278 UNIT 2 COLONIAL MESOAMERICA
Figure 7.7 Rafael Carrera,
conservative dictator of Guatemala.
Source unknown.programs were repressive, sterile impositions. As in Mexico, the Central American lib-
eral regimes applied excessive force against the Indians and lower-class mestizos in
an attempt to ensure the availability of cheap labor for the burgeoning capitalist en-
terprises (coffee and banana plantations) being established in the region.Conservative Followed by Liberal Rule in the Mayan Community of Momostenango.
The specific case of a native Mesoamerican community in nineteenth-century
Guatemala will help us understand the impact that liberal reforms had on local
Indian communities in Mexico and Central America during this phase of
neocolonial history. The community, Santiago Momostenango, was one of
approximately 700 Indian communities subjected to Spanish rule within the colonial
Captaincy General of Guatemala. Even though Momostenango’s tributary
obligations to their colonial overlords had not been particularly onerous, the Mayan
Indians there considered tributes to be an undesirable burden, and the local
inhabitants rose up in open rebellion against them toward the end of the colonial
period.