Causes Of The Latin American Revolutions

The Latin American Revolutions marked a time when the Spanish colonies succeeded
the Spanish Empire and became independent countries, which allowed them to gain a national
identity and sovereignty to rule for themselves by themselves instead of for Spain. Before the
revolutions the colonies were seen as that, just colonies. Afterwards they were their own states
that had their own culture. Even with that they still kept certain things from the European
Spanish culture.
What lead to the Latin American Revolutions was the social authoritarianism of the
Spanish Empire. The Spanish Empire would have a social pyramid based on the purity of the
blood of the individual. Mixed or pure looked native races would be down upon while
Peninsulares (comes

from Peninsula, meaning Iberian Peninsula) , people born in Spain, would
own most of the land , while being only .1% of the population. The next on the social pyramid
were creoles, pure spanish people but they were born on the colony. They would have to
continuously fight to keep their privileges. They were also the people who would do many
service jobs, one of those being keeping the libraries meaning they would get exposed to the
works of the enlightenment which would call for freedom and more rights. Under them where the
Mestizos and Mulattoes who could own business and small independent farms . Under all of
them was the Native Americans who were technically free judicially but in their social and
economic situations made their lives were hard. Other then that , economically the Spanish
Empire would milk the colonies for taxes to fund the Empire itself.