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MEXICAN REVOLUTION.
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Examines background, political ideology, economics, reform, leadership, focusing on effects of Revolution.... More...
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Paper Abstract:
Examines background, political ideology, economics, reform, leadership, focusing on effects of Revolution.
Paper Introduction:
The Mexican Revolution, fought in several phases from 1910 until the 1930s, was the defining formative event of modern Mexico, setting it off both from previous Mexican history and from the general development of the rest of Latin America. It was on the one hand one of the most violent of the 20th century's revolutions, killing a larger proportion of the population--about one Mexican in ten--than any other revolution till the genocidal Khmer Rouge upheaval in Cambodia (Hellman 49). On the other hand, the outcome of the Revolution was to give Mexico one of the more stable regimes in Latin America. If the struggle between rich and poor, which has shaken and defined the politics of most Latin American countries, was not solved by the Mexican revolution, it was at any rate sublimated by a resultant regime that, while nominally revolutionary, was primarily responsive to
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and among headlong, reckless fighters one of the first(Brenner and Leighton 46). The potential benefits of this development, however, were undercut bycorruption and cronyism. Therewas no la Pasionaria as in the Spanish Civil War. If a woman'shusband was killed, she could either attach herself to some other manor take over his uniform and gun herself. Hellman, Judith Adler. Most of all, women were swept up into the mass movements ofpopulation that accompanied the rural campaigns of the Revolution. The structural causes for fragmentation were reinforced byfragmentation in ideology. If the struggle between rich and poor,which has shaken and defined the politics of most Latin American countries,was not solved by the Mexican revolution, it was at any rate sublimated bya resultant regime that, while nominally revolutionary, was primarilyresponsive to the interest of elites, while offering just enough incentivesto popular classes to limit unrest and repression to a relatively lowlevel. Even nationalism, however, was only a loosely defined battle cry, andnot one that led directly to greater national cohesion in the short run.Landowners might be nationalistic in the sense of wanting to reclaim landsthat had fallen under foreign ownership, but they had little interest inthe federal government save as a prize to be siezed. Works Cited Brenner, Anita; and Leighton, George R. The women, though their job was foraging, cooking, and looking afterthe wounded, pitched in and fought if they felt like it. [The trooptrains] carried families, three layers deep: some inside the boxcars, someon top, and others, mostly the boys and young men, in hammocks slungbetween the wheels. Almost every troop had afamous lady colonel or captain, a husky, earringed girl armed tothe teeth. But the interests of these leaders, primarily securing and enlargingtheir own lands, had little correlation to those of other segments of theelite, such as industrialists who wanted to reclaim capital resources fromforeign hands, and were directly contradictory to the interest of peasantsin land reform. Mexican Lives. When these armies move it was like a mass migration. Others became heroines or victims in a less directly military way.In a late stage of the Revolution, a counterrevolutionary movement arose inrural areas, fostered by ultraconservative elements of the Catholic Church. These insurgents, the cristeros (so called for their rallying cry, elCristo rey, "Christ the king") chose as particular targets theschoolteachers in the secular revolutionary school system, many of whomwere young women. Under the influence of advisors known ascientificos, "scientific" development theorists, he established an economicpolicy based on encouragement of foreign investment (Hellman 45-46). By 191 , when Porfirio's health and personal grip on powerbegan to fade, the regime's domestic support base had shrunk almost tonothing. It isperhaps for this reason that, in spite of its social-revolutionaryelements, the Mexican Revolution never became a Marxist revolution as such. At a humbler level,however, many thousands of women took part in it, some directly in combat. Diaz was shrewd enough to realize that bythe late 19th century Mexico was already what would now be called anunderdeveloped country. Not only were the benefits unshared by theimpoverished majority of Mexicans, most of whom were peasants; they wereunshared even by most of the Mexican elite of landowners andindustrialists. In amaterial respect this policy was successful, and Mexico's economicinfrastructure underwent rapid development during the Porfirio era. No high-profilenational heroines seem to have emerged from the Mexican Revolution. The results of the Mexican Revolution ultimately fell far short ofthose hoped for by its more idealistic leaders and followers. As noted above, the Porfirio regime had madeitself so unpopular that almost all sectors of Mexican society joined inthe Revolution, but in consequence, no cohesive faction was able to imposea single ideological discipline on it as the Bolsheviks did on the RussianRevolution. The Mexican Revolution, fought in several phases from 191 until the193 s, was the defining formative event of modern Mexico, setting it offboth from previous Mexican history and from the general development of therest of Latin America. Withineach of these in turn were concealed many conflicting interests; of the twocomponents, nationalism was the stronger if only because it had an appealto Mexicans of all social classes, who might have experienced personallythe insult of high-handed treatment by the foreigners--especially from theUnited State--favored by the Porfirio regime. The Wind that Swept Mexico.Austin: University of Texas, 1971. Social-revolution ideology, indeed, was even more diffuse thannationalism. 92-94). The essential background to the Revolution is the generation-longrule of dictator Porfirio Diaz. Allcould agree that the pie had to be redivided, but there was no consensus onhow to divide it (Brenner and Leighton 27-29). The nature of the fighting,frequently for control of the railroad system, hastened the fragmentingprocess, since in the course of the fighting the railroads themselves wereoften largely destroyed. The doctrinal framework for a peasant-rooted Marxism, as later worked outby Mao and others, did not exist in 191 or for long thereafter, and soslight was the presence of a Communist Party in Mexico that there was noplace for such a doctrine to take form. Themost famous of these leaders (though both themselves of humble origin) wereEmiliano Zapata in the south and Pancho Villa in the north (Brenner andLeighton 42); the latter is long established as a stereotype "bandit" innorteamericano popular culture, among people who know little or nothing ofhis political role. Original publication 1943. Nevertheless, a form of landcollectivization, the ejido, did emerge. Instead of being an instrument ofrevolutionary control, however, the ejido movement was supported only fromthe bottom, and lapsed once the revolutionary party was firmly in control(Hellman 53, 61). On the otherhand, the outcome of the Revolution was to give Mexico one of the morestable regimes in Latin America. Thus, the Mexican Revolution was diffuse, dominated by no one socialgroup or ideology, or even by one center or region, since control of MexicoCity, or even of the whole Valley of Mexico, did not in itself confirmcontrol of the outlying northern and southern parts of the country. Hence the revolution that broke out that year was at once broad-based--drawing support from almost all sectors of Mexican society--anddeeply divided, since these sectors had widely variant objectives. On a globe it does not appear large when compared toRussia, or even to the United States, but Mexico is as large, andgeographically more diverse and divided, than the Russian heartland regionwhere the Russian Revolution was decided. Tortillas were ground and baked on fires in oil cansalong the whole top of the train, and dogs and babies accommodatedthemselves in the warmest corners within (Brenner and Leighton, 46).Some of the most vivid photographs in Hellman's essay are of these entirefamilies crowded onto the trains, following the revolutionary armies(Brenner and Leighton, pl. New York: The New Press,1994.----------------------- 7 It was on the one hand one of the most violent ofthe 2 th century's revolutions, killing a larger proportion of thepopulation--about one Mexican in ten--than any other revolution till thegenocidal Khmer Rouge upheaval in Cambodia (Hellman 49). The revolutionary theory of the time, imported largely fromEuropean Marxism, was urban-based, oriented more to the needs of anindustrial proletariat (then a small part of Mexican society) than to theneeds of the much larger peasantry, whose wishes at first were largelyinchoate, and only slowly incorporated in land-reform programs. Nevertheless, by involving so many Mexicans so directly, theRevolution became a transformative and defining event in Mexican history. Out of this chaotic welter of conflicting interests, two main threadsof revolutionary demands can be found: nationalism, which reflected moststrongly the interests of the elite, who had been shouldered aside underPorfirio by the cientificos and foreign interests, and social reform(especially land reform) which reflected the interests of the poor. Thisvery diffusion, though, because it led to many local centers of power and along duration, caused the Revolution to directly sweep in more Mexicansthan it might have had it been more tightly centered. Falling short of thatthey tended to set themselves up as local warlords, a process that tendedto prolong the civil conflict. This nationalistic impulsewas powerfully strengthened after the high-handed US occupation of Veracruzin 1914 (Brenner and Leighton 47). Thus, for example, the initial military success of the Revolution wasdue largely to the support of ranchers and other landowners, particularlyin the north and south, who were able to take the field with their ownarmies of tenants and ranch hands--in effect, quasi-feudal retainers. A further factor here was that Mexico is avery large country. Mexico underthe PRI, the party founded by the Revolution, remained very unequal in thedistribution of wealth and very uneven in the enforcement of its reformistlaws. Among those swept in were large numbers of women.
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