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Economic nationalism in Mexico has typically been linked to mid-twentieth-century experiments with state-led industrial protectionism. This article argues that the origins of this association lay in postrevolutionary conflicts between economic liberals and protectionists over state consolidation and industrial centralization. Within these struggles, promoters of state economic intervention as well as defender s of free trade and private enterprise justifiably pr oclaimed the nationalist merits of their divergent industrial projects. This article, by focusing on the political facets of industrialist conflicts amid rising post-World War II concerns over United States influence, sheds light both on how the post-World War II period became a turning point in the maturation of industrial protectionism, as well as on the contingent nature of its mid-twentieth-century association with economic nationalism. Scholars of Latin American development have most often identified economic nationalism with mid-twentieth-century experiments with state-led industrial protectionism. This has been fostered partly by the prominence of these policies in str ucturalist programs promoted by the Economic Commission for Latin America (CEPAL), which were aimed at overcoming dependency and underdevelopment in the region. Upon closer inspection however, an examination of industr ial development in postr evolutionary Mexico offers other possibilities for understanding economic nationalism. During the 1940s, supporters of state economic intervention and protected industrialization, as well as defender s of private enterprise and free trade both posited themselves as nationalist proponents of modernization and a front against United States imperialism. In doing so, each side promoted the nationalist merits of their divergent industrial projects as a means to lay claim to postrevolutionary political influence. The ensuing conflicts between the two over how to defend Mexico’s sovereignty in turn became central in larger rifts over the interrelated processes of industr ial centralization and state consolidation. Much of the energy behind these conflicts stemmed from concerns about the potential impact of planned, industrial protectionism on r uling party |
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