Cooption versus Cooperatives: The Alianza de Camioneros, the PRI, and the Consolidation of Power in Mexico City, 1937–48

In August of 1948, the Ministry of the Economy canceled the registration of the “18 de marzo” bus-line cooperative in Mexico City, ending a decade-long experiment in urban transport that had been plagued by fraud, financial problems, mismanagement, and labor disputes.  Since 1937, when President Lázaro Cárdenas had intervened on behalf of the group of workers attempting to acquire bus route permits who would later form the cooperative, Mexico City had grown dramatically and the country’s politics had undergone significant shifts.  In this changing atmosphere, not all transportistas were narrowly avoiding bankruptcy, however; while the members of the cooperative floundered, the entrepreneurs organized in the Alianza de Camioneros de México were consolidating their position both economically and politically. In fact, when the Cooperative finally collapsed, its operations were taken over by the Alianza, which had cultivated a close relationship with President Miguel Alemán and the Partido Revolucionario Institucional (PRI). 

The intertwined stories of the Cooperativa ‘18 de marzo’ and the Alianza, specifically why one failed and the other flourished, help to illuminate the pragmatic nature of the bargains struck between the state and the private sector during these years of political transition and how small capitalists gained increasing voice in urban policymaking. This paper will argue that in order to understand the shifts in Mexico’s political economy over the course of the 1940s, particularly in the urban sphere, it is necessary to examine the political relationships forged between mid-level actors in the private sector and political patrons.  As revisionist historians have observed, the PRI state in these years was not the monolithic hegemon of early interpretations.  While the PRI-state was not all-dominating, it did obtain a significant measure of strength through the flexibility and pragmatism it displayed in coopting and incorporating entrepreneurs, such as those in the Alianza.