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Hispanic American Historical Review 84.1 (2004) 186-187



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Missionary Capitalist: Nelson Rockefeller in Venezuela. By Darlene Rivas. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2002. Photographs. Map. Notes. Bibliography. Index. xiv, 290 pp. Cloth, $49.95. Paper, $19.95.

From the mid-1930s to the 1960s, Nelson Rockefeller represented several generations of Rockefeller family interest in Venezuela by forming and leading a family-financed development company, the International Basic Economy Corporation. Widely known widely throughout Latin America as IBEC, it brought a new dimension of American business to Latin America—espousing a self-consciously "socially responsible" private capitalism. This was to be a very different company from the Rockefellers' earlier Venezuelan venture, Creole Petroleum Corporation, an offshoot of Standard Oil. As a young man, Nelson's father, John Jr., had been on the board of another subsidiary, the Colorado Iron and Fuel Company, when the disastrous labor troubles at Ludlow, Colorado, erupted. Now father John and son Nelson wanted to move the family away from the "octopus" reputation of Creole in Venezuela.

Just before World War II, President Roosevelt—worried about hemispheric relations with Latin America and, especially, infiltration by the Nazis there—took a number of steps. One involved Nelson, who now began a public service career in the newly established post of Coordinator of Inter American Affairs, or CIAA. Under Rockfeller's direction, the office instituted programs in public health, agricultural research, and economic development. Rockefeller served through the war with praise and in 1944 was appointed by Roosevelt as assistant secretary of state for Latin American Affairs, focusing on political issues. He carried this portfolio less successfully to the San Francisco Conference of the United Nations and was not reappointed by Harry Truman. [End Page 186]

He then turned back to private enterprise and philanthropy, and thus was born IBEC in 1947. A nonprofit philanthropic entity (American International Association) was also constituted at the same time. IBEC, in contrast, definitely was profit seeking, but with a Nelson Rockefeller twist: each foreign enterprise would seek a 50 percent level of ownership from local investors. Visible recognition of this principle would help establish American capitalism as dependable, responsible, and productive in the Third World. Self-interest and public interest could thereby interact as they had not before. Later, Rockefeller would take this same formula to Brazil, and in a lesser way to Argentina, Chile, Peru, Colombia, and Puerto Rico.

"Basic economy" meant, in particular, food and shelter. In Venezuela, "VBEC" began efforts in modern dairy plants, a string of supermarkets (an innovative concept in Latin America), offshore fishing, and a physical land enhancement company (plowing services, etc.). The dairy and supermarket efforts, which were quite successful, lasted into the recent period. Venezuela provided a test case for many ideas, and Brazil even more so. It was all, indeed, "missionary capitalism," with some successes but many shortfalls.

Abiding passion for politics began to dominate Nelson's life, first with the presidential chases in the 1960s, then his 1966-73 governorship of New York, and finally, the vice presidency under Gerald Ford. This post was marked, incidentally, by bitter confirmation hearings, where his role in Latin America, and especially in Venezuela, underwent microscopic analysis.

Darlene Rivas's book is a meticulous and refreshing addition to the literature on Nelson Rockefeller's interest in Latin America, comparable to Elizabeth Cobbs's fine book on Rockefeller's Brazilian IBEC companies, The Rich Neighbor Policy: Rockefeller and Kaiser in Brazil (Yale University Press, 1992). Rivas points to his "great faith in the vitality of individual action, of entrepreneurship" (p. 209) but calls IBEC his "quixotic adventure." Nationalist resentment, she avers, was at the heart of this; indeed, on a visit as governor to Argentina in 1969, mobs burned 14 of IBEC's 17 supermarkets in Buenos Aires. "Limited by his optimism, he failed to notice the contradictions within his own belief system. He overestimated the ability of individuals to transcend their circumstances to achieve the dream," Rivas closes.



Wayne Broehl
Dartmouth College

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