Many authors have used the term neo-Zapatismo. For virtually all of them, neo-Zapatismo is limited to the Zapatista Army of National Liberation (EZLN) and to one essential idea, the "revival" of Zapatismo. "Revival" implies innovation and transformation, but it does not make it clear that the EZLN is at the heart of a wider current that reaches beyond it and, in tum, transforms it. This thesis analyses civil neo-Zapatismo through its many networks. Civil neo-Zapatismo includes a wide variety of Zapatista sympathisers, "NGO" activists, militants from indigenous and campesino organisations, members of the urban middle classes and popular, altemative and marginalised sectors of society. At different moments and in different ways, these neo-Zapatistas supported the Zapatista political demands, and some of them also entered into strategic alliances with the EZLN. Taking into account their values and norms as well as their forms of organisation, six kinds of neoZapatista networks have been identified: agrarista, democratic-electoral, indianistaautonomist, "women's rights", altemative revolutionary and intemationalist networks. Their members took part in wider political debates which they transformed through their opposition to official discourses. In this thesis, I explore in detail the inter-subjective dimensions of social and political relations as well as the "moral grammars" that underpin the Struggle for Recognition that I found to be characteristic of neo-Zapatismo. Neo-Zapatistas link the recent past of "The Repression" with present-day "Paramilitarisation" through their "collective memories of grievances". The "low intensity warfare" waged in Chiapas after the Zapatista uprising became a key concept that helped to reinforce neo-Zapatista "transnational advocacy networks". This term was taken up and popularised by some "NGOs" and became a crucial factor to influence both national and international opinion and policy-making. Finally, I demonstrate that "the conflict in Chiapas" has become part of a new global model for the exercise of power and war through networks

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My research is concerned with how the Postclassic Mexica people developed their unique perspective of history and environment in a dynamic cultural context. By focusing on the process of conceptualization of the Nahuatl word 'xihuitl', I analyze the way the Mexica expressed their cognition. Xihuitl covers a range of meanings: 'turquoise', 'grass', 'solar year', 'comet', 'preciousness', 'blue-green' and 'fire'. To group these meanings may seem odd because there is nothing to connect them that is intuitively obvious in the modern sense. I propose that xihuitl represents an aspect of cognition peculiar to the Mexica, and is linked especially to the economic, political and religious concerns of the Mexica elites. The meanings covered by xihuitl were not established at one time but were a product of history the history of the Mexica's experiences in and of their ever- changing environment. The correlations of the meanings of xihuitl can be explained from a structural point of view. However, structural analysis does not reveal the dynamic experiential processes that produced such correlations in the minds of the Mexica. In order to account for this dynamic aspect of the concept, I employ a theory drawn from cognitive science. This theory argues that the meanings and representations of a concept are metaphoric extensions that derive from the central sense of the concept. Applying this theory, I examine the metaphoric extension of each xihuitl representation from the central sense. I also analyze the four media of expression linguistic, iconographic, material and ritual in which representations of xihuitl occur. The representations of xihuitl in each medium embody a particular aspect of the concept. At the same time, the concept as a whole was affected by the Mexica conceptual system the way the Mexica saw their world rooted in the connections they believed existed between themselves and those who established earlier Central Mexican civilizations.

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No description available.

This thesis examines Mexico's relationship with the Second Spanish Republic, and analyses the rationale behind the Lazaro Cardenas government's (1934-1940) decision to provide military, diplomatic and moral support to the Republic during the Spanish Civil War (1936-1939). The Mexican government sent arms and ammunition to Spain when other nations refused to do so, constrained by the so- called Non-Intervention Pact. Moreover, Mexican diplomats organised a covert network to buy arms in third countries and then re-direct them to Spain. Mexico also lent the Spanish Republic its diplomatic backing at the League of Nations, where its delegates defended the Republican cause and denounced both the Axis intervention and the democracies' inaction. The thesis also interprets the repercussions that such policy had on internal Mexican politics, and for Mexico's international position, most particularly with regards to the United States. The Spanish War generated a backlash in Mexico, with the growth of a domestic Right, heavily influenced by European Fascism and Spanish Falangism. Conversely, Cardenas' position concerning Spain ultimately afforded his government the backing of the Roosevelt administration in the final showdown with that Rightist opposition. Extensive reference is made to primary sources, mainly diplomatic documentation and newspaper reports of the period.

Anastasio Bustamante was born in the modern day state of Michoacan in 1780. He served the Royalist Army during the insurgency (1810-1821). He was one of the first officers to adhere to Agustin de Iturbide's Plan of Iguala in 1821, and a signatory of the Act of Independence (28 September 1821). He was a member of Mexico's first independent government, the Junta Provisional Gubernativa (1821- 1822) and served as the Captain General of the Eastern and Western Internal Provinces during Iturbide's short-lived reign as Emperor (1822-1823). He served as the Commander General of the Eastern Interior Provinces between 1826 and 1829. In 1829 he became Vice-President of the Republic. In December 1829 he led a successful rebellion against the incumbent President, Vicente Guerrero. He served as acting Head of the Executive between 1830 and 1832. In 1837 he was elected President. He occupied this position until 1841. He commanded the troops of the Western Division during the war with the United States (1846-1848). Between 1848 and 1849, he oversaw the pacification of one of the many rebellions of the Sierra Gorda (now the Sierra de Queretaro). He died in Guanajuato in 1853, aged 73. This study examines Bustamante's military and political career. It rejects the traditional interpretation of the General, which portrays him as a weak and indecisive man lacking in any real political principles. Instead, it argues that Bustamante was a resolute and pragmatic leader, who supported the cause of moderate federalism for most of his career.

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No description available.

The pronunciamiento was a political practice with its origins in early nineteenth-century Spain. It was a form of political petitioning usually undertaken by coalitions of military and civilian actors to make demands against regional and national governments and negotiate political change. The petitions were generally accompanied with the threat of the use of military force should the demands not be met. As such, pronunciamientos have been defined by Will Fowler as “forceful negotiations.” The pronunciamiento developed as a political practice in a context of institutional disarray and contested legitimacy as a response to the constitutional crisis in Spain (1812-1820), and it became a particularly popular political tool in early independent Mexico (1821-1876) in a context in which successive governments experimented with new political systems. The fact that the institutions these governments created needed to acquire a political legitimacy that was stable enough to replace that of the Ancien Regime would prove problematic. It would be this context of uncertain legitimacies that would allow the pronunciamiento to develop a legitimacy of its own. It was an extra-constitutional, subversive form of political participation. It was used as a last resort by political actors who believed that, in the particular circumstance of having constitutional routes closed to them or of the government having broken the social pact, they had a right to insurrection to protect the people from the abuses of unjust or tyrannical government. As it developed in early independent Mexico, the pronuciamiento became one of the most used practices for effecting political change. Pronunciamientos were used at one time or another by political actors of all social classes and political persuasions. They preceded most of the major political changes of the period on both a regional and national scale, be they changes in government, the introduction of new laws or a change of political system. Pronunciamientos have often been referred to in the historiography of early independent Mexico as military revolts or coups. The pronunciamiento has thus been seen as a cause of instability and evidence of praetorianism in the political life of nineteenth-century Spain and independent Mexico. However, recent and current research on the subject, including the project at the University of St Andrews “The Pronunciamiento in Independent Mexico 1821 – 1876” of which this PhD is a part, has resulted in a revision of this narrow view of pronunciamientos as revolts and coups. The project and its affiliated researchers have developed a picture of the pronunciamiento as a political practice which was much more intimately involved with the newly developing constitutional institutions than previously thought. This PhD is a contribution to that revision which uses regional history to analyse the nature and evolution of the pronunciamiento. It is a study of the dynamics of and political actors involved in pronunciamientos in the state of Jalisco in western Mexico between 1821 and 1852. Jalisco in the early national period was a geopolitically important state and a popular place from which to launch pronunciamientos. Many political actors from within and without the state chose to launch pronunciamientos from Jalisco some of which had a significant impact on regional and national politics. To date there has been no thoroughgoing study of the phenomenon of the pronunciamiento as it developed in Jalisco. This analysis of the pronunciamientos which took place in Jalisco shows that pronunciamientos were used by all political actors to effect political change and had a very real effect on the lives of those directly involved as well as those of the general public who witnessed pronunciamientos on the streets of their towns and cities. It shows how pronunciamientos became closely interconnected with the newly developing constitutional institutions and how, while most pronunciamientos were recognized by all political actors as potential bearers of instability, the pronunciamiento was also considered to be a legitimate form of political participation given the extraordinary circumstance of a lack of recognised or legitimate government. The research demonstrates that pronunciamientos launched in Jalisco had a central part to play in the development of the new political order in the “age of democratic revolutions” and during the transition Mexico underwent from having a traditional corporate society and polity to acquiring a modern liberal one. The findings of this study provide an insight into the way in which political culture developed in Jalisco in the early national period. Alongside regional studies into the pronunciamientos launched in the San Luis Potosí and Yucatán in a similar period carried out by Kerry McDonald and Shara Ali, this research helps to develop a picture of how Mexican pronunciamientos worked at a local level allowing for more accurate generalisations to be made regarding the pronunciamiento as a practice on a national scale. The study also contributes to an understanding of how politics worked in Mexico in periods of institutional disarray, uncertain legitimacy and political transition and how insurrectionary political forms became legitimised.