BERGQUIST, Charles 1942-

PERSONAL:

Born March 14, 1942, in Jackson, MI. Education: Attended University of Chicago, 1960-62; University of Washington, B.A., 1967; Stanford University, M.A., 1968, Ph.D., 1974.

ADDRESSES:

Office—Department of History, University of Washington, Box 353560, Seattle, WA 98195.

CAREER:

Duke University, Durham, NC, assistant professor, 1972-77, associate professor, 1978-85, professor of history, 1985-88; University of Washington, Seattle, professor of history, 1989—, Harry Bridges Professor of Labor Studies, 1994-96, coordinator of Latin-American studies, 1989-92, director of Center for Labor Studies, 1994-96. Fulbright Lecturer in Colombia, 1988-89, and 1997.

AWARDS, HONORS:

Distinguished Undergraduate Teaching Award, Duke University, 1976; Robertson Prize, Hispanic American Historical Review, 1976; Social Science Research Council fellow, 1977-78; National Humanities Center fellow, 1980; Woodrow Wilson Center fellow, 1981; Bolton Prize honorable mention, 1986; named honorary professor, National University of Colombia, 1997.

WRITINGS:

Coffee and Conflict in Colombia, 1886-1910, Duke University Press (Durham, NC), 1978, 2nd edition, 1986.

(Editor) Alternative Approaches to the Problem of Development: A Selected, Annotated Bibliography, Carolina Academic Press (Durham, NC), 1979.

(Editor) Labor in the Capitalist World-Economy, Sage Publications (Beverly Hills, CA), 1984.

Labor in Latin America: Comparative Essays on Chile, Argentina, Venezuela, and Colombia, Stanford University Press (Stanford, CA), 1986.

(Editor with Ricardo Penaranda and Gonzalo Sanchez) Violence in Colombia: The Contemporary Crisis in Historical Perspective, Scholarly Resources (Wilmington, DE), 1992.

Labor and the Course of American Democracy: U.S. History in Latin-American Perspective, Verso (London, England), 1996.

(Editor with Ricardo Penaranda and Gonzalo Sanchez) Violence in Colombia, 1990-2000: Waging War and Negotiating Peace, Scholarly Resources (Wilmington, DE), 2001.

Contributor to books, including Handbook of Contemporary Developments in Historical Studies, Greenwood Press (Westbrook, CT), 1979; Technological Change and Workers' Movements, Sage Publications (Beverly Hills, CA), 1984; and Naciones, gentes y territorios: ensayos de historia comparada de America Latina y el Caribe, Editorial Universidad de Antioquia (Medellin, Colombia), 2000. Contributor to periodicals, including Hispanic American Historical Review, Latin American Research Review, and American Historical Review. Member of editorial board, Labour/Le Travail, Labor History, International Review of Social History, Analisis Politico, and Historia y Espacio.

SIDELIGHTS:

Charles Bergquist is a scholar of Latin-American history who has specialized in the study of Colombia. His book Coffee and Conflict in Colombia, 1886-1910 is an examination of how coffee became that country's most valuable export, allowing economic growth but also fostering conflict with other sectors of Colombia's economy. In 1899 the conflict led to the War of the Thousand Days, a civil war between political groups aligned with rival business interests. Some 100,000 citizens were killed in the struggle. "Bergquist has written a remarkable study, a fundamental contribution to the history of Colombia," Carl E. Solberg wrote of the volume in Business History Review, concluding that "there is no better history of modern Colombia available in the English language."

In 2001 Bergquist coedited Violence in Colombia, 1990-2000: Waging War and Negotiating Peace with Ricardo Penaranda and Gonzalo Sanchez. A collection of essays written by scholars of Latin-American history, this volume focuses on the rise of both left-wing and right-wing guerrilla groups in Colombia that finance their political ambitions through participation in the drug trade. The resulting violence has been met by the government's military muscle as well as by peace-making efforts from various civic organizations seeking a resolution to the widespread bloodshed. The essays gathered in Violence in Colombia, 1990-2000 explore from a number of perspectives the ongoing conflict and the efforts to bring peace. Jenny Pearce in a review for the Journal of Latin American Studies labeled the volume "the best introduction to the study of violence in Colombia in English."

Bergquist told CA: "The current crisis in Colombia, and growing U.S. involvement in it, threatens not only the integrity of that nation, it may destabilize the whole Latin American region. In the two books I've edited with Scholarly Resources, I've tried to bring sophisticated analysis by Colombians on these issues to an English-reading public. My other works try to place Colombian history in comparative Latin American—and U.S.—context."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

Business History Review, summer, 1985, Carl E. Solberg, review of Coffee and Conflict in Colombia, 1886-1910, p. 338.

International Journal on World Peace, March, 2002, Rene Wadlow, review of Violence in Colombia, 1990-2000: Waging War and Negotiating Peace, p. 105.

Journal of Latin American Studies, May, 2002, Jenny Pearce, review of Violence in Colombia, 1990-2000, p. 451.*