Street Democracy: Vendors, Violence, and Public Space in Late Twentieth Century Mexico

    Professor Garcia introduces the Mexican vendor’s struggle with two facts mostly unknown outside of the country; the vendor’s union is one of the biggest in Mexico, and unlike other unions, it is independent of the ruling party. If Mexico’s labor unions are mostly under government control without autonomy, then this doesn’t look good. The book focuses on the city of Puebla (in the middle of the country) where open-air markets are the primary source of purchase and the vendors are mostly women. Communist sympathies abounded in the 70’s and 80’s, along with theater productions about the vendors’ plight.

    

It seems like many of the women vendors are in it because they can’t find other jobs. Some of the characters in this study are illiterate, or failed to get jobs in the industries that existed in Puebla 30 years ago. Race and class play a huge part, because the wealthy city people didn’t want the shouts of the vendors or the mess of their wares. The Spanish and Lebanese industrialists, with their palatial homes, did not want to open their windows and smell cooking oil or hear crying babies. While the elite were consuming goods from enclosed stores in the shopping centers, the less affluent bought food, clothes, and other things from open-air vendors.

Throughout the book, classism, sexism, and racism come into play. I was shocked at how sexist Mexicans were towards women who worked in factories; they were thought to be diseased. Even the leftist unions disliked seeing women in factories because it didn’t jive with (what was in their eyes) the sanctity of motherhood and domesticity (never mind that these women would probably have rather stayed home like the rich Lebanese wives.) The classism is abundant in every part of the vendors’ struggle, starting with the way the poor often buy from street sellers because of the lower prices. It seems that the attitude towards street business changed when cars became commonplace and walking in the road was no longer safe. It also seems like the upper classes (keep in mind there was little upward mobility) didn’t like seeing lower-class people (often rural migrants) so close to their mansions.

    

The author manages to find a trove of resources for this book, going back to the 1940’s. Things don’t end well in this book. Puebla’s vendor district was turned into a shopping mall that nobody liked, with a food court that nobody wanted (selling the same disgusting food that American food courts assault us with) and the city had lots of urban renewal projects that failed. Activists for vendor causes were continually harassed by the government. Nothing changed.