Tag / latin america
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Spreading the Word: Latin America’s Shift Away From Catholicism
Ever since missionaries descended on Latin America during the European colonization of the 16th and 17th centuries, Catholicism has been the dominant religion of the region, from Puerto Rico to Chile. Home to 425 million Catholics, Latin America is home to over 40 percent of the world’s Catholic population. Brazil and Mexico boast the world’s…
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7 Years of Plenty, 70 Years of Famine: Understanding Venezuela’s Crisis
“I’d have been better off broke.” This is how Abraham Shakespeare, a $30 million American lottery winner, described his windfall. “It’s just upheaval that they’re not ready for,” a financial consultant explained. “People have had terrible things happen.” A common “filler” story for news channels is the “Curse of the Lottery.” These cautionary tales warn…
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Authoritarianism and the “Pink Tide”
During the 21st century, popular elections brought many left-wing governments into power in Latin America in a movement known popularly as the “Pink Tide.” The movement rose up in 1999 in response to the demise of decades-long, right-wing governments that were supported by the United States, and gained ground because of popular disillusionment with the…
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The Nonconformists: Uruguay Legalizes Abortion
Social policy never changes quietly. In the United States, it has been almost thirty years since Roe v. Wade legalized abortion for a woman in the first trimester of her pregnancy, and yet the country continues to vigorously argue over the issue today. Throughout the rest of the world, social policy issues are no simpler…
