Judith Adler Hellman

Mexican Popular Movements, Clientelism, and the Process of Democratization

The study of new social movements in Latin America has proven irresistibly attractive to many scholars. Examining these movements allows us to explore the formation of new identities, the emergence of new political and social actors, the creation of new political space, and the overall expansion of civil society. While all or any of these phenomena seem sufficiently intriguing to claim our attention in their own right, the most common rationale offered for the study of new movements is their apparent link to the democratization process. Through the last decade, in books, articles, and, above all, doctoral dissertations produced around the globe, scholars have justified their interest in new social movements in terms of the presumed importance of these organizations in the consolidation of democratic institutions. Most theorists writing in this field would agree with Alvarez and Escobar (1991) that these movements have “a democratizing impact on political culture and daily life” and “contribute to the democratization process.” The problem for most analysts is that we do not know enough about how this takes place, that is, the way in which “grassroots democratic practices [are] transferred into the realm of political institutions and the state.” When I look at the gap between the broader theoretical discussions of the question and

Social Movements: Revolution, Reform and Reaction

AbstractNACLA continues its celebration of its thirtieth anniversary with this ongoing series of “anniversary essays.” We have asked prominent NACLA-affiliated intellectuals and activists to reflect on the past 30 years of Latin American history and politics through the prism of the ideas, concepts and events that have been central to our understanding of the region. In the following essay, Judith Adler Hellman examines the evolution of the left’s approach to social movements over the past thirty years.

Immigrant ‘space’ in Italy: When an emigrant sending becomes an immigrant receiving society

Summary This article examines the social and political responses to the new flow of immigrants to Italy from outside the European Union. First, the Italian experience is compared with the rest of Europe with respect to such questions as the characteristics of the immigrants themselves, and the response to them on the part of political parties, the church, the unions, and the state at local, regional and national levels. Next, broader comparisons are drawn between the Italian case and that of classic ‘societies of immigration’, particularly with regard to the structure of economic opportunity available to the extracomunitari in Italy.

Migration in the Americas: Permanent, Cyclical, Temporary, and Forced

can Migration. Edited by Wayne A. Cornelius, David Fitzgerald, and Scott Borger. La Jolla: Center for Comparative Immigration Studies, University of California, San Diego, 2009. Pp. xii + 250.

Social Movements and Economic Transition: Markets and Distributive Conflict in Mexico. By Heather L. Williams. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001. 239p.

24.50 paper. Migration from the Mexican Mixteca: A Transnational Community in Oaxaca and California. Edited by Wayne A. Cornelius, David Fitzgerald, Jorge Hernandez-Diaz, and Scott Borger. La Jolla: Center for Comparative Immigration Studies, University of California, San Diego, 2009. Pp. x + 268.

54.95.

29.50 paper. Seeking Refuge: Central American Migration to Mexico, the United States, and Canada. By Maria Cristina Garcia. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2006. Pp. xvi + 274.

Mexico Under Fox (review)

24.95 paper. American Guestworkers: Jamaicans and Mexicans in the U.S. Labor Market. By David Griffith. University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 2006. Pp. xv + 234.

Introduction to the Special Issue on International Migration in the Americas

59.95 cloth.

Patriarchy on the line : labor, gender, and ideology in the Mexican maquila industry

Students of social movements have long struggled to explain why insurgencies occur where and when they do. In this excellent study, Heather Williams examines two contemporary Mexican movements—one rural, one urban—as a means to explain why unrest develops, when movements form, and what movement activists are likely to do once they manage to construct an organization and articulate a set of collective demands. Expanding on the work of Doug McAdam, Sidney Tarrow, Charles Tilly, and other scholars who have wrestled with these questions, Williams is concerned with the way in which Mexicos successive economic crises, and the implementation of neoliberal policies in response to these crises, influence the manner in which the dispossessed organize and press their demands on the state.

Mexico in crisis

At the halfway mark in the six year term of Mexican President, Vicente Fox, coeditors Luis Rubio and Susan Kaufman Purcell assembled a group of experts well equipped to assess the performance of the Fox regime and the national and international standing of the President himself. Luis Rubio sets the tone for the volume with an opening chapter focused on the process of democratization, with particular emphasis on institution building, while Edna Jaime addresses the ambitious goals and largely disappointing results of Foxs economic program, and Juan Pardinas examines Foxs mixed record in the fight to raise the standard of living of the Mexican poor. However, a full half of the book is devoted to the examination of Mexicos foreign relations. In three chapters contributed by Andres Rozenthal, Luis Carlos Ugalde, and Susan Kaufman Purcell, knowledgeable commentators reflect on the Fox governments global and regional foreign policy initiatives and failures with particular emphasis on Mexicos relations with the United States.