Burns 19). This statement would prove significant in explaining the continuing problems of rule and representation plaguing Latin American countries into the twentieth, and maybe even the twenty-first, century.
In Chapter Two, "The Institutions of Empire," Burns explores the political and economic means that subordinated the colonies to European demands (Burns 27). Spain and Portugal ruled their American empires for more than three centuries. Burns terms this "a remarkable longetivity that places them among the great imperial powers of all time" (Burns 38). They played key roles in European expansion during the sixteenth century, particularly in enhancing the rise of the nation-state and capitalism in Europe (Burns 60). The theory generated by their economic doctrines and practices is known as mercantilism. Mercantilist ideas, in turn, promoted European expansion and contributed to the rise of commercial capitalism (Burns 60).
As impetus to empire, mercantilism rationalized that colonies existed to enrich the European metro
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