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THE MODERN PERU: WESTERN, INDIGENOUS OR
MESTIZO? SELF-PERCEPTION OF PERU THROUGH ITS
HISTORIOGRAPHY
—o
FRANCISCO QUIROZ CHUECA
ABSTRACT
Peruvian conservative historiography seeks to present Peru as a Western
country located in the Andes. However, disputes among historians have raised
the question of how Western the country really is in view of the complex reality
of its ethnic and cultural composition, as well as its inclusion in the modern
age of the twentieth century. Throughout the nineteenth century an image of
the country as part of the Western and Christian world was built due to the
results of independence during the decade of 1820 and the guano export boom,
but the War with Chile (1879-1883) showed the weaknesses of the economic,
social and political development of the country. After the conflict, however,
it was sought once again to restore the lost historical image which started
the debate with ideas of a western country and others that emphasized the
indigenous majority basis of the Peruvian nation. Toward 1930 a tendency
arose to consider Peru as a Mestizo country although guided by White social
sectors. The historiographical debate is rich in proposals to the extent that the
exposed positions are being discussed even in present-day Peru.
Keywords: Peruvian historiography, Peruvian nationalism, Peru state forma¬
tion, Bartolomé Herrera, Rubén Vargas Ugarte
In this essay I contend that historiography developed in Peru in the nineteenth
and the beginning of the twentieth centuries reflects the specificities of the
formation of the ideas of a Peruvian identity as the product of the vicissitudes
of the idea of the Peruvian nation managed in the context of the formation
of the Peruvian republic after the long colonial period. The argument,
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