Geoforum 35 (2004) 545–548

www.elsevier.com/locate/geoforum

The non spaces of critical geography in Mexico q

Blanca Ram�ırez 1

Universidad Autonoma Metropolitana-Xochimilco, Apartado Postal 313-3, 62251 Morelos, Mexico

Received 4 December 2002; received in revised form 25 November 2003

Abstract

The paper examines the limited presence of critical geography in Mexico and analyses why the lack of theoretical discussion

means there is a need for theory from abroad. Different stages in the development of our critical practice, our links with planning

programmes, and a lack of relations with other Latin American countries are all salient features.

� 2004 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Keywords: Critical geography; Planning programmes; Theory; Mexico; Latin America

For those of us who have chosen to work from a

critical perspective in Mexican geography, it has been a

difficult path to follow. I studied to become a geogra-

pher at the Universidad Nacional Aut�onoma de M�exico

(UNAM), and now I teach and do my research at the

Planning School of the Universidad Autonoma Metro-

politana Xochimilco (UAM). One of the reasons I amnot still at the UNAM School of Geography is that I

was very critical of the theoretical and political ap-

proaches of the people working in that institution.

One cannot say that critical geography exists in

Mexico. There is no practice of critical analysis that

allows perspectives different from those of the tradi-

tional geography taught at the UNAM to emerge. To

illustrate the conservative character of the discipline inMexico, one need only to look at the undergraduate

curriculum. This curriculum is now more than 40 years

old (Chias et al., 1994, 78), with few changes made––and

no radical ones––since 1967 (ibid.). I was taught this

curriculum during the seventies, and it is the same one

taught to those trying to obtain their degree today. Not

surprisingly it is descriptive, traditional, lacks any ex-

plicit theoretical perspective, and has almost no politicalposition on contemporary problems.

q Modified document of the talk presented at the opening plenary

session of the 3rd Conference of Critical Geographers, held in

B�ekeczaba, Hungary, July 2002.

E-mail address: bramirez@correo.xoc.uam.mx (B. Ram�ırez).1 Member of the National Network of Urban Research.

0016-7185/$ - see front matter � 2004 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

doi:10.1016/j.geoforum.2004.01.012

Geography in Mexico was strangely isolated from the

revolutionary stream of development produced by the

post-revolutionary governments of the Partido Revolu-

cionario Institucional (PRI) during the 1940s and 1960s.

The critical perspective focused only on regionalization

for development at the end of the sixties (Bassols, 1967),

and Mexican geography accepted its institutionalizedposition in which teaching is the main activity, especially

in high schools. In this sense, the objective of discipli-

nary practice is to generate knowledge of the spaces of

the national post-revolutionary State without any cri-

tique of the way in which development took place and

differences were generated within the country.

An organization of radical geographers was born as a

result of a strike at the UNAM in 1976. Bringing to-gether students and lecturers for the first time, the Uni�onde Ge�ografos Progresistas de M�exico, A.C (Union of

Progressive Geographers of Mexico) came into being in

1978. While those of us involved in this organization did

try to create a space to discuss and reflect on geo-

graphical practice at a national level, our main focus

was on the way in which this area of knowledge had to

change at the UNAM School of Geography. We fo-cused our efforts on designing a new curriculum which

would produce an internal shift in reflection and prac-

tice. However, individualism and an inability to find a

clear direction caused this initiative to fail.

Nevertheless, in 1983 the Union began publishing a

journal called Posici�on, devoted to critical spatial anal-

ysis with an emphasis on the new schools of geographi-

cal thought and an analysis of the situation within the

546 B. Ram�ırez / Geoforum 35 (2004) 545–548

School of Geography (Uni�on de Ge�ografos Progresistas

de M�exico, 1988). All in all 8 issues of the journal were

published on an irregular basis until 1999.

In the early 1990s there was a new wave of hope,when a group of students began a movement aimed at

changing the curriculum. This movement was supported

by the University authorities, but not by most of the

traditional geographers teaching there. In the end the

authorities stopped the students, and no changes were

made to the way Geography was taught.

In the meantime, since the 1970s two new geography

programmes have appeared in other towns: in Toluca incentral Mexico in 1972, and later on in the western town

of Guadalajara. These programmes focused on planning

and ‘‘ordenamment du territoire’’, but neither of them

included critical perspectives in the curriculum. These

institutions managed to bring the hegemony of Geo-

graphy in the capital of the country to an end so far as

teaching was concerned, but geographical practice in the

form of research was still weak and was given littleimportance in national networks and seminars.

The Schools of Planning were an alternative which

made it possible to include critical perspectives on ter-

ritorial concerns in the curricula. Even if the Schools’

curriculums contained more urbanism than geography,

their inclusion of spatial aspects have proved important

to the development of territorial research in Mexico.

Notable amongst these was the undergraduate pro-gramme in Human Settlements (now called Territorial

Planning), which was created at the Universidad

Aut�onoma Metropolitana-Xochimilco as a result of the

impact of the growth of cities and the publication of the

Law of Human Settlements in 1970. This programme

included Marxist theory due to the importance at the

time of structuralism in Europe, and specifically France,

for understanding urban changes in Latin America.There were also the M.Sc and Ph.d programmes in

Architecture and Urbanism at the UNAM’s Faculty of

Design. These included programmes with different views

and theoretical alternatives. One of these was an inde-

pendent programme which came out of the debates of

the 1968 student movement, called ‘‘Autogobierno’’. It

was based on a Marxist perspective and was closely

linked to urban social movements.These programmes had an impact on urban and

geographical practice in different areas of knowledge,

including geography, urbanism, and urban sociology.

Research would be required to examine further the

nature of this impact and the border crossings which

have taken place between these different areas which I

imagine have provided an alternative space for those,

like myself, who have not been able to find spaces ofreflection or critical perspectives within the study or

practice of geography itself. As these other areas use

geographical tools such as cartography and regional and

spatial analysis in the first stages of the curriculum, a

solid background in geographical knowledge is needed

in order to understand social and urban changes. Such

knowledge is also needed later on in urban or regional

planning.Nowadays, although there are a few critical geogra-

phers, they are not teaching in geography. Instead they

are to be found teaching in other departments where the

schemas are more open, or else working in government,

where there is a small possibility of diverging from the

official and neo-liberal positions. These critical geogra-

phers accept new trends in geographical thought, and

because they are part of the establishment they can opennew spaces of geographical practice, using new biblio-

graphies and techniques, such as GIS. The cartographic

revolution of Geographical Informational Systems is in

fact ‘‘the new trend’’ in geographical thought in Mexico

nowadays.

However, there are a few radical geographers who

think socialist transformation is the way to change

society and that this can be achieved through the prac-tice of critical geography. These geographers have very

few spaces of action; they are mainly in higher educa-

tion, and they teach that transformation of neo-liberal-

ism is possible if we think of planning cities and places

through a critical analysis of contemporary capitalism.

In this context, the Anglo–American hegemony in

critical thought is probably not so dangerous in Mexico

as is the lack of theoretical and political perspectivewithin contemporary geography. This hegemony actu-

ally has a contradictory effect. Why do I say this?

On the one hand, Anglo–American hegemony offers a

starting point for theoretical and political perspectives,

because Mexican geography is producing no such pers-

pectives of its own. In this sense, those who have stud-

ied in Britain, the United States, Spain or France tend

to include the positions and discussions from thosecountries in the theoretical and methodological per-

spectives of their geographical practice. It is important

to expose students to these discussions, which have been

introduced in the country not only by geographers but

also by sociologists, urbanists and more recently

anthropologists interested in theories and practices

about space.

At the same time we have to be careful, becauseaccepting the theories of the North and Center as unique

or superior means adopting subordinated position

within the generation of knowledge in the international

division of labor. To accept theories from abroad might

help us transform the backward state of critical geo-

graphy in our country, but that does not mean we

should deny the possibility of generating our own the-

oretical reflection.On the other hand, however, Anglo–American hege-

mony is also responsible for the tradition of quantitative

geography in Mexico. Just like in the areas of its origins,

it is descriptive, general, and more orientated towards

B. Ram�ırez / Geoforum 35 (2004) 545–548 547

physical geography. Its influence is now widespread, not

only in geography departments but also in planning and

urban studies, as the chief means by which space is in-

cluded in physical and social practices.Anglo–American hegemony has from the outset en-

joyed two main forms of institutional support. Firstly,

there is pressure from the National Council of Science

and Technology of Mexico to link local knowledge

production to knowledge production of the quantitative

Anglo-American schools of thought. It has already

decided which schools we should study in, to obtain

postgraduate degrees and the subjects we need to de-velop and study within them in order to enrich our re-

search and teaching. Grants and financial support are

only available to study in those schools, and critical

programmes or subjects are hardly included at all in the

‘‘approved list’’. At the same time, neo-liberal policies in

higher education have meant that a part of academics’

salaries are now linked to productivity. Academic rele-

vance and ‘‘value’’ are decided on by a Council wherecritical perspectives get little recognition, and this has

direct consequences for our positions within our own

institutions.

Secondly, there is a tendency to evaluate our pro-

duction highly if it includes Anglo–American, French or

German bibliographical sources. Thus we tend to prefer

to use those kind of references and eliminate others from

our own work, particularly theoretical sources. In bothcases, we can assume that Anglo–American hegemony

receives support from those at the top of educational

policy making, and can be understood as part of the

intellectual division of labor in which countries from

the South do empirical work, while theory comes from

the north.

Lastly, not all Latin American countries share the

same influences. Brazil and Argentina, for example,have seen important developments in critical geography

(Uribe, 1998). This is especially the case with the former,

as the latter has mainly applied its experiences to

teaching. The Milton Santos school and the importance

of his thought, not only in Latin America but in the

North as well, deserves an analysis of its own in order to

measure its impact on the way we understand local

realities (Santos, 1973, 1996). Nevertheless, LatinAmerican countries do share some points with other

countries, including Spain, a country which has had an

important role to play in the translation of French and,

to a lesser extent, Anglo–American books into Spanish.

This point suggests a line of research and closer exami-

nation.

In general, one of the main problems is the isola-

tion of academic experiences, even among differentLatin American countries. This concerns not just criti-

cal geography but our knowledge of the region as

well. Sometimes it is cheaper and easier to travel

and participate in Anglo–American or European

seminars or encounters than ones held in South

America. Moreover it is easier to get support to

travel to the North than to the South, despite

similarities in our political contexts and everyday prac-tice.

In the light of these comments, one might ask a

number of questions. How can the situation of critical

geography in Mexico be improved? What might the

future hold in store? And what could critical geography

be in this context? In relation to other places, one might

expect that to be critical or to introduce critical geo-

graphy into our own contexts will produce differentcontents and meanings. This is another task we face as

critical geographers.

We could perhaps give priority to achieving the

following four goals. Firstly, to accept that theory is

important, and at the same time that we, as countries

of the South, can and have to think theoretically.

That does not mean we have to stop meeting and

exchanging experiences with our colleagues in theNorth. On the contrary, as critical geographers we

need a new political strategy of interdisciplinary

culture which allows voices from both North and

South to be heard, eliminates intellectual dependency,

and in which the North accepts that voices from

the South are relevant so far as reflection and theo-

retical orientations are concerned (Ram�ırez, 2000,

541).Secondly, we can bring about this new culture by

working both with other critical geographers in Latin

America, with whom we currently have few connec-

tions, and with our colleagues in the North. Isolation

and atomization have been among the main charac-

teristics of Mexican critical geographers. It is therefore

necessary to break down barriers and share experi-

ences whilst accepting our differences in order toproduce lines of thought that also correspond to other

experiences.

Thirdly, there is a strong need in Mexico for geo-

graphy to introduce its research into subjects which have

so far been left to the influence of other areas. Gender

and feminist studies, as well as political geography could

be seen as two good examples of where we have been

absent.Lastly, geography has not been part of Mexican

politics, and geographers have been left out of impor-

tant decisions regarding development and change.

Geographical practice has in the past had an important

role in creating critical perspectives on regional develo-

pment (Bassols, 1967), and these have since been

adopted by institutions and academics. But only a few

geographers have joined social and critical movements,and only a few have thought from a critical perspective.

It is here where we have much work to do in order to

generate new critical perspectives, and with it a critical

geography.

548 B. Ram�ırez / Geoforum 35 (2004) 545–548

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