's needs. The country
director of the Peace Corps in Bolivia , Derek Singer, worked well with him in part because
Estenssoro was familiar with U.S.-sponsored aid programs, most notably CARE, which operated
in Bolivia in the 1950s with Estenssoro's support.31 Additionally, the Peace Corps worked
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extensively with Bolivia 's new National Community Development program, a project set up by
the government to attack rural development problems by teaching campesinos technical skills.32
Overall, the good working relationship between volunteers and villagers reflected the generally
harmonious U.S.-Bolivian relations in the 1950s and early 1960s. By the late 1960s, however,
two important developments strained diplomatic relations and caused the Bolivian government to
expel the Peace Corps. First, anti-U.S. sentiment swept over the nation, fueled in part by
Bolivian opposition to U.S.-sponsored efforts to promote birth control in the nation. Second, and
more specifically, a compelling, artistically innovative, and anti-U.S. movie struck a chord with
the Bolivian left and, more generally, with Bolivian public opinion.
The causes of anti-U.S. feeling in Bolivia were multifaceted and complex. In 1967 Argentine
leftist guerrilla Ernesto "Che" Guevara, a close associate of Fidel Castro, was murdered by the
Bolivian army and many Bolivians thought the army had done so under the direction of the U.S.
Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). Guevara's killing fueled anti-norteamericano sentiment
amongst the Bolivian left -- to whom the Argentine represented the hope that the Cuban
Revolution could be replicated in Bolivia.
In addition to the high-profile Guevara murder, another cause of anti-Yankee feeling in the South
American nation was the lack of results from the much-heralded Alliance for Progress. U.S.
actions in Vietnam and discrimination against African Americans in the United States also fueled
resentment.33 But the most important factor behind increasingly virulent anti-U.S. sentiment in
1960s Bolivia was the controversy that erupted over the Peace Corps's program to provide birth
control information and materials to Bolivians.
Few U.S. observers in the mid-1960s thought that birth control would be so controversial.34 In
those years, fears of world overpopulation helped to forge in the United States a strong
consensus among both Republicans and Democrats over the need to reduce the growth of world
population through birth control.35 At the time, the Peace Corps perceived its birth control
program to be nonaggressive, small, and voluntary -- a description that is accurate. Moreover, the
Peace Corps's family planning activities were sanctioned by the Bolivian Ministry of Health,
which worked out an agreement with the Peace Corps for the distribution of birth control
materials.36 Peace Corps officials and vol- unteers simply failed to realize the explosive nature
of the birth control issue; no one foresaw that it would ultimately contribute to the Corps's
expulsion. Many Bolivians concluded that the Peace Corps meant to impose birth control
distribution in the nation. But as the Peace Corps set up a number of clinics in the campo
(countryside), these same clinics were staffed by Bolivian doctors.37
Bolivian attitudes toward contraception were the opposite of those widely held in the United
States . Most Bolivians maintained that birth control was not needed, for the Andean country had
a relatively small population of slightly more than 3 million and plenty of land and resources. In
fact, some Bolivians argued that their country needed population growth; with more people, it
could fill up its borderlands and protect against foreign encroachment.38 The Bolivian left took
this argument a step further: It argued that limiting population growth was part of a U.S.
conspiracy to reduce what little geopolitical power Bolivia had. Indeed, some on the Bolivian left
charged that contraception was a form of genocide.39 Reinforcing anti- contraceptive attitudes
was the fact that family planning had been brought into Bolivia by outsiders, for the most part
North Americans and Europeans. Many Bolivians of Indian extraction continue to be wary of
white foreigners, due to Bolivia 's geographic isolation and to traditionally racist attitudes on the
part of whites and mestizos toward Indians.
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Interestingly, the editors of El Diario , Bolivia 's oldest and most prominent newspaper,
attempted to put the conflict over the use of family planning in historical perspective. In the mid
to late 1960s, editorials in El Diario had a leftist slant. The editors argued that U.S. capitalists
("La plutocracia yanqui") were promoting developing world population control due to foreign
business's own narrow, economic interests. If Bolivia's population remained stable or fell, the
argument held, the Bolivian call to share the wealth generated by foreign investors would be
relatively weaker.
A second aspect of El Diario’s position was its editors' support for the idea of birth control for all
in Bolivia if the family chose it without coercion. This view ran counter to the widespread
Bolivian opposition to contraception.40 The editors supported the idea of birth control; what they
disliked was what they saw as outside coercion. They pointedly asserted that it was immoral for
the Peace Corps -- and more generally the United States and even the World Bank -- to prod
Bolivians to increase the use of contraception beyond what they would have used voluntarily.41
The Peace Corps in reality did little to reduce the size of Bolivia 's population, nor did it want to
limit population growth in order to reduce the nation's power. To the contrary, the Peace Corps
saw family planning as a means of giving women and families the option of having fewer
children, freeing more resources for each individual child's economic welfare, and thereby
offering those children hope for a brighter future.42 On this point, while the Peace Corps and the
editors of El Diario agreed, the major- ity of Bolivians, most of them Catholic, did not.43
Nonetheless, the Peace Corps continued its program of distributing contraceptives.
For the Peace Corps, moral correctness superseded political expediency. This commitment to
doing what it thought was morally Right -- typical of the Peace Corps -- blinded the Bolivian
Corps to the political ramifications of their good intentions.44
In addition to many Bolivians' belief that population control was a danger to their country, two
other considerations were at play. First, Bolivia 's high infant mortality rate, especially in the
rural areas, meant that birth control could lead to a family's having few or no children. Since
children are a peasant family's main form of wealth, campesinos logically feared anything that
might reduce the number of their children. Second was the widely held societal/cultural value of
machismo among men. Bolivian men feared that birth control would give women too much
power over the process of reproduction. For many, machismo, virility, and power were measured
in terms of the number of children a man fathered.45
Bolivia 's anticontraception sentiment coincided with rising anti-Yankee attitudes in the late
1960s. The consequences were profound. In 1969 the Bolivian government expropriated the
holdings of Gulf Oil company. In the late 1960s and early 1970s student demonstrations against
the United States reached a fever pitch. The offices of the Peace Corps were attacked, and the
Centro Boliviano Americano had to be moved from its location near the Universidad Mayor de
San Andres (a center of radicalism) to a more obscure side street. Allegations that Peace Corps
volunteers (indeed, almost all North Americans in Bolivia) were CIA agents abounded.46
While such sentiments were important sources of strained Bolivia 's relations between the
nations, the provocative 1969 film, Blood of the Condor (in the Quechua language, Yawar
Mallku) provided the coup de grace. The film proved to be, first, a poignant dramatization of
Bolivia's isolated Indians increasingly caught up in an urbanizing, modernizing Latin America ,
and second, a powerful anti-imperialist statement.47 The movie tells the story of an Indian
family's need to move to the city to find work and the difficulties of city life for Indians who did
not understand Spanish and were unfamiliar with urban culture.
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Blood of the Condor expressed an indigenous nationalism, arguing that Indians needed to
separate themselves from U.S.-dominated mestizo society and reconnect with their indigenous
roots. If violence were necessary to accomplish this goal, so be it.48 In director Jorge Sanjines's
words, the movie's two goals were "to denounce the gringos and to depict one aspect of Bolivia's
social reality" -- that is, to expose the reality of life for the Indians.49 The film portrayed Peace
Corps volunteers in the campo as arrogant, ethnocentric, and narrow-minded imperialists out to
destroy Indian culture. One particularly powerful scene showed Indians attacking a clinic while
the volunteers inside sterilized Indian women against their will. Later, in a move that typified the
deep-seated Andean Indian tradition of reciprocity, the Indians in the movie responded by
forcibly sterilizing some of the female volunteers.
The movie was immensely popular in Bolivia and gained a following around the world as well,
especially on university campuses. In Bolivia itself, the movie tapped into a traditional fear of
foreign influence. In La Paz , the nation's capital, the movie's popularity increased when the city
government, in the first censorship of a film since the 1952 revolution, inexplicably quashed its
showing. The only statement made by the mayor's office was that, "Because of instructions from
higher-up [instrucciones superiores], the release of Yawar Mallku has been delayed."50
Although the film dramatized the plight of Bolivia 's indigenous people, Indians in the campo
had a hard time understanding its meaning. In the movie, an Indian family is used to represent
the plight of all indigenous peoples in Bolivia . Many Bolivian Indians, however, in contrast to
individualistically oriented mestizos, Europeans, and North Americans, saw themselves as part
of a specific community, first and foremost. Indians' strong community orientation prevented
many from comprehending the artistic vehicle of one family representing the whole, a technique
used so powerfully in the film.51
As to sterilization, director Sanjines claimed that a friend of his, now deceased, had witnessed
Peace Corps volunteers sterilizing women in a clinic near Lake Titicaca in northwestern
Bolivia.52 However, Sanjines also stated that he was not interested in sterilization, per se. For
him, as an artist, the issue served as a metaphor to make a broader point. The scene on
sterilization was used to dramatize how U.S. influence, through the Peace Corps as well as the
Alliance for Progress, reached the most remote places in Latin America.53 Metaphorically,
Sanjines held, North American hegemonic power had sterilized the mestizo culture, cutting it off
from its Indian roots.54
Yet for many Bolivians in the late 1960s and early 1970s, especially left-wing Bolivians, the
sterilization issue was anything but a metaphor.55 To the contrary, it posed an immediate crisis
that needed to be resolved by ending the supposed sterilization program. If that meant the Peace
Corps volunteers had to leave, so be it. There is no documentary evidence, and the Peace Corps
has denied, that the volunteers ever sterilized anyone.56 Nonetheless, after Blood of the Condor's
release, few Bolivians were inclined to listen to the Peace Corps's statements on the policy of
contraception.
Stimulated by Blood of the Condor, anti-United States sentiment grew dramatically, and the Juan
Jose Torres government felt compelled to expel the Peace Corps.57 Torres, a top military leader
who came to power in a 1970 coup, was not virulently anti-norteamencano. Nor was he antiPeace Corps; in fact, he had worked closely with Peace Corps volunteers in El Alto, a suburb of
La Paz , in the 1960s. Even so, in May 1971 the Bolivian government announced that the Peace
Corps was no longer welcome in Bolivia.58 The government's announcement gave a vague
reason for the expulsion, stating that "deep structural changes" were necessary in Bolivia 's
relationship with the outside world, most notably the United States . The Torres administration
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used arguments typical of the left in the 1960s and 1970s-that foreign economic activity resulted
only in dependency of the host nation and would never provide for economic development. Only
by dismissing the Peace Corps could Bolivians achieve their goals of "national liberation and
popular participation" or implement their conception of "national development."59
Although the Bolivian left pressured the Bolivian government to force out the Peace Corps, the
government may also have been quietly happy to see the volunteers leave. One Bolivian official
who served as ambassador to the United States in the 1960s and 1970s thought that some
members of the Torres government feared the Peace Corps. Peace Corps volunteers were
intelligent and ambitious, and they had effectively promoted reforms through community
development. The Bolivian government feared that the volunteers might empower newly
confident Indians and lead them to question their subordinate position in Bolivian society.60
This line of argument is supported by the fact that, as the Peace Corps became more effective at
promoting rural development and public health, anti-Peace Corps sentiment in Bolivia rose.
According to the country director from 1967 to 1971, Gerald "Gino" Baumann, in the late 1960s
Peace Corps volunteers included a number of idealistic rebels -- student radicals who often
lacked practical skills and were not effective in the field. But by 1971, with a pared-down group
of volunteers and fewer radicals, the Peace Corps was a more effective force.61
In the final analysis, the expulsion was a concession to the strength of the Bolivian left. A day
before Torres issued the fateful order, El Diario reported that two leftist groups, the Central
Obrero Boliviano (COB) and the Comite Universitario Boliviano -- the nation's largest union and
a large organization of academics and students, respectively -- called for the Peace Corps to be
thrown out.62 Even though Torres forced the Peace Corps to leave, the head of state did not burn
all his bridges with the United States . Throwing out the U.S. Agency for International
Development (USAID) or the U.S. military (as some prominent Bolivian leftists demanded)
would have proven too costly to the Bolivian economy and too damaging to U.S.-Bolivian
relations. The expulsion of the Peace Corps, however, was sufficient to satisfy the anti-United
States left. Some characterized it as a national victory, a conquista nacional. At the same time,
the volunteers' adios did not excessively damage Bolivian-U.S. relations. 63 In that sense, the
Peace Corps was a sacrificial llama. 64
Although the Bolivian left saw the dismissal of the Peace Corps as a necessary move to allow
Bolivia to develop to its full potential economically, not all commentators agreed with the Torres
government's anti-Peace Corps policy. Writer, journalist, and historian Mariano Baptista
Gumucio Pointed out that the Peace Corps was invited in to help smaller, isolated, rural
communities improve the well-being of the poor in the nation. The Peace Corps, he argued, was
succeeding in these goals. He also claimed that urban Marxists were anti-Peace Corps because
these radicals feared the Corps's activities would promote capitalism and petty, bourgeois
attitudes among the poorer campesinos and cause the Indians to discard their long-standing
traditions and ideas in exchange for the foreign, Western-style way of United States.65 In fact, in
the countryside many campesinos did not want the volunteers to leave. After all, the
norteamericano idealists were working with the villagers on long-term projects that would be
abruptly terminated. In one instance, a volunteer who had worked planting trees in a small town
proved to be so well-liked that the townspeople put up a roadblock to prevent him from
abandoning the village.66
The expulsion of the Peace Corps proved to be a surreal and terrifying experience for some of
the volunteers. After the announcement, they were given less than three weeks to exit the
country. Anti-U.S. Bolivians took advantage of the volunteers' vulnerability, stealing some of
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A Sacrificial Llama? The Expulsion of the Peace Corps from Bolivia in 1971 by James F. Siekmeier & note on Yawar Mallku
their personal possessions. Demonstrators attacked some of the vehicles carrying departing
volunteers on their way to the airport.67
The volunteers were given the option of returning to the United States or transferring to Peru,
Ecuador, Paraguay, or Costa Rica. The reassignment to the first three countries was guided by
geography -- volunteers who had been posted in the Andean mountain regions of Bolivia had
developed appropriate skills (for example, sheepherding, campo agricultural projects, and rural
electrification) were sent to Peru and Ecuador. Those who had worked in the Bolivian lowlands
were offered assignments in neighboring Paraguay.68 Costa Rica became an option when
President Jose Figueres gave the volunteers an open invitation to work in his country.69
In the years since the Peace Corps was expelled, Bolivia and the United States again grew
close.70 But although the diplomatic difficulties were repaired, this historical episode illustrates
the fear many in the nonindustrialized world have of U.S. power and demonstrates how the left
can galvanize that fear. While perhaps extreme in the case of the Peace Corps, this fear is very
real. Moreover, the events detailed in this article show how a compelling visual presentation can
sway opinion and create strong attitudes and beliefs -- especially in a culture where many people
are illiterate and oral communication is so important. Finally, we learn that when people from
one value system ignore deeply held customs of people of a different culture, relations between
nations can turn sour very quickly.
I would like to thank the many people in La Paz , Bolivia , and Washington, D.C., who allowed
me to interview them, and Barb Bergman, Arnoldo De Leon, Daniel Castro, Jerome Crowder,
Walter LaFeber, Jane Mangen, and Stephen Streeter for helpful comments on earlier drafts of
this article. I would also like to thank Albert (Ace) Freeman for help with word processing and
Elizabeth Cobbs Hoffman and Jonathan Zimmerman for their help when I first conceptualized
the article. In addition, former Peace Corps country directors for Bolivia , Derek Singer and
Gerold "Gino" Baumann, proved extremely helpful, even sharing parts of their personal archives.
Notes:
1
Examples include Gary May, "Passing the Torch and Lighting the Fires: The Peace Corps," in
Thomas G. Paterson, ed., Kennedy's Quest for Victory: American Pacific Historical Review
@2000 by the Pacific Coast Branch American Historical Association 65 Foreign Policy, 19611963 (New York, 1989); Glen F. Sheffield, " Peru and the Peace Corps, 1962-1968" (Ph.D.
dissertation, University of Connecticut, 1991);Jonathan I Zimmerman, "Beyond Double
Consciousness: Black Peace Corps Volunteers in Africa , 1961-1971," Journal of American
History, 82 (1995),999-1028; Elizabeth A. Cobbs, "Decolonization, the Cold War, and the
Foreign Policy of the Peace Corps; Diplomatic History, 20 (1996),80; Elizabeth Cobbs Hoffman,
All You Need Is Love: The Peace Corps and the spirit of the 1960s (Cambridge, Mass., 1998).
2
Cobbs, "Decolonization," 80; Cobbs Hoffman, All You Need Is Love, 1~38, 251-259.
3
Since its inception, the Peace Corps has served 132 countries. Sixteen have asked the Corps to
leave. Those countries are Bolivia , Burkina Faso , Ceylon , Gabon , Guinea , Indonesia , Iran ,
Libya , Malawi , Malaysia , Mauritania , Peru , Somalia , South Korea , Tanzania , and Turkey .
Seven nations, including Bolivia , eventually asked the Peace Corps to return. See Cobbs
Hoffman, All You Need Is Love, 119,280.
4
The MNR won the 1951 election, but the Bolivian military prevented it from taking power.
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A Sacrificial Llama? The Expulsion of the Peace Corps from Bolivia in 1971 by James F. Siekmeier & note on Yawar Mallku
5
Economic Commission for Latin America , "Economic Policy of Bolivia ,". Economic Bulletin
for Latin America , 12 (Oct. 1967) 63-64.
6
Kenneth Lehman, "Revolutions and Attributions: Making Sense of Eisenhower Administration
Policies in Bolivia and Guatemala ," Diplomatic History, 21 (1997), 198-199.
James F. Siekmeier, “The Most Generous Assistance” U.S. Economic Aid to Guatemala and
Bolivia , 1944-1959; Journal of American and Canadian Studies, 11 (1994) 23-27.
7
8
Herbert S. Klein, Bolivia : The Evolution of a Multi-Ethnic Society ( New York , 1992), 188232, notes that there were no other viable political entities besides the MNR. In addition, see
Bernard M. Wood, "Foreign Aid and Revolutionary Development: The Case of Bolivia , 19521964;' Occasional Paper #8, 1970, School of International Affairs, Carleton University , Ottawa ,
Canada , 8-9.
9
Siekmeier, "'[T]he Most Generous Assistance,'" 23-27.
10
I use norteammcano here interchangeably with " United States ," or people from the United
States , to vary word use. This practice is common in many parts of Latin America.
11
Victor Andrade Uzquiano to Foreign Minister Walter Guevara Arze, Jan. 10,1956,
"Memorandum-Recapilacion de antecedentes sobre asistencia economica y tecnica de los EE.UU
a Bolivia , No.5," Embajada de Bolivia en Washington , Enero-junio 1956, pp. 9-17, Coleccion
de Embajada de Bolivia en Washington , Archivo de Relaciones Exteriores, La Paz , Bolivia.
12
Robert J. Alexander The Bolivian National Revolution ( New Brunswick , NJ. 1958), 260.
13
Oficina del Cuerpo de Paz, Dos Arios del Cuerpo de Paz en Bolivia , 10 July . 1964 (La Paz,
Bolivia, 1964). Bolivia had a population of only about three million at this time. The number of
volunteers jumped to 350 by the middle of the 1960s. Matilde Arze, a Bolivian official who
worked in the Peace Corps office in Bolivia , interview by author, May 15, 1997 , La Paz . See
also Kevin Lowther and C. Payne Lucas, Keeping Kennedy's Promise: The Peace Corps and the
Unmet Hope of the New Frontier (Boulder, Colo., 1978), 42.
14
On the point of the Peace Corps as a means of fighting communism or Soviet expansion in the
developing world, see Cobbs, "Decolonization," 90-94. Derek Singer, Latin American director of
the Peace Corps for part of 1961, and Bolivia country director for the Peace Corps in 1962-1964,
noted that Washington leaders wanted other Latin American nations to perceive that the United
States was supporting a democratic government, one generally seen as progressive. Derek
Singer, interview with author, July 2, 1997 , Arlington , Va.
15
Singer stated that, from the beginning, John F. Kennedy and his advisers wanted to keep the
Peace Corps institutionally separate from the traditional agencies that ran U.S. diplomacy -- most
notably the State Department and the Foreign Service. The idea was to keep the Peace Corps as
apolitical as possible. Singer interview.
16
Gerard T. Rice, Twenty Years of the Peace Corps (Washington, D.C., 1982), 3.
17
Carlos Ueras Restrepo, quoted in U.S. Peace Corps, Peace Corps Seventh Annual Report, June 30,
1968 (Washington, D.C., 1968), 53.
18
"Telegram From the Embassy in the Philippines to the Department of State," May 18, 1961 ,
Foreign Relations of the United States 1961 (24 vols., Washington , I ; D.C., 1961-1963), 23:
764n; for quote, see "Memorandum From the Under Secretary of State (Ball) to President
Kennedy;' Oct. 10, 1962 , ibid., 635; "Telegram From the Department of State to the Embassy in
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A Sacrificial Llama? The Expulsion of the Peace Corps from Bolivia in 1971 by James F. Siekmeier & note on Yawar Mallku
the Philippines ," Aug. 5, 1961 , ibid., 779n. For an explication of U.S. intervention in the
Philippines and U.S. attempts to prevent the spread of communism and cement close U.S.Philippine relations, see D. Michael Shafer, Deadly Paradigms: The Failure of U.S.
Counterinsurgency Policy (Princeton, NJ., 1988), 205-239.
19
Warren W. Wiggins, Associate Director, Office of Program Development and Operations, to
the Director [of the Peace Corps], March 29,1965 , folder AID . (US) 14 Peace Corps 1/1/64 ,
box 536, Central Foreign Policy Files, 1964-1966, Economic, General Records of the
Department of State, Record Group 59, National Archives II, College Park , Md.
20
Two studies that discuss the failure of U.S. economic aid toward Latin . America in the 1950s
include James F. Siekmeier, "Fighting Economic Nationalism: United States Economic Aid and
Development Policy “Toward Latin America , 1952-1961" (Ph.D. dissertation, Cornell
University, 1993), and Thomas Zoumaras, "Path to Pan Americanism: Eisenhower's Foreign
Economic Policy “Toward Latin America " (Ph.D. dissertation, University of Connecticut,
1987).
21
Important studies of the Alliance for Progress include Jerome Levinson and Juan de Oms, The
Alliance that Lost Its Way: A Critical Report on the Alliance for Progress ( Chicago , 1970);
Robert Divine, ed., Exploring the Johnson Years ( Austin , Texas , 1981) and Divine, ed., The
Johnson Years (Lawrence, Kans., 1987); Diane Kunz, ed., The Diplomacy of the Crucial
Decade: American Foreign Relations in the 1960s (New York , 1994); Walter LaFeber, Inevitabk
Revolutions: The United States in Central America (New York, 1993)~ esp. 147-196; and most
recently Stephen G. Rabe, The Most Dangerous Area of the World: John R Kennedy Confronts
Communist Revolution in Latin America (Chapel Hill, N.C., 1999).
22
Cobbs Hoffman, All You Need Is Love, 1, 6. In addition, many young people in the United
States in those years thought their country had grown "fat, arrogant and materialistic," in the
words of an early volunteer, Coates Redmon. Redmon, Come as You Are: The Peace Corps
Story (San Diego, 1986), 3. In the mind of Congressman William F. Ryan, the Peace Corps had a
noble mission: to ensure that the world's forgotten could achieve human dignity. Ryan quoted in
Marshall Windmiller, The Peace Corps and Pax Americana ( Washington , D.C. , 1970), 5.
23
Sheffield , " Peru and the Peace Corps," 382.
24
See Cobbs Hoffman, All You Need Is Love, and Zimmerman, "Beyond Double
Consciousness," noted in footnote 2.
25
Sheffield has argued that in Peru , the lack of language training in Indian languages made it
difficult or impossible for the volunteers to be effective in the countryside, where most were
posted in the 1960s. However, there seems to be little evidence of language barriers affecting
Bolivian volunteers' performance at this time. Sheffield , " Peru and the Peace Corps," 125.
26
Poston quoted in Thomas James Nicascrp, Community Development Training in Peace
Corps/Latin America : With special Emphasis on Bolivia (M.S. thesis, University of Missouri ,
1969), 4.
27
Sheffield , " Peru and the Peace Corps,' 246, 259-260, 191.
28
Lynn Hamilton, former volunteer, interview March 12, 1997 , La Paz ; James Cooney, former
volunteer, interview, June 25, 1997 , Washington , D.C. ; Nora Lopez, a Bolivian official who
worked in the Peace Corps office in Bolivia , interview, April 29, 1997 , La Paz ; Nora Calderon,
a Bolivian official who worked in the Peace Corps office in Bolivia , interview, April 30, 1997 ,
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A Sacrificial Llama? The Expulsion of the Peace Corps from Bolivia in 1971 by James F. Siekmeier & note on Yawar Mallku
La Paz ; and Arze interview. All interviews were conducted by the author. For more systematic
evidence of the volunteers' success in Bolivia , see Richard Griscom, "Bolivia-Impetus is to East
in Land Beset by Geography:' Peace Carps Volunteer, 3 (Feb. 1965), 8-16; Claude Wolfe, Heifer
Project-Peace Corps-Final Report and Evaluation July 1964, Bolivia II Project, I Cochabamba
Bolivia (Washington, D.C., 1962); Carl A. Moore, Contract Overseas Representative , Bolivia I
Peace Corps Public Health Group, April 1, 1962-April1 , 1964, Extension Division, The
University of Oklahoma , (Norman, Okla., 1964); Oficina del Cuerpo de Paz, Dos Arios del
Cuerpo de Paz; Dwight B. Heath, "The Emerging Volunteer Subculture in Bolivia :' in Robert B.
Textor, ed., Cultural Frontiers of the Peace Corps ( Cambridge , Mass" 1900), 271-297.
29
Donald Schultz, "Heifer Helps Cochabamba ," Peace Carps Volunteer, 3 (Feb. 1965),14.
30
Hamilton and Cooney interviews.
31
Irwin Rubenstein, Foreign Service Officer who helped set up some early Corps programs in
Bolivia , interview by author, May 22, 1997 , Miami ; Singer interview.
32
G. F. Baumann, "The National Community Development Programme in Bolivia and the
Utilization of Peace Corps Volunteers:' Community Development Journal 5 (1970), 191.
33
Daniel Rodriguez, "Goodbye Cuerpo de Paz," May 23,1971 , p. 2; "Exigen una investigacion
de las actividades del tenebrosos Ku Klux Klan," El Diario, April 17, 1971, p. 7.
34
Sheffield states that some U.S. officials did understand the political sensitivity of family
planning in 1960s Peru . Sheffield , " Peru and the Peace Corps," 231-237. There is little
evidence, however, that U.S. officials working in Bolivia foresaw the political ramifications of
the distribution of contraceptives.
35
For example, President Dwight D. Eisenhower, after he left office, sat on the boards of
population control agencies (as an ex-officio member). See C. Douglas Dillon, oral history
interview by John Luther (New York, 1972), Eisenhower Administration Project, Oral History
Collection of Columbia University , New York ; and Donald T. Critchlow, "Birth Control,
Population Control, and Family Planning: An Overview," in Critchlow, ed., The Politics of
Abortion and Birth Control in Historical Perspective (University Park, Pa., 1996), 1.0. For a
good example of the profamily planning consensus in the United States , with regard to reducing
the future populations of nonindustrialized nations, see William Rich, "Smaller Families
Through Social and Economic Progress;' in Colin I. Bradford, Jr., et al, New Directions in
Development: Latin America , Export Credit, Population Growth, and U.S. Attitudes (New York,
1974), 193-286.
36
Jaime Mendoza, Bolivian head of the Peace Corps office in Bolivia in the 1960s, interview by
author, May 15, 1997 , La Paz . The Corps and the Ministry of Public Health worked together in
the small birth control programs. Singer interview corroborates Mendoza's statements.
37
Ken Rustad, former volunteer in Bolivia , to the author, Aug. 7, 1998 . The doctors were
Bolivian, but Peace Corps workers staffed the clinics.
38
Ramon Aguilar A., "Necesidad de poblacion," El Diario, June 23, 1971 , p. .2; Mariano
Baptista Gumucid;Este Pais Tan Sow en Su Agonia (La Paz, 1972), 45-48.
39
Carlos D. Mesa G., ed., Cine Boliviano: del realizador al critico (La Paz, 1979), 150;
CELADEC (Comision Evangelica Latinoamericana de Educacion Cristiana), Bolivia : Racismo
y Anticoncepcion, (Lima, Peru, 1981),3. In the forceful words of prominent Uruguayan leftist,
Eduardo Galeano, it was more convenient for Industrialized world advocates of Third World
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A Sacrificial Llama? The Expulsion of the Peace Corps from Bolivia in 1971 by James F. Siekmeier & note on Yawar Mallku
population control to "kill future guerrillas while still in their mothers' bodies" than after they
were born. Galeano quoted in Alfonso Gumucio Dagron, Historia del cine en Bolivia (
Cochabamba , Bolivia , 1982),230.
40
"La madre proletaria," May 27, 1971 , El Diario, 2; Jorge Sanjines, one of Bolivia 's most
prominent filmmakers, interview by author, April 2, 1997 , La Paz ; Episcopado
Boliviano,.quoted in CELADEC, Bolivia , 52.
41
Starting in the late 1960s, the United States promoted family planning by means of its foreign
assistance programs; in some cases, the developing nations' adoption of family planning
techniques was mandatory if they wanted to receive aid. For an overview of U.S. foreign
policymakers' attempts to promote birth control in developing nations, see John Sharpless, "World
Population Growth, Family Planning, and American Foreign Policy," in Critchlow, ed., The
Politics of Abortion, 87-90. Authors critical of U.S. attempts to prod developing world nations to
increase use of contraception include CELADEC, Bolivia , 3; and Jacqueline R. Kasun, The War
Against Population: The Economics and ldeology of World Population Control (San Francisco,
1988), 85-94.
42
Mendoza interview.
43
CELADEC, Bolivia , 51-54.
44
Sheffield , " Peru and the Peace Corps," 234.
45
Mendoza interview; CELADEC, Bolivia , 51.
46
Hamilton interview, March 12, 1997 ; "Corpsmen, Out!" Christian Science Monitor, June 1,
1971 , p. 3. There were also allegations that the Corps used illegal drugs. See Baptista Gumucio,
Este Pais Tan Solo en Su Agonia, 65-67.
47
The condor was and is a revered animal of the Andean Indian peoples, and today it is a symbol of
the Indians' deep sense of a connection with the past. Inca mythology or religion holds that condors
transported the souls of the dead to heaven or the underworld.
48
James R Chamberlain, "Blood of the Condor;' in Leon G. Campbell, Carlos E. Cortes, and
Robert Ringer, eds., Latin America : A Filmic Approach ( Riverside , Calif. , 1975), 25-27:
Sanjines as a young man was inspired by the idealism of the 1952 Bolivian revolution. By the
1960s, he had become disillusioned with it -- the revolution had not significantly bettered the
lives of Bolivia's poor majority. Mesa . G., ed., Cine Boliviano, 138; Jorge Sanjines, Theory and
Practice of a Cinema with the People, trans. Richard Schaaf (Willimantic, Conn., 1989), 20.
49
Jose Carlos Avellar, A Ponte Clandestina-Birri, Glauber; Solanas, GarciaEspinosa, Sanjines,
Alea-Teorias de Cinema na America Latina (Rio de Janeiro, 1995), 228.
50
Presumably it was momentarily censored because of its inflammatory message. The origen of
the "instrucciones superiores" is unclear. Jorge Sanjines interview; Gumucio Dagron, Histona del
cine en Bolivia , 232; Carlos D. Mesa Gilbert, La aventura del cine Boliviana (La Paz, 1985),
217.
51
Jorge Sanjines interview. Sanjines in later films abandoned the use of an individual protagonist.
See Michael Chanan, ed., Twenty-five Years of the New Latin American Cinema (London, Eng.,
1983), 36. Historian Frederick B. Pike "; does a superb job exploring how the group-oriented
ideology of the Andean Indians (and Andean culture in general) has clashed with the individualistic
culture of North America . This clash goes a long way toward explaining the long history of
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A Sacrificial Llama? The Expulsion of the Peace Corps from Bolivia in 1971 by James F. Siekmeier & note on Yawar Mallku
misunderstanding and mistrust between the two regions. Pike, The United States and the Andean
Republics : Peru , Bolivia , and Ecuador ( Cambridge , . Mass. , 1977).
52
In an interview in 1971 (not conducted by the author), Sanjines said that a radio station in the late
1960s in La Paz reported that Indian women in Huatajata, a small village on Lake Titicaca in
northwestern Bolivia , had been sterilized. He claimed that gynecologists in La Paz had confirmed that
a woman had been sterilized at a clinic run by North Americans. Mesa G., Cine Boliviano, 149-150.
53
Jorge Sanjines interview.
54
Mesa G., ed., Cine Boliviano, 142; Avellar, A Ponte Clandestina, 226.
55
"Expulsion del Cuerpo de Paz," El Diario, May 25, 1971 , p. 2.
56
Sheffield , " Peru and the Peace Corps;' 235.
57
Former volunteer Rustad emphasized how the movie stimulated anti- norteamencano feeling.
Rustad to author, Aug. 7, 1998 .
58
According to Mendoza , he successfully managed to convince the Bolivian government that
cutting the accord between the Peace Corps and the U.S. government was too drastic. Torres
agreed to curtail the Corps's activities temporarily but not to sever the agreement. However, the
Washington Post published an article on the expulsion of the Peace Corps from Bolivia , in a
sense forcing Bolivia's hand. Mendoza interview. As a result, the Corps was forced out and only
invited back in 1975 for a brief year. In 1990 a multi-year accord was signed between the Corps
and the government of Bolivia.
59
" Bolivia expulsa a Cuerpo. de Paz," El Diario, May 22, 1971 , p. 1. This rhetoric accords with
the extensive literature on "dependency theory" popular in the 1960s and after. The classic
statement of dependency theory. for Latin America is Fernando Hennque Cardoso and Enzo
Faletto, Dependenna y Desarrollo en America Latina : ensayo de interpretacion sociologica
(Mexico City, 1969), translated as Dependency and Development in Latin America , by Marjorie
Mattingly Urquidi (Berkeley, 1979). Another classic statement is Theotonic dos Santos , "The
Structure of Dependence," American Economic Review, 60 (1970), 231-236. Also, see Andre
Gunder Frank, Latin America Underdevelopment or Revolution: Essays on the Development or
Underdevelopment and the Immediate Enemy (New York, 1969). Later accounts include Ronald
H. Chilcote, ed., Dependency and Marxism (Boulder, Colo., 1982); Mary Ann " Tetreault and
Charles Frederick Abel, eds., Dependency Theory and the Return of High Politics (New York,
1986). A more recent statement of dependency theory, which emphasizes the psychological need
for the developed world to compare itself favorably to the nonindustrialized world, is Arturo
Escobar, Encountering Development: The Making and Unmaking of the Third World (Princeton,
NJ., 1995). A recent challenge to dependency theory is Robert Packenham, Dependency
Movement: Scholarship and Politics in Development Studies (Cambridge, Mass., 1992).
60.
Interview with Julio Sanjines G. (no relation to Jorge Sanjines), April 1997, La Paz . Julio
Sanjines was a Bolivian ambassador to the United States in the mid- and late 1960s. See also
Paul Cowan, The Making of an Un-American: A Dialogue with Experience (New York,
1970),246.
61
Baumann to author, Sept. 8, 1998.
62
"ISAL respalda solicitud de expulsión del Cuerpo de Paz," El Diario, May 20,1971, p. 2;
Baumann to author, Sept. 8,1998.
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A Sacrificial Llama? The Expulsion of the Peace Corps from Bolivia in 1971 by James F. Siekmeier & note on Yawar Mallku
63.
"Expulsion del Cuerpo de Paz," El Diario, May 25,1971 , p. 2; Juan Lechin Oquiendo, a
prominent Bolivian leftist and former vice president, demanded that Bolivia sever all contacts
with U.S. military and intelligence organizations. Juan de Onis, " Bolivia Yields to Left-Wing
Pressure," New York Times, July 8, 1971 , p. 4.
64
Many Bolivian Indians sacrifice llamas to their gods to provide for a safe year in the mines or
other requested blessings.
65
Baptista Gumucio, Este Pais Tan Solo en Su Agonia, 65-67.
66
Baumann to author, Sept. 8, 1998.
67
Hamilton interview.
68
Baumann and deputy director of the Corps in Bolivia , Fred Caploe, to all Peace Corps
Volunteers and staff, May 24,1971 . I would like to thank Baumann for sharing this letter with
me.
69
"Cuerpo de Paz en Bolivia agradece a Jose Figueres," Ultima Hora, June 22,1971 , p. 5;
Statement by Senator Frank Church of Idaho, "Peace Corps Praised and Welcomed in Costa
Rica," Congo Rec., 92 Cong., 1 sess. (1971)-Senate, June 10,1971, p. 19326.
70
This harmony occurred mainly because the general who replaced Torres, Hugo Banzer Suarez,
was very pro-United States, & Bolivia was politically stable during the Banzerato. After being
thrown out in 1978, Banzer is now back in power (this time as elected president).
===================================================
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A Sacrificial Llama? The Expulsion of the Peace Corps from Bolivia in 1971 by James F. Siekmeier & note on Yawar Mallku
ADDITIONAL NOTES
JORGE SANJINES
FILMOGRAFIA
REVOLUCION 1961-1963
UKAMAU 1966
YAWAR MALLKU 1969
EL CORAJE DEL PUEBLO 1971
EL ENEMIGO PRINCIPAL 1973
BANDERAS DEL AMANECER 1984
LA NACION CLANDESTINA 1989
PARA RECIBIR EL CANTO DE LOS PAJAROS
1995
Jorge Sanjinés en 1959 recién graduado como director de cine en la Escuela Fílmica de la
Universidad de Chile, regresa a Bolivia y junto a Oscar Soria organizan el grupo que es conocido
más tarde como UKAMAU (nombre fue tomado del primer largometraje del grupo de 1966),
grupo al que más tarde se une Ricardo Rada y Antonio Eguino.
El Grupo fundó la primera Escuela Fílmica Boliviana teniendo como director a Oscar
Soria y como Sub Director a Jorge Sanjinés ambos también eran catedráticos.
Periódicamente invitaban a dictar cursos a Jorge Ruiz, Augusto Roca y Hugo Roncal, luego se
sumaron al grupo Leonardo Soruco, Federico Taborga y el actor Hector Vargas.
La Escuela Fílmica Boliviana contó con unos 25 alumnos y estuvo en actividad durante
cinco meses. El primer golpe se lo dió el Instituto Cinematográfico Boliviano, negándole el
acceso a sus proyectores, equipos y cerrándole una sala con asientos, que hasta entonces le había
permitido usar. La escuela continuo con sus actividades en casas particulares, el golpe de gracia
fue el de la intervención del Gobierno, que planeaba hacer de la Escuela Fílmica Boliviana una
institución oficial, dependiente del Ministerio de Educación, por la forma en que se hizo el
planteamiento, los directores optaron por cerrar la Escuela. Antes de la clausura definitiva, y a la
finalización de los cursos, se llevaron a cabo a modo de práctica algunas filmaciones con los
alumnos. Así nació REVOLUCION la primera película independiente del Grupo, era 1961 y se
terminó en 1963.
El grupo también organizó la primera institución de Cine-Debate con el nombre de Cine Club
Boliviano y como una de sus primeras tareas, llevó a cabo el Primer Festival Fílmico Boliviano
en la Universidad Mayor de San Andrés, en el cual se exibieron la mayoría de las películas
bolivianas producidas desde 1948.
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A Sacrificial Llama? The Expulsion of the Peace Corps from Bolivia in 1971 by James F. Siekmeier & note on Yawar Mallku
YAWAR MALLKU
1969: "Yawar Mallku" - Mejor Film Extranjero del Año - Asociación de Críticos Franceses.
1969: "Yawar Mallku" - Premio Timón de Oro - Venecia (Italia).
Sinopsis : Con los mismos actores de Ukamau la película, denuncia la esterilización de mujeres
campesinas por miembros del llamado Cuerpo de Paz, que fue finalmente expulsado de Bolivia, la
imagen final muestra a un grupo de personas empuñando armas símbolo de rebeldía y lucha en
contra de la opresión y división de clases, claramente reflejada en el film, la gente adinerada
viviendo en casas de lujo mientras al pueblo solo le queda la miseria en las villas (laderas), el robo
no consumado para poder comprar medicamentos, y finalmente la muerte por falta de comprensión
de los médicos.
Tipo : Largometraje blanco y negro
Producción : Grupo Ukamau
Jefe de producción : Ricardo Rada
Director : Jorge Sanjinés Guión : Jorge Sanjinés
Montaje : Jorge Sanjinés
Fotografía : Antonio Eguino
Asistente de Cámara : Juan Miranda
Continuidad : Daniele Caillet
Argumento :Oscar Soria, Jorge Sanjinés
Música : Alberto Villalpando Alfredo Domínguez Ignacio Quispe
En la quena: Gilbert Fabre Canción: Born to be wild (Stephenwolf) interpretada por Climax
Reparto : Benedicta Huanta Marcelino Yanahuaya Vicente Verneros Danielle Caillet Mario Arrieta Ilde
Artés Comunarios de Kaata
Año Estreno : 1969
User Comments:
Guerilla filmmaking with almost no production value. Artistic and paranoid. A must see
for every film student!, 24 Nov. 2003 S.M. Flatten Irvine, CA, USA
The editing and cinematography are of renegade or guerilla filmmaking. The film has almost no
production value of any kind. Blood of the Condor is amazingly artistic and complements the
paranoia of the plot. This film is must see for every film student and amateur filmmaker!
Several varieties of militant cinema appeared across the continent in the late 60s, ironically, in
some cases, as a result of support for film production on the part of reformist governments. In
Bolivia, where Spanish was a minority language, Jorge Sanjinés and the Ukamau group were
able to make a number of indigenous language films with nonprofessional actors. The group took
their name, the Aymara word for 'the way it is', from the first of these in 1966, about the revenge
of a man for the rape of his wife; they then went on to produce Yawar Mallku ('Blood of the
Condor', 1969), which recounts the response of a Quechua community to the sterilization of its
women by an American Peace Corps maternity clinic. Hugely successful, the film forced the
expulsion of the Peace Corps by the Bolivian government two years later. Nevertheless, the
experience of exhibiting the film to peasant audiences prompted Sanjinés to question the efficacy
of the style they were working in. Ukamau and Yawar Mallku still portrayed the protagonists as
individuals. In El coraje del pueblo ('The Courage of the People', 1971), the reconstruction of a
massacre of miners in the town of Siglo XX in 1967, the protagonist is collective. The complex
narrative built around flashbacks employed in Yawar Mallku is abandoned in favor of a linear
structure and a tendency towards sequence shots. The style is thus adapted to the traditions of
oral narrative: the players on the screen are the historical actors of the events portrayed, they are
dramatizing their own experience; the use of long takes allows them the greatest space to express
their collective memory, and a new kind of popular cinema is born. A military coup while the
film was being finished forced Sanjinés into exile, and his next productions along these lines
were made in Peru and Ecuador.
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