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Of all the influences on the development of New Granada's political life during the eighteenth century, Bourbon policies are the most obvious. We have seen how, throughout the century, ministers of Bourbon monarchs sought to enhance royal authority and improve Spain's command of the region's resources, with varying degrees of intensity and success. The first conjuncture of Bourbon reform in New Granada, in 1717–23, was ineffectual, if not entirely futile. It did, however, clear the ground for a second conjuncture of administrative and commercial reorganization in 1739–40, from which New Granada emerged with a new framework for government, under the command of the viceroys, and a new framework for its overseas trade, carried by individual register-ships. Then, after a long phase of piecemeal, incremental reform, the government of Charles III inaugurated Bourbon New Granada's third and most radical reformist conjuncture in 1778, when Gálvez's new colonial program was applied to the region in the visita general of 1778–83. New Granada's political system was therefore affected by three major moments of reform during the eighteenth century. In the first, the crown reasserted royal authority, but failed to sustain its reorganization of New Granada's system of government. In the second, Madrid established a permanent viceregal government, which strengthened the networks of royal command in New Granada by installing a strong authority at the heart of the territory. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

So far, we have examined the structures of settlement, society, and economy in eighteenth-century New Granada and have seen something of the economic links that bound the colony to Spain. However, by focusing on the character of New Granada's social and economic structures, the foregoing chapters have tended to emphasize elements of continuity and evolution within the colony, without paying much attention to the external factors that affected its development. And yet, of course, the eighteenth century saw important changes in relations between Spain and her colonies, as the Bourbon kings who inherited the Hapsburg throne sought to reverse the seemingly inexorable process of decline that Spain had suffered during the seventeenth century. Not only did the new dynasty establish a more centralized and absolutist authority within the metropolis, but, by political, military, and economic reform, it also sought to bring about what has been called the “second conquest of America.” This was not a process that began immediately or proceeded smoothly. The first reforms were hesitant in tone and uneven in application, and the great age of reform did not arrive until the reign of Charles III. New Granada, however, felt the repercussions of change at the metropolitan center early in the century, when its trade and administration were touched by Madrid's earliest efforts to reassert control over the resources of its empire. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]