Description

“Different Plans”: Indigenous Pasts, the Partido Liberal Mexicano, and Questions about Reframing Binational Social Movements of the 20th Century

Inspired by evidence found while researching the grassroots base of the binational Partido Liberal Mexicano (PLM) of the early twentieth century, Weber argues that indigenous organizing in binational and other social movements is more a continuity of older patterns than a novel rupture. The PLM was a revolutionary social movement; its leadership was linked to the base by traveling organizers-propagandists who dispersed PLM ideas and helped to make it the largest and most radical threat to Mexican dictator Porfirio Díaz from 1906 until late 1910. As the author pieced together shards of materials, it became clear that indigenous organizers and groups were critical to the PLM. This article focuses on how indigenous knowledge and memories about the past, some embedded in differing conceptualizations, might become part of a plural understanding of pasts.

social movement history, Partido Liberal Mexicano (PLM), indigenous knowledge

Citation: Social Justice Vol. 42, Nos. 3-4 (2015): 10-28