The period between the end of the Second World War and the beginning of the Cold War 1944-45 to 1947-48) represents an important conjuncture in the political and social history of twentieth-century Latin America. The initial democratization and attempts at reform were eventually suppressed during the shift to the right at the beginning of the Cold War.

This book involves case studies of the immediate postwar experience of eleven of the twenty Latin American republics, including all the larger countries with the exception of Colombia.