May 19, 2025 • 23 mins
Andrew is joined by Garrison to conclude his series on Latin American anarchism by talking about the spread of radical ideas in Mexico throughout the 19th century.
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
All the media.
Speaker 2 (00:05):
Hello, and welcome to it can happen here. This may
be my final episode on Latin American anarchism. That is,
we've covered Peru, Chile, Brazil, Argentina, Paraguay, Uruguay, the many
countries of Central America, the former countries of Grand Columbia,
and the Spaniphone Islands the Caribbean. Now we'll finally getting
(00:27):
to the big one, Mexico. And I say we because
I'm here with Garrison Davis.
Speaker 3 (00:32):
Hello, is this has been It's got to be like
a year long series now right.
Speaker 4 (00:37):
At this point.
Speaker 2 (00:38):
Yeah, it's been going on for some time with breaks
in between and everything.
Speaker 3 (00:42):
I'm very very excited.
Speaker 2 (00:44):
Yeah, to introduce myself real quick, I'm Andrew Sage. You
can find me on YouTube androism and we should to
check out the show notes for all the references, including
and hell capalities anarchism in Latin America, which was an
indispensable resource for the entire.
Speaker 4 (01:00):
Of this project.
Speaker 2 (01:01):
Without further Ado faminos, we have a lot to cover.
Mexico is a massive and storied country, so I can
only really give you a gist of its pre colonial
and colonial history. For the necessary context, we have to
start thousands of years before the name Mexico or Mexico
even existed. Of course, according to the Encyclopedia Britannica, the
(01:24):
land we now call Mexico is home to some of
the world's most unique ancient civilizations. Whose came the Almechs,
often called the mother culture of Mesoamerica, known for their
colossal stoneheads and influence on later cultures. Then the Maya
with their dazzline cities, mathematics and calendars, and eventually the Aztecs,
who built the Grand Empire settled onto nour stietland which
(01:45):
is now Mexico City. Unfortunately, we can't spend much time
on this rich history. We must progress to the time
of European contact. In fifteen nineteen, everything changed Spanish Conquistra
and nan Cortez, and within just two years the mighty
Aztec Empire fell disease. Alliances with native enemies of the Aztecs,
(02:07):
Technological advantages and brutal warfare aided the Spaniards to overthrowing
the civilization of millions. What followed was three centuries of
colonial rule under New Spain, marked by extraction, Catholic conversion,
and the mixing, often violently, of indigenous European and African peoples.
By the early eighteen hundreds, the winds of independence were
(02:30):
finally blowing. A Catholic priest named Miguel Hidago sparked the
fight with a cry for freedom in eighteen ten. Specifically,
he sought the end of rule by Spanish peninsulars, which
are the people who came from Spain and ruled over Mexico.
He called for the equality of races, and he called
for the redistribution of land. As a hill capility put
(02:53):
it in anarchism in Latin, a miracle. Hidago proposed to abolish,
even if by gentle and gradual means, what he called,
in almost Prudonian terms, the horrible right of territorial property, perpetual,
preditory and exclusive. This whole land topic is going to
come up a lot in the history. By the way,
you may be familiar with the phrase land and freedom
(03:15):
pierre libertad that comes from Mexico.
Speaker 4 (03:19):
Anyway, it took.
Speaker 2 (03:20):
More than a decade of war, but by eighteen twenty
one Mexico had finally broken free from Spain.
Speaker 4 (03:26):
Freedom, though didn't mean stability.
Speaker 2 (03:29):
The nineteenth century saw emperors come and go because there
was actually a time when Mexico as a monarchy, foreign
invasions by the United States via the Manifest Destiny and
Napoleon's France via monarchical Latin League, and internal power struggles.
The Zapateec president Benito Juarez, who from eighteen sixty four
to eighteen sixty seven had resisted foreign occupation by Napoleon's
(03:52):
Emperor Maximilian and fought for constitutional reform, sought to stabilize, secularize,
and modernize the country. In the mid eighteen hundreds, figures
like Quarez led a sweeping movement against the old powers
of Mexico, the Catholic Church and the military, which had
long dominated both land and politics. To the layers their reforma.
(04:15):
They seized church property, secularized education, and promised a new
era of rights and equality. But there was a catch,
because to weaken the Church, the liberals sold off its land,
not to the peasants or indigenous communities who had worked
on it for generations, but to wealthy buyers e heroes.
The communal lands of indigenous peoples were privatized under this
(04:39):
liberal banner freedom and progress. They created a new class
of landlords and pushed rural people deeper into poverty. But
Nita Juarez died, but his legacy lived on with those
reforms to cement the separation of church and state, freedom
of religion, the prohibition of forced labor, and so on.
But following him came the Porfiriato earth thirty year long
(05:01):
dictatorship under the mixed tech president Portfyrio Dias, who continued
the modernization of the country but also deepened its long
standing inequalities. Portfolio DEAs surrounded himself with intellectuals known as
the scientific Coos. They were positivists, as in adherents of
the positivist school of philosophy, which advocated for rational planning
(05:21):
and economic development as a path of social progress. His
slogan was ban Opalo the bread or the stick, and
reflected the policy of rewarding compliance with prosperity while punishing
dissent with severe consequences. The liberty order and progress equation
sacrificed liberty as the Mexican people were expected to trade
(05:45):
freedom for the benefits of these policies. Workers ended up
facing low wages, long hours, and of course lacked rights,
while estate laborers were landless and under the arbitrary rule
of Mao demos. Education was largely restricted to elites in
major cities, groups like the Yaqi Indians were forcibly relocated
(06:05):
as cheap labor to plantations. Governors, those supposedly elected, were
effectively presidential appointees, monitored by Heife's politicals, who intervened the
local affairs. The rulatis and elite constabulary maintained order, but
often disregarded due process, which fostered a whole reign of
terror in the rural areas. Diaza's popularity eventually waned as
(06:28):
prosperity was monopolized by a small, often foreign elite. This
elite emulated European customs, which created a stark divide with
the growing proletariat and middle classes. By the second half
of the nineteenth century, Mexico was caught in a contradiction
a state that promised emancipation through property rights while dispossessing
(06:49):
the very people it claimed to free. The liberal project
have feeled them, and in its failure, space opened for
deeper critiques of property power and the state itself. A
(07:10):
younger generation began questioning the system, and with this rise
in criticism, gim rise and repression, which set this stage
for the Mexican Revolution of nineteen ten.
Speaker 3 (07:21):
This whole era of the of like the turn of
the millennia and the start of the twentieth century has
like so much of this same stuff happening all over
the world. Like that's kind of one of the biggest
trends that we've been able to see throughout your Latin
American anarchism series, is like how how much they all
mirror each other, and like how much of like a
global movements used to exist, like not like a organized fashion,
(07:45):
but like there's like some like other force that is
that is like a driving these like global trends of
like revoltant revolution. Yeah, and like we see this a
lot in like the yeah, like the nineteen ten to
nineteen twenty time period, I mean even just in Latin America.
Speaker 4 (08:03):
Absolutely.
Speaker 2 (08:04):
I also think, of course, it's really easy to notice
these trends and notice these tides of history in retrospect.
You know, when you submerged in it, it's just like,
you know, all these conversations and stuff happening, for sure,
all these events and stuff happening around you. But when
by looking in the past you could say, oh wow,
this is like a global pattern. You know some I'm
always curious to see, like when we look back, I mean,
(08:27):
the twenty tens are already over. The narratives around it are
still formulated, right, We're still in the midst of the
nineteen twenty in the nineteen twenties, the twenty twenties, say,
you know, the narratives around it will still be developing
all now. But we're already halfway through, and I'm sure
people have already seen certain trends that are going to
make for some excellent retrospective commentary.
Speaker 4 (08:48):
Definitely.
Speaker 3 (08:49):
Yeah, Like the past ten years we've seen this like
global far right power grab and this like rebirth of
right wing populism sweeping a whole bunch of neoliberal democracies,
like post nineties, post War on Terror, post end of
history stuff where you see like the full extent of
like the Clinton, Reagan Thatcher economics completely completely crumble with
(09:11):
far right populism like taking taking over the reins of
most popular consciousness. Yeah, to the point where even like
the more like liberal parties are being quote unquote forced
to adopt like similar rhetoric looking at like like like
the Labor Party in the UK and hear in the States,
how how much like the Democratic Party last year, like
completely caved on like far right populist talking points on
(09:35):
immigration and stuff.
Speaker 4 (09:36):
Exactly exactly.
Speaker 2 (09:38):
I think part of it as well as a failure
to advance a positive, totally direction and a positive program.
Speaker 1 (09:44):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (09:45):
You know, when we allow the tunes of discourse, the
arena discussion to be dictated by the right, when we
simply react to what they are saying, when we simply
respond to their policies and their efforts, you know, we they.
Speaker 4 (10:00):
Slew down the progress of their goals.
Speaker 2 (10:03):
But ultimately, as long as we are engaged in dialogue
with their goals, they are stoly inching their goals closer
and closer to reality.
Speaker 4 (10:10):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (10:11):
Yeah, that is certainly the trend that I've been seeing
the past ten years, and I'm sure sure many people have.
Speaker 2 (10:16):
Yeah, I mean, the overturn windows pretty much entirely dictated
by what they decide. You know, I think I've mentioned
this before. The right to decided they wanted to talk
about critical race theory, and then critical race theory became
the center of conversation.
Speaker 4 (10:29):
The right decided they wanted to target.
Speaker 3 (10:32):
DEI gender ideology.
Speaker 2 (10:35):
Right, Yeah, and then that becomes the whole thing is
the whole center of discussion. They're not putting forward the
policies that are going to hurt pretty much everybody as
the center of their policy.
Speaker 4 (10:46):
That's more like an aside.
Speaker 2 (10:47):
When they give themselves, you know, salary raises and they
cut taxes on the ridge. That's not the center of
their political messages.
Speaker 4 (10:54):
Center the plical messages.
Speaker 2 (10:56):
You know, various culture related issues that they can use
silly their base, but it's nothing that's actually benefiting people,
you know. And instead of circumventing that that effort to
dictate the course of conversation and dictate our own conversations
instead what it's kind of following along the tail. But
(11:18):
that's a bit outside the scope of this a bit
of a digression here. But before we get to the
point of the Mexican Revolution, though, we should really take
a look at the slow and sell development of radical
ideas in Mexico during the nineteenth century. You see, indigenous
resistance persisted throughout Mexico's history through often quiet, revolved acts
(11:40):
of non cooperation that would steadily ensure that Spain could
never fully establish his dominion even after independence. The cldinal
structure lived on in the haciendas, the church, and the state.
So the indigenous communities would continue to resist, sometimes in
profoundly anti authoritarian ways, by the nineteenth century. And this
history is courtesy Anahill Cappialities anarchism Latin America. As I
(12:02):
mentioned in eighteen sixty one, a man arrived in Mexico
with a very distinct name. He was Platino Constantino Rourkanati.
He was a Greek immigrant, radicalized by the revolutions in
Europe and steeped in the works of Furia. Was a
utopian socialist and prudon who was an anarchist Fuist anarchist.
(12:24):
He had fled the counter revolutionary tide crashing over the
continent with a mission. Rocannati believed Mexico, with its long
standing indigenous traditions of communal landholding and mutual aid, was
the perfect place to plant the seeds of a new
utopian society. And in a lot of ways he was right.
Speaker 4 (12:42):
You know.
Speaker 2 (12:42):
He saw in the hero system the indigenous Kuna lan
Tenniel a living echo of the kind of society utopians
in Europe could only dream of. Where the liberally saw backwardness,
Rourkanati saw potential. His aim wasn't to civilize these communities,
but to learn from them and held them protect their
autonoity from the encroaching state through political philosophy and practice.
(13:06):
He seems to be a very interesting fellow, by the way,
I mean. He apparently spoke seven languages. He practiced medicine
by day and philosophy by night. He was a Christian,
but not anything like the Christians that dominated Mexico at
the time, because as an hil Caplite, he puts it
for him, the essence of Christianity is charity, that is
love for all, as it is taught in the Gospels,
(13:28):
and that essence is the moral foundation of socialism and
revolution as well. Pure Christianity, he wrote, is the religion
that will regenerate the world when people finally come to
understand the power of its basic principles liberty, equality, and fraternity.
But it is Christianity without dogma like Saint Simon's and
without priesthood, liturgy, or hierarchical organization, the model for which
(13:50):
he finds in the life of Jesus and his earliest followers.
Primitive Christianity is authentic Christianity, but has been entirely degraded
by the Catholic and Protestant churches, and has nothing to
do with so many sects that call themselves Christian end quote.
A few months after his arrival in eighteen sixty one,
he published a socialist primary in Mexico that marked him
as the first anarchist to put forward distinctly anarchist theory
(14:13):
in the country. In the mid eighteen sixties, he formed
a group called Lass Socil the goal of spreading the
ideas of mutualism, free association, anti capitalist cooperation through books,
pamphlets and education. Barucannati and his collaborators launched workers schools
aimed the promoting literacy, political consciousness, and autonomy. Once at
school was the Esquila de Rio id Socialismo, the School
(14:37):
of Lightning and Socialism Hellier. It combined moral instruction with
a deep critique of the exploitative labor system. This was,
you know, education as a rebellion, not just to read,
but to recognize the exploitation and to imagine alternatives. Rotconnati
thought of his socialism as the fullest expression of the
(14:58):
French revolutionary motto of liber equality and fraternity, which no
half measure like liberalism could ever reach. He recognized that
the immediate objective must be quote, the extinction of poverty,
the distribution and increase to the commonwealth, the abolition of prostitution,
and the conservation of all our faculties, including the intellectual, physical,
(15:18):
and moral ones, for the transformation of humanity through science, beauty,
and virtue end quote.
Speaker 4 (15:25):
One of those things was not like the others.
Speaker 2 (15:26):
I'm surely you noticed there was a standout in inclusion there,
but it makes sense considering his background. He also saw
himself as a cosmopolitan, perhaps owing in part to his
unique circumstances as a man with a Greek father, Austrian mother,
a French education, and Mexican who He said, quote, we
(15:46):
are Cosmopolitans by nature, citizens of all nations, and contemporaries
to all the asias. The greatest and most heroic human
actions belong equally to all end quote. In other words,
our country is the entire world, and all men are brothers.
He also wrote that the abolition of all government in
(16:07):
the nations, which frightens you and you consider impossible and absurd,
they have never tried it will usher in a totally
new world of institutions in which the peoples of the
world will live in happiness end quote. Brouclati was a
(16:30):
pacifist and as a prosch anarchism, which bought his original instruction
of socialism being via Charles Furia. But eventually he came
to understand the need for a class struggle, as he said, quote,
a social revolution in which many heroic victims will be
sacrificed in the sacred altar to restore the justice denied
it to the people end quote. His work attracted young radicals,
(16:52):
many of whom would later play key roles in the
development of Mexico's labor movement. Before he started Lass social
he had initiated the first group or is Sudiante Socialistas,
from which game figures such as Santiago Vilenueva, who tried
to organize the worker's movement, Permeneghillo, Phil Vicencio and Francisco's
at a Costa a leader of rural masses. It's the
(17:14):
core of this group that would help him to create
lessocl which would educate and agitate but also assist workers
beyond mutual aid to an active class struggle posture in
defense of the interests against bosses. So basically he took
these mutual aid societies and made sure that they didn't
stay mutual aid societies, that they were radicalized into resistance societies,
(17:36):
because those sort of mutual aid associations were very common
in Latin America at the time. You know, workers would
create these little groups where they would try and support
each other. But it's very easy to fall back on
that and to assume, you know, that's all you have
to do. Making sure that they have a radical posture,
a revolutionary posture. It's important to ensure that you're not
just rest in your laurels and expecting change to come
(17:57):
to you, and indeed they did not expect the change
to come to them. In June eighteen sixty five, these
resistant societies supported the first industrial strike in Mexico. Unfortunately,
it was crushed by the leader of the country at
the time, Emperor Maximilian, but it was his occupation and
the economic harshness of it all that fermented the spread
(18:18):
of anarchist ideas. Another student tut of Rocannati school came
Julio Chavez, a precursor to the more famous Emiliano Zapata
and a fervent anarchist communist. He agitated for a peasant
rebellion and engaged in land expropriations, which grew in popularity
wherever he was active, from the chalcot Tex Soco region
where he began, to all the states of Quebler and Morellia,
(18:42):
as Capelletti recounts, quote, the federal army finally moved against
him and defeated and imprisoned. He was executed in eighteen
sixty nine by order of President Benito Juarez. Before he died,
Chavez cried out, long live Socialism end quote. His manifesto,
which was written of few months before he died, would
help introduce more masses in the Mexican movement to the
(19:04):
idea of class struggle, and like a light bulb over
one's head, it immediately made it clear who was responsible
for their suffering. Santiago vid and Weever, and a fellow
student Rocanati named Vila Vitensio worked arduously to organize the
artisans and workers in Mexico City, and they definitely had
the cards stacked against them, but they helped to organize
(19:24):
an industrial strike in a textile mill in eighteen sixty eight,
and in eighteen sixty nine they established a Circulo Peraltario
and in eighteen seventy the Grand Seculio de Obreros de
Mexico and in eighteen seventy one the newspaper Al Socialista.
And this is when the red and black so famously
associated with anarchism came into the Mexican workers movement. The
eighteen seventies saw struggles between radical and moderate factions among workers,
(19:48):
proletarian presses making a name for themselves, and the first
Convention of the General Workers Congress of the Mexican Republic
in eighteen seventy six with a manifesto that indicated the
crown influence of libertarian ideology in Mexico. Of course, there
was a tension in that Congress between the socialists and
the anarchists, but water is wet. Sadly, Mexico wasn't ready
(20:10):
for revolution, or rather, the ruling class wasn't. While Rovercinnati
and others sold seeds among students and workers, the country
was swinging toward reaction.
Speaker 4 (20:22):
As I mentioned.
Speaker 2 (20:23):
Earlier, with the rise of Porphilrio Diaz in eighteen seventy six,
any space for radical thought began to close. Diaz, the
strong man of Oneization, was obsessed with order and progress.
He welcomed foreign capital, built railroads across the nation, and
gutted the countryside to make room for exports, and he
crushed dissent. While Rocnati avoided outright persecution thanks in parties
(20:47):
foreign status and pacifist leanings, the educational projects he inspired
were dismantled or sidelined. The more confrontational elements of the
early anarchists current went underground. Those who spoke of abolishing
property or questioned the Porphyria vision of modernity were met
with jail, exile, or worse. Rotcarati's allies, Alacosta, through his
newspaper Like International, promoted a twelve point socialist agenda, advocated
(21:11):
and universal social republic, municipal autonomy, workers' rights, workers associations,
wage avolition, and property equality. Despite Diaz's rise in eighteen
seventy seven, he led a present uprising in Sierra Gorda
and planets to La Baranca, battling federal forces until eighteen eighty.
(21:31):
Despite his defeat and imprisonment in eighteen eighty one, the
rebellion persisted. Salacosta's ally, Colonel Alberto Santa Fe, introduced the
Lays del Pueblo, Influenced by Mercunan's ideas. Though not a
purely anarchist manifesto, this document emphasized land distribution, national industry promotion,
army suppression, and free education. Salafe argued that true Mexican
(21:55):
independence depended on reclaiming stolen lands, a movement which, of
course ski in traction among the peasants. General Negrete supported
Santa Fe's revolutionary efforts, just as he had backed Chavez,
Lopez and Sanlacosta earlier. Santa Fe's resistance against Diaza's dictatorship
was more radical than mayor electoral opposition. It aimed at
transferring sovereignty to local municipalities and land to peasant collectors. However,
(22:21):
by the eighteen nineties, Diaz effectively suppressed most worker movements
through bribery and repression. While industrial workers and miners fared
slightly better than the peasant, wages steadily declined after eighteen
ninety eight. Rodocanati left Mexico in eighteen eighty six after
giving over two decades of his life to the cause,
But as two decades of so and seeds would eventually
(22:42):
flourish in the Mexican Revolution. What will be covering in
the next episode Thanks for tuninen A madrasage. You can
follow me on YouTube at andrewism and patron dot com
slash Saint Drew.
Speaker 4 (22:55):
Thanks again. This is it Could Happen Here. All power
to all the people peace.
Speaker 1 (23:04):
It Could Happen Here is a production of cool Zone Media.
For more podcasts from cool Zone Media, visit our website
Coolzonemedia dot com, or check us out on the iHeartRadio app,
Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts. You can
now find sources for it Could Happen Here listed directly
in episode descriptions. Thanks for listening.
All the media.
Speaker 2 (00:05):
Hello, and welcome to it can happen here. This may
be my final episode on Latin American anarchism. That is,
we've covered Peru, Chile, Brazil, Argentina, Paraguay, Uruguay, the many
countries of Central America, the former countries of Grand Columbia,
and the Spaniphone Islands the Caribbean. Now we'll finally getting
(00:27):
to the big one, Mexico. And I say we because
I'm here with Garrison Davis.
Speaker 3 (00:32):
Hello, is this has been It's got to be like
a year long series now right.
Speaker 4 (00:37):
At this point.
Speaker 2 (00:38):
Yeah, it's been going on for some time with breaks
in between and everything.
Speaker 3 (00:42):
I'm very very excited.
Speaker 2 (00:44):
Yeah, to introduce myself real quick, I'm Andrew Sage. You
can find me on YouTube androism and we should to
check out the show notes for all the references, including
and hell capalities anarchism in Latin America, which was an
indispensable resource for the entire.
Speaker 4 (01:00):
Of this project.
Speaker 2 (01:01):
Without further Ado faminos, we have a lot to cover.
Mexico is a massive and storied country, so I can
only really give you a gist of its pre colonial
and colonial history. For the necessary context, we have to
start thousands of years before the name Mexico or Mexico
even existed. Of course, according to the Encyclopedia Britannica, the
(01:24):
land we now call Mexico is home to some of
the world's most unique ancient civilizations. Whose came the Almechs,
often called the mother culture of Mesoamerica, known for their
colossal stoneheads and influence on later cultures. Then the Maya
with their dazzline cities, mathematics and calendars, and eventually the Aztecs,
who built the Grand Empire settled onto nour stietland which
(01:45):
is now Mexico City. Unfortunately, we can't spend much time
on this rich history. We must progress to the time
of European contact. In fifteen nineteen, everything changed Spanish Conquistra
and nan Cortez, and within just two years the mighty
Aztec Empire fell disease. Alliances with native enemies of the Aztecs,
(02:07):
Technological advantages and brutal warfare aided the Spaniards to overthrowing
the civilization of millions. What followed was three centuries of
colonial rule under New Spain, marked by extraction, Catholic conversion,
and the mixing, often violently, of indigenous European and African peoples.
By the early eighteen hundreds, the winds of independence were
(02:30):
finally blowing. A Catholic priest named Miguel Hidago sparked the
fight with a cry for freedom in eighteen ten. Specifically,
he sought the end of rule by Spanish peninsulars, which
are the people who came from Spain and ruled over Mexico.
He called for the equality of races, and he called
for the redistribution of land. As a hill capility put
(02:53):
it in anarchism in Latin, a miracle. Hidago proposed to abolish,
even if by gentle and gradual means, what he called,
in almost Prudonian terms, the horrible right of territorial property, perpetual,
preditory and exclusive. This whole land topic is going to
come up a lot in the history. By the way,
you may be familiar with the phrase land and freedom
(03:15):
pierre libertad that comes from Mexico.
Speaker 4 (03:19):
Anyway, it took.
Speaker 2 (03:20):
More than a decade of war, but by eighteen twenty
one Mexico had finally broken free from Spain.
Speaker 4 (03:26):
Freedom, though didn't mean stability.
Speaker 2 (03:29):
The nineteenth century saw emperors come and go because there
was actually a time when Mexico as a monarchy, foreign
invasions by the United States via the Manifest Destiny and
Napoleon's France via monarchical Latin League, and internal power struggles.
The Zapateec president Benito Juarez, who from eighteen sixty four
to eighteen sixty seven had resisted foreign occupation by Napoleon's
(03:52):
Emperor Maximilian and fought for constitutional reform, sought to stabilize, secularize,
and modernize the country. In the mid eighteen hundreds, figures
like Quarez led a sweeping movement against the old powers
of Mexico, the Catholic Church and the military, which had
long dominated both land and politics. To the layers their reforma.
(04:15):
They seized church property, secularized education, and promised a new
era of rights and equality. But there was a catch,
because to weaken the Church, the liberals sold off its land,
not to the peasants or indigenous communities who had worked
on it for generations, but to wealthy buyers e heroes.
The communal lands of indigenous peoples were privatized under this
(04:39):
liberal banner freedom and progress. They created a new class
of landlords and pushed rural people deeper into poverty. But
Nita Juarez died, but his legacy lived on with those
reforms to cement the separation of church and state, freedom
of religion, the prohibition of forced labor, and so on.
But following him came the Porfiriato earth thirty year long
(05:01):
dictatorship under the mixed tech president Portfyrio Dias, who continued
the modernization of the country but also deepened its long
standing inequalities. Portfolio DEAs surrounded himself with intellectuals known as
the scientific Coos. They were positivists, as in adherents of
the positivist school of philosophy, which advocated for rational planning
(05:21):
and economic development as a path of social progress. His
slogan was ban Opalo the bread or the stick, and
reflected the policy of rewarding compliance with prosperity while punishing
dissent with severe consequences. The liberty order and progress equation
sacrificed liberty as the Mexican people were expected to trade
(05:45):
freedom for the benefits of these policies. Workers ended up
facing low wages, long hours, and of course lacked rights,
while estate laborers were landless and under the arbitrary rule
of Mao demos. Education was largely restricted to elites in
major cities, groups like the Yaqi Indians were forcibly relocated
(06:05):
as cheap labor to plantations. Governors, those supposedly elected, were
effectively presidential appointees, monitored by Heife's politicals, who intervened the
local affairs. The rulatis and elite constabulary maintained order, but
often disregarded due process, which fostered a whole reign of
terror in the rural areas. Diaza's popularity eventually waned as
(06:28):
prosperity was monopolized by a small, often foreign elite. This
elite emulated European customs, which created a stark divide with
the growing proletariat and middle classes. By the second half
of the nineteenth century, Mexico was caught in a contradiction
a state that promised emancipation through property rights while dispossessing
(06:49):
the very people it claimed to free. The liberal project
have feeled them, and in its failure, space opened for
deeper critiques of property power and the state itself. A
(07:10):
younger generation began questioning the system, and with this rise
in criticism, gim rise and repression, which set this stage
for the Mexican Revolution of nineteen ten.
Speaker 3 (07:21):
This whole era of the of like the turn of
the millennia and the start of the twentieth century has
like so much of this same stuff happening all over
the world. Like that's kind of one of the biggest
trends that we've been able to see throughout your Latin
American anarchism series, is like how how much they all
mirror each other, and like how much of like a
global movements used to exist, like not like a organized fashion,
(07:45):
but like there's like some like other force that is
that is like a driving these like global trends of
like revoltant revolution. Yeah, and like we see this a
lot in like the yeah, like the nineteen ten to
nineteen twenty time period, I mean even just in Latin America.
Speaker 4 (08:03):
Absolutely.
Speaker 2 (08:04):
I also think, of course, it's really easy to notice
these trends and notice these tides of history in retrospect.
You know, when you submerged in it, it's just like,
you know, all these conversations and stuff happening, for sure,
all these events and stuff happening around you. But when
by looking in the past you could say, oh wow,
this is like a global pattern. You know some I'm
always curious to see, like when we look back, I mean,
(08:27):
the twenty tens are already over. The narratives around it are
still formulated, right, We're still in the midst of the
nineteen twenty in the nineteen twenties, the twenty twenties, say,
you know, the narratives around it will still be developing
all now. But we're already halfway through, and I'm sure
people have already seen certain trends that are going to
make for some excellent retrospective commentary.
Speaker 4 (08:48):
Definitely.
Speaker 3 (08:49):
Yeah, Like the past ten years we've seen this like
global far right power grab and this like rebirth of
right wing populism sweeping a whole bunch of neoliberal democracies,
like post nineties, post War on Terror, post end of
history stuff where you see like the full extent of
like the Clinton, Reagan Thatcher economics completely completely crumble with
(09:11):
far right populism like taking taking over the reins of
most popular consciousness. Yeah, to the point where even like
the more like liberal parties are being quote unquote forced
to adopt like similar rhetoric looking at like like like
the Labor Party in the UK and hear in the States,
how how much like the Democratic Party last year, like
completely caved on like far right populist talking points on
(09:35):
immigration and stuff.
Speaker 4 (09:36):
Exactly exactly.
Speaker 2 (09:38):
I think part of it as well as a failure
to advance a positive, totally direction and a positive program.
Speaker 1 (09:44):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (09:45):
You know, when we allow the tunes of discourse, the
arena discussion to be dictated by the right, when we
simply react to what they are saying, when we simply
respond to their policies and their efforts, you know, we they.
Speaker 4 (10:00):
Slew down the progress of their goals.
Speaker 2 (10:03):
But ultimately, as long as we are engaged in dialogue
with their goals, they are stoly inching their goals closer
and closer to reality.
Speaker 4 (10:10):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (10:11):
Yeah, that is certainly the trend that I've been seeing
the past ten years, and I'm sure sure many people have.
Speaker 2 (10:16):
Yeah, I mean, the overturn windows pretty much entirely dictated
by what they decide. You know, I think I've mentioned
this before. The right to decided they wanted to talk
about critical race theory, and then critical race theory became
the center of conversation.
Speaker 4 (10:29):
The right decided they wanted to target.
Speaker 3 (10:32):
DEI gender ideology.
Speaker 2 (10:35):
Right, Yeah, and then that becomes the whole thing is
the whole center of discussion. They're not putting forward the
policies that are going to hurt pretty much everybody as
the center of their policy.
Speaker 4 (10:46):
That's more like an aside.
Speaker 2 (10:47):
When they give themselves, you know, salary raises and they
cut taxes on the ridge. That's not the center of
their political messages.
Speaker 4 (10:54):
Center the plical messages.
Speaker 2 (10:56):
You know, various culture related issues that they can use
silly their base, but it's nothing that's actually benefiting people,
you know. And instead of circumventing that that effort to
dictate the course of conversation and dictate our own conversations
instead what it's kind of following along the tail. But
(11:18):
that's a bit outside the scope of this a bit
of a digression here. But before we get to the
point of the Mexican Revolution, though, we should really take
a look at the slow and sell development of radical
ideas in Mexico during the nineteenth century. You see, indigenous
resistance persisted throughout Mexico's history through often quiet, revolved acts
(11:40):
of non cooperation that would steadily ensure that Spain could
never fully establish his dominion even after independence. The cldinal
structure lived on in the haciendas, the church, and the state.
So the indigenous communities would continue to resist, sometimes in
profoundly anti authoritarian ways, by the nineteenth century. And this
history is courtesy Anahill Cappialities anarchism Latin America. As I
(12:02):
mentioned in eighteen sixty one, a man arrived in Mexico
with a very distinct name. He was Platino Constantino Rourkanati.
He was a Greek immigrant, radicalized by the revolutions in
Europe and steeped in the works of Furia. Was a
utopian socialist and prudon who was an anarchist Fuist anarchist.
(12:24):
He had fled the counter revolutionary tide crashing over the
continent with a mission. Rocannati believed Mexico, with its long
standing indigenous traditions of communal landholding and mutual aid, was
the perfect place to plant the seeds of a new
utopian society. And in a lot of ways he was right.
Speaker 4 (12:42):
You know.
Speaker 2 (12:42):
He saw in the hero system the indigenous Kuna lan
Tenniel a living echo of the kind of society utopians
in Europe could only dream of. Where the liberally saw backwardness,
Rourkanati saw potential. His aim wasn't to civilize these communities,
but to learn from them and held them protect their
autonoity from the encroaching state through political philosophy and practice.
(13:06):
He seems to be a very interesting fellow, by the way,
I mean. He apparently spoke seven languages. He practiced medicine
by day and philosophy by night. He was a Christian,
but not anything like the Christians that dominated Mexico at
the time, because as an hil Caplite, he puts it
for him, the essence of Christianity is charity, that is
love for all, as it is taught in the Gospels,
(13:28):
and that essence is the moral foundation of socialism and
revolution as well. Pure Christianity, he wrote, is the religion
that will regenerate the world when people finally come to
understand the power of its basic principles liberty, equality, and fraternity.
But it is Christianity without dogma like Saint Simon's and
without priesthood, liturgy, or hierarchical organization, the model for which
(13:50):
he finds in the life of Jesus and his earliest followers.
Primitive Christianity is authentic Christianity, but has been entirely degraded
by the Catholic and Protestant churches, and has nothing to
do with so many sects that call themselves Christian end quote.
A few months after his arrival in eighteen sixty one,
he published a socialist primary in Mexico that marked him
as the first anarchist to put forward distinctly anarchist theory
(14:13):
in the country. In the mid eighteen sixties, he formed
a group called Lass Socil the goal of spreading the
ideas of mutualism, free association, anti capitalist cooperation through books,
pamphlets and education. Barucannati and his collaborators launched workers schools
aimed the promoting literacy, political consciousness, and autonomy. Once at
school was the Esquila de Rio id Socialismo, the School
(14:37):
of Lightning and Socialism Hellier. It combined moral instruction with
a deep critique of the exploitative labor system. This was,
you know, education as a rebellion, not just to read,
but to recognize the exploitation and to imagine alternatives. Rotconnati
thought of his socialism as the fullest expression of the
(14:58):
French revolutionary motto of liber equality and fraternity, which no
half measure like liberalism could ever reach. He recognized that
the immediate objective must be quote, the extinction of poverty,
the distribution and increase to the commonwealth, the abolition of prostitution,
and the conservation of all our faculties, including the intellectual, physical,
(15:18):
and moral ones, for the transformation of humanity through science, beauty,
and virtue end quote.
Speaker 4 (15:25):
One of those things was not like the others.
Speaker 2 (15:26):
I'm surely you noticed there was a standout in inclusion there,
but it makes sense considering his background. He also saw
himself as a cosmopolitan, perhaps owing in part to his
unique circumstances as a man with a Greek father, Austrian mother,
a French education, and Mexican who He said, quote, we
(15:46):
are Cosmopolitans by nature, citizens of all nations, and contemporaries
to all the asias. The greatest and most heroic human
actions belong equally to all end quote. In other words,
our country is the entire world, and all men are brothers.
He also wrote that the abolition of all government in
(16:07):
the nations, which frightens you and you consider impossible and absurd,
they have never tried it will usher in a totally
new world of institutions in which the peoples of the
world will live in happiness end quote. Brouclati was a
(16:30):
pacifist and as a prosch anarchism, which bought his original instruction
of socialism being via Charles Furia. But eventually he came
to understand the need for a class struggle, as he said, quote,
a social revolution in which many heroic victims will be
sacrificed in the sacred altar to restore the justice denied
it to the people end quote. His work attracted young radicals,
(16:52):
many of whom would later play key roles in the
development of Mexico's labor movement. Before he started Lass social
he had initiated the first group or is Sudiante Socialistas,
from which game figures such as Santiago Vilenueva, who tried
to organize the worker's movement, Permeneghillo, Phil Vicencio and Francisco's
at a Costa a leader of rural masses. It's the
(17:14):
core of this group that would help him to create
lessocl which would educate and agitate but also assist workers
beyond mutual aid to an active class struggle posture in
defense of the interests against bosses. So basically he took
these mutual aid societies and made sure that they didn't
stay mutual aid societies, that they were radicalized into resistance societies,
(17:36):
because those sort of mutual aid associations were very common
in Latin America at the time. You know, workers would
create these little groups where they would try and support
each other. But it's very easy to fall back on
that and to assume, you know, that's all you have
to do. Making sure that they have a radical posture,
a revolutionary posture. It's important to ensure that you're not
just rest in your laurels and expecting change to come
(17:57):
to you, and indeed they did not expect the change
to come to them. In June eighteen sixty five, these
resistant societies supported the first industrial strike in Mexico. Unfortunately,
it was crushed by the leader of the country at
the time, Emperor Maximilian, but it was his occupation and
the economic harshness of it all that fermented the spread
(18:18):
of anarchist ideas. Another student tut of Rocannati school came
Julio Chavez, a precursor to the more famous Emiliano Zapata
and a fervent anarchist communist. He agitated for a peasant
rebellion and engaged in land expropriations, which grew in popularity
wherever he was active, from the chalcot Tex Soco region
where he began, to all the states of Quebler and Morellia,
(18:42):
as Capelletti recounts, quote, the federal army finally moved against
him and defeated and imprisoned. He was executed in eighteen
sixty nine by order of President Benito Juarez. Before he died,
Chavez cried out, long live Socialism end quote. His manifesto,
which was written of few months before he died, would
help introduce more masses in the Mexican movement to the
(19:04):
idea of class struggle, and like a light bulb over
one's head, it immediately made it clear who was responsible
for their suffering. Santiago vid and Weever, and a fellow
student Rocanati named Vila Vitensio worked arduously to organize the
artisans and workers in Mexico City, and they definitely had
the cards stacked against them, but they helped to organize
(19:24):
an industrial strike in a textile mill in eighteen sixty eight,
and in eighteen sixty nine they established a Circulo Peraltario
and in eighteen seventy the Grand Seculio de Obreros de
Mexico and in eighteen seventy one the newspaper Al Socialista.
And this is when the red and black so famously
associated with anarchism came into the Mexican workers movement. The
eighteen seventies saw struggles between radical and moderate factions among workers,
(19:48):
proletarian presses making a name for themselves, and the first
Convention of the General Workers Congress of the Mexican Republic
in eighteen seventy six with a manifesto that indicated the
crown influence of libertarian ideology in Mexico. Of course, there
was a tension in that Congress between the socialists and
the anarchists, but water is wet. Sadly, Mexico wasn't ready
(20:10):
for revolution, or rather, the ruling class wasn't. While Rovercinnati
and others sold seeds among students and workers, the country
was swinging toward reaction.
Speaker 4 (20:22):
As I mentioned.
Speaker 2 (20:23):
Earlier, with the rise of Porphilrio Diaz in eighteen seventy six,
any space for radical thought began to close. Diaz, the
strong man of Oneization, was obsessed with order and progress.
He welcomed foreign capital, built railroads across the nation, and
gutted the countryside to make room for exports, and he
crushed dissent. While Rocnati avoided outright persecution thanks in parties
(20:47):
foreign status and pacifist leanings, the educational projects he inspired
were dismantled or sidelined. The more confrontational elements of the
early anarchists current went underground. Those who spoke of abolishing
property or questioned the Porphyria vision of modernity were met
with jail, exile, or worse. Rotcarati's allies, Alacosta, through his
newspaper Like International, promoted a twelve point socialist agenda, advocated
(21:11):
and universal social republic, municipal autonomy, workers' rights, workers associations,
wage avolition, and property equality. Despite Diaz's rise in eighteen
seventy seven, he led a present uprising in Sierra Gorda
and planets to La Baranca, battling federal forces until eighteen eighty.
(21:31):
Despite his defeat and imprisonment in eighteen eighty one, the
rebellion persisted. Salacosta's ally, Colonel Alberto Santa Fe, introduced the
Lays del Pueblo, Influenced by Mercunan's ideas. Though not a
purely anarchist manifesto, this document emphasized land distribution, national industry promotion,
army suppression, and free education. Salafe argued that true Mexican
(21:55):
independence depended on reclaiming stolen lands, a movement which, of
course ski in traction among the peasants. General Negrete supported
Santa Fe's revolutionary efforts, just as he had backed Chavez,
Lopez and Sanlacosta earlier. Santa Fe's resistance against Diaza's dictatorship
was more radical than mayor electoral opposition. It aimed at
transferring sovereignty to local municipalities and land to peasant collectors. However,
(22:21):
by the eighteen nineties, Diaz effectively suppressed most worker movements
through bribery and repression. While industrial workers and miners fared
slightly better than the peasant, wages steadily declined after eighteen
ninety eight. Rodocanati left Mexico in eighteen eighty six after
giving over two decades of his life to the cause,
But as two decades of so and seeds would eventually
(22:42):
flourish in the Mexican Revolution. What will be covering in
the next episode Thanks for tuninen A madrasage. You can
follow me on YouTube at andrewism and patron dot com
slash Saint Drew.
Speaker 4 (22:55):
Thanks again. This is it Could Happen Here. All power
to all the people peace.
Speaker 1 (23:04):
It Could Happen Here is a production of cool Zone Media.
For more podcasts from cool Zone Media, visit our website
Coolzonemedia dot com, or check us out on the iHeartRadio app,
Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts. You can
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