This book shatters many misconceptions about foreign investment in Latin America. Viewing the foreign investor as neither cruel oppressor nor friendly benefactor, Jonathan Brown shows that the dynamic growth of the Mexican oil industry resulted from both the infusion of external capital and Mexico's own economic restructuring - conditions similar to those under which free markets are today being revived throughout the hemisphere. Brown's voluminous research into the operations of the British and American oil companies in Mexico between 1880 and 1920 reveals their involvement in the political and social breakdown that led the country to revolution in 1910. Brown weaves a fascinating, sometimes exciting story out of the complicated maneuverings among oilmen, politicians, diplomats, and workers in a period of massive social upheaval. Oil companies brought capital, technology, and jobs to Mexico, but they also threatened its deeply rooted social heritage. Brown shows that the Mexican response to this double edged situation was far more effective than has been recognized. Mexicans of all classes sought to impose their own traditions on the powerful companies, if only to prevent modern capitalism from destroying Mexico's political and social structure. Their success was remarkable. Lively provocative but evenhanded, with darts of wry humor, Oil and Revolution in Mexico will engage a wide variety of readers: business, economic, political, labor, and social historians and students of Latin America, revolutions, foreign investment, and international relations. |