Drums for Rancas (Spanish: Redoble por Rancas) is a 1970 novel by Peruvian author Manuel Scorza that represents the historical struggles of the inhabitants of the Department of Cerro de Pasco[1] as they fight to recuperate control and ownership of their communal lands from the Peruvian government and multinational mining interests.

The first story, told in the odd numbered chapters, is that of the impending, and finally frustrated, confrontation between Héctor Chacón “el Nictálope” and Judge Montenegro.

The villagers of Rancas are forced to wage a desperate and fruitless war against the colossal Pasto Corporation, which in the 1950s set out to build an immense empire in the Andes by fencing Quechua communities out of their grazing lands.

The outcome is inevitable and typical of most Spanish- American novels of social protest: the oppressed serfs are massacred by the national army, always at the service of foreign interests.

The novel ends with the souls of the dead Indians in their graves, talking about the fate they always have to suffer when facing the rich and the powerful.

The Fence first appears in an inchoate state, transported via that other hallmark of modernity’s late arrival to a savage frontier: the railroad.