Containing the Poor: The Mexico City Poor House, 1774-1871

by Silvia Marina Arrom

In 1774 Mexico City leaders created the Mexico City Poor House—the centerpiece of a bold experiment intended to eliminate poverty and impose a new work ethic on former beggars by establishing a forcible internment policy for some and putting others to work. In Containing the Poor Silvia Marina Arrom tells the saga of this ill-fated plan, showing how the asylum functioned primarily to educate white orphans instead of suppressing mendicancy and exerting control over the multiracial community for whom it was designed.With poverty, begging, and homelessness still rampant in much of Latin America today, this study of changing approaches to social welfare will be particularly valuable to student and scholars of Mexican and Latin American society and history, as well as those engaged in the study of social and welfare policy.

Genres: Nonfiction

416 pages, Paperback

First published January 28, 2000

Reviews

[Greg Boyer · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very cool local history of Mexico. The Foucault references are neat but I got a bit lost in the weeds since I'm really not an expert in him in any way