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CHOICE Review

With so many articles and books already published on Latin America's debt, one must seriously question the usefulness of yet another volume. There are, however, compelling reasons for adding this volume to any complete collection on Latin American economies. First, and most important, there are some worthy and, yes, fresh approaches to understanding the causes and stubbornness of the 1980s debt crisis. And second, the contributors are outstanding economists and Latin Americanists--Rudiger Dornbusch of MIT; Alejandro Foxley and Ricardo Ffrench-Davis from Chile; Richard Webb, former president of the Peruvian Central Bank; David Ibarra, Mexico's former finance minister; among others of equal caliber--who have been participants in the both the debt buildup and the efforts to resolve the consequences of the debt overhang. The various sections examine the adjustment process, the relation of trade and foreign investment to debt, strategies for ending the crisis, and country studies of Brazil and Costa Rica. Specialists will find the essays of value as will those who would like to learn about the debt crisis for the first time. The only complaint that might be registered about the volume concerns the absence of an index. Upper-division and graduate collections. J. L. Dietz California State University, Fullerton