Thoroughly revised and updated, this text provides the basic economic tools for students to understand the problems facing the countries of Latin America. In this third edition, Patrice Franko analyzes challenges to the neoliberal model of development and highlights recent macroeconomic changes in the region. Including charts and tables with the most current data available, the book also offers a wealth of new boxed discussions and vignettes. After a brief historical overview incorporating quantitative and theory-driven results from the new economic history, Franko builds a contemporary model of regional development. She explores the contradictions of growth, especially in the context of overcoming intractable problems of poverty, education, health, and discrimination. Franko focuses on factors of competitiveness, including labor markets, technology, and infrastructure challenges. Inviting students to view challenges through the eyes of policymakers, the text encourages a critical assessment of past and present policy choices. Updated chapters include new research on debt relief, inflation targeting, the changing role of the state, the challenge from China, chronic poverty, bottom-of-the-pyramid marketing, conditional transfer programs, and progress on the millennium development goals. Liberally interspersed with examples and case studies, the book successfully combines theory and its application in the real world. This innovative yet user-friendly text simultaneously challenges strong students while clarifying the fundamentals for novices. By exploring the difficult choices facing Latin American policymakers, the author gives readers interested in economics or in Latin American studies the conceptual means to understand the puzzle of strong, sustainable, and equitable growth in the region.