M exico, Worker Struggles and Labor Unions, 1950s–1970s

Abstract

The major Mexican worker struggles of the 1950s to the 1970s grew out of the political economic system that had been established in Mexico in the post‐revolutionary period. The Mexican ruling party, the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI), had by 1950 through a combination of political maneuvers, payoffs, gangsterism, and police and military action succeeded in taking control of virtually the entire organized labor movement. The Confederation of Mexican Workers (CTM) and the other major labor federations and industrial unions had all affiliated with the PRI. In return for getting out the vote for the ruling party and supporting its policies, union officials became PRI leaders who were rewarded with political positions as governors, congressmen, and senators. Workers, when they were hired, automatically became members of the appropriate union and members of the PRI, and they were mobilized by the union to attend party demonstrations and to vote.