The history of Peru between 1956 and 1968 corresponds to the period following the general elections that put an end to the eight-year military dictatorship that ruled the country since 1948, with Manuel Prado Ugarteche taking office for the second time in 1956.

These were characterised by a notable economic expansion, development of national infrastructure, state services and the beginning of the migration of indigenous populations from the Andes to Lima and the main cities of the country.

The Cuban revolution, perpetrated by communist militants, generated illusions and growing social unrest encouraged by perceived shortcomings, without identifying their causes.

This delay was mistakenly taken as a boycott of the solution to the strong existing social inequalities, when reality indicates that fiscal accounts would not support the amount of credits and training necessary to execute the reform in Peru.

None of the 3 contenders, Víctor Raúl Haya de la Torre, leader and founder of APRA, Fernando Belaúnde Terry of Popular Action and General Manuel Odría were able to exceed a third of the votes.

[1] Rumours of fraud in the 1962 elections renewed fears of social chaos that occurred in 1948 and the Peruvian Armed Forces carried out the first institutional coup d'état in its history,[1][2] evidencing the depth of the debacle that originated during the government of Bustamante y Rivero and that no one wanted to live again.

This resulted in the halting of reforms and productive stagnation, which contrasted with the increase in social demands in water, drainage, communications and others, given the incessant migration verified since 1950 and the prosperity experienced under the Odría government.

In the countryside, budgetary deficiencies in security and police intelligence allowed the illegal seizure of land by radical characters and romantic imitators of Fidel Castro and other communists.

The government was overwhelmed due to the large size of the national territory, by the continuous demolition work of the APRA-UNO alliance and by the radical organisations infiltrated in the productive apparatus, who stopped the creation of more companies with ideological confrontations.

Apparently all that was missing was a trigger for the military to bring order, just as Odría had done after the debacle of the government led by the Bustamante y Rivero and APRA alliance in 1948 (which left inflation of 30.8% when the average was 6%).

Legal recognition was also given to hundreds of indigenous Indian communities,[5] the hospital network was expanded into uncovered areas,[6] and improvements were made in social security coverage.

[7] Migrations to the main ciiies gave rise to the appearance of the first human settlements in the urban periphery, today converted into districts since the promulgation of the 1993 Constitution of Peru.