The Big Ditch

The Big Ditch PDF Author: Noel Maurer
Publisher: Princeton University Press
ISBN: 0691248079
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 440

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Book Description
An incisive economic and political history of the Panama Canal On August 15, 1914, the Panama Canal officially opened for business, forever changing the face of global trade and military power, as well as the role of the United States on the world stage. The Canal's creation is often seen as an example of U.S. triumphalism, but Noel Maurer and Carlos Yu reveal a more complex story. Examining the Canal's influence on Panama, the United States, and the world, The Big Ditch deftly chronicles the economic and political history of the Canal, from Spain's earliest proposals in 1529 through the final handover of the Canal to Panama on December 31, 1999, to the present day. The authors show that the Canal produced great economic dividends for the first quarter-century following its opening, despite massive cost overruns and delays. Relying on geographical advantage and military might, the United States captured most of these benefits. By the 1970s, however, when the Carter administration negotiated the eventual turnover of the Canal back to Panama, the strategic and economic value of the Canal had disappeared. And yet, contrary to skeptics who believed it was impossible for a fledgling nation plagued by corruption to manage the Canal, when the Panamanians finally had control, they switched the Canal from a public utility to a for-profit corporation, ultimately running it better than their northern patrons. A remarkable tale, The Big Ditch offers vital lessons about the impact of large-scale infrastructure projects, American overseas interventions on institutional development, and the ability of governments to run companies effectively.

The Big Ditch

The Big Ditch PDF Author: Noel Maurer
Publisher: Princeton University Press
ISBN: 0691248079
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 440

Get Book Here

Book Description
An incisive economic and political history of the Panama Canal On August 15, 1914, the Panama Canal officially opened for business, forever changing the face of global trade and military power, as well as the role of the United States on the world stage. The Canal's creation is often seen as an example of U.S. triumphalism, but Noel Maurer and Carlos Yu reveal a more complex story. Examining the Canal's influence on Panama, the United States, and the world, The Big Ditch deftly chronicles the economic and political history of the Canal, from Spain's earliest proposals in 1529 through the final handover of the Canal to Panama on December 31, 1999, to the present day. The authors show that the Canal produced great economic dividends for the first quarter-century following its opening, despite massive cost overruns and delays. Relying on geographical advantage and military might, the United States captured most of these benefits. By the 1970s, however, when the Carter administration negotiated the eventual turnover of the Canal back to Panama, the strategic and economic value of the Canal had disappeared. And yet, contrary to skeptics who believed it was impossible for a fledgling nation plagued by corruption to manage the Canal, when the Panamanians finally had control, they switched the Canal from a public utility to a for-profit corporation, ultimately running it better than their northern patrons. A remarkable tale, The Big Ditch offers vital lessons about the impact of large-scale infrastructure projects, American overseas interventions on institutional development, and the ability of governments to run companies effectively.

Panama Odyssey

Panama Odyssey PDF Author: William J. Jorden
Publisher: University of Texas Press
ISBN: 0292718012
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 781

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Book Description
The Panama Canal Treaties of 1977 were the most significant foreign policy achievement of the Carter administration. Most Latin American nations had regarded the 1903 treaty and its later minor modifications as vestiges of "American colonialism" and obstacles to any long-term, stable relationship with the United States. Hence, at a time when conflicts were mushrooming in Central America, the significance of the new Panama treaties cannot be overestimated. Former Ambassador to Panama William J. Jorden has provided the definitive account of the long and often contentious negotiations that produced those treaties. It is a vividly written reconstruction of the complicated process that began in 1964 and ended with ratification of the new pacts in 1978. Based on his personal involvement behind the scenes in the White House (1972–1974) and in the United States Embassy in Panama (1974–1978), Jorden has produced a unique living history. Access to documents and the personalities of both governments and, equally important, Jorden's personal recollections of participants on both sides make this historical study an incomparable document of U. S. foreign relations. Beyond the singular story of the treaties themselves—and how diplomats negotiate in the modern world—is the rare description of how the United States deals with a major foreign policy problem. How does a superpower cope with a tiny nation that happens to occupy a strategically critical position? And how does the U. S. Senate face up to its constitutionally assigned power to "advise and consent"? Once treaties are approved, does the House of Representatives help or hinder? Panama Odyssey also deals with another crucial element in the shaping of policy—public opinion: how is it informed or led astray? In sum, this is a history, a handbook on diplomacy, a course in government, and a revelation of foreign policy in action, all based on a fascinating and controversial episode in the U. S. experience.

Modern Panama

Modern Panama PDF Author: Michael L. Conniff
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 110847666X
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 367

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Book Description
Provides a comprehensive overview of the political and economic developments in Panama from 1980 to the present day.

Erased

Erased PDF Author: Marixa Lasso
Publisher: Harvard University Press
ISBN: 0674984447
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 353

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Book Description
The Panama Canal's untold history—from the Panamanian point of view. Sleuth and scholar Marixa Lasso recounts how the canal’s American builders displaced 40,000 residents and erased entire towns in the guise of bringing modernity to the tropics. The Panama Canal set a new course for the modern development of Central America. Cutting a convenient path from the Atlantic to the Pacific oceans, it hastened the currents of trade and migration that were already reshaping the Western hemisphere. Yet the waterway was built at considerable cost to a way of life that had characterized the region for centuries. In Erased, Marixa Lasso recovers the history of the Panamanian cities and towns that once formed the backbone of the republic. Drawing on vast and previously untapped archival sources and personal recollections, Lasso describes the canal’s displacement of peasants, homeowners, and shop owners, and chronicles the destruction of a centuries-old commercial culture and environment. On completion of the canal, the United States engineered a tropical idyll to replace the lost cities and towns—a space miraculously cleansed of poverty, unemployment, and people—which served as a convenient backdrop to the manicured suburbs built exclusively for Americans. By restoring the sounds, sights, and stories of a world wiped clean by U.S. commerce and political ambition, Lasso compellingly pushes back against a triumphalist narrative that erases the contribution of Latin America to its own history.

How Wall Street Created a Nation

How Wall Street Created a Nation PDF Author: Ovidio Diaz-Espino
Publisher: Primedia E-launch LLC
ISBN: 0990552128
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 156

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Book Description
How Wall Street Created a Nation: J.P. Morgan, Teddy Roosevelt, and the Panama Canal narrates the dramatic and gripping account of the beginnings of the Panama Canal led by a group of Wall Street speculators with the help of Teddy Roosevelt’s government. The result of four years of research, the book offers the real story of how the United States obtained the rights to build the Canal through financial speculation, fraud, and an international conspiracy that brought down a French republic and a Colombian government, created the Republic of Panama, rocked the invincible President Roosevelt with corruption scandals, and gave birth to U.S. imperialism in Latin America.

Silver People

Silver People PDF Author: Margarita Engle
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
ISBN: 0544109414
Category : Juvenile Nonfiction
Languages : en
Pages : 275

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Book Description
As the Panama Canal turns one hundred, Newbery Honor winner Margarita Engle tells the story of its creation in this powerful new YA historical novel in verse.

Panama's Canal

Panama's Canal PDF Author: Mark Falcoff
Publisher: American Enterprise Institute Press
ISBN:
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 192

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Book Description
But this book is about more than a particular problem or even the future of Panama. This is also a parable for other small countries. Every act of liberation carries a corresponding burden of responsibility. The author casts into sharp relief the challenges facing many former colonial and dependent countries as we enter the post - anti-imperialist age.

The Panama Canal

The Panama Canal PDF Author: Walter LaFeber
Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA
ISBN: 9780195061925
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 288

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Book Description
Surveys relations between the United States and Panama since the nineteenth century, emphasizing events that have shaped recent treaty negotiations

The Panama Canal Conflict Between Great Britain and the United States of America

The Panama Canal Conflict Between Great Britain and the United States of America PDF Author: Lassa Oppenheim
Publisher: Cambridge, University Press
ISBN:
Category : Hay-Pauncefote Treaty
Languages : en
Pages : 74

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Book Description


Proposed Panama Canal Treaties

Proposed Panama Canal Treaties PDF Author: United States. Congress. House. Committee on International Relations
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 584

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Book Description