¡Caramba! ¡That is life in the tropic!: un recorrido por la ley y el orden en la literatura hispanoamericana

Two hundred years of colonial rule left Latin America in a state of institutional development characterized by the tension between law and culture. Taking historical and neo-institucional perspectives, this paper discusses the gap between traditional behaviors and those imposed through legal order by the rulers of the country, which are not necessarily the most adequate ones. The author examines eleven Latin American novels so as to better understand formal and informal institutions of three critical phases of institutional development in Latin America.