ABSTRACT
INTRODUCTION Foreign direct investment (FDI) has played a crucial role in Mexico’s development since the nineteenth century. Investments in mining, oil and public utilities around the turn of the century were followed, after the interruption forced by the 1910 Revolution, by important investments in manufacturing, throughout the importsubstituting industrialization (ISI) process. In this context, multinational enterprises (MNEs) have been leaders in some of the most important industries on which the country has based the expansion of its domestic market and its industrial exports. The investment development path (IDP) concept (Dunning and Narula, 1994)1 is a useful tool to understand and summarize the dynamics of FDI inflows to Mexico, as well as the more recent outflows from the country.
