Mexicos Uneven Development

Mexico and the United States may be neighbors, but their economies offer stark contrasts. In Mexico’s Uneven Development: The Geographical and Historical Context of Inequality, Oscar J. Martínez explores Mexico’s history to explain why Mexico remains less developed than the United States. Weaving in stories from his own experiences growing up along the U.S.-Mexico border, Martínez shows how the foundational factors of external relations, the natural environment, the structures of production and governance, natural resources, and population dynamics have all played roles in shaping the Mexican economy. This interesting and thought-provoking study clearly and convincingly explains the issues that affect Mexico's underdevelopment. It will prove invaluable to anyone studying Mexico’s past or interested in its future.

Mexico and the United States may be neighbors, but their economies offer stark contrasts. In Mexico’s Uneven Development: The Geographical and Historical Context of Inequality, Oscar J. Martínez explores Mexico’s history to explain why Mexico remains less developed than the United States. Weaving in stories from his own experiences growing up along the U.S.-Mexico border, Martínez shows how the foundational factors of external relations, the natural environment, the structures of production and governance, natural resources, and population dynamics have all played roles in shaping the Mexican economy. This interesting and thought-provoking study clearly and convincingly explains the issues that affect Mexico's underdevelopment. It will prove invaluable to anyone studying Mexico’s past or interested in its future.

Now in an updated edition, this groundbreaking study develops a new approach to understanding the formation of the postrevolutionary state in Mexico. In a shift away from dominant interpretations, Adam David Morton considers the construction of the revolution and the modern Mexican state through a fresh analysis of the Mexican Revolution, the era of import substitution industrialization, and neoliberalism. Throughout, the author makes interdisciplinary links among geography, political economy, postcolonialism, and Latin American studies in order to provide a new framework for analyzing the development of state power in Mexico. He also explores key processes in the contestation of the modern state, specifically through studies of the role of intellectuals, democratization and democratic transition, and spaces of resistance. As Morton argues, all these themes can only be fully understood through the lens of uneven development in Latin America. Centrally, the book shows how the history of modern state formation and uneven development in Mexico is best understood as a form of passive revolution, referring to the ongoing class strategies that have shaped relations between state and civil society. As such, Morton makes an important interdisciplinary contribution to debates on state formation relevant to Mexican studies, postcolonial and development studies, historical sociology, and international political economy by revitalizing the debate on the uneven and combined character of development in Mexico and throughout Latin America. In so doing, he convincingly contends that uneven development can once again become a tool for radical political economy analysis in and beyond the region. A substantive new epilogue engages the main theoretical debates that have emerged since the book was first published, while also exploring the dominant geographies of power and resistance that are shaping state space in Mexico in the twenty-first century. And now a Spanish edition, Revolución y Estado en México moderno (México, D.F.: Siglo XXI, 2017), is available as well. Click here to see the book trailer.

This book is the first comprehensive and systematic English-language treatment of Mexico's economic history to appear in nearly forty years. Drawing on several years of in-depth research, Juan Carlos Moreno-Brid and Jaime Ros, two of the foremost experts on the Mexican economy, examine Mexico's current development policies and problems from a historical perspective. They review long-term trends in the Mexican economy and analyze past episodes of radical shifts in development strategy and in the role of markets and the state. This book provides an overview of Mexico's economic development since Independence that compares the successive periods of stagnation and growth that alternately have characterized Mexico's economic history. It gives special attention to developments since 1940, and it presents a re-evaluation of Mexico's development policies during the State-led industrialization period from 1940 to 1982 as well as during the more recent market reform process. This reevaluation is critical of the dominant trend in economic literature and is revisionist in arguing that, in particular, the market reforms undertaken by successive Mexican governments since 1983 have not addressed the fundamental obstacles to economic growth. Development and Growth in the Mexican Economy also details the country's pioneering role in launching NAFTA, its membership in the OECD, and its radical macroeconomic reforms. Carefully argued and meticulously researched, the book presents a wide-ranging, authoritative study that not only pinpoints problems, but also suggests solutions for removing obstacles to economic stability and pointing the Mexican economy toward the road to recovery.

This booklet explores the role of Mexico's interaction with the United States and assesses the impact of geography on shaping the destiny of the Mexican people. Historically the United States has exerted overwhelming influence over the way that Mexico has developed economically. Most importantly, in the mid-nineteenth century the United States undermined Mexico's long-term development by dispossessing its neighbor of its most valuable lands, imposing a border that has heavily favored U.S. interests, and paving the way for the dominant U.S. economy to compete more closely and more directly with the much weaker Mexican economy. As a result of these events, Mexicans have had to struggle to build their country under the shadow of the powerful United States, not unlike small retailers who try to survive in the face of crushing competition from a Wal-Mart megastore located uncomfortably nearby.

This book offers an analysis of some of Mexico's most pressing problems. It is designed to help the reader understand the underlying dynamic processes shaping Mexican society and the Mexican economy. The chapters present a vision of a common pattern of distorted development that assumes unique forms in different parts of economic and social life.

Enrique de la Madrid examines Mexico's comparative advantages, its growth potential and the challenges of the internal reforms promoted by President Enrique Peña Nieto. Enrique de la Madrid Cordero analyses Mexico's economic growth over the last three decades and the historic opportunity for eliminating its barriers to growth and aspiring to becoming a developed country. Foreword by Luis Videgaray Caso. "Mexico is blessed with a wealth of strengths and comparative advantages, placing it among the countries with the highest growth potential in the twenty-first century. Furthermore, this country has achieved a series of fundamental goals over the years, clearly shown by indicators on education, health, employment, housing and infrastructure, to name only a few. However, despite its strengths and achievements, Mexico's economic growth over the last three decades has been inconsistent and unspectacular; especially considering its potential and the need to end the poverty lived by almost half of all Mexicans. Three elements have caused Mexico's low economic growth: a lack of financial penetration, a shortfall in economic competition and low productivity. These elements have also led to the country's inadequate and unequal distribution of wealth. Today, a favorable international context and a process of profound internal reforms promoted by President Enrique Peña Nieto within the "Pacto por México", Mexico is on the brink of a historic opportunity for eliminating its barriers to growth and aspiring to becoming a developed country within this generation." Enrique de la Madrid

For the past twenty-eight years I have traveled to and periodically lived in Mexico. As an extranjero I have enjoyed the advantage of association with nearly every social strata-from descamisados in ciudades perdidas to members of the elite. These have been my maestros, and I owe them a great deal.