THE AMBIGUOUS RELATIONSHIP WITH THE EUROPEAN HERITAGE. THE ANTI-OCCIDENTALIST CONCEPTIONS OF BOLIVIAN INTELLECTUALS

Abstract

Important approaches on Latin American and Bolivian evolution (like postcolonial studies and the theories about decolonization and indianism) are based on simplifications concerning occidental modernity. Those theories have a romantic root and they work through excluding binary oppositions. In spite of their revolutionary language, their practical result lies in the consolidation of traditional authoritarianism and in the justification of ancestral paternalism. Otherwise, these antimodernist theories simplify present reality and avoid an adequate understanding of the complex modern order.