TRANSMODERNITY: Journal of Peripheral Cultural Production of the Luso-Hispanic World

Constrained by Bolivia’s marginal position in the global economy and the systemic exclusion of indigenous populations, early twentieth-century criollo elites were unable to establish a modernity grounded in stable material and political structures. Instead, they projected their ambitions onto infrastructure projects and the expansion of consumer practices, with the desire to align themselves with the industrial centers of the West. Drawing upon the concept of infrastructure as material interventions in space that facilitate mobility and shape collective imaginaries, this article analyzes José Aguirre Achá’s 1923 Bolivian novel, Platonia. The novel illustrates how infrastructure projects, such as the railroad, promoted aesthetics of mobility and cosmopolitanism, reinforcing criollo elites’ political and cultural dominance while marginalizing subaltern groups from the envisioned modernity.