xx |  Introduction
not. In fact, Mexico never once abandoned capitalism as the foundational principles of
its economy, and also always embraced a variation of meaningful social democracy,
albeit one infused with semi-authoritarian tendencies. Nevertheless, it bears repeating
and emphasizing again that Mexico may arguably be considered the singular precursor
in the Western world to what we have come to understand as modern revolutionary
socialism.
Another aspect of Mexico’s political legacy and makeup that emphasizes the impor-
tance of privileging the study of the country is the ingenious way the country’s post-
revolutionary elites crafted a political system that maintains social stability and order,
is inclusive of a full range of radically different ideologies and constituencies, and is
both semi-democratic and semi-authoritarian at the same time. The postrevolutionary
Mexican political system is so novel and fascinating that Peruvian novelist and intel-
lectual Mario Vargas Llosa has termed it the “perfect dictatorship.” It is a political sys-
tem that maintained single-party hegemony over the levers of power for more than 70
years, yet doing so without relying on charismatic personalistic leadership and while
maintaining a generational transfer of power via some semblance of a fairly reliable,
regular, and open democratic electoral process. Mexico did not need a Lenin, a Stalin,
a Mao, a Castro, a Mandela, or a Chavez in order to perpetuate a hegemonic single-
party state. And its impressive method of cooptation and incorporation of ideological
difference and dissent provided a lesson in maintaining social and political stability.
As if this weren’t enough, Mexico is also, in its own right, an influential leader within
the Latin American subregion of the Western Hemisphere and has been able to main-
tain a certain measure of independence from the regional hegemonic impulses of the
United States, all while it has deepened its dependence on the United States and gravi-
tated more and more fully into the orbit of a North American union.
In terms of society and culture, Mexico also can claim relevance and importance as
a country worthy of particular attention and study. Mexico has long been a country
grappling with social and class hierarchies, exacerbated and maintained by growing
indices of inequality. But it has managed to walk this tightrope of class and social ten-
sions carefully, and always with an eye toward eliminating the underlying causes of
such tensions. Since its 1910 revolution, Mexico has been a rare case study in the Latin
American region in the sense that it has managed to avoid really disruptive, nationwide
social and class conflict. There have been a couple of explosive moments of class con-
flict in the country, such as the 1968 student protests and subsequent government mas-
sacre of many of these protesters, as well as the 1994 indigenous Zapatista armed
uprising. But these moments have been exceptional, mostly contained, and relatively
short-lived. For the most part, given that the country is a product of Spanish colonial-
ism, has had periods of violent social upheaval, is home to substantially different racial
and ethnic citizen constituencies, and derives from a conservative sociocultural ethos
when it comes to issues like marriage, sexuality, and family, Mexico has charted a rela-
tively accepting, socially progressive, and welcoming path. Women face traditional bar-
riers to equality and social acceptance, but women have also been well represented in
the public sector and in Mexican government when compared with other countries
within the community of Western democratic nations. Indigenous peoples and other
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