Salt and the Colombian State

After reading the Colour of Paradise, it was hard for me to make the transition to view salt as a valuable commodity in comparison to the emerald, which was the topic of the previous book.  Joshua Rosenthal discusses in his book titled Salt and the Colombian Stat the strong sense of rebuilding held by the Colombian people after the colonization.  Even though he acknowledges that the Colombians did not have a strong political figure or a revolution similar to the Mexicans, yet they were able to socially reconstruct the country.   I was not fully convinced that he gave sufficient credit or agency to the indigenous population, because he did not them as ones creating the change.  However, the author shows the indigenous people’s abilities of adjusting to multiple political and social changes. 

 One aspect that I value about commodity is the social life of the product and ways in which it relates to factors such as consumption, supply and demand.  Even though Rosenthal highlights the social changes that were created by salt in the Colombia’s period of nation building and transformation, however he does not capture the same changes that Mintz mention in his book about sugar.  I feel that Mintz better discusses the ways in which commodities did a full social restructure through consumption.  In addition, Mintz to restructure commodity like sugar moves through the social classes starting mainly with the elites.   Maybe if Rosenthal used another commodity other than salt he would make a more solid argument.  Overall the book is history-based and displays life after colonization in Columbia, but it is not a book that clearly and effectively articulated some of its arguments.