Ferguson’s Law Arrives in Guatemala
Guatemala’s 2027 budget reveals a critical fiscal milestone: interest payments on public debt now exceed spending on health, security and infrastructure. This essay applies Ferguson’s Law to examine what that means for the country’s future.
The Republic Montesquieu Could Not Write
In the autumn of 1748, a book with no author’s name left the presses of Geneva. Its creator had spent twenty years writing it and did not dare sign it. The magistrate of Bordeaux, Charles-Louis de Secondat, Baron de Montesquieu, already knew what imprudence cost: his Persian Letters (1721) had also been published anonymously, printed […]
When Stealing Stopped Being Shameful
loss. He has no land to leave them, no cattle, no home. Martín Fierro, the character created by José Hernández, has been a forced soldier, a deserter, an outlaw, and a fugitive. He has lost everything, including his respectability. And yet, in The Return of Martín Fierro (1879), when he gathers his sons and the son of […]
The American Republic: An Experiment Begun 250 Years Ago
It is the night of July 4, 1776. In a printing shop on Market Street in Philadelphia, a young apprentice sets type letter by letter for a document that has just arrived from the Continental Congress. His employer, John Dunlap, has asked him to work through the night: the text must be printed before sunrise. […]
When a Country Spends in Emergencies… as It Does in Normal Times
Diego turned eighteen just a few weeks ago. Next year he will vote for the first time and, like thousands of young Guatemalans, he still doesn’t know where he will study, which company will give him his first job, or how much he will earn five years from now. What he hasn’t yet imagined is […]
Less Free Than Athens
Lisandros was born in Phoenicia but has lived in the port of Athens for twenty years. He rents a workshop where he manufactures amphorae to export olive oil. He hires both free workers and slaves. He asked no one’s permission to open his business. No one demands monthly reports from him. If a trading partner breaks […]
The Sunday Colombia Chooses Its Future
Andrés Rodríguez is twenty-three years old and lives in El Poblado, Medellín. Four years ago, when he turned eighteen and was able to vote for the first time in his life, he confidently cast his ballot for Gustavo Petro. He did not do it on a whim. He did it because he believed in the […]
Geography Gave Us Wings, but the Future Landed in Panama
For much of the twentieth century, Pan American World Airways aircraft regularly touched down on the runway of La Aurora Airport. For thousands of American travelers, Guatemala was neither a secondary stop nor a remote destination lost among volcanoes. It was a frequent stop within the air network that connected the continent’s major cities. The […]
Should Guatemala Follow Mexico? A Mirror We Cannot Ignore
Do you remember Demetrio? The man from the Alka-Seltzer commercials of the 1980s who, after a night of excess, would return home feeling miserable. Well, when Demetrio wanted to buy his Corolla in the year 2000, he needed twenty-seven months of salary to pay for it. That same year, a Demetrio in Guadalajara needed only […]
Neither Caudillo nor Party: Republic
Ayn Rand was twelve years old when the Bolshevik Revolution arrived in Petrograd. She watched the State confiscate her family home and her father’s business, a pharmacy he had built through his own work and effort. There was no compensation, no due process, no possibility of appeal. The Soviet Constitution of 1918 had stated it with […]