REBEL MEXICO

Student Unrest and Authoritarian Political Culture During the Long Sixties

By Jaime M. Pensado

Stanford University Press

Copyright © 2013 Board of Trustees of the Leland Stanford Junior University
All rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-0-8047-8653-9

Contents

Key Acronyms………………………………………………………xiAcknowledgments……………………………………………………xiiiIntroduction………………………………………………………1Part I. Prelude to the Sixties: Youth Unrest and Resistance to Postwar
“National Identity”………………………………………………..1 Conflicting Interpretations of Mexico’s “Economic Miracle”……………192 Fun and Politics in Postwar Mexico…………………………………50Part II. The Rise of Mexico’s “Student Problem” and the Consolidation of
“Charrismo Estudiantil” in the Early Sixties………………………….3 “¿Manos Extrañas?”: The 1956 Student Protest and the “Crisis” of
Authority…………………………………………………………834 The Re-establishment of Authority………………………………….1005 The 1958 Student Movement and the Origins of Mexico’s New Left………..129Part III. Student Unrest and Response in the Aftermath of the Cuban
Revolution………………………………………………………..6 Contested Notions of Revolution……………………………………1477 “No More Fun and Games”: From Porristas to Porros……………………1818 Conservative Mexican Exceptionalism: Body Politics and the “Wound” of
’68………………………………………………………………201Conclusion: The End of an Era……………………………………….235Notes…………………………………………………………….245Bibliography………………………………………………………299Index…………………………………………………………….323

CHAPTER 1

Conflicting interpretationsof Mexico’s “economic Miracle”

BEGINNING IN 1938 and continuing during the presidential administrationsof Manuel Ávila Camacho (1940–1946), MiguelAlemán (1946–1952), and Adolfo Ruiz Cortines (1952–1958), Mexico experienceda period of dramatic changes. The new Import Substitution Industrialization(ISI) economic model was created and ideologically promoted underrevolutionary nationalism. As understood throughout the continent, the ideaof ISI was that, by investing in its own national industries, Latin Americawould minimize the historical dependency on European and North Americanmanufacturing and agricultural goods and, thus, become more integratedand self-sufficient, particularly, during difficult worldwide economicrecessions. With this goal in mind, the patriotic banner of “national unity”served as the impetus for ISI, whose effect was felt primarily in the nation’scapital. In time, these economic changes came to be equated with rapid urbanindustrialization, an influx of entrepreneurs and technocrats into the government,the centralization of state power, and a more harmonious relationshipwith the private sector.

This period was commonly hailed as Mexico’s “economic miracle.” It waswidely reported, for example, that between 1940 and 1966, the Mexican GDPgrew 368 percent. In addition, the press, governmental reports, and scholarsalso noted that the average annual growth-rate of GDP for the same periodwas larger than 6 percent. Other indications of this tremendous growthincluded significant advances in manufacturing, an unprecedented low inflation,and a steady foreign exchange rate. Furthermore, the economic miraclerepresented a moment when a number of important technological advancesin the energy, communications, and transportation systems were realized,and increases in production, tourism, and the availability of consumer goodsstimulated mass consumption for a burgeoning middle class. This was especiallytrue following the presidential administration of Ávila Camacho, whendozens of new industries dramatically transformed the economic and sociallandscapes of Mexico.

However, a closer look at other forms of statistical data reveals that thiseconomic boom came with a high price. For example, while this period sawsubstantial economic growth as measured in GDP, dependency on foreigncapital in the form of direct foreign investment (mostly from the UnitedStates) grew more than 700 percent between 1940 and 1957, primarily becauseof the state’s failure to finance itself from domestic resources. As a resultof this investment, the economic and cultural roles of the United States inMexico during this period grew significantly important. U.S. governmentofficials, advertising agencies, and business executives regained ownership ofproduction properties and dominated bilateral trade and high technology.Moreover, they brought with them new capitalists beliefs that primarily benefitedthe rising middle class in the urban sector as represented in the celebrationsof upward social mobility, material prosperity, and what historian JulioMoreno calls “a form of democracy through consumption.” Concurrently,the economic miracle did not necessarily benefit all sectors of society equally.Economist Roger Hansen noted, for example, that economic growth duringthis period did not imply a reduction of social and economic inequalities.He concluded, in fact, that the cost of living index for Mexico City’s workingclass increased significantly from 21.3 in 1940 to 75.3 in 1950 (1954=100). Yetreal wages plummeted by as much as 30 percent between 1940 and 1950. Thesituation did not improve during the next decade for the bottom 30 percentof families, as they experienced a decline in their monthly incomes from anaverage monthly salary of 302 pesos in 1950 to 241 in 1963. The top 30 percentof families, in contrast, saw an average increase in their monthly incomesfrom 1,132 pesos in 1950 to 2,156 in 1963.

Economic disparities had an important impact on the composition ofschools. More than 80 percent of politécnicos (students enrolled in the NationalPolytechnic Institute, IPN) during the late 1930s came from parents of thelower class, particularly the working, public, and peasant sectors (see Table1.1). Only a small fraction of them (4.7 percent) came from households inwhich their parents held a professional career. Unfortunately there are noreliable statistics on the social background of politécnicos during the 1940sand early 1950s. Jorge “Oso” Oceguera (head of the cheerleading team of theIPN, 1950–1957) remembered during an interview, “[T]he fact that we werestudents certainly put us in a privileged position. But in reality, the overwhelmingmajority of politécnicos were from the working class or what couldbroadly be described as a lower middle class on the verge of upward socialmobility.”

Nicandro Mendoza (principal leader of the 1956 student protest) gave asimilar description:

Prior to the [1956] strike, the majority of us came from humble origins.This was evident in the clothes we wore, in the neighborhoods where welived, and especially, in the nature of the demands that we raised during ourstudent protests. The majority of students enrolled in the Politécnico camefrom parents of the lower classes. Many politécnicos certainly witnessed agradual improvement in their lives during the 1940s and 1950s, but judgingfrom the frustration expressed in many of the political rallies organizedduring these two decades, you could conclude that a large majority ofstudents felt that they had been excluded from the economic boom.

The socioeconomic circumstances of the politécnicos differed from theoverwhelming majority of universitarios (students enrolled at the NationalAutonomous University of Mexico, UNAM) during the growth of Mexico’seconomic boom. The first census taken at UNAM in 1949, for example, indicatedthat from a total of twenty-three thousand students, 29 percent camefrom parents that were described as comerciantes (merchants), 20.64 percentas empleados (public employees), and 10.58 percent as profesionistas (professionals).In other words, unlike the majority of working-class politécnicos,a total of 70 percent of all students enrolled at UNAM in the late 1940s couldbe broadly defined as members of the middle class. The remaining 30 percentwere from the lower- and upper-class sectors. Historian David E. Loreynoted that little had changed over a decade later.

Data compiled from a study by Milena Covo (see Table 1.2) supports Lorey’smajor findings. It also offers a more detailed description of the social compositionof most universitarios during the late 1950s and early 1960s. Nearly allstudents enrolled at UNAM during this period were between the ages of eighteenand twenty-five. At least one-third of all universitarios were born outsidethe Federal District. Only a small fraction of the total number of studentswere married. By and large, their education was paid for by their parents,who generally held a professional or white-collar job. An average of one-fifthof all universitarios held a part-time or a full-time job to supplement theirincome. In short, as Lorey similarly noted in his study, a significant numberof students enrolled at UNAM came from the middle- and upper-class sectors,which witnessed the greatest benefits of the economic boom.

The class distinctions between politécnicos and universitarios would influencethe distinct political trajectories that these two groups of students wouldtake during the 1940s and 1950s. Because the postrevolutionary state proceededto transform UNAM into the most important educational institution in Mexico’spursuit of modern industrial capitalism, universitarios overwhelminglyfared much better as a result of the restructuring of the economic and politicalsystems during this period than did the politécnicos. For the latter, the “shiftto the Right” in politics and the state projects of “modernization” and “nationalunity” meant a gradual abandonment of the cardenista policies, includingwhat they deemed as an “attack” on popular education and a deterioration oftheir schools. For universitarios, on the other hand, these two decades broughtunprecedented economic opportunities celebrated with the creation of CiudadUniversitaria and a new attitude of middle-class consumption. For both, thisperiod of extraordinary economic expansion also marked the rise of a uniqueenvironment of corporatism and nationalist anticommunism, as well as anunprecedented growth in student population. A further examination of theimpact these socioeconomic, demographic, and political changes had on thestudent population lays the groundwork for the so-called student problem thatemerged during the long sixties and the perceived need on the part of authoritiesto control it. But first, a brief historical sketch of the founding of UNAMand the IPN and the successful efforts to extend state corporatism into thedomains of these major centers of higher education is in order.

Conflicting Origins of UNAM and the Politécnico

UNAM has its roots in the Royal and Pontifical University of Mexico,which was founded in 1551 and officially inaugurated in 1553 as the oldest NorthAmerican university in the Western tradition. For two centuries it wouldserve as one of the principal institutions of colonial culture and authority. Itstime-honored elite status repeatedly expressed itself in a conservatism, a resistanceto change from without, and an uneasy, see-saw relationship with thestate. For example, in 1821 the university refused to accept the new independentnation, and it sheltered those who fought in favor of retaining colonialrule. The conservative university was viewed as a threat to the new nation byinfluential liberals like José María Luis Mora, who declared it “useless, pernicious,and irreformable.” Following the war of independence, the universitywas forced to close its doors several times.

After closing the university in 1867, President Benito Juárez opened theEscuela Nacional Preparatoria (National Preparatory School, or ENP) inthe colonial building of San Ildefonso. Located at the center of what becameknown as the barrio estudiantil (student neighborhood), the ENP served asthe most prestigious institution since its creation in 1867 until September of1910, when the National University reopened its doors as part of the centennialcelebration of independence. Two months later, the Mexican Revolutionerupted, and once again the university served as a refuge for those who foundthemselves in opposition to the insurgents. Tension between the universityand the state continued to grow following the violent phase of the revolution(1910–1917). The subordination of the university to the Ministry of Public Education(SEP) in 1923, and the creation of the secundarias (Secondary Schools)two years later, further worsened the relationship. The tension came to ahead in a 1929 student protest that resulted in important concessions. Theprotest forced the state to grant the university its autonomy; it gave the schoolthe legal rights to administer its resources, make academic decisions, andappoint its own administrators. By incorporating the Federación EstudiantilUniversitaria (University Student Federation, FEU) into the University Council,students were represented as a unified body.

Relations between the university and the state would turn bitter once againin the early 1930s during a debate over the role that socialist ideas should havein the schools. Student strikers had raised the issue of a specifically socialistapproach to education during a 1929 strike, and the 1933 University Congressin Puebla provided a forum for opposing sides on this issue to meet. Onecamp of students and school authorities was represented by Vicente LombardoToledano, a teacher, union leader, political activist, and a director of theENP at the time. While praising the university for its “affirmation of spiritualvalues and human dignity,” Lombardo Toledano believed that only a radicalredistribution of wealth on the part of the state and a socialist educationalcampaign carried out with the help of universitarios could incorporate thepoor into the revolutionary project to create a truly just society. Stronglydisagreeing with this position was a second and larger faction. It was composedof old liberals, conservatives with close affiliations to the church, andleftists, broadly represented by the man of letters and former university rectorAntonio Caso. For Caso and his followers, academic freedom could beguaranteed only with institutional neutrality and, thus, a legally sanctionedsocialist pedagogy placed this in jeopardy. For those who agreed with Caso,politics had no place inside the schools. Rather, they envisioned the universitiesas cultural communities exclusively concerned with research and teaching.25 Key players inside the university—including José Vasconcelos (rectorof the university in 1920 and first Secretary of Public Education, 1920–1925),Rodolfo Brito Foucher (director of the Law School), and Alejandro GómezArias (leader of the 1929 student strike)—sided with the Caso position. Inretaliation, the state announced the New Organic Law of 1933, stating that thegovernment would no longer subsidize the university. Consequently, the universityobtained complete autonomy from the state and thus lost its “nationalcharacter.” Now students were allowed to participate directly in the school’sgovernance, and they gained a hand in designating school authorities. At thispoint the National University became the Autonomous University of Mexico(UAM). But over time autonomy in the name of liberty had the de facto effectof creating a more favorable climate for conservatives.

The historical roots and aspirations of the IPN varied significantly fromthose celebrated by the founders of UNAM. The Politécnico was created in1937. Originally conceived within a “pragmatic” Marxist framework, the maingoal of the IPN was to serve the nation by educating the children of the workingclass in the latest technological advances. Responding to the worldwidedepression and crisis that began in 1929, the founders of the IPN deemed that inorder to eliminate dependence on foreign suppliers, Mexico, first, had to investin technical education and, then, develop its own industries. It was thereforenecessary for the nation to distance itself from the idea, widely accepted in thepast, that the technical professions were beneath the cultural level of the so-calledliberal professions of UNAM, primarily law and medicine.

As expressed in a proposal presented to the Ministry of Education by Juande Dios Bátiz, head of the Department of Vocational Education, “the RevolutionaryGovernment had the obligation to offer Mexico’s youth—especially tothe children of the working class—new professions that would take advantageof natural resources.” These new professions, to be created by the state, he furtherargued, would foster a new social state, one that was more humane andjust. The popular and nationalistic emphases presented in Bátiz’s proposaland championed by President Lázaro Cárdenas (1934–1940) envisioned theIPN as a genuine project of the Mexican Revolution. As such, it was to enjoyan official relationship with the state that precluded institutional autonomy.Its directors were to be designated by the government according to a verticalrelation of power, and its budget was to be drawn up with the exclusive goal ofmeeting the nation’s greatest needs.

This particular affiliation of the IPN and the state tended to relegate thestudents to a subordinate position vis-à-vis the government, much like thepaternalistic relationship. For its part, Papá Gobierno (Papa Government)was to ensure that the schools were equipped with the latest technology, andthat students received practical training that would help meet the needs ofthe people. The government was also charged with guaranteeing an educationfor all members of the popular sectors of society through the provisionof a number of benefits, including full and partial scholarships, subsidizedmeals, dormitories, and free publications. Its social mission was designed intoa decidedly practical and communitarian curriculum and pedagogy. To thisend, Rural Medicine replaced the traditional curriculum of Medicine, theprogram of Commerce made cooperatives in poor neighborhoods a centralpriority, and the Engineering and Electricity schools were tailored to nationalizedindustries. The government also committed to budget increases thatwould support the growing student population.
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