<p> Most non-Central Americans think of the narrow neck between Mexico and Colombia in terms of dramatic past revolutions and lauded peace agreements or sensational problems of gang violence and natural disasters. In this volume the contributors examine regional circumstances within frames of democratization and neoliberalism as they shape lived experiences of transition. The authors-anthropologists and social scientists from the United States Europe and Central America-argue that the process of regions and nations disappearing (being erased from geopolitical notice) is integral to upholding a new post-Cold War world order-and that a new framework for examining political processes must be accessible socially collaborative and in dialogue with the lived processes of suffering and struggle engaged by people in Central America and the world in the name of democracy.</p>