State Image Building versus Social Reality: Prostitutes, Alcoholism, and Morality in Puntarenas, Costa Rica, 1880–1930

Beginning in the late nineteenth century, Costa Rican political elites tended to define the country as a liberal democracy composed of hard working, clean living, white yeoman farmers, nestled in the highland Central Valley primarily producing coffee for export.  This image has also been widely disseminated outside of Costa Rica including by historians and other analysts until recently.  The rise of coffee for export in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries helped finance the emergence of a reasonably modern state and the provision of government services.  This national project was facilitated by promoting an image of the country that emphasized patriotism, submissiveness to authorities, societal concord, family values, and racial purity. 

This paper analyzes the reality of Costa Rica, particularly that which existed outside of the Central Valley in the periphery of the country, specifically Puerto Puntarenas.   There the government tolerated prostitution for "the good ordering of society", as well as the supposed smooth functioning of a port that catered to substantial international trade.  The porteno population diverged from the national image by not being of largely European background and by seeking to support themselves often through prostitution and bars and dance halls. Because the port was the major outlet for the country's principal export and supplier of government funds, the state assumed a more tolerant attitude towards prostitution than it did in the capital of San Jose and the Central Valley.  In addition, the government derived funds from a liquor monopoly, a holdover from the colonial era that is still in existence today.  Using data from national and local archives the demography, marriage patterns, crime statistics, and alcohol consumption in Puntarenas are analyzed in order to establish the socioeconomic reality of the port.  Such reality conflicts with the historical image of Costa Rica so useful in consolidating the country in the period of liberal state building.