The Latin American movements for independence drew strength from unfair taxation and trade policies, Spain’s declining control over its Latin American colonies, racial and class discrimination, and the spread of revolutionary ideas. By the eighteenth century the Spanish colonies had become self-sufficient producers of foodstuffs, wine, textiles, and consumer goods, though Spain maintained monopolies on alcohol and tobacco and the colonies traded with each other. In Peru, for example, domestic agriculture supported the large mining settlements, and the colony did not have to import food. Craft workshops owned by the state or by private individuals produced consumer goods for the working class; what was not manufactured locally was bought from Mexico and transported by the Peruvian merchant marine.

Spain’s humiliating defeat in the War of the Spanish Succession (1701–1713; see “Mercantilism and Colonial Wars” in Chapter 18) prompted demands for sweeping reform of all of Spain’s institutions, including its colonial policies and practices. The new Bourbon dynasty, descended from the ruling house of France, initiated a decades-long effort known as the Bourbon reforms, which aimed to improve administrative efficiency and increase central control. Reform took on new urgency after Spain’s expensive and lackluster participation in the Seven Years’ War. Under Charles III (r. 1759–1788), Spanish administrators drew on Enlightenment ideals of rationalism and progress to strengthen colonial rule and thereby increase the fortunes and power of the Spanish state. They created a permanent standing army and enlarged colonial militias. To bring the church under tighter control, they expelled the powerful and wealthy Jesuit order (which had already been exiled from Portugal, Brazil, and France). They also ceased the appointment of Creoles to state posts and followed the Bourbon tradition of dispatching intendants (government commissioners) from the mother country with extensive new powers over justice, administration, tax collection, and military affairs.

Additionally, Spain ended its centuries-old policy of insisting on monopoly over trade with its colonies. Instead it adopted a policy of free trade in order to compete with Great Britain and Holland in the struggle for empire. In Latin America these actions stimulated the production of agricultural commodities that were in demand in Europe, such as coffee, sugar, leather, and salted beef. Between 1778 and 1788 the volume of Spain’s trade with the colonies soared, possibly by as much as 700 percent.7 Colonial manufacturing, however, which had been growing steadily, suffered a heavy blow under free trade. Colonial textiles and china, for example, could not compete with cheap Spanish products.

Madrid’s tax reforms also aggravated discontent. Like Great Britain, Spain believed its colonies should bear some of the costs of their own defense. Accordingly, Madrid raised the prices of its monopoly products — tobacco and liquor — and increased sales taxes on many items. War with revolutionary France in the 1790s led to additional taxes and forced loans. As a result, protest movements in Latin America, like those in British North America in the 1770s, claimed that the colonies were being unfairly taxed. Moreover, new taxes took a heavy toll on indigenous communities, which bore the brunt of all forms of taxation and suffered from the corruption and brutality of tax collectors. Riots and protest movements met with harsh repression.

Political conflicts beyond the colonies also helped drive aspirations for independence. The French Revolution and the Napoleonic Wars, which involved France’s occupation of Spain and Britain’s domination of the seas, isolated Spain from Latin America. As Spain’s control over its Latin American colonies diminished, foreign traders, especially from the United States, swarmed into Spanish-American ports. In 1796 the Madrid government made exceptions to its trade restrictions for countries not engaged in the Napoleonic Wars, such as the United States, thus acknowledging Spain’s inability to supply the colonies with needed goods and markets.

Racial, ethnic, and class privileges also fueled discontent. The Creoles — people of Spanish or other European descent born in the Americas (see “Culture and Community in the Atlantic World” in Chapter 19) — resented the economic and political dominance of the peninsulares (puh-nihn-suh-LUHR-ayz), as the colonial officials and other natives of Spain or Portugal were called. In 1800 there were about thirty thousand peninsulares and 3.5 million Creoles. Peninsulares controlled the rich export-import trade, intercolonial trade, and mining industries and increasingly replaced Creoles in administrative positions. The Creoles wanted to free themselves from Spain and Portugal and to rule the colonies themselves. They had little interest in improving the lot of the Indians, the mestizos of mixed Spanish and Indian background, or the mulattos of mixed Spanish and African heritage.

As in Saint-Domingue, a racial backlash against the growing numbers and social prominence of people of mixed racial origin occurred in the last quarter of the eighteenth century. In 1776 King Charles III outlawed marriages between whites and any person with Indian or African blood. The cabildos (municipal councils) of cities like Lima, Caracas, and Buenos Aires issued ordinances prohibiting nonwhites from joining guilds, serving in the militia, and mixing with whites in public.

A final factor contributing to rebellion was cultural and intellectual ideas. One set of such ideas was the Enlightenment thought of Montesquieu, Voltaire, and Rousseau, which had been trickling into Latin America for decades (see Chapter 19). North American ships calling at South American ports introduced the subversive writings of Thomas Paine and Thomas Jefferson. In 1794 the Colombian Antonio Nariño translated and published the French Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen. (Spanish authorities sentenced him to ten years in an African prison, but he lived to become the father of Colombian independence.) By 1800 the Creole elite throughout Latin America was familiar with liberal Enlightenment political thought and its role in inspiring colonial revolt.

Another important set of ideas consisted of indigenous traditions of justice and political rule, which often looked back to an idealized precolonial past. During the eighteenth century these ideas served as a rallying point for Indians and non-Indians alike, roused by anger against the Spanish. As Spain was increasingly reviled as cruel and despotic, indigenous culture and history were celebrated. Creoles took advantage of indigenous symbols, but this did not mean they were prepared to view Indians and mestizos as equals.