This tightly written, sharply focused book constitutes another step in redefining the political scene in early national Mexico. Using quantitative methods and a prosopographical approach, Donald Stevens examines the backgrounds and careers of radical, moderate, and conservative national leaders and cabinet ministers to test traditional interpretations of the causes of Mexican political instability. His positional analysis focuses on the politicians geographical origins, education, activities in the wars of independence, occupations, political experience and longevity in state or national office, wealth, residence, and household makeup.
Stevens initially tests some traditional hypotheses concerning the immediate postindependence period, particularly those linking Mexican economic and fiscal instability to volatile political change. His analysis finds that dramatic economic and fiscal fluctuations, such as irresponsible government borrowing, did not cause political instability; instead, political changes led the new nation into its deteriorating fiscal condition.
Having established—to his satisfaction—the primary importance of mercurial political change, Stevens examines and compares the careers and lifestyles of national leaders of all political persuasions. Not surprisingly, he confirms that conservatives came more often than not from Mexico City, supported the royalist cause in the wars of independence, had political experience primarily at the national level, and were wealthier than their radical or moderate counterparts. On the other hand, he finds that these same conservatives paid significantly less for housing in the Mexican capital than did moderates or radicals and, ironically, rented more often from private individuals than from the church. That radicals were more likely to come from the south and moderates from the north is generally accepted; but that there really was no “liberal crescent” surrounding Mexico City, that Veracruz produced far more conservative leaders than radicals, and that radicals rented more often from the church than from private individuals are all new findings. Moreover, Stevens establishes that the radicals, conservatives, and moderates who served at the national level together constituted a definable political elite, coming primarily from a small core of lawyers and military men, the latter differentiated partly by their service in the national army (conservatives) or local provincial militias (radicals).
With its focus on the common or uncommon attributes of Mexican national political leaders, this book and others, such as Barbara Tenenbaum’s Politics of Penury (1986), on fiscal crises of the early republican period, provide new dimensions to our understanding of Mexican state building. Innovative in its use of statistical methods and prosopographical analysis, this work has systematically confirmed some conventional wisdom and successfully exploded some traditional views about early Mexican republican politics. Stevens’ analysis creates a more meaningful framework for looking at the historical realities of early national Mexico.