... The Awakening of Social Protest (1900-1930) ...
by Infocostarica Staff

The last decade of the nineteenth century marked the beginning of capitalist investments that would lead to an imperialist hold of the United States over Costa Rica and other Latin American countries. In 1884, the Costa Rican government finally signed a contract with American entrepeneur, Minor C. Keith, in which the businessman agreed to finish the railroad to the Atlantic and to lessen the British debt, in exchange for a 99 year concession of the railroad and huge amounts of land in the Atlantic. Keith financed most of this enterprise with his earnings from another investment- banana plantations. His participation in this business culminated with the founding of the United Fruit Company in Boston, in the year of 1899.

Costa Rica, which had defended its sovereignty in the 1856 war against American filibuster, William Walker, was facing the imperialist threat but much stronger this time. The ironic part of this story is that Costa Rica had caused this situation by welcoming unleashed foreign investment. The country was completely surrounded by the American influence: on the North, the marines had invaded and occupied Nicaragua (1912-1934); on the South, Panama had been chosen for its canal; on the Atlantic coast of Costa Rica, the United Fruit Company had basically taken over the region. Even after the two world wars, the United States influenced economic and political decisions of the Costa Rican government.

Up until the founding of the United Fruit Company, Costa Rican exports were limited to coffee. However, in 1910, the export of bananas equaled that of coffee, and in 1911 the country became the world's largest producer of this crop. Between 1914 and 1930, world prices for bananas fell or rose dramatically. By 1930, the company decided to desert the Atlantic region and to move to the Pacific. This change, which was due to the deterioration of the land, also caused great social chaos, since the inhabitants of the region had become completely dependent of the company, and the government had never encouraged any diversification.

Besides bananas, there were other alternate products which began to be exported. Sugar cane was planted mostly near the Pacific, while gold and silver were extracted from several locations. Cattle also became an important export, but it caused social harm when large expanses of land were privatized, thus leaving peasants landless and extremely poor. The Costa Rican elite didn't hesitate to diversify their investments, and started to participate in several enterprises at the same time.

The hunger for earnings from foreign and national businessmen, usually meant a lack of concern for society in general. There were several strikes that denoted the poor conditions of the common workers: the Chinese, Jamaican and Italian strikes (1879-1888) during the railroad construction; the banana plantation strikes (1910-1921); the miner's strikes in Guanacaste (1906-1922). There were several demonstrations in the Central Valley as well, but they were more peaceful, since they recurred to legislative and judicial means, instead of more coercive measures. In San Jose, workers formed unions and rallied for a reasonable work day and for higher salaries.

Thanks to these social pressures, the Costa Rican government was forced to allow the formation of non-traditional parties, such as the Reform Party (1923) and the Communist Party (1931). Within these parties, common workers, peasants and other poor people rose to power in the party and in the government itself. The individuals in the lower social levels had anarchist and socialist ideas that they expressed freely in their meetings and clubs.

Because of the imperialist invasion of the United States in business and government, and the Costa Rican government's passivity towards it, the lower classes suffered tremendously. However they responded by voicing their discontent through unions and strikes, thus giving rise to a social consciousness that had been missing in the country for a very long time.