The impact of the new sociability: civil society, communicative recursion and educational change in the postcolonial Latin America

Abstract

The contribution analyses the different reception of the monitorial or Lancasterian system of education in three Hispanic American cities in the postcolonial period. In view of the generalized acceptance of this system of schooling among the Hispanic American elites, the questions about the factors promoting its varying implementation and spread arises. The article focuses on the local processes related to the reception of this method in three cities: Mexico, Buenos Aires, and Caracas. Working on prosopography data about the membership of the Lancasterian societies in Mexico, and Buenos Aires, of the more informal group of supporters in Caracas, and the Charity Ladies’ Society in Buenos Aires, the article propose to explain the different paths and acceptance as related to the degree of institutional cohesion of these groups and their varying rapports to the political sphere. On the whole, the significant role of voluntary associations in the field of school policy in post-colonial Hispanic America was closely related to the weakness of the state initiative.