ts of land and the indian and black inhabitants. A dominant social class, primarily white or light-skinned, has evolved over time from the early colonos or hacenderos, who owned the large sugar cane, coffee, cacoa and tobacco plantations, and merchants to the modern economic and social elite, which now includes major industrialists and resort owners. This interlocking elite, which is linked by close ties of family, kinship and the godparent (compadrazgo) system, largely controls the country. Former U.S. Ambassador Martin (1966) described them as follows: "The oligarchy . . . consists of perhaps a score of families related by blood and marriage . . . They have ruled the Republic --furnished its Presidents and generals, its finance and business --for more than a hundred years. Their fortunes are based on land, sugar, tobacco, rum; on cattle and rum and rice and coffee and cacao; on trade and finance" (p. 133). Wiarda (1969) said: "Dominican social structure remains in many respects semi-feudal with a few, lighter-skinned elements at
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