AHA Session 71
Conference on Latin American History 16
Society for Historians of American Foreign Relations 2
Conference on Latin American History 16
Society for Historians of American Foreign Relations 2
Friday, January 8, 2027: 8:30 AM-10:00 AM
Grand Ballroom E (Sheraton New Orleans, 5th Floor)
Chair:
Kevin P. Coleman, University of Toronto
Papers:
Comment:
Karin A. Rosemblatt, University of Maryland, College Park
Session Abstract
Throughout the Cold War, coups d’état reshaped Latin American political life, often under the shadow of superpower rivalry and anticommunist doctrine. This session examines coups not as closed chapters of twentieth-century history but as evolving political repertoires that persist in new institutional, ideological, and transnational forms. By tracing continuities and transformations from the 1960s to the present, the panel reframes the coup as both a dramatic rupture and an enduring mode of political reordering across the hemisphere.
Kevin P. Coleman and Sebastián Carassai argue that several of the forces central to Cold War coups have adapted rather than disappeared. They trace how military takeovers have given way to economic pressure, judicial maneuvering, and new forms of democratic erosion.
Daniel Richter situates Miami as a hemispheric hub of right-wing organizing, showing how exile communities, religious networks, and financial infrastructures have linked U.S. politics to coup-related mobilizations across Latin America.
Andre Pagliarini examines official commemorations of Brazil’s 1964 coup during the presidency of Jair Bolsonaro, demonstrating how state-sponsored revisionism reframed military intervention as a democratic safeguard.
Taken together, the panel contends that coups are not simply past events but living political languages—transnational, adaptable, and central to contemporary struggles over democracy in the Americas.
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