The Importance of the State: Political Dimensions of a Nonprofit Network in Oaxaca, Mexico

Abstract

This article examines a network of nonprofit nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), government agencies, and other social and political actors in Oaxaca, Mexico. Analyses indicate that NGOs are more connected to government authorities than to any type of nonstate organization. Results also suggest that NGOs located in municipalities where support was the highest and lowest in the 1994 to 2001 elections for the long-ruling Partido Revolucionario Institucional were best connected to the government. The size of Indigenous populations located around the NGOs also appears to have had an impact on NGO connectedness to the government. These results offer support for social origins theory, which acknowledges the impact of social—political environments on the development of NGO sectors.