The Middle Class

By one estimate, between 1940 and 1970, membership in the middle class increased from 16 to 34 percent of Mexico’s population. The increased size of the middle class was closely tied to increased industrialization and expanded access to education. The middle class, whose earnings were well above the national average, was largely made up of professionals, managers, office workers, small-scale entrepreneurs, and some unionized workers in strategic industries.139

During the prolonged economic growth of the 1950s and 1960s, upward social mobility was a reality. In 1962, sociologist Pablo Gonzalez Casanova commented: “In Mexico, which is industrializing and urbanizing, there is permanent social mobility. Yesterday’s peasants are today’s workers, whose children can become professionals.”140

For the first time, large numbers of government bureaucrats, university professors, and shopkeepers could buy cars, study abroad, acquire homes of their own, take vacations in Acapulco, travel to the United States, and buy home appliances on credit at Sears.141

The burgeoning middle class reaped material rewards offered by the system and returned the favor by backing the PRI. For them, upward mobility was more important than multi-party democracy. This support was rewarded by actions favoring the middle class, which further cemented their loyalty. To cite one example, in 1947 Aleman announced a $10-million program to construct subsidized housing for the middle class and federal employees.142

During the 1960s, as a college education became accepted as a prerequisite for high political office, top state and federal officeholders, as well as the leadership of the PAN, increasingly came from the middle class.143

During the 1960s, the very success of the middle class produced contradictions that would lead to change. The political system, which had been structured in the 1930s to accommodate workers and peasants, failed to provide a political role for members of the middle class, aside from those actually holding office. Also, by the 1960s, the number of aspirants to higher education exceeded capacity. To add insult to injury, there were not enough jobs being created to give professional employment to the soaring numbers of university graduates. These tensions formed the backdrop for the 1968 student movement, which cost the political loyalty of middle class members whose parents had strongly supported the system that had provided them with upward mobility.144