- Why has the Gulf of Mexico (plus the Caribbean Sea) attracted so much attention from major world powers for so long? How and when did the United States become a dominant actor in this area?
- How did the Spanish penetration of Central America differ from the conquest of Mexico? What implications did this have?
- What are the defining features of “plantation societies”? How do Central American societies compare with late-nineteenth-century Mexico?
- What have been the long-term consequences of the construction of the Panama Canal? What if an inter-oceanic waterway had been built in Nicaragua instead?
- What explains the emergence of armed guerrilla movements in El Salvador and Nicaragua? Why were the revolutionaries able to take power in Nicaragua, but not in El Salvador?
- Has Central America finally embarked on a period of peace? Why and to what extent?
Modern Latin America
