The economic and social changes taking place in Latin America inevitably triggered demands for political change as well; political change in turn affected the course of socioeconomic development. As the 20th century opened, the most prevalent regime types were military dictatorship—exemplified by that of Porfirio Díaz in Mexico and after 1908 Juan Vicente Gómez in Venezuela—and civilian oligarchy—as in Chile, Argentina, Brazil, or Colombia. Even in Díaz’s Mexico the constitution was not entirely meaningless, while civilian governments commonly used some combination of electoral manipulation and restricted suffrage to keep control in the hands of a small minority of political leaders ...(100 of 38230 words)