THE DECOMPOSITION OF PRE-CAPITALIST AGRARIAN STRUCTURES IN MEXICO

The focus of the proposed study is the analysis of underdevelopment as evidenced by the agricultural sector of Mexico. Underdevelopment as a concept has been specifically defined as a process of imposed primitive accumulation. Basically, this definition rests on the historical fusion of production systems, and it therefore implies a particular point of departure for the analysis and a specific theoretical approach. The analysis begins with a reconstruction of the production system indigenous to Mexico before conquest by the Spaniards, and assumes that the level of production is the definitive aspect of a society. Next, the incorporation of the Meso-American production system into the European and later the American commercial network is traced through its effects in Mexican agriculture. The history of underdevelopment in Mexico, beginning with the year 1519, is empirically documented in Mexican agricultural production through the period of first Spanish, then English, and finally United States' influence. In general, the analysis documents the persistence of archaic agricultural forms that correspond to the ancient indigenous system of production and attempts to demonstrate that these forms do not represent an obstacle to development but rather a consequence of underdevelopment. The survival of these ancient agrarian social relations is attributed to decelerated capitalist development nationally. Findings indicate that the relatively slow maturation of the capitalist mode of production in Mexico is attributable to the diversity of class contradictions inherited from antecedent production systems and to the disaccumulation of capital through the world market.