Mexico

[Fighter]

Reading about recent comments Hugo Chavez had made about the President of Mexico implied that Mexico is waiting for Fox to join him in his socialist quest.

Is there a genuine socialist movement in Mexico? I go there a lot, have friends on both sides of the border (I'm in California) and never find any Mexicans who are interested in revolution. Most want to make more money for their families, on both sides of the border.

I'm the one talking about a profitless society, and they're telling me they just want more cash.

Is Chavez attempting to speak over the head of Fox, indirectly to the Mexican people, to encourage a socialist movement?

[which doctor]

I would say that Mexico is one of the exploited countries. A tool of capitalism. There is a somewhat of a revolutionary struggle, mainly in chiapas, but besides that I don't think there is much.

[Jimmie Higgins]

I guess it depends on where you go in Mexico. If you go to a border town, that's like going to Las Vegas to see what Americans are like; most likely you will meet many poor people in Vegas who want more cash.

THere was a great deal of support for the Zapatistas among urban Mexicans, from what I've read, and so I would say there probably is a lot of sentiment and support for the left.

Everyone in capitalism who dosn't have cash wants it. If there was a large revolutionary movement, then people who, right now, are struggleing only to make money, might see that there is a possibility to end a life of scroungeing and always coming up short, so they would possibly join the movement.

[Guerrilla22]

The people who live in Mexico as wel as the rest of latin America are in very desperate situation. Quite a few pwople in those countries are mostly focused on where their familie's next meal is going to come from, let alone political revolution. That said you'll find that their worldview is very leftist leaning.

[Sankara1983]

Mexico has innumerable social organizations and left-wing groups, many of which are named after and/or claim to follow Zapata, Cabañas, Magón, Cárdenas, Villa, and other historical leaders of the Mexican left. There are certainly role models, but genuine leftist sentiment is not present in any of the major institutions because of very restrictive electoral laws and the omnipresent influence of the corrupt PRI. The PRD (a social-democratic party) has numerous currents, and even some Trotskyist entryism, but their presidential candidate for 2006 is much closer to reformist Lula than leftist Chávez. Even the Mexican green party is run through with questionable dealings. I'm not sure of the character of Partido del Trabajo, which has Congressional seats.

For many Mexicans the promise of the 1910 revolution is still meaningful.

[Fighter]

Sankara,

Forgive my ignorance, but are you saying the revolution 100 years ago in Mexico was social/economic as well as nationalist?

[Black Dagger]

but are you saying the revolution 100 years ago in Mexico was social/economic as well as nationalist?

It was, yes- even if many of the 'promises' were not kept.