In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:

Reviewed by:
  • Mexico: From Moctezuma to the Rise of the PAN
  • Peter M. Ward
Mexico: From Moctezuma to the Rise of the PAN. Jaime Suchlicki. Washington D.C.: Potomac Books2008, 3rd Edition. Pp. xiii and 233, map, photos and index. $24.95 (paperback) (ISBN 978-59797-168-3).

Having not read the first two editions of this book (published in 1996 and 2001) I am not able to assess how far this edition differs, although the structure suggests that it has probably changed rather little. The bookends are new, of course, and comprise a preface and a few final pages on the prospects for the Calderón presidency. (It goes no further than the first few months.) The first few pages are very well executed, offering a quick overview of the achievements and failings of the Fox presidency (2000-2006), and this brings the reader into the volume and offers a sense of immediate challenges that Mexico faces today. These challenges are further explained in Chapter 1 "Understanding Mexico" which offers the reader a guide about how best to fathom the contradictions that underpin the nation: the Catholic Church versus the political system; liberal versus conservative political spectra and cultures; north versus south; race and ethnicity, and so on.

So far, so good, but thereafter the volume becomes what, I suspect, it has always been in previous iterations, namely a historical narrative from the Pre-Columbian period to the present. In this respect the book's title "From Moctezuma to the Rise of the PAN" [End Page 208]is somewhat misleading since it actually goes much further back in Mexico's history than Moctezuma (who was fifteenth century) – and it does so very well. And, truth be told the rise of the PAN actually goes back to late 1930s with important political success and development in the 1980s and 1990s, none of which are discussed. In Suchlicki's book the PAN appears to "start" with the Vicente Fox victory in 2000. The title further misleads insofar as it is not about Mexico, but only about the historyof Mexico, narrated across some fifteen chapters that cover the principal periods from pre-Columbian, through the conquest and colonial periods, to the Bourbon century, Independence movements, Santa Anna, the liberal reforms and Juárez, the Porfiriato, revolution and post-revolution, the rise of the PRI, the years of crisis 1994-94 and so to the "rise of the PAN". This, too, is fine, and Suchlicki writes his history well: it is a clear, interesting, and fast paced. It is also an authoritative narrative and will serve very well as an overview of Mexican history. But that is all it is -- a history -- and that should have been reflected in the book's title.

I enjoyed the two chapters where he pauses and breaks out of his section-by-section history and examines in depth, first "The U.S.-Mexican War" (chapter 9), and second "Mexicans and Mexican Americans" (chapter 18). Neither topic features very extensively (if at all) in most standard Mexican histories and are important, therefore, not least for a largely US audience at which, I assume, the book is targeted. They are also important in providing a hinge around which Mexico-US relations may be analyzed, past, present and future.

Overall, though, the book resembles the English adage of the "curate's egg –(being) good in parts". I have mentioned the good: the less good relates to the failure to do justice to Mexico beyond that of its historical narrative. There is no geography to speak of: neither physical nor environmental analysis; there is no discussion of urban and rural development challenges, indeed urbanization and the major Mexican cities (including Mexico City itself) are untouched. So, too, is the social and cultural underpinning of Mexico largely ignored. At best these are mentioned in passing as a vague backdrop to the historical foreground. The same is true for the political process, which is discussed in pure narrative, and does little justice to major political figures and challenges in Mexico's political economy – even the most recent and familiar ones. For example, Calderón's PRD nemesis – Andres Manuel López Obrador...

pdf

Share