Workers, Neighbors, and Citizens: The Revolution in Mexico City

by John Lear

Workers, Neighbors, and Citizens examines the mobilization of workers and the urban poor in Mexico City from the eve of the 1910 revolution through the early 1920s, producing for the first time a nuanced illumination of groups that have long been discounted by historians. John Lear addresses a basic During one of the great social upheavals of the twentieth century, urban workers and masses had a limited military role, yet they emerged from the revolution with considerable combativeness and a new significance in the power structure.



Lear identifies a significant and largely underestimated tradition of resistance and independent organization among working people that resulted in part from the changes in the structure of class and community in Mexico City during the last decades of Porfirio Diaz's rule (1876–1910). This tradition of resistance helped to join skilled workers and the urban poor as they embraced organizational opportunities and faced crises in wages and access to food and housing as the revolution escalated. Emblematic of these ties was the role of women in political agitation, street mobilizations, strikes, and riots. Lear suggests that the prominence of labor after the revolution was neither a product of opportunism nor one of revolutionary consciousness, but rather the result of the ongoing organizational efforts and cultural transformations of working people that coincided with the revolution.

Genres: History

441 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2001

About the author

John Lear’s research and teaching interests include Mexico, Cuba, post-independence Latin America, comparative labor and urban history, cultural politics, and gender and social movements. His newest book, Picturing the Proletariat: Artists and Labor in Post-Revolutionary Mexico, 1908-1940 (2017) considers relations between artists, the state and organized labor during this period. His first book, Chiles Free-Market Miracle: A Second Look (1995), examined neo-liberal policies in Chile. His second book, Workers, Neighbors and Citizens: The Revolution in Mexico City (2001), explored urban mobilization in the Mexican Revolution. He is currently working on a political biography of Diego Rivera, to be published by Verso. He has written a variety of editorials on contemporary Latin America for local newspapers. Lear taught a first-year seminar on Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera. Other courses included Modern Latin America, Modern Mexico, History and Film, Art and Revolution in Latin American, and a travel seminar to Latin America. He speaks Spanish, French, and some Portuguese.

Reviews

[Chuck · Rating 3 out of 5]

I particularly enjoyed the discussion of the anarchist elements in the labor movement of the time. Well researched and comprehensive.