Mexican Miracle
After the era of Avila Camacho ended in 1946, the spirit of revolution still held the country of Mexico enraptured. While it transformed its citizenry from pragmatic public agents to denizens of great hope, it also lent legitimacy to the governments in place until 1970. By the time they stalled in a frozen revolution, the "Mexican Miracle" of 1940-1968, the legacy of the now governmentally-installed revolution manifested itself in the independence witnessed after 1940. At that point, the new paradigm for leadership pushed for the nation's industrialization, fostering growth among the working and middle classes. These social changes were manifested in Mexico's economics, social fabric, and reputation.
During the time of the "Mexican Miracle," urban bourgeoisie came into such capital that they were able to, for the first time independently, link with foreign investments and markets became a reality, and so by 1960 Mexico was once again as engulfing as it had been during the Porfiriato. ISI's decision to centralize industrialization was a direct reaction to Cardenisimo, but it resulted in a schism between the members of the revolutionary elite. Policy soon followed, clarifying relations between the private sector and the state that would consume the Mexican economy for the next few decades.
It was the duty of the state to create and maintain economic infrastructure, but it was deemed inappropriate for it to intervene...
Quite soon, a mixed economy emerged, with the optimistic state reveling in overzealous development and in constant war with the market-supported bourgeoisie. The agreement they had created was effective in not only the development of a functioning economy, but was also the directly contributing factor to the "Mexican Miracle."
On average, the Mexican economy grow 6% every year between 1940 and 1980, and between the years of 1940 and 1960, national production boomed 320%. (Wyman, 83.) The structure of the economy was markedly different as a result of the "Miracle," with the largest numbers now seen in the manufacturing industries, juxtaposed to historical reliance on agriculture and agrarian economies. Increased production meant an implicit deluge of goods and services, which was unmatched by population growth. While the ratios did not parallel, the population certainly grew, and soon the previously bustling countryside was filling the streets and sidewalks of Mexico's cities in a mass-cultural urban migration.
In 1940, only 20% of Mexicans lived in cities. Others remained in their countryside villages, where the agriculture that had so controlled Mexican economic history was rooted. (Handelman, 17.) But in 1940, the already struggling agricultural economy accounted for only 10% of its national product; within ten years, that number…
