JMM, interesting you should mention these but not Peace Corps. The Great Society CAP grew, to some extent, out of programs overseas, especially in Latin America - the Alliance for Progress in particular. Peace Corps, in tis early years - and again, especially in Latin America - focused heavily on community development. LBJ's war on poverty/Great Society incorporated the community development experience in the CAP programs, helped to support them with VISTA volunteers (domestic Peace Corps derivative). Many of the community organizers (where have we heard that term?) - especially the VISTAs - got their tactics from Alinsky's Reveille for Radicals. Some of the tactical learning was from the textbook; much was not - it was just in the air...

I was an undergrad and grad student during this time. 2 undergrad summers working community development in Mexico - 1 rural with the American Friends Service Committee, 1 urban with a bunch of Jesuits, seminarians, and secular college kids in Mexico City. As a grad student, I worked in rural Peru and collaborated with local governments and Peace Corps vounteers while I was researching my doctoral dissertation. So, the all politics is local notion was very much a part of what I was involved with and, I should point out, it was in my experience, a very successful development model.

Interestingly, and bringing this discussion back to where it started, Amb. Corr during this period, was detailed from the Foreign Service to Peace Corps staff where he was Peace Corps Country Director for Colombia. That experience clearly influenced the way he thought about development strategies when he was Ambassador to El Salvador.

Cheers

JohnT