ABSTRACT
This chapter surveys the history of Mexico's foreign trade, with an emphasis on interaction with the United States. Foreign trade, both legal and illegal, has been a major driver of Mexico's economy since the country achieved independence in 1821. One of the major challenges faced by Mexico upon independence in 1821 was intense foreign competition faced by the most important domestic manufacturing sector-the textile industry. The chapter refers to legal trade as conventional trade, and to illicit trade as contraband trade. The structure of trade between Mexico and the United States was transformed when Mexico began to adopt the neoliberal model in the early 1980s. The near-collapse of the Mexican economy during the debt crisis and oil bust drove the government to abandon import substitution industrialization, to lower tariffs, and to join the world trading community through General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) system.
