Banker to the Third World

"Banker to the Third World is a rich and penetrating work. By examining U.S. loans to Latin America in the 1920s and 1930s and comparing them to more recent loans, Barbara Stallings offers important new insights into more recent debt problems. Equally important, Stallings uses the large literature on Victorian Britain's overseas investments to discover the truly novel aspects of American investments a century later. This is a first-rate study of the relationship between leaders and borrowers, in good times and in bad."—Charles Lipson, University of Chicago
 
"In the flood of books on the Third World debt crisis, Stallings's volume on Latin America stands out for its historical perspective, useful collection of data, sound economic analysis, and cool understanding. It is at the same time scholarly and accessible. An excellent contribution!"—Charles P. Kindleberger
 
"The author has compiled an extremely impressive and important set of time series on Latin American and U.S.–Latin American economics previously unavailable anywhere. Her comparison of British lending in the nineteenth century and U.S. lending in the 1920s and 1970s is also original and creative. This book will be welcomed by specialists in international finance, internation political economy, and twentieth-century U.S.–Latin American relations."—Richard Feinberg, Overseas Development Council