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The Mexican Industrialization Program (MIP) began as a solution to unemployment in the Mexican border region and to the loss of competitiveness of US firms vis-á-vis import competition. US and Mexican tariff exemptions facilitated the relocation of labor-intensive assembly operations from the US to the Mexican border region. Critics have argued that arrangements of this type are quickly undermined by developments in both the developed and the developing country involved. In the developed country, protectionist measures intended to defend the jobs of workers who are in competition with lower wages in developing countries might threaten the viability of coproduction. Critics also predict that social unrest stimulated by exploitative work conditions endanger this arrangement in the developing country. However, this paper concludes that in the US the impulse to protect jobs from relocation has been blunted by the desire to permit US firms to enhance their competitiveness by relocating labor-intensive stages of production in low-wage labor markets. Reinforcing the competitiveness rationale, that US opponents of the MIP lack a viable specific policy to oppose the participation of US firms has crippled their efforts. In Mexico the threat to the MIP posed by social unrest has been reduced by the low-wage level and lack of employment opportunities in the Mexican labor market. In that market maquiladoras offer the most economically vulnerable workers needed jobs and in some maquiladoras relatively attractive work conditions. Where their economic vulnerability does not ensure worker acquiescence, the desire to maximize employment has led the Mexican government to tolerate labor control tactics and on occasion to intervene to suppress labor unrest. / Master of Arts

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The sudden and steady increase in the involvement of women in the Mexican labour force beginning in the 1980s, signifies a major shift in gender roles and activities. It is a little studied outcome of Mexico's combination of economic crisis (which served to increase the supply of female labour) and subsequent adoption of neoliberal economic policies (which stimulated the demand for female labour). In fact, what is not known, are the implications of this employment for the Mexican women themselves. The dissertation moves beyond the existing literature on the gendered consequences of employment and economic development, by bringing in the citizenship literature to help define women's status. Specifically, the dissertation proposes a way of determining these consequences by examining three dimensions of women's status, two of which refer to women's roles and capabilities in the public sphere---political and economic---and one which refers to women's status in the private sphere---the household. By disaggregating the status variable, the dissertation highlights the significant improvements in women's status while identifying the remaining obstacles to gender equality. The dissertation develops a number of measures of women's multidimensional status, and assesses the differences between employed and non-employed women using data obtained from a survey of women in Mexico City. In the economic sphere, the findings indicate that employment improves women's status by enhancing women's independence. Employment provides women with the economic resources that enable them to lessen their dependence on men. At the same time, women continue to face inequality in the labour market, signifying the continuing subordination of women. In terms of women's household status, the findings show that women retain the primary responsibility for childcare, and for the maintenance of the home. This inequality is significant, and serves to limit further improvements in

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Seeds have become one of the most contested resources in our society. Control over seeds has intensified under neoliberalism, and today four large multinational corporations control approximately 70 percent of the global seed market. In response to this concentration of corporate power, an international social movement has emerged around the concept of seed sovereignty, which reclaims seeds and biodiversity as commons and public goods. This study examines the relationship between the global dynamics of commodification and enclosure of seeds, and the seed sovereignty countermovement for decommodification. I approach this analysis through an ethnographic case study of one local seed sovereignty movement, in the indigenous central region of Chiapas, in southern Mexico. I spent eight months between 2015 and 2016 conducting field research and documenting the development of the Guardians of Mother Earth and Seeds project, a local initiative focused on seed and food sovereignty that was initiated in 2015 by DESMI, the most established NGO working in this region. It encompasses 25 peasant communities--22 indigenous and 3 mestizo--from the Los Altos, Norte-Tulijá, and Los Llanos regions of Chiapas. I also collected data from 31 other communities in the region involved to varying degrees with this agenda of seed and food sovereignty. This study incorporates both communities affiliated with the Zapatista Army of National Liberation (EZLN) and non-Zapatista communities. Three research questions guide this dissertation: (1) How do the increasing industrialization and commodification of seed systems and agriculture affect peasant communities in Chiapas?; (2) How is the local seed and food sovereignty countermovement responding to those processes of commodification?; and (3) How does this case study contribute to understanding the relationship between capital's tendency to enclose the commons and the protective countermovements that attempt to resist such market encroachments? This study found that the development of industrial agriculture and the commodification of seeds at the global and national scales have implied neither the displacement of these communities' native seeds by commercial seeds, nor their privatization--two of the most frequent potential risks denounced by representatives of the national and international seed sovereignty movement. Instead, the main impact of industrial agriculture and Green Revolution policies in the study region has been the chemicalization of peasant agriculture, with attendant negative impacts on the environment and human health. I also found that subsistence agriculture--the main mechanism through which native seeds are reproduced within communities--is undergoing a process of severe deterioration, which partially responds to the neoliberal dismantling of governmental institutions and programs supporting peasant agriculture. A key finding of this research is that the deterioration of subsistence agriculture is the main risk that the neoliberal restructuring of agriculture poses to native seeds. In response to these developments, communities in this study have embraced a project of decommodification focused on enhancing and expanding their subsistence agriculture. This project encompasses agroecology, food production collectives, and initiatives for agro-biodiversity conservation and ecological restoration. I argue that this project contributes to the decommodification of subsistence agriculture in the region, primarily by strengthening the non-commodified structures that are essential for these communities social reproduction.

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This research is an exploration of the applicability of a methodology to the study of decision making on migration in Mexican households. This thesis shows the importance of using multiple respondents in order to examine the role of women in decision making within Mexican households that have migrated. Women's roles in the processes of decision making and migration are varied, but individuals in all households studied indicated that migration is a family, rather than individual, decision. Gender differences appeared in responses to many questions, emphasizing men's and women's different priorities. The most striking differences emerged between spouses in the same household, and the results show the inaccurate picture that can develop if one household member is used to represent all members.

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