From Castro to Peron, Trio of Authors Feasts on Sacred Cows

In a landmark bestseller that is stirring heated debate, a trio of writers slaughters the sacred cows of Latin America’s political and intellectual tradition.

The title sets the tone: “Manual of the Perfect Latin American Idiot.”

The “idiot” in question marches in a legion of political bosses, economists, intellectuals, guerrillas and clerics whose leftist, populist and nationalist ideas are the source of Latin America’s miseries. That, at least, is the provocative premise of authors Carlos Alberto Montaner of Cuba, Plinio Apuleyo Mendoza of Colombia and Alvaro Vargas Llosa of Peru, whose father is the acclaimed novelist Mario Vargas Llosa.

In Mexico, according to the manual, the idiot worships at the authoritarian altar of the dominant Institutional Revolutionary Party, or PRI. In Argentina, the idiot clings nostalgically to the fascistic paternalism of onetime dictator Gen. Juan D. Peron. In Cuba, the idiot blames Yankee imperialists for the ills afflicting Fidel Castro’s revolution.

“We use the word ‘idiot’ to describe a person who is indifferent to reality,” said Montaner, a Cuban exile who lives in Madrid. “Someone who can’t see that, after 50 years, these ideas have failed.”

Those are fighting words, and some reviewers have fired back. The Mexican newspaper La Jornada dismissed the book as “badly written,” “intolerant,” “irritating” and ignorant of Mexican reality. “Sectarian humor that makes its fortune laughing at others,” wrote intellectual Aurelio Asiain, labeling the authors “the new Latin American idiot.” Epoca magazine chimed in: “As simplistic as reader’s digest.”

In Argentina, a reviewer called the authors blind to the ravages of colonialism, military dictatorship, U.S. interventionism and the domination of the poor by the powerful. He fumed: “Their premise is that the Latin American identity implies the choice of poverty and backwardness, and if we are poor and backward it is because we have not wanted or known how to be developed and rich.”

And during the authors’ recent visit to Lima, the owner of a bookstore recognized Montaner browsing among the shelves and shouted, “You’re the real idiot!”

On the other hand, President Ernesto Perez Balladares of Panama said on television that he recommended the book to his Cabinet ministers. Admiring Mexican politicians have sent copies to friends and enemies. Brisk sales have pushed the book to the top of nonfiction bestseller lists throughout the region.

The three authors describe themselves as disenchanted former leftists who believe that free-market reform is the only hope for Latin America. They condemn big government, closed markets, extremists of the left and right and the historical obsession with evil foreign imperialists. Their collaboration began after a conference in Bogota, Colombia, when they shared a taxi and started making fun of the rhetoric of the speakers.

“It started as a joke,” said Vargas Llosa, a London-based journalist, in a telephone interview. “We said we should compile a catalog of all the ridiculous things we had heard.”

“Manual of the Perfect Latin American Idiot” opens with a presentation by the elder Vargas Llosa. The book’s targets are distinguished: Castro and his admirers in Europe and the United States; romantic revolutionaries Che Guevara and Subcommander Marcos, the Mexican guerrilla leader; a century of strongman rulers from Simon Bolivar of Venezuela to Gen. Augusto Pinochet of Chile; and a canon of left-wing classics such as Eduardo Galeano’s “Open Veins of Latin America.”

Despite all the irreverence, the generally positive response in Latin American government circles is not surprising. Except for Cuba, most nations are heading along the path of economic liberalism favored by the authors: privatizing state enterprises, opening markets and reducing the public sector.

Therefore, some critics chide the book for declaring war on an already vanquished enemy, a Latin American left that is declining and demoralized.

Vargas Llosa disagreed. He said outmoded revolutionary sentiments remain entrenched among intellectuals, as evidenced by the continuing widespread defense of Cuba. And authoritarianism and corruption have impeded many governments, regardless of ideology, from reaching an ideal of political tolerance and economic liberalization, he said.

“There is a great danger that these reforms will not be realized,” he said. “In almost all the examples of privatization of state companies, there are corrupt deals with political cronies, money paid under the table, the granting of monopolies and captive markets.”