From the outset, the formation of the Peruvian republic was profoundly troubled. In 1810, the Creole aristocracy throughout the Viceroyalty of Peru entered the age of independence with divided loyalties and deep distrust of liberal ideals and popular politics. Still haunted by fears of the Andean insurrection of the 1780s, many landowners and merchants preferred to live under the iron fist of Spanish absolutism than unleash the forces of revolution and rebellion. Indeed, Creole Peru witnessed the beginning of postcolonial dislocations and widespread peasant mobilizations in 1811 and 1812, when the Spanish liberals tried to dismantle tribute for indios and castas (non-Indian castes) in Peru and the rest of America. The restoration of the Bourbon dynasty in 1814 probably brought a collective sigh of relief to most Creoles, but by then Peru's future political fate was already being decided by the grand designs of great liberators in distant lands. It was only a matter of time before two invading armies, one led by José de San Martín and the other by Simón Bolívar, would foist independence upon Peru's reluctant Creole aristocrats.

Throughout most of the decade of the 1820s, Peru's transition from colony to republic followed a circuitous process of liberal reform and illiberal counterreform. As we discussed in chapter 1, the critical issue of tribute was at the core of emerging political debates over the meaning and boundaries of postcolonial republicanism in Peru.