The Philosophies Influencing Latin America Assignment

The Philosophies Influencing Latin America - Assignment Example The Jesuits generation perpetuated the intellectual traditionalism up to the mid 18th century, and then they tried to modernize the thought of Aristotle. Political chaos hindered the widening of the academic philosophy at the start of the 19th century, but later, positivism was well established in the majority of the Latin American countries (Gaus & Courtland, 2011). New intellectual movements erupted as a reaction against anti positivism in the early the 20th century. Between the 16th and 17th centuries, the philosophies in Latin America had a tendency to strengthen medieval ideas (Oliver, 1998). The Portuguese and Spanish were, therefore, influenced to take up medieval land ownership systems including the relationships between the servants and their masters. The natives were treated as slaves. However, with the Latin Americans’ growing awareness of new philosophies and ideas in Europe and North America, they began adopting them but at a very slow pace (Gaus & Courtland, 2011). For instance, the idea of democracy was relatively established in America by the end of the 1700s, but it took much longer for Latin America to adopt democracy. Marxist philosophy has influenced the continued punitive justice systems, issues of power and human rights. Most of the cultures are still based on the thoughts that Marxist theories describe reality accurately. Caudillos ascended to power mostly by illegal and violent means, although some were highly educated in theology (Oliver, 1998). There were groups of caudillos that were social liberals, while others favored free markets. However, most hindered the separation of state from government. During their rule, Latin American natives were forced into labor and peasants worked the land for long hours. They also took away the right of the middle-class citizens to vote or own land.