2026/03/25 by Thomas Lindner · 1 voice · 1 citation
Social Sciences · Arts and Humanities · #Colonial History and Postcolonial Studies #Hispanic-African Historical Relations #Politics and Society in Latin America
paper · doi:10.14324/111.444.ra.2026.v11.1.002
openalex publication_date 2026/03/25 · openalex created_date 2026/03/26 · openalex updated_date 2026/05/21
During and after the Mexican Revolution, the issues of socialism and Indigeneity were discussed by politicians, intellectuals, journalists and political activists. The new revolutionary Mexican state was interested in these topics because Mexico had a large Indigenous population and some revolutionary factions were sympathetic to socialism. To meet internal challenges, people looked outside Mexico for inspiration and studied anti-colonial movements in other parts of the world. This article presents and discusses three case studies of anti-colonial movements – in China, India and Morocco – and how they were discussed in Mexico. The focus lies on the institutionalisation phase of the Revolution, roughly between 1917 and 1929. The article includes an analysis of these countries’ respective communities in Mexico, such as the Chinese community in northern Mexico or the Indian anti-colonialists in Mexico City, adding a social history perspective to the existing literature. The article argues that the Mexican Revolution, as perceived and constructed by many of its protagonists, was less internally focused than portrayed in historiography as global anti-colonial movements were an inspiration for the Mexican Revolution and its institutionalisation.