This dissertation examines the provision of public beneficence during the Porfiriato using the Hospicio de Pobres, a home for poor and orphaned children, as a case study. Although Mexican historians have usually found the origins of public welfare services in the 1910 Revolution, the Porfirian state did attempt to improve the administration of beneficence. In the case of the Hospicio, the state built for it a modern facility which opened in 1905. This not only represented an improvement in living conditions for the children interned there, but also served as a very visible symbol of the desire of the Porfirian state to be modern It is argued that the Hospicio represented a sphere of interaction between the state and poor families in Mexico City. The use that poor families made of the Hospicio is as important as the elite view of the institution. Although some children living there were orphaned or abandoned, most had some family connection. Poor families used the services of the Hospicio as a tool to cope with their poverty and often interned their children only temporarily. Families particularly requested education for their children there, believing, as did the state, that this was the path out of poverty. Social and institutional history are not seen here as two distinct areas of study. The history of the poor is also the history of their dealings with the state, and the history of the state is also the history of its ideas about its poorest citizens / acase@tulane.edu
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:TULANE/oai:http://digitallibrary.tulane.edu/:tulane_24318 |
| Date | January 1998 |
| Contributors | Mitchell, Margaret Tyler (Author), Greenleaf, Richard E (Thesis advisor) |
| Publisher | Tulane University |
| Source Sets | Tulane University |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Rights | Access requires a license to the Dissertations and Theses (ProQuest) database., Copyright is in accordance with U.S. Copyright law |
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