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CHOICE Review

The organizing theme and premise of this case study of economic development in Puerto Rico is that the dominant development strategy at a given time reflects the underlying class conflicts and coalitions between the Puerto Rican economy and US. Although the extent to which the author, a political sociologist, is able to sustain this premise is debatable, the book nevertheless provides a useful update and review of how Puerto Rico's economy has evolved in this century. Pantojas-Garcia describes the transformation from a strategy of import-substitution industrialization before WW II to capital importing and export processing after the war, spurred by tax and financial incentives and emigration possibilities stemming from Puerto Rico's special relationship with the US. There is a lack of recent case studies of Puerto Rico; older studies such as The Modernization of Puerto Rico by Henry Wells (CH, Oct'69), The Puerto Rican Economy and United States Economic Fluctuations by Werner Baer (1962), and Wages, Productivity, and Industrialization in Puerto Rico by Lloyd Reynolds (CH, Oct'65) are now quite dated. Good bibliography. Recommended for Latin American collections at the upper-division and graduate levels. -M. C. Bird, The Colorado College