Redemocratization in México: the paradox of the Guadalajara explosions of April 22, 1992

Abstract

It is the view of many scholars that Mexico is undergoing a process of redemocratization initiated by the student uprising of 1968. Many of these writers, who in this paper will be referred to as "optimists," share the belief that as a result of cumulative and continued pressures from civil society, the contemporary Mexican political system exhibits signs of metamorphosis. Pluralism, it is further argued, will be the culmination of this process. This micro-study empirically demonstrates a case characterized by paradoxes and conflicting realities that generate the reconsideration of the optimist's assertions. The data gathered in Guadalajara indicate an uneasy conexistence of subaltern resistance to, and acceptance of, the status quo. While not neglecting the fact that the Guadalajara explosions sparked a social movement among victims and sympathizers, the post-crisis response of the movement addressed the related problems within the regime's institutional structures and their behavior indicated the presence of interaction codes typically representative of the prevailing corporatist political system. On this reading, the views of the optimists are not totally rejected, but rather revisited.