Between European and American Dominance: Mexican Foreign Trade in the Nineteenth Century

• Published in: Itinerario
• Main Author: Bernecker, Walther L.
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: Cambridge University Press (CUP) 1997
• Subjects: Political Science and International Relations; History; North Atlantic
• Online Access: http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/s0165115300015254; https://www.cambridge.org/core/services/aop-cambridge-core/content/view/S0165115300015254

Conventional accounts of economic links between the North Atlantic nations (USA/Europe) and Mexico state that the Europeans clearly dominated Mexican foreign trade in the first decades after national independence while the United States only achieved significance in Mexico's import-export trade in the Porfiriato during the last quarter of the nineteenth century. Such studies suggest that the United States only gradually discovered an interest in Mexico so that in previous decades the Europeans ruled the field unchallenged. It is generally overlooked that from quite early on Mexico was a part of North American foreign and trade policy because of geopolitical and economic considerations. The geopolitical component was the result of the geographic proximity of Mexico to its northern neighbour; the economic ties due to Mexico's silver mines, the intensive smuggling between North and South from the outset, and the constant increase in trade volume.