Latin America through Soviet Eyes: The Evolution of Soviet Perceptions during the Brezhnev Era 1964–1982

Latin America through Soviet Eyes provides an original and comprehensive assessment of changing Soviet perceptions of politics in Latin America during the Brezhnev years. Dr Prizel surveys the views of Soviet academics and journalists as well as of politicians on three main areas. He explores the changing Soviet perceptions of Latin America’s domestic politics including the Church, the military and national liberation movements; he examines the role of Latin America in global politics and the way in which the USA has influenced regional events, and he discusses the emerging Soviet-Latin American relationship. Case studies of Mexico, Chile, Brazil and Argentina provide a framework for understanding changing Soviet perceptions in the context of the domestic dynamics of specific individual countries. This book is based on a wealth of Russian, Spanish and English language sources. Soviet academic journals, newspapers, communist party journals and the numerous books published by the Institute of Latin America of the Academy of Sciences in the USSR provide the Soviet view of Latin America and this is examined against a background of regional perceptions expressed in Spanish-American material.