Imperialism and Modern State Building Explode: The Mexican Revolution History 111 – World History since 1500

Spring 2022

Jorge Minella ([email protected])

Early Twentieth Century

 Increased competition among nation-states and their empires.

 Tightened imperial grip.

 Challenges to imperial domination rising.  Peaked after World War 1.

 World War 1.  Industrial warfare, mass mobilization.

 Mass society and culture.

Today’s Class

 Conflicts not only between nations or nations and their colonial subjects, also class conflict.

 Class-based clashes interacted with imperialism and international warfare.

 Sweeping revolutions.

 Mexico, 1910-1920.

 Nation-building and colonial legacy, imperialism, class struggle, mobilization of society.

 Next class: WW1, Russian Revolution, Paris Peace Agreements.

The Mexican Revolution Begins

Mexico Between 1810 and 1876

 Caudillos.

 Turmoil, political instability.

 Imperial interventions.

 U.S. invasion of Mexico, 1845-1848.

 French occupation, 1864- 1867.

 Porfirio Diaz takes power, 1876.

Porfirio Diaz’s cabinet, ~1900.

The Porfiriato, 1876-1911

 Dictatorship.

 Stability and economic growth.

 Modernization of the export economy.

 New technology.

 Association with U.S. business interests.

 But wealth was increasingly concentrated.

 Benefit of few families and U.S. investors.

 Peasants lost land.

 Stability through brutal repression and cooptation.

The Porfiriato’s Decline

 Concentrated wealth caused resentment.

 Economy growth increased social complexity.

 Labor demands met with violence.

 Sectors of the elite resented Diaz excessive political control.

Image of the 1906 Cananea Strike, at the American-owned Cananea copper mine, in Sonora, northern Mexico. Many workers killed for demanding better working conditions.

Francisco Madero

 Mine and landowner from northern Mexico.

 Educated in the U.S. and France.

 Modern businessmen, but resented privileges to U.S. investors.

 Ran for president in 1910.

 Arrested.

 Called for armed insurrection against Porfirio.

Broad coalition to oust Porfirio Diaz

 Conflicting additional goals would complicate the situation.

 Political reformers.

 Sectors of the landowning class, merchants, middle-class intellectuals.

 Social reformers.

 Fundamentally rural.

 Central and southern Mexico’s peasants. (Emiliano Zapata)

 Northern Mexico’s rural laborers and miners. (Pascal Orozco and Pancho Villa)

Pancho Villa

 Sharecropper family.

 Laborer in Durango, northern Mexico.

 Experienced and witnessed mistreatment and poor conditions.

 Became a “social bandit”.

 Joined Madero’s call to arms.

Emiliano Zapata

 Feared the expansion of export-oriented sugar plantation into his village’s land.

 Elected president of the village council in 1909.

 Sought to defend the village through legal means but failed due to the biased Porfirian judiciary system.

 Joined Madero’s call to end Porfirian rule.

Porfirio Ousted, Madero President

 Porfirio Diaz renounced after Pancho Villa defeated federal troops in Ciudad Juarez.

 Francisco Madero elected president, November 1911.

 But ousting Diaz was just the beginning.

Madero in the 1911 electoral campaign with Zapata’s troops.

The Mexican Revolution Unfolds

Madero in Power

 From November 1911 to February 1913.

 Short reign due to political mistakes and the coalition’s diverging goals.

 Madero dismissed social demands.

 Antagonized an important sector of the coalition, mainly Zapata’s peasants.

 Madero maintained part of the Porfirian state intact.

 The army officers.

 The judiciary system.

Zapata’s Plan of Ayala

 Call to oust Madero.

 Land reform.

 1/3 of the land should return to peasants.

 Peasants’ colonial heritage.

 Trying to compromise.

 In the north.

 Also called to oust Madero and address the working class's demands.

The Federal Army

 Madero called the Federal Army against his former allies.

 Army controlled by Porfirian officers.

 Led by Victoriano Huerta.

 Fought against Zapata and Orozco.

 But turned against Madero.

 Conspired with other Porfirian officers and the U.S. Ambassador.

Victoriano Huerta

The Tragic Ten Days (Feb. 1913)

 Battle in Mexico City.

 Thousands killed.

 Madero assassinated.

 Porfirian regime restored with Huerta.

Modern weaponry employed in the battle.

Madero’s Coalition Back Together

 Pancho Villa and northern elites.  Constitutionalist Army

 Emiliano Zapata and central Mexico’s peasants.

 Call to oust Huerta and draft a new constitution.

 Huerta resigned, end of reestablished Porfirian rule.

Pancho Villa and his troops.

Late 1914, Conference of Aguascalientes

 Meeting of all factions of the coalition.

 Villa’s rural laborers army.

 Northern elites.

 Zapata’s peasants.

 What should be the course of the revolution?

 Political?

 Social?

 Coalition split again.

Constitutionalists vs. Conventionists

 Constitutionalist Army.

 Led by northern elites.

 Carranza and Obregón.

 Defended political reform, opposed Zapata’s land reform.

 Conventionist Army.

 Pancho Villa and Emiliano Zapata.

 Social reform.

 Conventionist Army took Mexico City.

Zapata and Villa’s armies enter Mexico City, December 1914.

Constitutionalist Win

 Constitutionalist Army winning the civil war.

 Superior resources.

 U.S. support.

 Less weariness.

 Accepted part of the social reform agenda.

 Decreased battered Conventionists’ will to fight.

 Gained support of the urban middle and working class.

 Constitutional Assembly.

 New 1917 Mexican Constitution.

Mexico’s New Constitution

Social Reforms and the 1917 Constitution

 Article 27.

 Land reform.

 Nationalization of underground resources.

 Article 123.

 Workers’ rights.

Carranza’s Government, 1917-1920.

 Should follow the 1917 Constitution.

 Instead, undermined it.

 Brutal repression on labor.

 Increased persecution of peasants demanding land rights.

 Zapata kept fighting.

 Now with a weakened and weary peasant army.

 But symbolically relevant.

 Zapata executed in April 1919.

Obregón’s Response

 Carranza’s violent methods and disregard for the Constitution.

 Many enemies.

 Álvaro Obregón.

 Former ally, member of the northern middle-class.

 Had led divisions of the Constitutionalist Army against Zapata.

 But came to recognize the need for social reform.

 Ousted Carranza.

 Revolutionary process coming to an end.

 A million people died.

The Mexican Revolution and World History

 Contemporary revolutions.

 China’s nationalist revolution, 1911.

 Russia’s communist revolution, 1917.

 Rise of industry and changes in social classes.

 Nation-state formation.

 Complex; colonial heritage.

 Expansion of capitalism and resulting social tensions.

Our website has a team of professional writers who can help you write any of your homework. They will write your papers from scratch. We also have a team of editors just to make sure all papers are of HIGH QUALITY & PLAGIARISM FREE. To make an Order you only need to click Ask A Question and we will direct you to our Order Page at WriteDemy. Then fill Our Order Form with all your assignment instructions. Select your deadline and pay for your paper. You will get it few hours before your set deadline.