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Obstinate Star. A History of the Puerto Rico Independence Movement

Buy hardcover (Brill)
Published Sep 2024

Rafael Bernabe

Author: Rafael Bernabe
Obstinate Star is a history of Puerto Rico’s independence struggle against Spanish and U.S. colonialism. From the time of the Napoleonic Wars, it traces the movement’s currents, within and beyond the island, linking them to ongoing social conflicts and international trends and conjunctures. Beginning with the radical democratic fight against Spanish control, it moves on to the early reactions to U.S. rule, the role of Nationalism, Communism and New Deal currents during the Great Depression and the Second World War, the rise of new forces in the wake of the Cuban revolution and recent struggles in the epoch of capitalist globalisation.

Biographical Note

Rafael Bernabe, Ph.D. (1989), State University of New York, teaches at the University of Puerto Rico. His works include Walt Whitman and his Caribbean Interlocutors (Brill 2021) and (with César Ayala) Puerto Rico in the American Century (University of North Carolina 2006).

Readership

The book will be of interest to persons or institutions working on colonialism and anti-colonialism, nationalism and national liberation, labour struggles in colonial contexts, and U.S. and Caribbean history.

Table of Contents

Abbreviations ix
Introduction
1 Absolutism, Capitalism and Nationalism
2 From Napoleon’s Invasion to the Colombian Connection, 1809–23
3 Exclusion and the Crystallisation of Difference, 1837–60
4 Abolitionism, Reform and the Path to Revolution, 1850–66
5 Lares and Its Aftermath, 1867–74
6 Cosmopolitan Patriots, 1874–90
7 New York, Paris and the Cuban Connection, 1890–98
8 New Century, New Empire: Hostos and the Imperial Republic,
1898–1903
9 Independentista Variations: Radical Inclinations, 1904–30 120
10 Independentista Variations: Conservative Reactions, 1904–30
11 Labour, Colonialism and Independence, 1898–1930
12 Puerto Rican Janus: Pedro Albizu Campos (i)
13 Puerto Rican Janus: Pedro Albizu Campos (ii)
14 Luis Muñoz Marín, Social Protest and the New Deal
15 Communists and Independent Communists, 1930–35
16 1936: Confrontation and the Crisis of Colonial Rule
17 Independence in Puerto Rico and New York, 1936–40

18 The ppd and the Popular Front, 1940–44
19 Communism, Nationalism and the War against Fascism, 1938–45
20 Hiding in Plain View: Nationalists, Trotskyists, Communists,
1938–1945
21 The Turning Point That Wasn’t, 1945–6
22 Bullets and Ballots: Resistance to Colonial Reform, 1946–50
23 Communist Crosscurrents, 1946–54
24 Hardest Times: Independence in the 1950s
25 The mpi and the New Struggle for Independence, 1959–75
26 Strategic Debates and Divisions, 1959–75
27 Democratic Socialism: The Battle for the New pip
28 Radical Politics and Culture beyond the mpi and the pip
29 In New York and Beyond: The New Struggle in the Diaspora,
1967–82
30 The Crisis of the psp and the Search for Alternatives
31 Independence Underground: Armed Struggle, 1974–85
32 Independence in the Time of Neoliberal Globalisation
33 Colonial Crisis and Signs of Resurgence
Conclusion
Appendix – James N. Sager: Communism and Nationalism in Puerto
Rico, 1925–7
References
Index