ABSTRACT

This chapter analyzes the ideological sources that nourished the homogenizing policy of the nineteenth century, with its serious socioeconomic implications, the integrationism that followed the Mexican Revolution, and, finally, the situation of recent decades. The ideological sources of criollo liberalism can be found in the positivism and evolutionism in vogue at the time in the metropolitan countries. The destructive effects of the liberal initiatives for most of the indigenous communities can best be observed in the arena of socioeconomic policy. In contrast to the previous liberal-evolutionist position, integrationist indigenism accepted the compatibility of integration of indigenous people into national life and conservation of their cultural foundations. Integrationism was increasingly forced toward the evolutionist postulates that had served as a basis for the policies of the liberals. Ethnicism or Fourth Worldism has become the most effective of the political-ideological tools used the by dominant classes in Latin America to guarantee hegemony over the indigenous movement.