Costa Rican nationalism

Analysis

The myth of rural democracy revolves around the idea that Costa Rica has always been democratic: that since colonial times, Costa Ricans have enjoyed a society where all from the governor to peasants have had a voice and vote in decisions. This depiction of a perfectly egalitarian society has been questioned by academics such as Iván Molina, who challenge the image of a colonial and post-colonial, democratic and horizontal Costa Rica, arguing that in fact there existed a powerful, liberal, coffee-growing bourgeoisie that controlled the country. Nevertheless, it is generally accepted that unlike many of its neighbors, the social hierarchy in Costa Rica was never so marked, especially in the absence of an aristocracy with noble titles imported from Spain as in other Latin American nations, and the configuration of land ownership prevented the emergence of large latifundia. Furthermore, social reforms beginning in the forties permitted a degree of social mobility, such that today it is common for working and middle class people to rise to public office as deputies and have on occasion risen to the office of president, even as a privileged political-business class persists.

The racial myth is based on the idea that Costa Ricans in general are ethnically whiter than their Central American neighbors. This myth is deeply rooted in Costa Rican ideology and has been consciously or unconsciously used throughout history as a form of exclusion from the ethnically diverse populations, immigrants and peripheral provinces supposedly more mestizas. Again, recent studies seem to be refuting this myth. Although indeed miscegenation in Costa Rica could be less than in other countries due to the almost absence of indigenous peoples in its territory, recent genetic studies show that the majority of Costa Ricans have European, indigenous and African ancestry to some extent and that miscegenation it is similar to other Latin American countries. This myth may be giving way, however, because Costa Rica has recently been declared a multi-ethnic country by the Legislative Assembly.

According to scholar Massimo Introvigne two variants of Costa Rican nationalism developed: a Christian nationalism linked to the Catholic identity of the Costa Rican, and an esoteric nationalism linked to the liberal and secular intellectual elite. The second would emerge especially influenced by The Theosophical Society, founded in the country in 1904 and that would include Costa Rica within the esoteric cosmology of Theosophy as a spiritually special place and would adapt many of the theosophical cosmogonic beliefs to the ethical context. For example, the book of the theosophist and first lady María Fernández Le Cappellain Zulia and its prequel Yolantá occurred both in the pre-Hispanic period and presented the Costa Rican indigenous peoples in utopian and idealized versions and as heirs of esoteric knowledge. Fernández was the wife of Federico Tinoco, a Costa Rican politician who led a coup d'etat that overthrew the constitutional president Alfredo González Flores and in whose government several theosophists held positions, described by some academics as a nationalist. In any case, esoteric and Catholic nationalism would come into conflict during the first half of the 20th century.

From these myths originate a series of elements typical of Costa Rican nationalism that derive from one or the other, as they are; an idyllic view of the colonial period, coffee producers as the foundation of the nation, Costa Rican centrism, ethnic democracy as exceptionally good, and the country's superiority over many of its neighbors, represented in the phrase "Central American Switzerland.