This volume contains the first two of twelve proposed monographs on aspects of Mexican economic history and thought. These deal with agriculture, animal husbandry, and land tenure from pre-Columbian times to the mid-1920s at the rate of several pages per century. Each part is written independently and includes its own bibliography. There is no unifying theme, such as a theory or a model of rural development, so that the reader is left with a loose collection of descriptive material from secondary sources and seemingly random quotations by social and economic commentators of the time.
This is not to suggest that the two principal themes, agricultural production and land tenure, are not of fundamental importance to the history of development. Indeed, Mexico is the archetype of an export economy in which social, economic, and political relations were continually influenced by the productivity of natural resources and the pattern of asset ownership. To relate the history of land tenure to the evolution of agricultural markets in Mexico would be a most useful exercise. One might well discover that the evolution of land ownership patterns corresponds to changes in domestic and foreign demand, agricultural technology, and the degree to which various sectors of the population participated in politics. The changing status of land tenure might be shown to have influenced the pattern of agricultural production and productivity once detailed statistics were examined in relation to both factor ownership and market conditions. The author does not choose, however, to engage in such an analysis.
Instead the reader must content himself with bits and pieces of factual evidence uncritically presented, plus unsupported social commentary. There is little new material. The data for production of agricultural commodities in the nineteenth century (including frijol and maíz) are taken directly from Estadísticas económicas del Porfiriato (El Colegio de México). One would have hoped for a more thorough investigation of the statistics and more basic research than is presented here, especially on the period before 1877. The section on land tenure omits data on the adjudication of land titles after the Reform, despite the fact that scholars such as Wilkie have unearthed records which shed considerable light on quantitative aspects of tenure change during the Porfiriato. In addition, there is little attention to the significance of varying production units such as haciendas and plantations, as they influenced rural income and welfare during the nineteenth century.
In the opinion of this reviewer the author has failed to discharge his responsibility to a) order and evaluate critically the evidence available on his subject and b) analyze its performance in terms of market forces and their underlying social and political determinants.
