Páez, Perú De Lacroix, and Bolívar at the Congress of Ocaña, 1827–28

In 1825, Simón Bolívar was the most powerful man in South America. He controlled, directly or indirectly, a vast territory stretching from Central America to the Southern Cone and even ot the Brazilian frontier. He governed two countries and a third was organizing itself under his protection, to the extreme point of baptizing itself with his name, Bolivia. Yet just three years later, all had taken a radical turn. Secessionist movements, civil wars, an international conflict and a profound institutional crisis marked the twilight of Bolívar’s political life and then, unimaginably, the end of his biological life as well. This talk will discuss the great unravelling of Bolívar the man, and Gran Colombia as a political entity. It will be framed through a discussion of Bolivar’s summit meetings with Páez and Perú de Lacroix, against the backdrop of a global panorama of one of the crises with the greatest drama and consequences Latin American history.