This volume is one in a continuing series of book prepared by the Federal Research Division of the Library of Congress under the Country Studies/Area Handbook Program, formerly sponsored by the Department of Army and revived in FY 2004 with congressionally mandated funding under the sponsorship of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Strategic Plans and Policy Directorate (J05). Most books in the series deal with a particular foreign country describing and analyzing its political, economic, social, and national security systems and institutions, and examining the interrelationships of those systems and the ways they are shaped by historical and cultural factors. Each study is written by a multidisciplinary team of social scientists. The authors seek to provide a basic understanding of the observed society, striving for a dynamic rather than a strategic portrayal. Particular attention is devoted to the people who make up the society, their origins, dominant beliefs and values, their common interests and the issues on which they are divided, the nature and extent of their involvement with national institutions, and their attitudes toward each other and toward their social system and political order. The use of foreign words and terms has been confined to those essential to understanding the text, with a brief definition upon first usage and additional treatment of Glossary A. A list of abbreviations and acronyms of Spanish names, with English translations, can be found in table A. The text uses the standard spelling of place-names sanctioned by the United States Board on Geographic Names. The book's formal information cutoff date for the chapters is December 31, 2008. Certain parts of the text, however, contain later information, added as it became available since the completion of research. The Introduction provides a general update for 2009 and early 2010.
