Mexican Government Diaz, Villa and Zapata\'s Ideas

Mexican Government

Diaz, Villa and Zapata's Ideas of Government and the Individual:

Similarities and Dissimilarities

Government in many areas of the world has changed from one in which the people are the vassals of the government to one in which the government is the servant of the people. Individuals form societies because they have a selfish need for protection, and they form governments for that purpose. Unfortunately, those governments sometimes abuse their power and forget what the government is for. Mexico had three rulers in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries who epitomized divergent beliefs regarding the government and individual rights. This essay reflects the authoritarianism of Diaz, Villa and Zapata and how they dealt with the subject of individual rights.

Diaz

Porfirio Diaz had one of the longest reins as ruler of Mexico of any leader. Ostensibly he was the leader of a representative republic, but in reality he was a dictator who ruled the country with an iron fist. He believed that he was the "father of the nation" (43), and he treated his people as an authoritarian would. There are many examples of how Diaz ruled the people and what he actually thought of them. In one instance, his 80th birthday, Diaz invited dignitaries from around the world to a birthday celebration at his palace in Mexico City. The ambassadors were shown the innermost parts of the city that Diaz had sanitized of people, as well as grime, so that they could see his vision of Mexico. The poor meanwhile had been banished to the slums so that Diaz could look good in his whitewashed world (1, 2).

He was the epitome of the, seemingly, benevolent dictator who showed the world the good he did for his people while keeping the average citizen in abject poverty. The rights of individual citizens were wrapped up in what they could provide for the government and Diaz. He claimed the Mexican people as his children, but he was a very abusive father.

Villa

The problem with the government according to Pancho Villa is that it was all about Pancho Villa. He cared about the people only as far as he could use them. In comparing his style of leadership to Zapata's the book says "Villa had none of Zapata's mystical feeling about the soil or about the village as personality. He was more of a political opportunist, proactive where Zapata was reactive" (71). This meant that Villa was able to win the love of the people who fought for him because he needed them at the time, but in reality he believed that the peasants were scum the same as Diaz. There was really very little difference between Diaz and Villa. Both were opportunists who came from the poorest of the mestizos and rose to power through wheedling and strong-handed techniques.

As far as individual rights, he believed that the peons had none. It seemed that to him, they were a permanent working class who should have no higher ambition than that. He "went on record as opposing worker's rights to strike or form trade unions" and he tried to make sure that the full-blood Indians were kept in check (293). The people were subject to the rule of the governor, not the other way around.

Zapata

Emiliano Zapata came to power in Mexico as a peasant who was not willing to bow to the power that Diaz claimed. He was one of the first supporters of Madero, but he was also quick to denounce him when it became apparent that he was weak (110). Zapata was an unwilling leader whose only original ambition was to gain back the land that his family and other villagers had stolen by rich land owners. He actually went with a delegation to see Diaz prior to becoming one of the leading revolutionaries in the South of Mexico. He was basically forced to take the presidency because others, who manipulated him including Pancho Villa, realized how popular he was with the people.

Zapata had two main problems. First he was a great revolutionary general because he knew how to fight, but he was not skilled as a governmental leader. He was a motivator who could rouse an army to fight, but he did not have the skill of diplomacy. The second issue that caused Zapata to have a very short stay as the leader of Mexico was the fact that he believed in the power of tradition to a fault. The text says;

"Once it was settled what the extent of the village's land was, the village could either decide to keep it as common land with user rights, or divide it up and give individual title to smallholders" (315).