Victor Raúl Haya de la Torre (1895-1979) was the founder and leader of the American Popular Revolutionary Alliance (APRA), principal theorist of Aprismo, and three-time presidential candidate (in the 1930s and 1960s) of the Peruvian Aprista Party. He spent most of his adult life in jail, in exile, or in hiding from the police.

Victor Raúl Haya was born in Trujillo, Peru, on Feb. 22, 1895; his father was a newspaper publisher and his mother a descendant of a president of Peru. He studied at Trujillo National University and San Marcos University, but did not graduate. From the beginning, he took up popular causes and involved himself in radical movements. He said, "I have always preferred doing to discussing," and he believed doing and organizing were inseparable. He became involved in agitation on student reform issues, but was jailed in 1923 and then deported over an incident...