mexico gawronski, vincent[1]

8/11/2019 Mexico Gawronski, Vincent[1]

1/36

Universidad Nacional Autnoma de Mxico

University of California Institute for Mexico and the United States

The Revolution Is Dead. "Viva la revolucin!:" The Place of the Mexican Revolution in the Eraof GlobalizationAuthor(s): Vincent T. GawronskiSource: Mexican Studies / Estudios Mexicanos, Vol. 18, No. 2 (Summer, 2002), pp. 363-397Published by: University of California Presson behalf of the University of California Institute for Mexicoand the United Statesand the Universidad Nacional Autnoma de Mxico

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2/36

The Revolution

is

Dead.

iViva

la revoluciont:

The Place of the Mexican Revolution

in the

Era of Globalization

Vincent T.

Gawronski

Birmingham-Southern College

Mexicans have

long

cherished their

revolutionary

heritage,

but where does the

Mexican Revolution now reside in collective

memory,

and does the idea of the

Revolution still have

any

legitimating

power?

And what has

been

the

relationship

between the PRI's

long

sequence

of

legitimacy

crises and the Mexican

Revolu-

tion? Until

procedural democracy provides

significant

substantive and

psycho-

logical

benefits,

the recent

democratic turn will not

fully supplant

Mexico's tra-

ditional sources of

legitimacy.

While

Mexicans

generally

see the

regime

as

falling

short in

achieving

the basic

goals

of the Mexican

Revolution,

there are indica-

tions that the Revolution-understood as collective memory, myth, history, and

national

identity-still

holds

a

place

in

political

discourse and

rhetoric,

even if

such

understandings

make little

logical

sense in the era of

globalization.

Los mexicanos han tenido un

largo

carinio

por

su

herencia

revolucionaria,

pero

id6nde

reside ahora la Revoluci6n mexicana en

la

memoria

colectiva?,

etodavia

tiene

poder

legitimador

la idea de la Revoluci6n? eY cual ha sido

el vinculo

entre

la secuencia

larga

de

las crisis de

legitimidad

del PRI

y

la

Revoluci6n

Me-

xicana? Hasta

que

la democracia

procesal proporcione

ventajas

substantivas

y

psicologicas significativas, la vuelta reciente a la democracia no suplantara com-

pletamente

las fuentes tradicionales de

la

legitimidad

en

Mexico. Mientras

que

los mexicanos

generalmente

entienden

que

el

regimen

ha fallado en la

reali-

zacion de las metas basicas de

la Revoluci6n

mexicana,

hay

indicaciones

que

la

Revoluci6n-entendida

como

memoria

colectiva, mito,

historia

e

identidad

nacional-todavia tiene

lugar

en

el

discurso

y

retorica

politicos,

incluso

si

tales

conocimientos tienen

poco

sentido

l6gico

en la

epoca

de la

globalizaci6n.

This

essay

addresses the

overarching

question

of how a

political

system

that

emerged

from a true

social revolution

responds

to

global

forces

that

seem to

be

undermining

revolutionary

nationalism as

a source of

politi-

MexicanStudies/EstudiosMexicanos

Vol. no.

18(2),

Summer

2002,

pages

363-397.

ISSN

7429797

?2002

Regents

of

the

University

of

California.

All

rights

reserved. Send

requests

for

permission

to

reprint

to:

Rights

and

Permissions,

University

of

California

Press,

2000 Center

St.,

Berkeley,

CA

94704-1223

363


3/36

Mexican

Studies/Estudios

Mexicanos

cal

legitimacy

and

regime

support.

The dominant

precepts

underlying

globalization-namely

neoliberalism-simply

negate

many

of the

prin-

ciples upon

which

revolutionary-nationalist

regimes

have been based.

The

specific

case

is

Mexico,

where the once

highly

statist,

nationalist,

and

at

least

rhetorically

socialist

regime

has embraced neoliberalism

and is in

the

throes

of

democratic transition. The more

general

ques-

tion

necessarily

provokes

several interrelated

questions

that focus

speci-

fically

on the

place

of the Mexican Revolution: Where

does the Mexican

Revolution-with

its

lofty

goals

(historically comprising

a

religion

of

the

patria )-reside

in the

Mexican

collective

memory, especially

since

Vicente Fox Quesada of the conservative Partido Acci6n Nacional (PAN)

has defeated the Partido Revolucionario Institucional

(PRI)?

Have

the

myths

and rituals of

revolutionary

nationalism lost their

appeal?

What

has been the

relationship

between the PRI's

long

sequence

of

legitimacy

crises

and

the

Mexican Revolution? Did

the

PRI so

empty

the Mexican

Revolution of

significance

as

to

make its

mythology

meaningless

and

thus

incapable

of

rendering

support

for both the

PRI and

perhaps

even for

the

entire

political

system?

Does the electoral defeat

of

the

PRI in the

era of

globalization

finally

signal

the Mexican Revolution's death knell?

Does

the idea of the revolution continue to have

any

legitimizing/

legitimating

power? Finally,

and

perhaps

most

important,

can

the

proce-

dural democratic

transition,

with the

high,

and often

unrealistic,

expec-

tations it has

generated,

supplant

traditional

revolutionary

nationalism

as the foundation of the Mexican

political system,

thus

constituting

a

new

Mexican Revolution? As

Benjamin

(2000:

13)

emphasized:

Mexi-

cans invested

a

lot

of

meaning

in

their Revolution with

a

capital

letter

during

this

century,

but

where does that

meaning

now

lay

in Mexican

collective memory, especially as so many forces-both local and global-

are

making

it

increasingly

difficult to

uphold

so

many classically

revolu-

tionary

goals

and

ideals?

Drawing

from several

public opinion surveys

conducted

by

the

Mexico office

of the

well-known

firm Market

Opinion

Research Inter-

national

(MORI

de

Mexico),

this

analysis

and

discussion focuses on two

1997-1998

surveys

that included commissioned items

exploring

the Rev-

olution's

progress

and

likely

demise and the

place

of the Mexican Rev-

olution in the

minds of the Mexican

people.

The first task was to assess

the

saliency

of the Mexican Revolution's basic

goals

and

ideals with

the

1.

Public

opinion polling

has

a

relatively

long

history

in

Mexico,

but

very

few

polls

of

any

significance

have

tapped

attitudes and

opinions

regarding

the relevance

and/or

ful-

fillment

of the basics

goals

and ideals

of the Mexican Revolution.

Nonetheless,

three of

the more

important

survey

research-based

studies are Basanez

(1990),

Camp

(1996),

and

Dominguez

and McCann

(1996).

364


4/36

Gawronski:Mexican

Revolution

in the

Era

of

Globalization

365

following

question,

which was

asked on both

surveys:

Towhat

extent

are the

following

basic

principles

of

the Mexican Revolution

relevant

to

today's

(1997-1998)

society?

Drawing

from Frank

Brandenburg's

1964)

notion of a

revolutionary

creed,

the

question

was broken down to

the

most

commonly

understood

revolutionary

goals

and ideals:

(1)

The

Land

Belongs

to Those Who Work

It, (2)

Respect

for

Labor

Rights,

(3)

No

Reelection

of the President of the

Republic,

(4)

National Economic

Sovereignty,

5)

SocialJustice.

Asking

respondents

to use a

five-point

scale

(one,

very

relevant o

five,

not-at-all

elevant ),

he

question

was

intended to measure the extent to

which Mexicans

see the

primary

goals

and ideals of the Revolution as importantto today's(1997-1998) Mexico.

From

relevance,

he

survey

instrument moved to

fulfillment,

nd the

survey respondents

were

asked to

evaluate the

degree

to which

they

saw each of the five basic

principles

as

having

been

fulfilled,

once

again

according

to

a

five-point

scale

(one,

very

fulfilled

o

five,

not-at-allul-

filled ).

Towhat

extent has the

government

fulfilled

the

basic

princi-

ples

of the Mexican Revolution so far?

The first MORI

survey

(n

=

1225)

was conducted in Mexico

City

in

September

1997.

The

second,

national in

scope

(n

=

1105,

weighted

valid

n

=

1642),

was administered in late

December

1997

through

early

January

1998.2

The

survey

results and

analysis

empirically

validate much

of the

existing

literature

on

Mexico,

and two

very

strong

conclusions

stand out:

1. The

goal

of

No Reelection of the President

of the

Republic

con-

tinues

to

be

very

relevant to

Mexicans,

and to Mexico

generally,

and is the most fulfilled

basic

revolutionary principle.3

2. The Revolution-generatedgoal of SocialJustice s the least rele-

vant and least

fulfilled

goal.

2.

The

questions

that were

eventually

included in the December

1997-January

1998

national

survey

(n

=

1105,

weighted

valid n

=

1642)

went

through

several iterations. To en-

sure that the

questions

were

understandable,

a

self-administered

pre-test

was conducted

among

Mexican nationals

living

in the

Phoenix, Arizona,

area.

In

September

1997,

MORI

de

Mexico conducted a

pilot study

(n=1225)

in Mexico

City

to ensure that

the

questions

were

manageable

in the field. The

pilot

study produced

valuable

quantitative

and

qualita-

tive data and can be considered a stand-alonestudy of Mexico City.After some minor ad-

justments

and

rewordings,

MORI

appended

the final

survey

instrument

to the

1997

Mexico

Latinobar6metro,

which is a

comprehensive public

opinion survey

modeled after the Eu-

robarometer and

implemented

annually

n seventeen Latin

American countries and

Spain.

3.

While the

principle

of no

reelection also

applies

to

other elected

officials,

it is

most

strongly

associated with the

presidency

because of the

highly

presidentialist

nature of

the

postrevolutionary

regime

and the existence

of the

six-year perfect

dictatorships -the

sex-

enios.

Moreover,

t was also

much easier

to

tap opinions

regarding

he

presidency

because

it is has

been such

a

visible and

palpable

historical

component

of

Mexico's

political

system.


5/36

MexicanStudies/EstudiosMexicanos

The Revolution as a

Source

of

Legitimacy

Exploring public

attitudes toward the Revolution is

admittedly

sensitive.

Whether

institutionalized,

permanent,

frozen,

or

programmatically

dead,

the Revolution has carried enormous

symbolic

value

and has

generated

a massive literature.4

Historically

t has

been

a

national

adhesive,

at least

rhetorically,

despite

never

being

uniformly

understood.

Now,

however,

the Mexican

political

system,

which

was

founded on

revolutionary

rhet-

oric and socialist ideals

(some

initially

competing),

is

facing

unique

chal-

lenges.

Indeed,

contrary

to its

founding

revolutionary ideology,

Mexico

is increasingly becoming a cog (or pivot ) n the global system (espe-

cially

with

its

unique

global

trade

relations),

and the official revolution-

ary party-the

PRI-is no

longer

revolutionary

or even

populist.

As

Thomas

Benjamin

(2000:

23)

astutely

observed:

The Mexican

political

system

during

most of the twentieth

century

has based

its

legitimacy argely

on la Revoluci6n.The state and the dominant

party,

ac-

cordingly,

re the culmination

nd continuation f the Mexican evolution.La

Revoluci6n

s identifiedwith the most sacred

values

andthe

highest

principles

of theRepublic, swellas thegreatestneeds andaspirationsf itspeople.The

revolutionary

rigins

of the

political ystem

and

the

system's

aithful dherence

to

la Revolucion

have

justified

he existence

of

the

system,

the

hegemony

of

the official

party,

and

the

authority

f the

successive

regimes

thattake

power

every

six

years.

This

pattern

or

support

s

changing,

however.The

system

has

deviated rom

ts

founding

principles

as Mexican ivil

society

has

changed

and

awakened.

Opponents

of the

government

aveembraceda Revolucion

andare

making

t

their

own.

Addressing

legitimacy

in

Mexico,

however,

is

always

fraught

with

prob-

lems because Mexicans

supported

the PRI-state

system

for decades de-

4. Within the vast Mexicanist mainstream

literature,

a

strong

current

has

empha-

sized

the Mexican Revolution and its

meaning

and

importance.

Still one of the most in-

sightful

works is The

Making

of

Modern Mexico

(1964),

where

Brandenburg

more con-

cretely

developed

the

idea of the

Revolutionary

Family

and the

closely

associated

Revolutionary

Creed.

Ross's

Is the Mexican Revolution

Dead?

(1966)

and Cumberland's

The

Meaning

of

the

Mexican Revolution

(1967)

continued

the focus. The Revolution

was

then revisited

in the

mid-1980s

with the

Cambridge

History of

Latin America series

(1984),

Knight's (1986) erudite two-volume history, and Hart's(1987) influential work. Later, n

their edited

volume,

Everyday

Forms

of

State

Formation,

Joseph

and

Nugent

(1994)

in-

sightfully

demonstrated the

continuing

role of the Mexican

Revolution in the

relationship

between

popular

cultures and state formation

at the local level

(see

also Becker

1995).

At

the

same

time,

however,

other scholars

began shifting

the theme to the Revolution's

pos-

sible

demise,

specifically Meyer

(1992),

Aguilar

Camin

and

Meyer

(1993),

and

Middlebrook

(1995).

Benjamin

(2000),

from

a

more historical

perspective,

examined how Mexicans

in-

terpreted

the Revolution

through

collective

memory, myths,

and

historiography

between

1910

and

1950.

366


6/36

Gawronski:Mexican Revolution in the Era

of

Globalization

367

spite

injustices,

gross

inequalities,

and

classic semi-authoritarianism.5

Indeed one of the most

enigmatic

features of

Mexican

society

is

the de-

gree

to which Mexicans

have

historically

tolerated

so

much.

Support,

in such

cases,

for the

system

does not emanate as

much from belief

in

the

validity

of

legal

statute or rational

rules,

resting

more on

ideolog-

ical

foundations

and

culture than

on

modern

sources,

despite

Mexico's

remarkable and

thoroughly

modern

constitution.

But as

globalization

bears down

heavily

on

Mexico,

the traditional

ideological

and cultural

sources of

legitimacy

are

withering

just

as

democracy

seems to

be

tak-

ing

hold-that

is,

as

democratic

procedures

(free

and fair

elections)

and

high expectations of benefits (substantive and psychological) replace

revolutionary

nationalism. Thus the traditional

symbolic,

national ad-

hesive that has held the

postrevolutionary

regime together

for so

long

is

now

dissolving.

However,

the

apparent

democratic transition

will

mean

very

little if

the

average

Mexican's

quality

of

life does not soon

improve.

If the

regime

does

not meet

a

sufficient measure of social ex-

pectations,

democratic breakdown and civil unrest

may

result. As

well,

if

society

continues to hold

socialist and

revolutionary-nationalist

deals

or

if

it maintains

unrealisticallyhigh expectations,

the

regime

could

be

forced to deal

with

greater

levels of

opposition

and/or

political

violence.

Regime

performance

and effectiveness

become

more

salient when

crises

emerge

or

when

social

(value)

expectations

outrun

regime

(value)

capabilities.6

5.

Padgett's

(1976,

1966)

work laid out the fundamental

characteristics

(semi-

authoritarianism,

o-optation, corporatism)

of what Needler

(1995)

described as the

clas-

sic Mexican

political system.

6. Mexico

is indeed in

flux,

but

potentially

the

gravest problem

resides in the im-

plications

of a

stuck,

or at

least

a

severely

constrained,

policy

pendulum.

In

his

famous

J

curve

theory

of

revolution,

Davies

(1962)

posited

that when an

intolerable

gap

emerges

between

expected

values and

actual

values,

conditions become

ripe

for

revolution. The

contemporary

Mexico

case, however,

is not a

perfect

fit for Davies.

Punctuated with

so

many

crises,

Mexico has not

yet

experienced

a

long

period

of

rising

expectations

and

gratifications.

n

fact,

Mexico's most

successful

period

of economic

growth-the

so-called

Mexican Miracle-exacerbated

many inequalities.

Indeed,

only

recently

have the

mod-

ernization of Mexican

society

and the

apparent

democratic transition

significantly

raised

hopes

and

expectations-unfortunately

just

as

Mexican

policymakers

are

becoming

more

constrained.

Therefore,

Mexico's

predicament

more

closely

fits

Gurr's

1967)

model than

Davies's

or,

for that

matter,

Johnson's

(1966).

Gurr

(1967: 3)

argued

that:

[T]he

necessary

precondition

for violent civil conflict is relative

deprivation,

defined

as actors'

perceptions

of

discrepancy

between their value

expectations

and

their

en-

vironment's value

capabilities.

Value

expectations

are

the

goods

and conditions

of

life

to which

people

believe

they

are

justifiably

entitled. The

referents

of value

capabili-

ties

are

to be found

largely

in the social and

physical

environment:

they

are conditions

that determine

people's

chances for

getting

or

keeping

the values

they

legitimately

ex-

pect

to attain.


7/36

Mexican

Studies/Estudios

Mexicanos

Undeniably,

he institutionalization f the MexicanRevolutionand the

creation of a

revolutionary iconography

with

its

associated

myths

were

unique

historical,

political,

and cultural

processes.

And a

specific pro-

grammatic

agenda

emerged

to

advance basic

revolutionaryprinciples

and

ideals,

but this created a tension

between

the

real and

the ideal.

The PRI

laid official claim to its

revolutionary

heritage,

in

essence,

by

upholding

a

nationalist-revolutionarymyth

(or

myths),

advancing

socialist

rhetoric,

and

implementing

certain ideals and

goals

but

freezing

others for later.

The

revolutionaries-the

RevolutionaryFamily -blessed

the PRIas the

official

party

of the

Revolution,

as Martin

Needler

(1995:

68-69)

noted:

In Mexico

egitimacy

has two sources,democratic nd

revolutionary,

eflecting

the fundamental

mbiguity

f Mexican

political

mythology.Legitimacy

omes

from

election

by

the

people;

t also comes from he

heritage

of the Revolution.

When

egitimacy

o

longer

comesfrom

above,

rom

royalty

uling

by

the

grace

of

God,

t mustcome from

below,

rom he will

of

the

people,

or from

he act

of the overthrow

of

the

illegitimate

uler tself.Untilthe

system

began

the

ex-

tendedcrisis

period

of the

1980s

and

'90s,

these two

sources

of

legitimacy

on-

verged

n the official

party,

he PRI.

The PRI-state ystem also reliedupon populism andspecific socialistpoli-

cies such

as

land

redistribution,

albeit

limited,

and economic national-

ism

(Import

Substitution

Industrialization)

o

foster a sense

of

Mexican-

ness

(mexicanidad),

which

garnered

support

for the

regime.

Indeed

support

for

the

postrevolutionary

regime

became

tightly

bundled

with

Mexican

nationalism and a sense of

identity,

especially

cultural

nation-

alism.

Also,

creating

a

sense

of

who

is

and who

is

not Mexican bound

the

nation and

the

postrevolutionary

state

(see

Knight

1994).

Thus,

the

vast

literature

on

political legitimacy

in Mexico has tended

to focus on how certain institutions,

practices,

social forms,

myths,

and

heroes

became

accepted

as

legitimate.

It has

generally emphasized

the

historical

process

whereby

the national state came

to exercise control

and domination after the Mexican

Revolution,

especially

how the state

institutionalized he Revolution.7 Vincent

L.

Padgett's

(1976: 59-60)

work

is

still

revelatory:

The

nationalist,

evolutionary

radition

omposed

of idealsand

heroes reaches

back

hrough

ime.The roots ie in

the

periods

of

Cardenas

nd

Zapata,

nd ur-

7.

Importantly,

Mexican

attitudes toward

education

are

very

significant

for

political

legitimacy

and

regime

support.

Education is an

agent

of

political

socialization,

and in

Mexico,

the

public

schools are

operated

by

the

national

government.

Needler

(1995:

69)

noted that

public

education

in

Mexico

has a

high

content

of civic indoctrination. This

factor,

as

Camp

also observed

(1993: 57),

could serve as a

positive,

indirect means

of

re-

inforcing

the state's

egitimacy-especially

because texts

in

elementary

schools are selected

by

the

government.

Therefore,

education is

important

for

passing

on the basic

principles

368


8/36

Gawronski:

Mexican Revolution

in the Era

of

Globalization

369

ther,

in those of

Juarez,

Hidalgo,

and

Morelos,

and even

stretching

back

to

Cuauhtemoc

and the

days

of

Indian

greatness.

All of this has

been

shaped

into

an historical

synthesis

which focuses on the

identity

of the

people

and forms

the

basis

of

the

existing

national order.

Mexicanism

Mexicanidad)

is

used to

justify

the

present

and the future. The

Revolutionary

coalition

has found it

a

valu-

able

means of

subordinating

the

deep

schisms in Mexican

society

to the

imple-

mentation

of

policy

and the

stability

of

government.

This institutionalization

process,

Alan

Knight

(1994: 60)

later

added,

while

undeniably

a

state

project

of cultural

transformation,

was

complex

and

contradictory:

The

revolutionaries,

as I

have

said,

firmly

believed

in

notions of

hegemony,

even

false consciousness

(if

not in those

terms).

But how successful were

they?

First,

did

they

transform

popular

consciousness,

legitimizing

the

revolutionary

regime?

(And

if

so,

we

may

ask

again,

did

thereby

foster a new

mystification

or

false

consciousness ?

Or, rather,

did

they

successfully

combat

a

rival

legitimation-

for

example,

Catholic conservatism-and

thereby

demystify,

breaking

the fetters

of false

consciousness?)

Or was the

revolutionary project

a

failure,

a

gimcrack

facade behind

which the

common

people,

the

peasants especially,

grumbled

and

prayed

to old

gods,

untouched

by

the

new

legitimation?

Was it a case not

just

of idols behind altars but idols behind altars behind murals?

Needler

(1995:

69),

moreover,

highlighted

the role

of the

president

of

Mexico:

The

popular

mandate

and democratic

legitimacy

were of

course

personalized

in the role of the

president. By

a

sort

of

pseudo-apostolic

succession,

the

pres-

ident was

also the

direct heir of the

martyrs

of

the

Revolution,

having

received

the

presidential

sash from the hands of his

predecessor,

who had

received

his from

his,

in a line

which

goes

back at least to

Obreg6n.

The

party

and the

president

thus incarnated

legitimacy

in Mexico.

Benjamin

(2000:13),

focusing

on the

early

postrevolutionary period,

em-

phasized

the role the

voceros de la Revolucion had on

legitimating

the

regime.

The

voceros

were

those that had invented

and

constructed the

Revolution with

a

capital

letter in their

pamphlets,

broadsides,

procla-

mations, histories,

articles,

and

editiorials. He

(2000: 14)

explained:

Their

talking, singing,

drawing,

painting,

and

writing

invented

la Revoluci6n: a

name transformed into what appeared to be a natural and self-evident part of

reality

and

history.

This

talking

and

writing

was also

part

of an

older,

larger,

and

greater

project

offorjando

patria, forging

a

nation,

inventing

a

country,

imag-

ining

a

community

across

time and

space

called

Mexico.

and ideals of the

Mexican

Revolution,

which

Padgett

(1976:

9)

pointed

out

early

on:

Par-

ticularly

important

is the

interpretation

of

history

as

presented

to most

Mexican school

children

and

young

people.


9/36

Mexican

Studies/Estudios

Mexicanos

The

Revolution,

consequently,

became

embedded in Mexican collec-

tive

memory

as

national

myth

and

history.

Virtually every

Mexicanist

therefore agrees that Mexico's postrevolutionary political system has,

at least

metaphorically,

rested on

a

socialist-nationalist

and

revolution-

ary

ideology,

but

Mexico's

biggest

paradox

has

been

the

dissonance be-

tween

revolutionary

rhetoric and the

reality

of

the Mexican

state,

which

became

readily

apparent

when Mexico's

post-World

War

II

period

of

economic

growth-the

Mexican Miracle -started

to

peter

out,

and

most

starkly

in

1968,

with the massacre at Tlatelolco.8

Starting

in

1968

and more or less

ending

with the

highly

contested

1988

presidential

elections

Mexico

experienced

a

long sequence

of

legitimacy

crises. The

definitive

end of the

sequence

of

legitimacy

crises came with the

pop-

ular election

of Mexico

City's

first true

mayor,

Cuauhtemoc

Cardenas,

in

1997,

and

of

course,

with

the electoral defeat of

the

PRI in

2000

by

Vicente Fox.

The

PRI's

Sequence

of

Legitimacy

Crises:

Moral,

Performance-Based,

and Political

Many less astute observers of Mexico have tended to explain the PRI's

loss of

support

by

focusing

on

perceptions

regarding

the PRI's

(in)at-

tentiveness to social

expectations

during

the

1980s

and

1990s;

however,

the

beginning

of

the

end

for the PRI must

be

pushed

back

to

1968,

a

point

made

by

Will

Pansters

(1999: 250)

and

many

others:

Although

the

agitated

summer of

1968

ended

in

brutal

repression,

its

longer-

term effects

are

argued

to

be

so

profound

that there

exists a line of

continuity

between

this

experience

(1968)

and the electoral

opening

which,

sinceJuly

1988,

8. The

Tlatelolco

rally

was

not

large

compared

to

the

protests

and demonstrations

that would be

organized

in the

1980s

and

1990s

in Mexico

City's

z6calo.

On October

2,

1968,

just days

before Mexico would host

the

Olympics,

thousands of

students,

women,

children,

and

spectators

gathered

in

the

Plaza. The demonstration was

peaceful.

The

speeches

were

emotional

but not

noteworthy.

Riding

(1985:

60)

summarized

what

hap-

pened

next:

At

around

5:30

P.M.

here

were

10,000

people

in the

plaza,

many

of them women and

children

sitting

on the

ground.

Two

helicopters

circled

above,

but

the crowd was ac-

customed

to

such

surveillance.

Even the

speeches

sounded familiar.Then

suddenly

one

helicopter

flew low over the crowd and

dropped

a flare.

Immediately,

hundreds

of

soldiers

hidden

among

the Aztec ruins of the

square opened

fire with automatic

weapons,

while

hundreds of secret

police

agents

drew

pistols

and

began making

ar-

rests.

For

thirty

minutes,

there was total confusion. Students

who fled into the

adja-

cent Church of San Francisco

were chased and beaten and some

were

murdered.

Jour-

nalists

were

allowed

to

escape,

but then

banned from

re-entering

the area when the

shooting

stopped.

That

night,

army

vehicles

carried

away

the

bodies,

while firetrucks

washed

away

the blood.

370


10/36


of

Globalization

371

seeks

to

put

an end to the

hegemony

of the official

party.

These effects

range

from

the modification of values and behavioural

practices,

through

a

reorgani-

zationof class alliances within the

ruling

elite

(favouring

the urbanmiddle classes

to the detriment

of

traditional

corporatist

sectors),

to the

emergence

of

public

opinion

as

a

political

factor. Others have

emphasized

that

it

was

the

violent

sup-

pression

of

the

1968

student movement and the

spreading

of

leadership

and

ideologies throughout

society.

With

the massacre of

students

and other

protesters

in the Plaza de

Tlatelolco-several

hundred

people

were killed but

the

government

only

conceded

32-the

PRI-state

system

was

widely

challenged,

for the first

time, on a value basis. The 1968 Olympic Games were held without ma-

jor

incident,

and Mexico's

image

abroad was saved. Less

immediately

vis-

ible but more

important

in

the

long

term,

the

moral

legitimacy

of

the

entire PRI-state

system

was undermined.

In

particular

the

regime

lost

the

support

of

many

of

Mexico's established and

upcoming

intelligentsia.

Many

of Mexico's

intellectuals

had shared with the

political system

an

ideological agenda

of

revolutionary

nationalism and the

widespread pro-

motion of education. Entwined in mutual

support,

the

intelligentsia

lent

legitimacy to the regime. In return the regime doled out favors and gov-

ernment

posts

to

their favorite sons

(and

a few

daughters).

However,

shocked

by

the

PRI-state's behavior

at

Tlatelolco,

such

world-renowned

writers as Carlos Fuentes and Octavio Paz

strongly

denounced

the

bru-

tal

actions

of

the

regime,

breaking

their official ties with the

government

and

calling

into

question, really

for the first

time,

the

legitimacy

of

the

whole

postrevolutionary

system.

Enrique

Krauze

(1997:

733)

noted the

historical

impact

of

1968

on

Mexican

politics

and

society

while

focusing

on the motivations and con-

sequences

of

people's

actions:

The Student Movement of

1968

opened

a crack

in

the

Mexican

political system

where it

was

least

expected:

among

its

greatest

beneficiaries,

the sons

of

the

middle class. On their

own account

they

rediscovered that man

does not

live

by

bread

alone. Their

protest

was not in behalf of

revolution,

it was for the

broader cause of

political

freedom. As had been the case

with

the

doctors,

the

government

did not know how

to

handle middle-class

dissidence

except

through

the

same violent

methods

(loaded

threats

or

loaded

guns)

that had

given

them

effective results with the workers and the peasants. Here, their action had the

opposite

effect.

But

despite

the revealed

contrast between the

regime's

professed

rev-

olutionary

values

and its

actions,

it

survived

through

co-optation,

clas-

sic

semi-authoritarianism,

and moderate

political

reforms. The

1977-

1978

reforms softened direct

challenges

to the

system

by

making

it

eas-

ier for

opposition

parties

to

officially

register

and

by

widening,

ever so


11/36

Mexican

Studies/Estudios

Mexicanos

slightly,

the arena for

political

mobilization

and

interest

representation.

The

political

reform

was

the

government's

and

the

ruling

party's

re-

sponse to a series of challenges that undermined the efficiency and le-

gitimacy

of the PRI

(Pansters

1999:

250). Indeed,

PRI

political

reform

efforts

have been more a result of PRI-elite survival

strategies

than ad-

herence to some

deep-seated

commitment

to

democracy

and revolu-

tionary

goals

and ideals. PRI elites

implemented

liberalizing

political

re-

forms in

response

to

perceived

threats,

not because

they

were

being

responsive

and attentive

to

the needs

and

wishes of the Mexican

people.

Todd

A.

Eisenstadt

(2000: 5-6) argued

that the PRI

liberalized

the

electoral

system

for four reasons:

First,

the PRI

could,

through

multiple

iterations

of

graduated

reforms,

acquire

precise

information about

in-

cumbent

and

opposition popularity

in

various

segments

of the

popula-

tion.

Second,

the PRI could divide and

conquer

the

opposition

through

such reforms.

Third,

the

channeling

of

opposition

into

the

electoral

arena

helped

the

PRI

to channel

protesters,

students,

and the

strongly

disillusioned out of the

unpredictable

realm of street demonstrations

and

picket

lines

and

into

the

highly

regulated

realm

of

campaigns

and

elections. This channeling also

helped

to restore credibility to the [PRI]

domestically

and

internationally. Finally, political

liberalization

helped

to

bind

the

hardliners

within

the

authoritarian

coalition. Eisenstadt

(2000:

6)

explained:

[T]he

party's

technocratic

leaders,

especially

in the

1990s,

increasingly

dis-

counted the old-time machine's

ability

to

get

out the

vote as a skill valued

by

the

party.

In

fact,

President Carlos Salinas

repeatedly

undermined the traditional

machine

bosses

by

negotiating

away

their

electoral victories

at

post-electoral

bar-

gaining tables with the PAN,known as concertasiones (Spanish slang combi-

nation of concession

and

agreement ).

Salinas

drove

a

wedge

into the

party

starting

in

1989

which ended

in electoral defeat

11

years

later

by placing

a much

higher

premium

on

getting

along

with the PAN n federal

parliamentary

cham-

bers

on economic

policy

votes than

on

getting along

with

his

own

party's

tra-

ditional vote

getting

activists.

He

has been

widely

blamed

for

weakening

the PRI

to

the

point

that

PRIistashave

proposed

his

expulsion

from the

party.

Ernesto

Zedillo,

Salinas's ess

politically

adroit and

equally

technocratic successor con-

tinued Salinas's

policy

(but

without

going

to

Salinas's

extreme

of

sacrificing

lo-

cal PRI victories for concession

agreements

with the

PAN),divorcing

himself

from

party

affairs in

the

controversial

safe

distance

policy.

While

it is true that the PRI

liberalized

itself into electoral

defeat,

the

story

needs more

contextualization and

explanation

because the dem-

ocratic transition

has

been

so

protracted.

Moreover,

while

Mexico has

made

significant

democratic strides with the PRI's

losses,

very

few

politi-

cians

and even fewer academics

are

declaring

the transition

complete.

372


12/36

Gawronski:

Mexican

Revolution in the Era

of

Globalization

373

Essentially,

the PRI's

implosion

and

apparent

demise must

be

traced to

the

PRI-state

system's

long

sequence

of

legitimacy

crises,

political

re-

form efforts to deal

with

several

problems,

and a

general falling

out

of

touch with the Mexican

people

as

society

modernized,

all of

which

re-

sulted

in

the

withering

away

of the PRI's

traditional

revolutionary

sources

of

legitimacy

and

corporatist

and

populist

networks.

In

1982

Mexico

announced

that

it could no

longer

service its

ex-

ternal

debt,

banks

were

nationalized,

and an

economic debacle

ensued,

which initiated

Latin America's Lost Decade of

development. Chap-

pel

Lawson

(2000: 272)

noted that

[b]y

the

early

1980s,

fifty

years

of

corruption, cronyism, patronage, and pork barreling had sabotaged

Mexico's

economy.

Then,

in

1985,

Mexico

City

was struck

by

twin earth-

quakes

that

devastated

parts

of

the

city.

The PRI-state

system's

disaster

response

and

subsequent

management

of the

reconstruction

were

widely

criticized. The

regime's

performance

legitimacy

was

lost,

as

people

realized

just

how

few

resources the

PRI-state

system really

com-

manded,

how

corrupt

it

was,

and

how much

political space

actually

ex-

isted. The

confluence of these

factors made the

PRI

politically

vulnera-

ble in the

highly

tainted

1988

presidential

elections,

in

which the PRI

resorted

to

electoral

alchemy

to

prevent

a

Partido

de la

Revoluci6n

Democratica

(PRD)

victory.

In

1988,

then,

the

PRI lost

political

legiti-

macy.9

Lawson

(2000: 272)

emphasized

the

importance

of

1988:

Although

the

regime's

legitimacy

had been

eroding

steadily,

it now

collapsed.

Like

other

catalytic

events-such as the

Tlatelolco massacre of

1968,

the national

bankruptcy

of

1982

and the

devastating

Mexico

City

earthquake

of

1985-the

alleged

fraud of

1988

triggered

mass

protests

and

increasing

social

mobilization.

Since 1988, Knight (1999: 106-107) argued the PRI has fallen into an-

other

Darwinian

period,

having gone

through

three

(and

now

four)

stages

in its

evolution:

[F]irst

a

Darwinian

period

(1917-29)

of

internal

conflict,

punctuated

by

revolts

from within the ranks of the

revolutionary

army,

during

which,

with the

recur-

rent victories

of

the

central

government,

the ranks

of the dissidents

were thinned

and

the

penalties

of

insurgency

rammed

home.

Second,

a

long

transitional

pe-

riod

(1929-52)

when

revolts were few or feeble and

PNR/PRM/PRI

dissidents

mounted

significant

but

unsuccessful

electoral

challenges

to the

official candi-

date.

Third,

the

heyday

of the PRI

1952-87),

when the

party

machine,

possessed

of

enormous

powers

of

patronage,

maintained

party

cohesion,

avoided schisms

and

defeated the

genuine

opposition parties

with

relative ease. The PRI

split

of

9.

A

useful heuristic device for

clarifying

the

PRI-state

system's

sequence

of

legiti-

macy

crises is

Collier

and

Collier's

(1991)

critical

juncture

framework.

Application

of

the framework reveals

that

the

turn

to

political

liberalization

is

a direct

legacy

of

the

1968-1988

period

of

change

and

transformation

for the

entire

country.


13/36

Mexican

Studies/Estudios Mexicanos

1987,

followed

by

the

highly

contentious

1988

election,

represented,

in some

ways,

a return to

the

second

phase,

although

in

very

different

socio-economic

circumstances.

Nevertheless,

by

the

1991

mid-erm

elections,

it

appeared

that

everything

had

returned

to normal.

The PRI

regained

its

strength,

primarily

because

the PRD

leftist

coalition could

not muster the

same

measure of

support

that it

had in

1988.

However,

despite

the

apparent

return to

normality,

political

liberalization

continued

apace

with further

electoral

reforms.

In

1989

the

Federal

Electoral

Institute,

Instituto

Federal

Electoral

(IFE)

was

created and

then

reconstituted in

1990

to

release it

further from

the

fetters of government control and to empower it to oversee and moni-

tor

the

voting

process.

A

1993

electoral reform

law

helped

to

make the

electoral

process

even fairerand

more

transparentby

giving

the

IFEmore

power

and

autonomy.

Eisenstadt

(2000: 11)

called

the IFE

[t]he

most

critical

autonomous

institution for

mediating

the

'levelness' of

the elec-

toral

playing

field.

In

large

part

due to

the

IFE,

he

1994

presidential

election

appeared

both fairand

clean,

despite

being

preceded by

a host

of traumatic

events,

especially the Zapatistauprising in Chiapasand then the assassinations

of

1994

PRI

presidential

candidate

Luis Donaldo

Colosio and

then Mario

Ruiz

Massieu,

the

PRI

party

chairman.

President

Ernesto

Zedillo who had

replaced

Colosio

as the

PRI'scan-

didate,

was in office

less than a

month

before Mexico

tumbled

into

yet

another

economic

crisis,

as a

consequence

of a

poorly

managed

peso

devaluation.

Millions

of

jobs

were lost as

the middle class

once

again

bore

the

brunt

of

Mexico's

wrongheaded

economic

management,

and

doubts

were raised

about Mexico's

future

stability,

especially

as

incidences of

high-level

narco-corruption

came to light. But

political

liberalizationand

democratic

aspirations

tempered

direct attacks

on the

regime-the

var-

ious

guerrilla

insurrections

in the South

were an

exception-and

miti-

gated

a

potentially

volatile

situation.

The

1997

mid-term

elections continued

the

liberalizing

trend.

One

important

result

was the election

of Mexico

City's

first

true

mayor,

the

PRD's

Cuauhtemoc

Cirdenas,

ratherthan

an

appointed

regent.

This

gave

the PRD

greater

political

recognition

and

prestige.

The second

result was

an opposition majority in the Chamber of Deputies (Mexico's lower

house),

again

for the first

time. But the

most historic

development

has

been

the

most

recent.

The

July

2000

presidential

elections resulted

in the

PRI's

irst defeat

ever,

when Vicente

Fox

Quesada

of the

center-right,

conservative Par-

tido Acci6n

Nacional

(PAN),

but in

coalition with the

Partido Verde

Ecologista

(PVE),

won the election.

Significantly,

Zedillo

publicly

rec-

374


14/36

Gawronski:

Mexican Revolution

in

the

Era

of

Globalization

375

ognized

Fox as his

successor,

hailing

Mexico

as a

true

democracy.

0

And

in

Chiapas,

where the

Zapatista problem

has

been

festering

since

1994

and where the PRI has

traditionally

and

authoritatively

dominated

poli-

tics,

the PRI was defeated in the

August

2000

gubernatorial

race

by

a

former

priista,

Pablo

Salazar

Mendiguchia.

To

defeat

the

PRI,

Salazar was

supported by

a

broad coalition

of

eight

opposition parties.

Apparently,

the Mexican

people

had had

enough,

publicly

declar-

ing

that

they

would

vote PRI

but

then

secretly

voting

for the

opposition.

Judith

Adler Hellman

(2000: 6)

emphasized

that

it was

the

sum of mil-

lions of individual decisions

to

vote

strategically

and

non-ideologically

that made the difference. Democratic procedures do matter, and the Mex-

ican

people

voted for

change.

Indeed

they

now

feel

safer

voting

for

the

opposition,

and for the first

time,

it is

possible

to

contemplate

seriously

the consolidation

of

democracy

in

Mexico.

1

Through

this

sequence

of

legitimacy

crises,

the

PRI-state

system

gradually

moved further

away

from its

revolutionary

heritage,

but

the

Revolution still resided

firmly

in the collective

memory

of the Mexican

people.

In

fact,

through

the

sequence

of

legitimacy

crises,

PRI

elites were

10.

Zedillo,

whose sexenio was not

especially

remarkable,

nonetheless found him-

self in an

interesting

situation. Hellman

(2000:

9)

explained:

At

worst,

history

will

note its financial

scandals,

not to mention its

failure

to resolve

the crisis in

Chiapas, improve

the

poor

human

rights

record of

Mexico,

or make a dent

in the

growing

power

of the

drug

lords. Yet

the

outgoing

president

found himself

in

a

win/win

situation. Either the

PRI

would

prevail,

in which case

Zedillo

could claim

that the

good government

and

leadership

he

provided

paved

the

way

for

victory.

Or,

as

transpired,

Labastidawould lose to

Fox,

and Zedillo could

play

a

historic role in the

great transition, calling for respect for the democratic process, the will of the people

and the rule of law.

11.

However,

there

remain

significant challenges

to democratic consolidation. A

wealthy

and

powerful

economic class continues to

reap

the benefits from

neoliberal,

free-

trade

policies,

and economic benefits have not been

trickling

down,

despite

Mexico's cur-

rent macroeconomic

stability

and

growth

rate. No one eatsthe

GDP,

nd

approximately

half

of

all Mexicans live at or below the

poverty

line,

with

the

income of the

poor

lower

in real terms that it

was

before the

1994

crisis. General crime

is

rampant

in some

areas,

especially

in Mexico

City

and

along

several

lesser-traveled,

rural

roads,

and human

rights

abuses are not

infrequent. Arbitrary

detention, torture,

and assassinations with

impunity

continue, and the

judicial system

is too weak (and often too

corrupt)

to

investigate

and

prosecute.

The

illegal drug

trade feeds

billions

into the

political economy,

which con-

tributes

heavily

to

corruption.

Also,

environmental

degradation

and

pollution

on

a

grand

scale are

prevalent, especially

in Mexico

City

and

along

the

U.S.-Mexican

border. Chronic

low-intensity

military

conflict continues in a number

of

states,

and

finally,

democratiza-

tion has not

proceeded

at

the same

pace

across all

regions

or

spheres

of

government.

As

a

result,

Mexico's new

political

order

comprises

a

series

of

authoritarianenclaves in which

the old rules of

the

game

still

operate

(Lawson

2000:

267-268).


15/36

Mexican

Studies/Estudios

Mexicanos

assailed for

betraying

the

principles

of the

Mexican Revolution.

This

be-

trayal

would become more

evident,

and even

necessary,

as

Mexico

be-

came

more

deeply

integrated

into the

global

economy

and

more vul-

nerable to its

vicissitudes

and

as the

government's

policy pendulum

stuck

to the

center-right,

with

policymakers

forced to

abandon

outright

the

revolutionary programmatic

agenda.12

As

Needler

(1995: 30)

pointed

out:

Under other

circumstances,

the

change

in economic

policy

would

have been

an

extremely

risky

policy

for

Salinas,

putting

in

doubt

his

legitimacy

as heir

of the

Revolutionary

tradition at the

same time as his other source

of

legitimacy,

as

winner

of democratic

election,

was

also under

question.

There

is, however,

a

legitimacy

that derives from

performance

as well as a

legitimacy

that attaches

to

origins,

and

Salinas's

position

was

revalidated

n the

eyes

of the

public by

the

success of his economic

policies.

This was missed

by

Cuauhtemoc

Cardenas,

who continued to focus

his

attacks on the

questionable

election of

1988

and

failed

to devise a

coherent

critique

of

the Salinaseconomic

policies

and a

plau-

sible

alternative economic

strategy.

The

regime

and the

PRI

especially

are

no

longer

as

flexible

as

they

once

were because neoliberalism

demands that Mexican

policymakers

dis-

avow rhetorical and symbolic commitments to the Revolution. AsJoseph

Klesner

(1997: 198)

argued:

Revolutionary

nationalism does

not

pro-

vide

legitimacy

for the current

rulers

because

Zedillo,

Salinas before

him,

and de la Madrid

even

earlier have

actively

sought

to tear down the

poli-

cies that

buttress

revolutionary

nationalism.

Now Mexican

policymak-

ers face the dilemma of

reconciling

the

revolutionary

past

with the ne-

oliberal

present just

as Mexico

becomes

more

deeply

embedded

in

the

global

capitalist

system,

and with

the

victory

of the

center-right,

conser-

vative

PAN,

it seems

unlikely

that the Mexican Revolution will be

called

upon

in

political

discourse and rhetoric for

garnering regime

support.

The

Revolution Revisited:

Another Mexican

Revolution?

As

Brandenburg

noted,

the

Revolutionary

Family

advanced

a kind of

loose

ideology,

the

Revolutionary

Creed,

which he

(1964:

8-18)

broke

12.

Needler

(1982, 1990, 1995)

had

argued

that the

PRI

had set

up

a

presidentialist

political system characterizedby a corporatistumbrella structurewith a wide arrayof po-

tentially

conflicting

groups.

These

groups-labor, peasantry,

business,

the middle

class,

the

military-were

not

all

formally

contained within the

PRI,

but all

their

political

activ-

ity

was. The

key

to

Mexican

political

stability

then became a

strategy

(accidental

or

con-

scious)

whereby

successive Mexican

presidents emphasized

the interests of certain social

sectors more than others. The

emphasis,

however,

changed

with

each

president.

Thus the

emphasis

or favoritism

pendulum

would rest

temporarily

on one

group

but

then

move to

a different

group

with the next

president.

In that

way,

no

group

ever felt

permanently

dis-

affected,

and

all

believed

that it

might

be their

turn

next time.

376


16/36

Gawronski:

Mexican

Revolution

in the

Era

of

Globalization

377

down

to fourteen

points:

(1)

Mexicanism,

(2)

Constitutionalism,

(3)

So-

cial

justice,

(4)

Political

liberalism,

(5)

Racial

tolerance, (6)

Religious

tol-

erance, (7)

Intellectual

freedom

and

public

education, (8)

Economic

growth,

(9)

Economic

integration,

(10)

Public

and

private

ownership

initiatives,

(11)

Defense

of

labor

rights,

(12)

Financial

stability,

(13)

A

share in world

leadership,

and

(14)

International

prestige.

This

creed,

which

still

pervades

Mexican

political

culture,

provided

the

ideological

and

symbolic

adhesive

for

consolidating

state

power,

garnering

popular

support,

legitimating

the

rule of the

PRI,

and

cobbling together

the

ever-

troublesome

and

disparate

Many

Mexicos. 13

Traditionally, he PRI'spurpose has been to articulate and channel

interests,

organize

power

and

authority-through

corporatist

networks-

and

advance

(purportedly)

the

basic

principles

and nationalist-socialist

ideals of

the Mexican

Revolution.

But

the world has

changed

consider-

ably

since the

founding

of

the

PRI,

and

Mexico is

subject

to new

glob-

alizing

forces

(internal

and

external).

As David

Barkin,

Irene

Ortiz,

and

Fred

Rosen

(1997:

27)

succinctly explained:

Mexico is

transforming

t-

self

through

the conflictive

interaction

of two

powerful

forces-the

glob-

alizing project imposed

from

above,

and

the resistance

to that

project,

welling

up

from below.

This interaction

inevitably

creates

opportuni-

ties and

constraints

while

challenging

many

principles

and ideals

borne

of the Mexican

Revolution;

it

also undermines

the

regime's

traditional

revolutionary

sources

of

legitimacy

and

exacerbates

many

state-society

conflicts.

To

justify

often

very

different state

policies,

the

Revolution

has his-

torically

been

made

quite

flexible,

and

its

basic

principles

have

been

un-

derstood

and

reinterpreted

over

the

years

in

many ways by

the

average

Mexican and political elites. PRIelites even reinterpreted the Revolu-

tion

to

justify

such

antirevolutionary

acts as

revoking

Article

27,

thereby

ending

the

ejido

system,

a cornerstone

of

revolutionary

nationalism.

En-

gaged

in

policies

of economic

liberalization,

the PRI elites

argued

that

the

Revolution

had

been

so successful

that Mexico

is set to

pass

on to

the

next

revolutionary

stage

despite

whole

regions

of Mexico

having

never

experienced

the

prior

stages,

most

notably Chiapas.14

Glossed over

is the

fact that

the new

happens

to

be

substantively

antithetical

to the

old

revolutionary goals

and

ideals.

Inevitably,

then,

the

issue of

political

stability

and

the

potential

for

13.

See

the classic

work

by Simpson

(1966)

and

Knight's

(1994)

discussion

of how

the Mexican

Revolution

created

a sense of nationhood.

14.

Interestingly,

as the

first

post-Cold

War and

postmodern

insurrectionary

move-

ment,

the

Ejercito

Zapatista

de

Liberacion

Nacional

(EZLN)

has been

careful to avoid

Marx-

ist/socialist

discourse

(see

Bruhn

1999).

For more

comprehensive

works on the

indige-

nous

uprising

in

Chiapas

see

Harvey

(1998),

La Botz

(1995),

and Ross

(2000).


17/36

Mexican

Studies/Estudios

Mexicanos

political

violence and

revolution

in

Mexico

must be raised. So

while

many

scholars have

debated the

end

of

the Mexican

Revolution,

others

have

explored

the

possible

onset of another or at

least increased levels of

po-

litical violence

(for

example,

see Alschuler

1995,

Pansters

1999,

Knight

1999).

Specifically,

however,

Linda S.

Stevenson

and

Mitchell

A.

Seligson,

in

their

exploratory

study

of

assembly plant

(maquiladora)

workers

along

the U.S.-Mexican border and in

northern

Mexico,

were driven

by

the

question

of how

prone

to revolution Mexico

might

be. That

is,

they

were

concerned

with

the

propensity

for

political

violence and

political

instability,

arguing

that

an

underlying

effect has

explained

Mexico's

long-

standing political stability:

[T]his

effect holds

only

in the case of nations that have

undergone

an

unusually

violent,

protracted

revolution. Bolivia's revolution of

1952

was

short

and

rela-

tively

bloodless;

and

although

the Cuban Revolution

of

1959

was

preceded

by

two

years

of armed

conflict,

its

scope

and level were

relatively

minor in terms

of

casualties. In

other

cases of modern

revolutions,

such

as

Russia, China,

and

Mexico,

the

insurrectionary

phase

of the revolution lasted a

number

of

years

and was

accompanied

by

an

enormous amount of violence.

Thus,

we

suggest

that the sheer

magnitude

and

ubiquity

of violence asso-

ciated with the revolution in

Mexico,

in contrast to those in Bolivia and

Cuba,

has

left

such a

deep psychological imprint

on most Mexicans that the fear of re-

visiting

that

violence has been a

major

constraint

on

violent

political

actions.

(Stevenson

and

Seligson

1996:

60)

These scholars

(1996:

60)

further

hypothesized

that

...

as

time

passes

and the memories of the revolution

fade,

the

degree

of fear declines and

more

people

become

willing

to take

political

actions that older

genera-

tions would not have

taken

previously.

In other

words,

as

the

histori-

cal event and the fearful violence associated with it fade from memory,

the Revolution no

longer

serves

as a

source of

political stability.15

Moreover,

the

increasingly

divisive

nature

of

Mexican

politics, par-

ticularly

the

camarilla

system,

has

been

contributing

to

the

increasingly

violent nature of

politics

in Mexico. The camarilla is

essentially

the

sys-

tem of

patronage

and

obligation

in

which

loyalty

is

owed

to a

benefac-

tor who

is

often

a

family

friend or member of

an

intimate

clique.

The

15. Turningthis into a hypothesis that can be tested with public opinion polling is

more

difficult

than it seems.

Measuring

peoples' propensity

to

engage

in violent or revo-

lutionary

political

behavior

can be difficult. Public

opinion

polls

do

not measure

how

prone

a

country

might

be

for a

revolution-only

feelings,

beliefs,

and ideas about

violence,

po-

litical

participation,

and

revolution.

Moreover,

public opinion-particularly

a

survey

snap-

shot in time-cannot be used

to

predict

the

propensity

to

engage

in

political

action. There

is a

discontinuity

between how

people

think or

how

they

claim

they

will

behave,

and how

they actually

do

behave.

Therefore,

public opinion

is

only

one

aspect

of a

very compli-

cated

reality.

378


18/36

Gawronski:Mexican Revolution

in the Era

of

Globalization

379

benefactor

protects

and

appoints

to

key positions

the

loyal up-and-comer

who

reciprocally helps

to

push

the benefactor

up

the

political

hierar-

chy. Basically,

the future of the

young

subservient

is

dependent

upon

the

success

of the

benefactor,

but

Pansters

(1999: 260)

argued

that:

The

sharpening

of

camarilla

politics

shades into the

institutional framework

and

generates regime

instability.

The

discretionary

use

of

the law and

the use

of

violence

were also inherent to the

logic

of

personalism,

but

today

they

tend

to

subvert the

institutional framework. The

disruption

of

important

areas

of the

political

and socio-economic

system simultaneously

fosters different forms of

violence

and undermines the mechanisms to counteract them.

Finally,

Mexican

public opinion

has

certainly

not

ignored

Mexico's less

than

stable

situation. For

example,

in

August

of

1990,

MORI

fielded a

national

survey

(n

=

1711)

that

explored

Mexican

knowledge

of,

and at-

titudes

toward,

human

rights

and human

rights organizations.

Embed-

ded in

the

survey,

however,

was

a most

intriguing

question:

Some

say

that

because

of

poverty, corruption,

and

other

problems,

there could

be

a revolution

in Mexico within five

years.

Do

you

believe

that is

prob-

able

or

improbable?

While the

question

was

a

bit

sensational,

the re-

sults were

quite

startling:

Of the

1,598

people

who

provided

substan-

tive answers to this

question, fully

47.1

percent reported

seeing

another

revolution in Mexico within

five

years

as either

probable

or

very

prob-

able.

Only

39.6

percent

believed

that

it

was either

improbable

or

very

improbable,

and

slightly

over

13

percent responded

with

regular

(in

English

a kind of

maybe ).

Flawed or

not,

the

question appeared

to

tap

some

very

deep

public

concerns

over the

stability

of the

country.

Four

years

later the

Zapatistas

burst onto

the scene

in the southern

state of

Chiapas. Apparently, many of the 1990 survey respondents indeed had

their

finger

on

something.

The

1997-1998

Survey

Results

To

explore

the current

place

and or

plight

of the Mexican Revolution

in the minds of the Mexican

people,

MORI was commissioned with

a

set of

questions,

which were first tested

on

the

September

1997

Mexico

City survey

and then included

(reformulated slightly)

on the

full

national

survey.

The first task was

to

assess the current

saliency

of the Revolu-

tion's basic

goals

and

ideals,

and the

following

question

was

asked on

both

the Mexico

City

and national

surveys:

To what extent are the fol-

lowing

basic

principles

of the Mexican Revolution

relevant to

today's

society?

Drawing

from

Brandenburg's

(1964)

notion

of a revolution-

ary

creed,

the

question

was

broken

down

to

the most

commonly

un-

derstood

revolutionary

goals

and ideals:

(1)

The Land

Belongs

to Those


19/36


20/36


of

Globalization

381

litical institutionalization and constitutionalism

sharply

contrasts

with

the fre-

quent

elimination

of constitutional

guarantees

under authoritarian

military

gov-

ernment in other

parts

of Latin America.

While no reelection remains a sacrosanct

revolutionary

principle

in

Mexico,

the

survey

data reveal that Social

Justice

is the least relevant

revolutionary principle

in Mexico

City

and the next-to-least

relevant for

the

nation,

but

for all

intents and

purposes

Social

Justice

is

tied with

National Economic

Sovereignty.

It

seems that

some of

the

respondents

are

expressing deeply

ingrained

frustration and

cynicism

regarding

so-

cial

justice-that

is,

social

justice

is

perceived

as irrelevant

perhaps

be-

cause

it

has been so unfulfilled.

Mexicans,

after

all,

have lived with in-

stitutionalized

inequality

and

injustice

for

quite

a

long

time.

In the Mexico

City survey,

the MORI interview team was

able

to

record a wide

variety

mexico gawronski, vincent[1]

Documents