History of corruption in Latin America: the reforms
The Bourbonic era: Puebla and the Viceroyalty of Nueva Granada
In this section, we will explore of the Bourbonic reforms in the definition and treatment of corruption in the new world. Also, with the case-study of Puebla, New Spain we aim to challenge the centrality of the Bourbonic reforms in fighting corruption in colonial Latin America. By examining and comparing two particular experiences in the new world and how different segments of the population reacted to the new limits imposed on the previous negotiation ideas and flexibility in governance.
First, the Chapter written by Frances Ramos* presents a compelling argument on how, in a specific time in a specific locality, the very definition of what constituted corruption changed. The author does so by presenting the pre-Bourbonic efforts of the Puebla Alcalde Mayor, Juan Jose Veytia, to increase crown profits and dismantling the networks of corruption-like behavior. The policy change carried out by this royal bureaucrat would play out to be radical, efficient, and troubling for the local elite, the poblanos. Mainly because he challenged and transformed the preestablish and customary flexibility traditions with new limits in governance.
In colonial times custom trumped law. As explained in the first section, the idea of negotiation meant that the authorities had the flexibility to execute or not some regulation to maintain the Spanish order. That flexibility became custom; hence, few questioned.
Ramos’ Chapter reconstructs how Puebla’s city acted as an unintentional testing ground for various late eighteenth-century reform schemes — foreshadowing later attempts by Bourbonic bureaucrats to make colonies more lucrative by fashioning more fiscally-responsible administrations. The chief of the reformist movement was the Alcalde Mayor, Veytia, who, as soon as he established himself in Puebla, started a crusade against the use of public office for diverting royal money into private hands.
The author made the case that since the late 1680s, high-level administrators worked on fighting “corruption” and rationalizing expenditures in both the Metropolis and the colonies. For instance, the author shows how, in 1686, the Council of Castile stated that if the King could prevent corruption, revenues would cover his needs and free the crown from debt (Ramos 2017). Therefore, the problem of fund embezzlement and fraud was well known in the kingdom. Even as early as in 1682, the council established the Junta de Fraudes, and ten years later, the Junta de Resguardo de Rentas in 1692. However, it is important to highlight that these institutions had limited action in the colonies and only reflected the juridical differentiation that the colonies often endured in receiving good governance.
Because of this reality, Veytia’s first push was to target the Poblanos merchant priest, which he considered responsible for the most significant fraud in the region. For example, He believed that the city lost twenty thousand pesos due to the merchant priest’s illegal and immoral tactics (Ramos 2017). Priests were allowed to inherit property and do business. However, those businesses were not covered by fuero ecclesiastico. Hence, they were obligated to pay tributes and taxes to the crown. Not only that, but these merchant priest used proxies to amass property and carry out business and used the fuero ecclesiastic to avoid the royal taxes.
It is essential to highlight that throughout the Chapter’s argument; the author presupposes that the city’s mercantile priest formed part of the viceroyalty political bureaucracy because they enjoyed their appointments by the approval of the King. These actions are significant because, as explained above, there is no academic debate about the anachronism of the word corruption that excludes the viceroyalty bureaucracy to be suspect of behaviors that could be deemed as corruption (Pietschmann, 2013).
As Ramos elaborates, the power struggle unleashed by the alcalde mayor illustrates the importance of custom in determining whether a given behavior constitutes corruption or not. In this case, the limit would be set by Phillip V himself, who in a letter said that he “would implore the bishop to instruct the priest to pay the alcabala and warned that if they still did not, he would embargo their goofds and haciendas.” The merchant priest had not other option but to pay. Like the previous century, the King himself established the limits in the ongoing negotiations (Lane, 2015). However, the experiences documented by Ana Cardenas’s article in the post-Bourbonic Kingdom of New Granada would add a new variable in setting the limits: the freemen of all colors.
The article, Corrupción, poder y abuso: el caso de los Capitanes a Guerra durante el tardío colonial en el Nuevo Reino de Granada, illustrates how the free inhabitants denounced through formal means corruption-like behavior of the viceroyalty appointees. Although most of the accounts gathered by the author describe pacific engagements, others initiated political actions and, in some cases, violence to protect themselves from the so-called bad governance (mal gobierno). In sum, this article’s significance lies in the fact that the King was not setting the limits by himself after the Bourbonic reforms. Nevertheless, freemen’s population were also to be considered, especially in the new urbanized small town of the New Granada.
The article assembles and follow several cases of quejas and reclamos. In 1789, the archbishop and Viceroy Antonio Caballero y Góngora recognized the problems with corruption and power abuse by the corregidores in the territory: los corregidores unos verdaderos monopolistas, tanto de los frutos que extraen de las provincias cuanto de los géneros comerciales que se introducen en ellas, con notorio agravio de los vasallos del Rey, que claman por la protección de las leyes
This kind of statement will mark the transformation of corruption’s meaning to the more holistic definition to which we relate the concept today. The article also includes several statements from letters and testimonies of free inhabitants, used in court. For instance, this statement was done in a hearing where the Corregidor Ignacio Sachez mora was accused: defraudaba (Ignacio Sanchez) Real Hacienda mediante el contrabando y le ofrecía dispensa en el pago de la alcabala a todos los vecinos que le vendieran mercancías a menor precio. Also, Según la población, era avaro, usurero y déspota, pues se aprovechaba de su papel de juez extralimitándose en su autoridad con el único objeto de enriquecerse.
In this article, we observe the dynamic released by the reforms created a changed the perception of the new world inhabitants. They feel that the negotiation or flexibility used to justify corruption-like behavior was detrimental to the King’s patrimony and against the towns/city’s wealth. Hence, they were creating a sense of public interest fundamental to define corruption and to fight it.
* Ramos, Frances. Custom corruption and reform in early Eighteen century Mexico: Puebla’s Merchant priest versus the reformist Bureaucrats. Chapter 7. (2017). Corruption in the Iberian Empires: Greed, Custom, and Colonial Networks. University of New Mexico Press. Christoph Rosenmüller
