Connecting is Civilizing: Road Construction, Modernity, and the State in Mexico, 1925–60

This paper explores the creation of a road-based transportation network in Mexico between 1925 and 1960.  Starting virtually from scratch in the 1920s, by the mid-1960s Mexico was connected by over 55,000 kilometers of paved roads and had 1.2 million registered vehicles.  Although crucially important to supporting Mexico’s economic “miracle” in the middle years of the century, this transformation has received remarkably little scholarly attention. My paper argues that roadbuilding was a special kind of public works project – something of an empty vessel into which different groups could pour their own ideas and expectations.  This characteristic shaped the evolution of the network in key ways.  By conceptualizing the project as it did, the state was able to enlist key segments of the private sector in an alliance to build both national highways and equally important rural roads.  What started as a highly centralized and closely administered effort in the 1920s, had been transformed into a locally directed and funded project by the late 1940s.  In this way, the national state was able quickly to expand the scope of Mexico’s road network despite limited resources.  At the same time, the transition to roads was closely bound together with the economic integration of North America, especially between Mexico and the United States.  Again, the conceptual flexibility of roads and their power as symbols of unity and hemispheric solidarity allowed the state greater leeway to carry out the project.  Always conducted in the shadow of the great Porfirian railroad boom, which had largely served the interests of U.S. capital, the construction of a road network necessarily enmeshed Mexico in new webs of interdependence with the United States.  These shaped the development of Mexico’s road network, but did not thwart it, largely because of the symbolic power and flexibility of roads.