Abstract
Constitutional or so-called fundamental rights appeared in Mexico in the nineteenth century as a consequence of the introduction of liberal thought. In contrast, human rights as declared in international law developed in Mexico in the context of a serious economic crisis that affected the whole of Latin America in the 1980s. During this crisis international financial institutions interfered in national politics and imposed a conservative economic discourse that had an overwhelmingly negative impact on people’s welfare and contributed to the establishment of new methods of collective action. The discourse introduced by these institutions was neoliberalism.
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Notes
For discussions of import-substitution policy, see: Kay, C. (1989). Latin American Theories of Development and Underdevelopment. London: Routledge; Castañeda, J.G. (1993). Utopia Unarmed. Latin America Left after the Cold War. New York: Alfred A. Knop; Rist, G. (1997). The History of Development. From Western Origins to Global Faith. London: Zed Books; Kaplan, M. (2002). El Estado latinoamericano: crisis y reformas. In Basave, J., Dabat, A., Morera, C., Rivera Ríos, M.Á. and Rodríguez, F. Eds. Globalización y alternativas incluyentes para el siglo XXI. Mexico: Facukad de Economía-UAM-I; Isin, E.F. and Wood, P.K. (1999). Citizenship & Identity. London: Sage; Gutiérrez Garza, E. (1988). Introduccíon. In Gutiérrez Garza, E. Ed. La crisis del Estado de Bienestar. Testimonios de la crisis II. Mexico: Siglo XXI-UNAM; Durán Juárez, J.M. and Partida, R. (1992). Modelo económico, regionalización y nuevo Estado mexicano (1940–1990). In Alonso, J., Aziz Nassif, A. and Tamayo, J. Eds. El nuevo Estado mexicano. I. Estado y economía. Mexico: Nueva Icnagen; Calderón Rodríguez, J.M. (1988). La ruptura del colaboracionismo de clases y las perspectivas de la democracia. In Gutiérrez Garza, E. Ed. La crisis del Estado de Bienestar. II. Mexico: Siglo XXI-UNAM; Kitching, G. (1990). Development and Underdevelopment in Historical Perspective. Populism, Nationalism and Industrialization. London: Routledge; Soria, V.M. (1988). La crisis de la protección social en México. Un análisis de largo plazo con énfasis en el periodo 1971–1985. In Gutiérrez Garza, E. Ed. La crisis del Estado de Bienestar. II. Mexico: Siglo XXI-UNAM; Green, D. (1995). Silent Revolution: The Rise of Market Economics in Latin America. London: Cassell: LAB.
The Austrian School of Economics is a liberal economic trend that appeared as a counterbalance to Marxist ideas in the late nineteenth century. It was not very popular among mainstream economists because of its subjectivist approach to economics. Before the Second World War it was identified by six central ideas: methodological individualism; methodological subjectivism; marginalism; the influence of utility on demand and thus of market prices; opportunity costs; and the time structure of consumption and production. After the 1940s, two important ideas were added by Ludwig von Mises and Friedrich Von Hayek: markets and competition as processes of learning and discovery; and the individual decision as an act of choice in an essentially uncertain context. The Austrian School came to be well known in the mainstream Anglo-Saxon liberal economic tradition only recently, thanks to the work of Hayek, who moved to the United States in 1950 after working for a few years as a lecturer at the London School of Economics. The revival of Austrian economics is located in time in 1974, during the South Royalton Conference, shortly before Hayek was awarded the Nobel Prize for Economics. Friedman was also awarded this prestigious prize in 1976. A few years later he would become an adviser to Margaret Thatcher. Friedman’s first opportunity to work with a “real” national economy was with dictator August Pinochet in Chile; this is one of the reasons for Thatcher’s admiration of Pinochet. Kirzner, I.M. (1992). The Meaning of Market Process. Essays in the Development of Modern Austrian Economics. New York: Routledge.
See discussions of the methodological inaccuracies of neoliberal economics in: Chang, H.-J. (2002). Una perspectiva institucional sobre el papel del Estado: hacia una política económica institucional. In Basave, J., Dabat, A., Morera, C., Rivera Ríos, M.Á., and Rodríguez, F. Eds. Globalización y alternativas incluyentes para el siglo XXI. Mexico: Facultad de Economía-UAM-I; Shand, A.H. (1990). Free Market Morality. London: Routledge; Toye, J. (1993). Dilemmas of Development. 2nd. Oxford: Blackwell.
The analysis of Structural Adjustment Programs was popular in the 1990s with many interesting studies being produced, such as: Román Morales, L.I. (1992). ¿Qué es el ajuste estructural? Mexico: ITESO y Proyecto CONACYT-SIMORELOS; Dasgupta, B. (1998). Structural Adjustment, Global Trade and the New Political Economy of Development. New York: Zed Books.
From the 1930s to 2000, Mexican presidents belonged to the PRI, which was first set up in 1929 as the National Revolutionary Party by President Plutarco Elias Calles, a general from the times of the Mexican Revolution. The party was set up as a means to solve political conflict between caudillos (charismatic leaders) in the aftermath of the 1910 Mexican Revolution and to legitimize the government created by the 1917 Constitution. It changed its name to the Party of the Mexican Revolution in 1939, and became the PRI in 1946. The PRI ruled the country in continuous six-year administrations until 2000 when, following at least 12 years of slow political change triggered by both internal and external dynamics, a president from a different party—the conservative PAN, which was set up in 1939—was elected in a less-questioned electoral process. There is general agreement that the PRI managed to stay in power for so long because of its corporatist and clientelistic politics. Camp, R.A. (1996). Politics in Mexico. 2nd. New York: Oxford University Press.
For broader discussions of Mexican corporatism see: Ramírez Saiz, J.M. (2003). Organizaciones cívicas, democracia y sistema politico. In Aziz Nassif, A. Ed. Mexico al inicio del siglo XXI. Democracia, ciudadania y desarrollo. Mexico: CIESAS-Porrúa; Malloy, J.M. (1977). Authoritarianism and Corporatism in Latin America: The Modal Pattern. In Malloy, J.M. Ed. Authoritarianism and Corporatism in Latin America. Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press; Taggart, P. (2000). Populism. Buckingham: Open University Press; Camp, R.A. (1996). Politics in Mexico. 2nd. New York: Oxford University Press; Fox, J. (1995). Mexico’s Difficult Democracy: Grassroots Movements, NGOs, and Local Government. In Reilly, C.A. Ed. New Paths to Democratic Development in Latin America. The Rise of NGO-Municipal Collaboration. Boulder: Lynne Rienner.
Analysts of corporatism share the opinion that corporatism, as it was known until the 1980s, no longer exists and it is not the only form of social organization as was previously the case. Nevertheless, this is not to say it has disappeared. Corporatism observers share the opinion that we are facing a different form of corporatism that responds to the necessities of the “neoliberal project”—neocorporatism. The monopoly of representation is one of the characteristics lost in the reform. While this is dealt with later in the chapter, see also: Mondragón Pérez, Y. (1997). La recomposición neocorporativa entre Estado y sindicatos: los límites a los proyectos sindicales de interlocución, el caso del STRM. In Zermeño, S. Ed. Movimientos sociales e identidades colectivas. Mexico en la década de los noventa. Mexico: La Jornada-CIICH; Calderón Rodríguez, J.M. (1988). La ruptura del colaboracionismo de clases y las perspectivas de la democracia. In Gutiérrez Garza, E. Ed. La crisis del Estado de Bienestar. II. Mexico: Siglo XXI-UNAM; Bizberg, I. (2003). Estado, organizaciones corporativas y democracia. In Aziz Nassif, Alberto, Ed. Mexico al inicio del siglo XXI. Democracia, ciudadanía y desarrollo. Mexico: CIESAS-Porrúa.
Translation of Monsiváis on page 224 of Castañeda, J.G. (1993). Utopia Unarmed. Latin America Left after the Cold War. New York: Alfred A. Knop. See Monsiváis, C. (2000). Prólogo. Lo marginal en el centro. In Monsiváis, C. Ed. Entrada libre. Crónicas de la sociedad que se organiza. Mexico: Era.
Commentators argue that actual independent organization during the period of PRI rule started as the result of governmental repression against student movements on two occasions. During the first, on October 2, 1968, dozens of students were killed two weeks before the Olympic Games in Tlatelolco Square, Mexico City, by police and army officials dressed as civilians who mixed with the crowd at a demonstration against police repression of previous student mobilizations. The massacre put an end to two months of student activism against repression. Three years later, on June 10, 1971, under the “leftist” government of Luis Echeverría, another massacre took place. After that, dozens of students joined the guerrilla movements operating in Mexico City, southern and northern Mexico. Guerrillas were persecuted and their members were victims of forced disappearance, torture, imprisonment, or execution. Those who did not join guerrillas joined popular movement organizations or set up NGOs. According to Jorge Castañeda, independent urban movements from the 1970s were easily coopted, corrupted, and repressed. More successful independent organizations were the ecclesiastic base communities (comunidades eclesiales de base, CEBs), which were widespread throughout Latin America in the 1970s and encouraged by liberation theologians. See Castañeda, J.G. (1993). Utopia Unarmed. Latin America Left after the Cold War. New York: Alfred A. Knop; Foweraker, J. Ed. (1990) Popular Movements and Political Change in Mexico. London: Lynne Rienner Publishers.
The election of the PRI’s presidential candidate was a very important political ritual because it meant that the one chosen would in fact be the next Mexican president. The president in turn would choose the candidate from his cabinet. Before the neoliberal turn, the Interior Secretary would often be the one appointed, but neoliberals tended toward those in charge of the Treasury or the Finance Secretariat. A discussion appropriate for those unfamiliar with Mexican politics can be found in Camp, R.A. (1996). Politics in Mexico. 2nd. New York: Oxford University Press.
The best example of a neocorporatist union is the formerly state-run telecommunications company Telmex. As Telmex was to be privatized in the early 1990s, Salinas launched a Union Modernization Project that established the new rules. The union of the still state-run Electricity Company, the SME, and the union of Volskwagen Mexico later adopted the new model. A detailed account of the Telmex union case is presented in: Mondragón Pérez, Y. (1997). La recomposición neocorporativa entre Estado y sindicatos: los límites a los proyectos sindicales de interlocución, el caso del STRM. In Zermeño, S. Ed. Movimientos sociales e identidades colectivas. México en la década de los noventa. Mexico: La Jornada-CIICH. General discussions of neo-corporatism can be found in: Bizberg, I. (2003). Estado, organizaciones corporativas y democracia. In México al inicio del siglo XXI. Democracia, ciudadanía y desarrollo. Mexico: CIESAS-Porrúa.
For a broader discussion of the case of the Comité de Defensa Popular see Haber, P.L. (1997). !Vamos por la dignidad de Durango! Un estudio del poder sociopolítico. In Zermeño, S. Ed. Movimientos sociales e identidades colectivas. México en la década de los noventa. México: La Jornada-CIICH.
Pronasol’s political aims were clearly revealed in its incorporation into, and eventual elimination from, the bureaucratic layer. It was first set up as a Program in 1989 and was incorporated into the then new Secretariat of Social Development, the chairperson of which, Luis Donaldo Colosio Murrieta, became the next PRI presidential candidate and was assassinated during his electoral campaign in 1994. His successor and eventual president Ernesto Zedillo eliminated it altogether in 1994 as soon as he took office. For interesting discussions on the political role of Pronasol see: Kaufman, R.R. and Trejo, G. (1997). Regionalism, Regime Transformation and Pronasol: The Politics of the National Solidarity Programme in Four Mexican States. Latin American Perspectives. October 1997. 29 (3): 717–745; Morris, S.D. (1992). Political Reformism in Mexico: Salinas at the Brink. Journal of Interamerican Studies and World Affairs. Spring 1992. 34 (1): 27–57.
Between the 1950s and 1960s the Catholic Church played a crucial role in founding NGOs through providing credit funds, popular education, food distribution, health, and solutions to urban problems. However, it was not until the 1970s that NGOs multiplied. These were set up by the progressive Church advancing liberation theology and intellectuals of the social left and were based on the ideas of popular pedagogy and dependency theory. Hernández, L. and Fox, J. (1995). Mexico’s Difficult Democracy: Grassroots Movements, NGOs, and Local Government. In Reilly, C.A. Ed. New Paths to Democratic Development in Latin America. The Rise of NGO-Municipal Collaboration. Boulder: Lynne Rienner. p. 192.
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© 2008 Ariadna Estévez
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Estévez, A. (2008). The Neoliberal Paradox: Conservative Economic Change and the Rise of Democratic Politics. In: Human Rights and Free Trade in Mexico. Palgrave Macmillan, New York. https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230612617_2
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