La participación popular en las revoluciones hispanoamericanas, 1808-1816

Un ensayo sobre sus rasgos y causas

Abstract

This essay investigates how members of the “popular classes” – peasants,
rural wage- workers, indigenous communities, slaves, artisans and urban
plebeian – participated in the complex political conjuncture initiated
with the monarchical crisis of 1808. Each of these groups has been often
studied in separate, according to their specific social or racial belongings.
Based on an extensive bibliography, this article intends to trace, altogether
the trajectories of the different groups in that same conjuncture, thereby
analyzing what did they have in common and delving into the causes of
their actions, from the local to most general ones: such as the Imperial
crisis and the crucial dilemma caused by the absence of the Spanish king
from the throne.