Ideology and Pragmatism in the Foreign Policy of Peru

Abstract

With the exception of two widely separate periods, pragmatism has prevailed over ideology as the dominant influence on Peruvian foreign policy since Peru declared its independence from Spain in 1821. In the initial period that constituted the first two decades of independence, competing political forces, complicated by economic, ideological, and personal conflicts, battled to determine the future of the state. In a confused and shifting milieu, successive governments struggled to define the frontiers of Peru, not in the narrow sense of planting border markers, but in the broader sense of determining whether Peru would be divided, federate with Bolivia, or stand alone. The second period in which ideology influenced pragmatism to a notable degree was a twelve-year period of military rule, known as the docenio (1968–1980), during which socialist policies dominated domestic and foreign policy. This was particularly true in the first half of this period when the foreign policy of the Juan Velasco Alvarado administration (1968–1975) worked to modify the nation’s commercial and diplomatic relationships with other countries, especially the United States.