We explain what the Porfiriato was, its history and the characteristics of this period. Also, its causes and what its culture and politics were like.
What was the Porfiriato?
The Porfiriato was a period in the political history of Mexico during which the nation was under the authoritarian control of the Oaxacan military man José de la Cruz Porfirio Díaz Mori (1830-1915). It took place between November 28, 1876 and May 25, 1911, and was a key period in the historical development of the country, especially as a precursor to the Mexican Revolution.
In the years of the Porfiriato, Porfirio Díaz held the presidency for several consecutive terms except for a period of four years in which another politician (General Manuel González Flores) took office, but subject to his authority. Finally, shortly after the outbreak of the Mexican Revolution, he renounced power and fled to France.
The Porfiriato was a complex stage of Mexican political life, since It was a moment of modernization but also of annulment of political freedoms where a single political leader authoritatively governed the nation.
Key points
- The Porfiriato was a period in Mexican history that took place between 1876 and 1911, in which Mexico was governed by Porfirio Díaz.
- It was a stage of political stability based both on the establishment of agreements and on authoritarianism, political repression and press censorship.
- Porfirio Díaz promoted modernization, secular education, and foreign investments, especially in industry and railroads.
- Despite economic growth, the Porfiriato increased inequality and maintained political authoritarianism, leading to the Mexican Revolution in 1910.
See also: Student movement of '68
Characteristics of the Porfiriato
The Porfiriato It was a dictatorship that centralized power in the figure of Porfirio Díaz who became the leader of the entire country and whose will supplanted the guarantees established in the Constitution of the time, such as freedom of the press.
This was possible because he was very popular among the military, which allowed him to reform the army and subordinate the federal police and the rural police to the central government. So, exercised political repression and maintained authoritarian order throughout the country. However, this did not prevent rebellions, uprisings, protests and conflicts, but none managed to shake the government.
The continuity of the Porfiriato translated into a material boom the result of the opening to foreign investment and the liquidation of idle land, which was sold to private owners. They became large landowners, while the majority of peasants remained landless. Thus, crops (coffee, sugar, cotton) increased considerably, as did mining activity (silver, iron, copper, lead) and oil exploitation.
At the same time, the government insisted on modernization of the country for which he invested in public works and in the expansion of the railway network, whose dimensions reached 23,000 kilometers (compared to the almost 700 kilometers it had in 1876).
History of the Porfiriato
Porfirio Díaz had been a prominent soldier during the Reform War (1858-1861) and the second French intervention in Mexico (1862-1867), especially in the latter, where he received honors as a hero after recovering Puebla and Mexico City from dominion. foreign. Thanks to this, he had access to politics, where he competed against Benito Juárez in the presidential elections of 1867 and 1871, and was defeated on both occasions.
In 1872, after the death of Juárez, he was also defeated by Sebastián Lerdo de Tejada, against whom he rebelled militarily and gained support due to the unpopularity of the new president. Thanks to this coup d'état, Porfirio Díaz became president of the nation in 1876 and called elections for the following year, where he won. With the exception of four years in which Manuel González Flores nominally governed (1880-1884), Díaz monopolized the position of president of Mexico ever since.
The dictatorship of Porfirio Díaz lasted 35 years (if you count the years of the González Flores government). In his later days, he claimed that the country was ready for democracy, but he never made any real attempt to relinquish power.
When in 1910, at the age of 80, he again presented his candidacy for the presidency and was proclaimed the winner, political and social discontent unleashed, on November 20 of that year, the rebellion of the liberal politician Francisco I. Madero, that started the Mexican Revolution.
Porfirio Díaz was defeated militarily and politically, He resigned from the presidency on May 25, 1911 and left the country forever. In this way, the Porfiriato period came to an end.
Causes of the Porfiriato
The regime of Porfirio Díaz Its main cause was the Tuxtepec Revolution of 1876 in which the leader opposed the re-election of Sebastián Lerdo de Tejada and led a coup d'état which forced his resignation.
The Tuxtepec Revolution was motivated in part by the frustrations accumulated by Díaz in his successive electoral defeats, as well as by the growing unpopularity of President Lerdo, derived from his attempt to monopolize power through re-election.
Politics during the Porfiriato
Politics during the Porfiriato was largely subordinated to the will of the dictator and his alliance with the military. Although his arrival to power had occurred within the framework of an uprising against the re-election of Sebastián Lerdo de Tejada, in 1890 the government of Porfirio Díaz approved indefinite re-election which was not well received by the opposition sectors.
The political repression It was a common resource of the State during the Porfiriato, especially in the period from 1890 to 1908, in which its centralism, paternalism and authoritarianism were accentuated, all justified with the argument that the forced pacification of the country was necessary. This went hand in hand with the control of the press and the creation of the newspaper The Impartialwhich was dedicated to praising Díaz's measures.
The press censorship It violated the freedom of the press enshrined in the Constitution of 1857 and was protected by the so-called Gag Law of 1882, which allowed the Porfirio Díaz regime to exercise selective censorship against media that criticized the government and even imprison its journalists. In this way, opposition newspapers such as Regeneration They were closed and journalists like the brothers Ricardo, Jesús and Enrique Flores Magón suffered imprisonment and exile.
The foreign policy of the Porfiriato sought recognition from foreign powers since Mexico had broken diplomatic relations with some of them during the second French intervention in Mexico between 1862 and 1867, and Díaz had come to power through a coup d'état. He achieved, among others, the recognition of United States and Great Britain which was very important given that British and American capital was the most abundant in the context of foreign investment during the Porfiriato.
Culture during the Porfiriato
During the Porfiriato, a positivist philosophy ruled in Mexico which stimulated, among other things, the study of history and the construction of a historical discourse aimed at promoting national unity. Also a lot was invested in education national, in very modern terms: secular, free and obligatory as established by the Regulatory Law of Education enacted in 1891. In addition, Porfirio Díaz surrounded himself with a group of intellectuals known as the “scientists,” who provided him with advice.
On the other hand, a law was approved at this time to create the National University of Mexico, away from the influence of the Catholic Church and the Royal and Pontifical University of Mexico, which was considered a viceregal symbol. Many of these changes were expansions of Benito Juárez's previous management.
The literature was one of the arts most notable during the Porfiriato. Authors who had trained at the Liceo Hidalgo and who had been influenced by Romanticism contributed to this. Furthermore, with the restoration of the Republic in 1867, groups of writers had emerged with a common aesthetic project, who in many cases continued their work during the years of the Porfiriato, such as Ignacio Manuel Altamirano, Guillermo Prieto, Manuel Payno, Ignacio Ramírez, Vicente Riva Palacio, Luis G. Urbina, Justo Sierra and Juan de Dios Peza.
In addition, the Mexican boy genre theater appeared, a form of theater popular which played an important role in the times of the revolution.
Ideology of the Porfiriato
Porfirio Diaz belonged to the Liberal Party who had established a republic in Mexico in 1867 after defeating conservative forces. However, unlike other liberal personalities who came from the civil sphere, he considered that the military leaders had been marginalized from the political reconstruction process and that the republican leaders had not been able to pacify the nation and consolidate democracy.
For this reason, He combined his liberal ideas with the project of achieving social pacification at any cost even if it was a “forced peace” (that is, imposed by force). So, established an authoritarian regime under the slogan of “order and progress”. This slogan was based on positivist philosophy, specifically on the ideas of the French philosopher Auguste Comte (1798-1857), to which the “scientists” who advised Díaz adhered.
He positivism of the Porfiriato He proposed that scientific knowledge applied to the administration and modernization of the country should lead to social and economic progress (a formula known as “little politics and a lot of administration”). However, in a society characterized by political-military conflicts, the scarce democratic tradition and the resistance of indigenous populations that defended their ways of life, the Porfiriato argued that order and progress had to be imposed by force that is, through the centralization of political power, the signing of agreements with some social sectors and the repression and censorship of opposition and dissatisfied sectors.
How long did the Porfiriato last?
The Porfirio Díaz regime It began in 1876 and formally ended in 1911, with his resignation. In total, the leader spent 35 years in power: 31 as president of Mexico and four as a strong man behind the puppet government of Manuel González Flores.
Continue with: Mexican Revolution
References
- Garner, P. (2015). Porfirio Diaz. Between myth and history. Criticism.
- Serrano Álvarez, P. (2012). Porfirio Díaz and the Porfiriato. Chronology (1830-1915). National Institute of Historical Studies of the Revolutions of Mexico. https://inehrm.gob.mx/
- Tenorio Trillo, M. and Gómez Galvarriato, A. (2006). The Porfiriato. Economic Culture Fund.
- The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica. (2023). Porfiriato. Encyclopedia Britannica. https://www.britannica.com/
- Von Wobeser, G. (Coord.). (2014). History of Mexico. Economic Culture Fund.
