When the Spanish began to colonize the Americas there was a clear distinction between the natives whom they encountered and their own society. Though the Spanish attempted to maintain two wholly separate worlds, it soon became apparent that this would be near impossible. Miscegenation had spawned a plethora of new ethnicities, and racial mixing was prevalent throughout the colonies. As this intermingling of races spread, the Spanish elites were faced with the ensuing problem of maintaining their supposed superiority. In the centuries leading to their independence from Spain, the creole elites fought for their precarious hierarchy, which became progressively more difficult as time passed. Following their break from the crown, Latin America was involved in a flurry of civil disputes. Even after the creation of Republics throughout the land, many maintained that despite political participation by the mixed classes, they would never be socially equal to the elites. In spite of an ever changing social mobility and political backdrop, the elite distinction created by the original ideas of racial hierarchy continued into modern decades as a vital part of the culture.
Originally, Spain envisioned an idealistic society that consisted of two distinct worlds between the natives and the colonists. This idea quickly lost validity, and by the late 16th Century, the Americas were “characterized by tremendous ethnic diversity that resulted from both racial mixing and cultural exchange that unsettled the ordered world originally conceptualized by Spanish authorities” (Curcio-Nagy, 146). In attempts to cope with this inevitable trend, officials “sought to maintain control by recourse to a number of policies, most striking among them the creation of the caste system” (Curcio-Nagy, 146). This system emphasized the importance of limpieza de sangre, essentially the purity of blood, as a means to reinforce the role of superiority that the elites held in the colonies. Darker skin was associated with evil, and their roles in festivals suggested that Afro-Americans “could compensate for their black skin by their love for the viceroy or loyalty to the Spanish ruling system” (Curcio-Nagy, 59). Reflecting these beliefs were the plebeians themselves, using the caste system freely as a tool that to establish forms of social identity, as it “functioned as a system of social control… [creating] status difference between groups” (Cope, 4). Marriage and relations between the groups was a common occurrence, and this constant miscegenation should have created a number of new racial types. Yet, race among the plebeians was not so much dependent on their parental lineage as their social standing, and much of the diversity that existed “was filtered out by the sieve of social perception” (Cope, 71). Those barred from the elite class lived with a constant desire to move up socially through this ever flexible ethnic hierarchy.
During the Hapsburg era, this mobility was not strongly discouraged, and it even flourished in some cases. Elites felt secure in their position atop the social hierarchy and allowed the lax mobility to flourish. Many illegitimate elites born before the mid 1700s did not feel the need to apply for a gracias al sacar, and were able to pass successfully. Though passing “was never an all-or-nothing affair,” many experienced informal evidences of social mobility that “provided important measures of status and personal gratification” (Twinam, 186). This early period was marked with a relatively lax attitude towards passing and tolerance for illegitimates. Those who desired to apply faced little scrutiny and “essentially, anyone who petitioned and paid received a gracias al sacar” (Twinam, 247). The Camara was non-discriminatory in terms of natal status, and dealt with the few requests in a passive manner that echoed much of the current public sentiment.
This same passivity was a distinguishing factor of the Hapsburg period festivals. Spanish ruling elite sought to use these festivals to “dominate subject people culturally, inducing submission, and encourage the acceptance of their political agenda” (Curcio-Nagy, 3). The Hapsburg period festivals included elaborate fanfare and encouraged the participation of the lower castes in performances. There existed a “Hapsburg emphasis on difference and inclusion,” making a distinction between the elites and the castas, but doing so in a way that sought to include the plebeians in the process (Curcio-Nagy, 151). Each role served to emphasize and reiterate what elites believed to be their natural positions in society, as they were “designed to present the hierarchical nature of society and encourage Native Americans and Afro-Americans to recognize and accept their subordinate positions” (Curcio-Nagy, 42). In the coming century, an increase in racial ambiguity coincided with the Bourbon Reforms, bringing with it much harsher distinctions between the elite and the lower classes.
In the late 18th Century, Camara officials underwent a reformation and began to implement a harsher method for legitimating through gracias al sacar. In this way they acted as “gatekeepers to preserve the social and racial hierarchy by deciding which few would be let in, thereby keeping out many” (Twinam, 311). After nearly three centuries “during which natal and racial markers that legitimized hierarchy became increasingly ambiguous, Spanish America approached… the beginning of a meltdown” (Twinam, 336). The elite responded to this gradual disappearance of the barriers of birth and race that had previously set them apart with heightened discrimination. Whereas before, informal passing had been commonplace among illegitimates, now a majority of illegitimates faced increasing prejudice from local elites. It became difficult to procure a gracias al sacar as Camara officials began to implement a much stricter process. Though the Bourbon Reforms were radical on paper, colonial officials altered the ultimate impact of the laws, and its social policy encouraged local elites to continue to act as gatekeepers during this threatening time. The differences between Spain and its colonies had grown throughout the centuries, and “even if the king and ministers had wanted to open the gate wider and to encourage social mobility, the officials of the Camara effectively slammed the door on potential entrants” (Twinam, 292). As Latin America achieved its independence from Spain, the ensuing Republics struggled with the same issues of race.
By the nineteenth century, much of Latin America was experiencing waves of violent repressions by the elites, and desperate revolts by the plebeians. The lower castes shared in the “egalitarianism of misery,” and the proportion of wealth among the elite and the commoners was grossly inadequate. Those not among the fabulously wealthy, who accounted for only a very small percentage of the population, were forced to endure the battle of poverty together, and “an unclean, malodorous, disease-ridden environment was a fact of life” (Cope, 29). Popular republicanism “challenged the ideology and economic positions of the powerful,” and all of its different discourses agreed as they “contested the right of the wealthy to control the lives of the poor” (Sanders, 56). Subaltern groups in Colombia fought for “independent economic space,” or more simply put, land (Sanders, 56). Yet, this was a point of divergence between the elite liberals and the popular liberals, who did not agree on economics beyond the ending of monopolies and the abolition of slavery. Popular liberals continued to push for more land, and it began to take a toll on their alliance with the liberal elites. While the liberal elites could to a certain extent help the subalterns in their effort to gain back the ejidos, “they could not support subalterns’ goals for a radical reconfiguration of property relations” (Sanders, 99). This point of difference became vital in separating the elites from their temporarily allied plebeians.
With republicanism came a wholly changed political sphere, as it had expanded to include those lower castes who had been previously devoid from political activity. Conservative elites discovered just how large of a role subaltern groups now played, when they “had tried to control politics without securing alliances and active support among the region’s lower classes…[and] within two years of their victory, the Conservatives’ big for social control had failed” (Sanders, 111). They were much more openly racist than liberals, and many spoke out against the political equality of the lower classes. Other conservatives denied publicly that race should be a source of legal discrimination, “but they did claim that racial differences indicated a natural social inequality” (Sanders, 140). The liberal elites were not innocent of racism either, although they generally exercised more caution in the public eye. Yet, “despite public acclamations to the contrary, many Liberals did not believe that blacks, and certainly not Indians, were their intellectual or social equals” (Sander, 141). According to liberal policy, men of all races were entitled to political equality, or at least the ability to be political participants. Legally, these lower castes were now equal, but socially, they had not moved from the original racial hierarchy.
The evolution of politics in Latin America reflects the trend for equality, yet this equality is not one that pervades into the social workings of their culture. In spite of centuries of political change, and numerous battles fought for republicanism, the plebeian class continues to live in much of the same racial hierarchy as the original colonies. The rigidity of formal boundaries between the elites and the lower classes may have been relaxed over the centuries, but the line separating the two continues to exist. Racial prejudice that began over the obsession for pure blood still dictates the social structure of modern society. Race has evolved over these years into a malleable source of status, continually driven by the nearly unanimous belief of elite superiority.
