ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on the way the nature of society at regional level shapes politics and the way politics shapes social life, emphasizing the less formal processes which enabled the Partido Revolucionario Institucional to recover at least part of the ground it lost in 1988. It argues that the political triumph of Salinismo was partly an illusion, but that the regime's strategies articulated with diffuse and capillary forms of power in a way which promoted popular disillusion with the prospects for political reform in Mexico. Even in political terms, links other than to Mexico City can be important, as witnessed, for example, by the impact of the "El Barzon" movement, or the support neocardenismo received from migrant colonies in California. The continuing power of hierarchic model is demonstrated by the fact that the forces of opposition to neoliberalism initially crystallized around neocardenismo.
