Post 2: Road to Modernization
During these last view classes, we have continued our discussion on Latin American independence, specifically Mexico. As we have been discussing the hardships the newly independent countries went through, it was all the same for Mexico. Mexico had received their independence, and then they began to have problems that involved their economy, society, and government. The country tried to figure out the way they were going to increase their economy because they had debts they have to pay off and they need money to begin their modernization process. Although, this was much harder because of all the land that they did have and the disunity of the people living within the country. With this disunity throughout the country, the citizens had different political preferences that then made it harder to find a way to rule that will please everyone. However, everybody knows that no matter what decisions are made, there will always be people who dislike that outcomes of the decisions. Which is shown through the different changes of power throughout the few years after they gained their independence. This changing in power begins when they believed Agustin de Iturbide should be the king, but he immediately disbands the Congress created and goes back to the type of government that made them fight for their independence in the first place, a monarchy. I believe this shows how the leaders of the revolt and those fighting had different goals with gaining their independence from the Europeans. Once Mexico dealt with Iturbide, with the help of Antonio Lopez Santa Ana, they truly began to change leaders. What I found to be interesting to learn was that Santa Ana was the president 11 times, but only being elected once. However, I wonder if he had the same supporters that always made it possible for him to be president because he was changing his views against the leaders that people didn't like. As he changed his political stances, did his supporters change? Also, how did they not notice that he was changing his stances every time there was a disliked leader? If they did know, they must not have cared. We also read an interesting story in Serrata's part of the class, which was The Slaughter House. This book was written by Esteban Echeverria and was about two political parties, Federalist and Unitarians, and the problems between the two at the time. This was a problem as well for succeeding and progressing as an independent country. Although this story took place in Argentina, all the other countries faced the same disunity problem, which stumped the growth of their independent countries and their modernization.
I personally enjoyed reading Israel’s latest blog, because he not only talked about the obvious disunity that was going on in Mexico in the nineteenth century, but he also took a step farther and talked about why it existed to begin with. One thing I found very interesting about his blog his how he clearly defined the reason for why disunity existed in Mexico: the fact that individuals or regions of Mexico had different political preferences and ideas towards which type of government the country should run by. While some parts of the region wanted to become modernized nation, like the Europeans, other wanted to continue in their traditional way of living, like the natives, who were used to their city-state way of life. I would further his argument about his reasoning for disunity in Mexico and say that all of the personal preferences that people had on what the country should be like were stemmed from their own personal experience with the Europeans towards the end of the colonial period. Because everyone had different experiences being under European rule, individuals began to have different views on how govern the nation, prompting that sense of disunity among the masses.
ReplyDeleteHis discussion on the leaders of Mexico is what really caught my eye as I read this essay. I understood in class that Santa Ana changed his political spectrum constantly to adhere to the situations occurring in Mexico at the time, but I never really considered why. Israel used a lot of critical thinking to bring about questions about Santa Ana’s changing political spectrum that I never thought of nor considered. For example, he questioned that since Santa Ana had supporters for him, did they change as he moved from one political spectrum to another? He also questioned why no one really noticed his changing political stance, as many people did not like the current Mexican leader that was in power. Before now, I just viewed this political tactic as him moving from one spectrum to another to benefit his own personal interests. Never did I consider, however, if he changed his supporters or if the people were fully aware of his wishy-washy attitude politically. All in all, Israel blog post showed a lot of in depth thinking and understanding of both national disunity and the political movement of Santa Ana.