Table of Contents

Introduction. Commodity Chains in Theory and in Latin American History / Steven Topik, Carlos Marichal, and Zephyr Frank 1
1. The Spanish-American Peso: Export Commodity and Global Money of the Ancient Regime, 1550–1800 / Carlos Marichal 25
2. Indigo Commodity Chains in the Spanish and British Empire, 1560–1860 / David McCreery 53
3. Mexican Cochineal and the European Demand for American Dyes, 1550–1850 / Carlos Marichal 76
4.Colonial Tobacco: Key Commodity of the Spanish Empire, 1500–1800 / Laura Nater 93
5. The Latin American Coffee Commodity Chain: Brazil and Costa Rica / Steven Topik and Mario Samper 118
6. Trade Regimes and the International Sugar Market, 1850–1980: Protectionism, Subsides, and Regulation / Horacio Crespo 147
7. The Local and the Global: Internal and External Factors in the Development of Bahia’s Cacao Sector / Mary Ann Mahony 174
8. Banana Boats and Baby Food: The Banana in U.S. History / Marcelo Bucheli and Ian Read 204
9. The Fertilizer Commodity Chains: Guano and Nitrate, 1840–1930 / Rory Miller and Robert Greenhill 228
10. Brazil in the International Rubber Trade, 1870–1930 / Zephyr Frank and Also Musacchio 271
11. Reports of Its Demise Are Not Exaggerated: The Life and Times of Yucatecan Henequen / Allen Wells 300
12. Cocaine in Chains: The Rise and Demise of Global Commodity, 1860–1950 / Paul Gootenberg 321
Conclusion: Commodity Chains and Globalization in Historical Perspective / Carlos Marichal, Steven Topik, and Zephyr Frank 352
Contributors 361
Index 365

Promotional Information

Examines the commodity chains that have connected producers in Latin America with consumers around the world for five hundred years

About the Author

Steven Topik is Professor of History at the University of California, Irvine. His books include The World That Trade Created: Society, Culture, and the World Economy, 1400 to the Present (with Kenneth Pomeranz) and Trade and Gunboats: The United States and Brazil in the Age of Empire.

Carlos Marichal is Professor in the Centro de Estudios Históricos at El Colegio de México. He is the author of A Century of Debt Crises in Latin America: From Independence to the Great Depression, 1820–1930 and numerous books in Spanish.

Zephyr Frank is Assistant Professor of Latin American History at Stanford University. He is the author of Dutra’s World: Wealth and Family in Nineteenth-Century Rio de Janeiro.

Reviews

"From Silver to Cocaine is an ambitious and novel application of the 'commodity chain' approach to the insertion of a whole continent into the world economy. It has no rivals."--William Gervase Clarence-Smith, author of Cocoa and Chocolate, 1765-1914 "From Silver to Cocaine is an important and innovative collection. It provides a corrective to the purely national studies of commodities and of export sectors, and to studies that posit influence in only one direction, focusing on the international penetration of capital and trade into Latin America. This book makes a strong statement about the direction of future research: it should be required reading for anyone interested in the economic history of Latin America, broadly conceived."--Edward Beatty, Kellogg Institute for International Studies, University of Notre Dame