Democracy And Dictatorship in History of Mexican Revolution Free Essay Example

The Porfiriato Era began in 1876 – 1911 when Diaz along with his supporters and army took complete control of the Mexican government. Diaz won the presidential election in the 1877 and started abusing his dictatorial powers from that point on, repressing democracy and freedom in his own country for the next 35 years. Diaz felt as if Mexico wasn’t ready for choosing a new leader to be put into office, like the U.

S do when practicing democracy. This investigation will discuss about some of the reasons why Diaz presidency failed, such as the economic and cultural limitations he put on his country by giving a most of Mexico’s land to countries like the U.S and Europe, the class separations that Diaz reign caused, and the people Diaz choose to be around and surround himself with.When Diaz came into presidency most of the land had been untouched, even with the past president’s trying to lead Mexico in a new direction.

Mexico at the time had a serious long list of foreign debts and their politics were pathetic in the European countries.

Diaz believed that if Mexico wanted to make progress ,they would first need to change the stigma with their polities and give them a update. During his first term, Diaz put Mexico’s economics as his first priority in order to better his country. Throughout the Porfiriato, the government passes numerous settlement acts that made the common land in Mexico, available to bring in foreign settlers to construct and repair them.

The government had taken about a quarter of the territory in Mexico by 1906, land they had no right over but would take by force from the peasant villages.

According to Meyer, Diaz cut his own salary and those of his close employees in order to create a better government policy in the hopes of reducing bandits and to make cities along the border in order to bring in more foreign investors. Even with this economic reform were indeed made for Mexico’s benefit, their was not enough money to keep this policy going therefor failed. In Diaz’s second term, Mexico experienced its first economic incline as electrical and water power started replacing man and animal power strength. This was significant because as Mexico started to become a potential profit for mining and oil, the U.S and Europe began entering Mexico in the 1880s.

The Porfiriato built and brought many different industries into Mexico but the upkeep of all of these industries were only made for the wealthy. Another consequence allowing private companies to take a third of any unclaimed land and constructing railroads, mining, telegraph lines and oil, expanding the interest of people to Mexico. The ever growing popularity of foreign and domestic investment left many farmers homeless and with a negative view at the corruption these investors were causing. This uneven balance of wealth led to workers leading riots in order to get higher wages and many people were killed. Therefore by 1906, the stock market crashed and many factories had to be closed down. Another reason Diaz dictatorship failed was his ownership of all the new modern industries that made the already rich, richer, and the poor at the bottom. Under Diaz, liberals were made wealthy along with the foreign investors. Even with all the new economic infrastructure and all the jobs the were creating , they did not pay much leaving most of the Mexicans dirt poor. This is significant because with the new economic restoration booming, then to be rapidly plummeting caused serious injury to the Mexican economy. Also, with the Mexican revolution was a direct result of Diaz making a fast economic incline and another issue was the new industries only seemed to favor the wealthy and not peasants.

According to McManus, when Diaz set his ownership on the economic uprising, a wealthy man named Francisco I. Madero was the very first person to question this oppressive rule, become a idol for the working and peasant classes. Due to Diaz’s increase in investment by other countries,he only outed the middle and poor classes, while the wealthy took control of this isolation by expanding into peasant territory with Diaz permission as the poor had to give their land to the wealthy leaving many of them landless with no ways to feed their families If the peasants did not give up their land freely he would send his Rurales, an elite police force with immunity to take the land by any means necessary. The rurales had the right to kill or rob anyone who disobeyed Diaz’s wishes.This is significant because as more people were left without land, the anger built up against Diaz and Madero saw an opportunity to remove him from his dictatorship with the help of the now landless peasants that were in slowing rising in number. Finally, the people and crowds Diaz would surround himself in would also lead him down a path to failure.

Diaz was growing old and soft, alongside his cabinet members as not a single one of them was under the age of sixty. There was no new modern young person under Diaz administration, with fresh ideas and new world views. According to Werstein, Diaz had long since surrounded himself with none other than his very own devoted, loyal, and faithful followers, who would bend to Diaz every will as they were rewarded by Diaz for their servitude. Diaz created pan or palo were he would win people other and lure them onto his side with gifts such as large estates and others would be rewarded with being provided certain political privileges.

The people who choose to be part of the Porfiristas, the ever growing group of Diaz followers, prospered and lived really good lives. The others who did bow down to Diaz, lost everything they ever had and in some cases had to flee Mexico and or died. The significant because Diaz gave bandits that were behind bars the choice to pick between being loyal to him and serve him or stay a bandit and die. He made those bandits who choose pan, enroll into his elite police force and gave them immunity and gave them everything they could ever dream for in exchange they would hunt down other bandit gangs who were not serving Diaz and kill them if they refused Diaz offer. In hindsight, this led the people to choose pan, in order to continue to live and get a reward out of saying yes. Their was also the cientificos, a group of scholars, government officials, and lawyers that helped advise Diaz presidency. This elite group of wealth rose up holding racist beliefs turning into a philosophy called positivism.

Since Diaz rarely stopped to think about the consequences of his actions or think about those he was close to, the cientificos or scientific ones, found that Daiz was very gullible and uses that to control Daisy’s actions to have complete control of power. With Diaz being so clueless, the cientificos practically had control over the government and planned how they would take over after Diaz was gone. Even his own group of elite government advisors, planned against him after giving them so much.It can be concluded that the most significant reason for the downfall of Diaz was his overwhelming fashinastion in trying to make Mexico’s economic system fit the structure of the modern era. Diaz wanted other countries to only witness the greatness that Mexico had to offer and not the poor part of his country that he tried to hide. He was so invested in making Mexico more established like the U.S and Europe, that he did not notice the conscuses of all the rapid economic growth he was causing.

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