Panelists
include Professor Adolfo Gilly (UNAM), Professor Alicia Hernandez
Chavez (Colegio de Mexico), and Professor Alan Knight (Oxford
University). Moderated by Professor Margaret Chowning, UCB
Department of History
 |
| Prof. Alan Knight |
In
English the word 'history' means two things: it means what happened and
the study of what happened by historians. I was initially
a little confused (it was clearly my mistake), since I thought
we were going to talk in this session about the recent history
of Mexico, in the sense of recent historiography,
rather than recent (actual) events. In a way I'm quite glad
at this outcome: actual events are rather more important;
and, as Alicia knows, talks about historiography can get
me into hot water. So I'm going to avoid Mexican historiography
(incidentally, I express some views on the 'new cultural
history' of Mexico in a forthcoming piece in the Latin
American Research Review, 2002). I'm going to try to
talk about Mexican contemporary history but with the caveat
that I'm not really an analyst of contemporary Mexico. I
don't have any claims to particular expertise on that subject,
though I certainly have a lively interest in contemporary
Mexico. Adolfo who's both a historian, a contemporary commentator
even political activist (in the good sense of the word) has
much better claims than I do. (Here Adolfo dissents and I
seek to justify the use of 'activist' . .). Historians are
rightly leery of making comments about the recent past: you
don't have hindsight and you don't usually have accessible
archives. (In fact, for a good deal of recent history you
may never have accessible archives: either because matters
were too 'sensitive' or because political actors have given
relinquished written communication in favor of more ephemeral
verbal/electronic communication. So perhaps we will not be
much the wiser even fifty years from now. . .).
I
thought what I would call this brief presentation - if I
have to give it a title - "The Strange Death of PRIísta Mexico".
This picks up on a title of a book written some forty years
ago called The Strange Death of Liberal England, by
George Dangerfield. Dangerfield was trying to explain the
sudden decline and fall of the British Liberal Party around
the time of the First World War. At the beginning of the
20th Century the Liberal party was - if not 'hegemonic' -
certainly very powerful. Along with the Conservatives, it
had dominated late C19 British politics. Its basic ideals
permeated British society. It trounced the Conservatives
in the 1906 election and embarked on a vigorous reform program.
Yet the course of the next 10 or 15 years, around the time
of the First World War, it rapidly collapsed. It was reduced
to a tiny, almost insignificant rump party. This dramatic
change was associated not just with the Liberal party as
such, but also with certain broader changes in the British
political economy. Various historians, Dangerfield and others,
played around a metaphor which may be of some use to us,
as we consider the decline of the PRI in Mexico. There is
a sick man crossing the street. He is hit by a bus and soon
after dies. The key question is: was this man so sick, so
debilitated, that he was going to die very soon anyway? The
bus just finished him off a bit more quickly! Or, maybe he
had no more than a bad cold and was going to recover - the
bus was therefore crucial? It's a way of formulating the
old and familiar historical question about structure and
contingency. Was the decline or fall of the PRI something
that was heavily determined and bound to happen - perhaps
around the time when it actually happened - because of various
deep-seated causes? Or was the story one of conjunctural
coincidences and their effects? The first view stresses inevitability,
the second implies contingency - and human culpability: that
is, it could have turned out significantly differently, if
political actors had (plausibly) behaved somewhat differently.
First
of all, it all seems to me the change which happened in the
year 2000 is quiet clearly very significant. It was the first
time in Mexican history that there had been a change of government
as a result of a genuine mass election. There had, of course,
been many elections in Mexican history; there had been changes
of government going right back to the 1820's; but this was
the first time a genuine mass electorate, including women
in the franchise, voted, and voted the incumbent government
out of office. The party in power changed through the ballot
box. That is clearly historically significant. We may take
such events for granted if we live in 'consolidated' democracies,
but for Mexico this was something new - and most people would
also say something positive.
It
doesn't yet mean that Mexican democracy is 'consolidated'.
If you have kept up with the output of that major academic
industry, democratisation studies, you will be aware that
the product cycle has gone from breakdowns to transitions
to democratic 'consolidations'. So, in Mexico, we now have
to talk about consolidation (rather than transition). It
may seem a little risky to talk in these terms, but I don't
see any immediate or mortal threats Mexican democracy, as
it's currently constituted. In saying that Mexico is now
democratic, I would mention the familiar caveats that are
required in this context: I'm talking about 'procedural',
electoral democracy, 'democracy without adjectives', to use
Krause's term, not other possible variants (social democracy,
workers' democracy, participatory democracy, etc). In these
familiar procedural/electoral terms Mexico is now a democracy
- and one which, like many others, has plenty of faults as
well. (Some of these faults - such as electoral fraud - are
not so extensive to invalidate the description; others -
such as media bias - are well-know in many consolidated [Western]
democracies, hence cannot be used a proof of Mexico's 'undemocratic'
status. More important would be considerations of the rule
of law, which is not the same as electoral democracy).
Now,
in many ways the Mexican story looks like a unilinear process
of progressive pluralism leading finally to a genuine democratic
transfer of power. But it's not quite as unilinear or simple
as it may seem. There have been many studies of recent Mexican
elections: a particularly good one is Juan Molinar Horcasitas,
El tiempo de la legitimidad (1991) which traces the progressive
decline of the PRI, in electoral terms, through the late
1970s and 1980s. (McCann and Domínguez, Democratizing Mexico,
1996, is a valuable sequel). Horcasitas (now a government
minister!) tells a story of progressive decline and, indeed,
if you roughly extrapolate his graphs you would produce a
PRI exit from government sometime in the first decade of
the twenty-first century. The 2000 election therefore anticipated
the trend; but the trend was clearly downward. On the other
hand, there were big ups and downs along the way (the graph
is not smooth and linear). In 1991, following the severe
shock which the PRI received in 1988, the party revived (in
congressional elections). Again in 1994 Ernesto Zedillo won
the presidential election pretty handily, without substantial
fraud, and despite the major problems which his administration
faced (the Chiapas revolt in January, the assassination of
the PRI's presidential candidate in March). So, it's not
quite the case that the graph goes down hill all the way.
We need to take into account certain contingencies.
I
also think that the result of the election in 2000 was quite
a surprise. A lot of people are now wise after the event
and declare: "Well, it's obvious Fox was going to win." I
don't think that was the case. I was in Mexico during the
summer of 2000, both before and after the election. I think
the majority of people expected a (probably close) PRI victory
and were surprised at Fox's clear-cut triumph. In June I
attended a meeting in the British Foreign Office convened
to discuss Mexico. (I should stress that this was, for me,
a rare foray into political consultancy. I don't plan to
make a habit of it). I was in a group of about ten people,
supposedly experts on Mexico (one was a prominent Mexican
academic and commentator); like good experts, 9 out of 10
of us said that Labastida, the PRI candidate, would win.
This was not unreasonable: the balance of the polls said
as much. The one dissident, I might add, had predicted the
decline and fall of the PRI on more than one occasion in
the past. This time he was proven right. But I noticed with
interest, on reading the UC Berkeley Center for Latin American
Studies brochure (cite reference?*), that, at a previous
Mexican politics seminar held here prior to the election,
five distinguished speakers (one of them being Adolfo [Gilly])
'all predicted that on July 2 the system that ruled Mexico
for so long would be forever changed'. One can't help feeling
that with powers of prediction like this they should spend
some time at the racetrack or the casino . . .
So,
I think the outcome was both significant and a surprise.
As regards the aftermath, perhaps the most important, if
obvious, point to make is that nothing disastrous has happened.
The sky did not fall in. Government went on; Mexicans continued
working, producing, trading. So the PRI's loss of power did
not, as some people used to anticipate, bring about a social
or political breakdown. I stress this also by way of questioning
some of the more extreme culturalist explanations of Mexico
- or the rest of Latin America - which stress the deep, died-in-the-wool,
anti-democratic character of the country/continent, hence
its supposedly profound incapacity to democratise, given
its ponderous baggage of Iberian, Catholic, colonial and
authoritarian values. That sort of explanation - of which
I've always been very sceptical - cannot really accommodate
this quite rapid change. What was important in determining
the outcome was a series of political decisions made by both
voters and political elites. Institutional factors, such
as the creation of IFE, which made possible a better electoral
system, also counted; they in turn reflected changing political
pressures ('from below') and policies ('from above'). You
can't explain this in terms of a relatively unchanging and
deterministic inherited 'political culture'.
So,
was it chronic disease or was it being hit by the bus? As
I said, the PRI did experience a period of gradual - but
not unilinear - decline in the last 20 years of the last
century. Mexico therefore is very different from the democratisation
processes evident in many other Latin American countries
- particularly Chile, Argentina, Uruguay, Brazil - where
and or back to democratic rule. Mexico's is a much more gradual
and incremental process - perhaps more analogous to processes
which occurred in other 'dominant [civilian] party' regimes,
such as Taiwan's, or with the Italian Christian Democrats
or the Indian National Congress. It is a different kind of
democratic transition compared to those of the southern cone.
In seeking to explain this transition à la mexicana,
some analysts have posited a natural fit between economic
change and political change: neoliberalism, embodying free
trade and free markets, gives you democracy (free markets
in votes) I am very sceptical about that argument. While
I can see some abstract logic to it, I don't think it helps
much as a historical explanation of the changes. One reason
for being sceptical, of course, is that neoliberal policies
can be implemented by highly authoritarian governments, e.g.,
Pinochet. Furthermore, in the case of Mexico, the idea that,
for decades, the country groaned under the weight of an enormously
powerful, bloated state that controlled the entire political
and economic life of the country is an exaggeration, particularly
for the heyday of the PRI (1950s and '60s), when the PRI
was a much more effective, dominant, and coherent party than
it would later become. The Mexican economy in those days
was not nearly so heavily statist - in terms of payrolls,
parastatals and public ownership - as it would later become
with the oil boom and 'neo-populism' of the 1970s. Political
reform (e.g., 1977) and the erosion of the PRI's electoral
dominance which went with it, coincided with greater economic
interventionism and (as some call it) 'neo-populism'. Under
Salinas the state sector shrank, yet, between 1988 and 1994,
the fortunes of the PRI appreciably revived. So, I don't
see much of a fit between the evolving political economy
and the fortunes of the PRI.
So
what do I think was so crucial? The PRI experienced several
shocks as a ruling party, notably the internal schism of
1987-88. But this was followed by a genuine revival. In my
view the crucial year was 1994. That was the "annus horribilus" of
the PRI from which it never really fully recovered. Ninety-four,
you'll remember, was the year of Chiapas; and of the killings
of both Colosio and Ruiz-Massieu. But most important, I think,
was the devaluation and the associated crisis which came
in December of '94, just after Zedillo took power. I'm sure
that historians of the future will debate at length the causality
of that crisis: was it the product of deep problems associated
with the Salinas economic project (an overvalued peso, a
growing trade deficit, the tesebonos, etc.); or was it rather
the result of the famous 'errors of December', committed
by the incoming Zedillo government, notably Jaime Serra Puche,
who mishandled what was meant to be a controlled devaluation.
As a historian (of the present, not the future) I'm going
to avoid that debate. No doubt there are arguments to be
made on both sides. But I do think the impact of that recession
starting in December of '94 was extremely important. That
was, perhaps, the final serious collision with the bus which
made the PRI's survival in power very much more precarious.
It was, after all the third recession Mexico had experienced
in about twelve years: two in the eighties and then another
in '94. It meant, as Carlos Fuentes put it, that the Mexican
people, like Sisyphus, having spent their days pushing a
huge rock to the top of the hill, repeatedly saw it roll
back down again at night. I think the third time that the
rock rolled down proved too much. So, changing the metaphor,
it was, for the PRI, a case of 'three strikes and out'.
In
particular, the 1994-5 crisis undermined the persistent claims
to technocratic, economic expertise which the government
- under both Salinas and then Zedillo - had trumpeted. It
showed that Mexico was not securely in the first world. It
also had practical effect not just for poorer people (who
were perhaps used to dealing with economic vicissitudes)
but also for the burgeoning Mexican middle class. This was
a very severe recession, involving high interest rates, job
losses, mortgage defaults, companies going bust. It unravelled
the incipient, political coalition that Salinas had quite
successfully put together during 1988-94, which had combined
both poorer groups in society (the beneficiaries of PRONASOL,
traditional PRI voters) and also the urban middle classes
(growing in relative numbers, sympathetic to the opposition,
but also attracted by Salinas' personal panache, neoliberal
reforms, and Firs World rhetoric). Finally, that disillusionment
was compounded by well-known revelations of corruption (bank
privatisation, FOBAPROA, CONASUPO, narcopolitical associations).
Thus, the PRI came to be seen as incompetent and corrupt,
insouciant and uncaring.
Zedillo,
being essentially a good technocrat rather than an accomplished
politico, decided his priority was to revive the economy
rather than to revive the PRI. He didn't try to do what Salinas
- a more skilful political operator - had done in 1988-94.
He managed to steer the economy towards recovery, along orthodox
lines (the US boom clearly helped); but he let the PRI twist
in the wind, lacking either the will or the capacity to generate
a major revival of the party (as the PRI bitterly recall
today!). Five years on from the 1994-5 crisis, the voters
had not forgotten. They responded positively to a candidate
like Vicente Fox, who played a very broad audience, beyond
the normal PAN constituency, portraying himself as a successful,
new-style, businessman, neoliberal in persuasion, but pragmatic
in approach, promising good relations in the U.S.
Finally,
what does this all mean? It is, as I have said, a real change
in Mexican politics. In the past - usually when arguing with
political scientists - I have often seen political change
in Mexico as more cosmetic than substantial I think this
change is more than cosmetic. Yet the sky hasn't fallen in.
This summer I was in Argentina as well as Mexico. In both
economic and political terms Argentina is in a much worse
condition than Mexico. In Argentina one encounter tremendous
disillusionment with all political actors (update: the recent
elections of October 14 confirmed this). In Mexico, too,
there is disillusionment; but while Mexican disenchantment
is both old and, I think, evidence of a kind of healthy scepticism
about politics, Argentinian disillusionment is bleak and
negative, suggesting a certain bankruptcy of the sort of
political order. Mexico also has NAFTA, which, despite its
many faults, also offers definite benefits within a neoliberal
order (in other words, if you opt for neoliberalism, you're
better off with NAFTA than without). The same cannot be said
for MERCOSUR. Thus a key factor for Fox and his administration
is the behavior of the US economy, especially in light of
the September 11 events, and the impact this will have on
interest rates, oil prices and above all U.S. demand for
Mexican goods.
Meantime,
domestically Fox appears though to be reasonably popular.
He's not been a brilliantly successful President. His cabinet
is an odd combination of left, right and center. His legislative
program is not advancing as rapidly as it might. Chiapas
remains a problem. The ley indigena is not clearly unsatisfactory.
Tax reform is stalled. This is not a tremendously upbeat
picture; but nor is it anything like as dark as the current
scenario in Argentina. De la Rúa would change places with
Fox at the drop of a hat, I am sure. Part of the reason that
Fox is getting a relatively easy ride is, of course, that
the opposition is in some disarray too. The PRD has its perennial
internal problems. (With Adolfo at my side I shall refrain
from rehearsing these . . .). The PAN is not entirely enamoured
with Fox either; and the PRI, above all, faces really serious
problems in trying to come to terms with its new role as
a party of opposition party. (The PRI's recent tight victory
in Tabasco may give grounds for hope; but it also boosts
the claims of Roberto Madrazo to party leadership, and it
is not clear whether a Madrazo PRI, however effective it
may be in some southern states, has the broad appeal necessary
to revive the party's fortunes nationwide). Party politics
aside, Mexico of course faces major structural problems relating
to poverty, regional and ethnic inequalities, drugs, corruption,
and the rule of law - all of which in itself the change of
government in itself will not resolve rapidly, if at all.
In
conclusion: clearly, the PRI was eventually destined to leave
power. It wasn't going to go on forever. But the pace and
pattern of its decline depended heavily on conjunctual factors
(which also imply human agency - statesmanship, or the lack
of it). I would identify first the minor collision of 1987-88,
which struck the careless pedestrian a glancing blow (from
which he appeared to recover); then, six years later, emboldened
by his recovery, he stepped in the path of a bigger bus:
the crisis of December of 1994 and its aftermath. The first
weakened the patient, the second finished him.
But
in order to cheer up any PRIístas in the audience, let me
return to the British Liberal Party. As a result of the First
World War it was soon reduced to a tiny rump and it stayed
like that for a long time. But now, interestingly, the Liberal
Party has made a significant recovery, helped by the strange
repositioning that's going in the UK as the Labour Party
grows more conservative than the old Conservative Party.
Hence, the Liberals have now emerged as a successful opposition,
gaining seats in parliament, and raising (Liberal) hopes
of a future Liberal administration. Perhaps the PRI can draw
comfort from this scenario. Although, if the analogy holds,
they may have to wait till about 2080 until they recover
Los Pinos.
