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2011-05-07T11:58:28Z 10000-01-01 Es, John van Wilson, Suzanne Beall 2011-05-07T11:58:28Z 1995 Using Colombia as a case study, the study empirically examines major theoretical debates about the Latin American middle class' politics. Theoretical debates about the middle class' politics have focussed on the controversial progressive theory, which argues that the Latin American middle class supports democracy, economic development, and reforms addressing economic inequality. In contrast, dependency theorists and theorists who view the middle class as politically and economically insecure have asserted that the middle class is authoritarian and opposes economic development and policies that alleviate economic inequality. Multi-class survey data from Colombia collected in 1976-77 and 1985 demonstrate that no theory is completely correct in its depictions of the middle class. As with other Colombian social classes, the middle class supports democracy; yet, it simultaneously embodies complex and, at times, contradictory attitudes toward democracy. While the middle class, like other social classes, generally opposes government economic intervention, it favors a mixed economy and forms of government economic intervention that benefit it economically. The middle class is internally divided in its support for policies to alleviate economic inequality with large minorities supporting such policies. An interclass polarization is present for many policies, especially those relating to land reform, with the lower class favoring policies to ameliorate economic inequality, the upper class opposing such policies, and the middle class occupying an intermediate position vis-a-vis other classes. The findings that the middle class has complex political attitudes, that it is alternately different and similar to other classes, and that the middle class has varying patterns of alliances with other classes suggest that theoretical portrayals of the class should not be painted in simplistic terms. The middle class fits neither the progressive theorists' idealized picture nor the demonized view of dependency theorists and theorists who portray the middle class as insecure. With its intermediate stance on policies addressing economic inequality, the middle class may play a role as the swing class in debates over land reform and other economic redistributional issues. The middle class, as such, may perform a pivotal role in determining the outcome of political debates about reform and redistribution. Made available in DSpace on 2011-05-07T11:58:28Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 2 license.txt: 4922 bytes, checksum: 910b249b4beec47e7ab768910c8f966f (MD5) 9522188.pdf: 11157386 bytes, checksum: cdee0ca92d33e54a3379b3179bcc5cad (MD5) Previous issue date: 1995 Item marked as restricted to the 'UIUC Users [automated]' Group (id=2) by Howard Ding (hding2@illinois.edu) on 2011-05-07T14:35:00Z Item is restricted indefinitely. Restriction data tranferred 2014-07-01T11:13:38-05:00 Original Data Group with Access UIUC Users [automated] Release Date: none Reason: ETDs are only available to UIUC Users without author permission ETDs are only available to UIUC Users without author permission U of I Only AAI9522188 (UMI)AAI9522188 http://hdl.handle.net/2142/19151 eng Copyright 1995 Wilson, Suzanne Beall History, Latin American Political Science, General Sociology, General The status quo of politics or the politics of the status quo: The political role of the Colombian middle class text Sociology Sociology University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign Dissertation Ph.D.