12 SOCIAL MOVEMENTS IN MEXICO (LAST 100 YEARS) - CULTURE VOCABULARY - 2025

The social movements in Mexico have emerged since the beginning of the XXI century to today willing to fight for social, political, economic and cultural mainly of citizenship.

However, each and every one of them has its roots in the last convulsed 20th century, where the Mexican nation underwent great changes since the triumph of the Mexican Revolution of 1910.

Since then, Mexico has followed an uninterrupted history of social protests and mobilizations that allowed it to get rid of not only the dictatorship of Porfirio Díaz.

It was possible to improve public education by decreeing it secular, free and compulsory, and initiating a series of reforms that led to the creation of PEMEX (a company of Petróleos Mexicanos), the establishment of the female vote, the signing of the Free Trade Agreement and the arrival of the power of the National Action Party.

In the first half of the 20th century, the peasant, labor and union movements were the ones who raised their voices, today the Mexican social movements have managed to constitute a true collective effort where the struggles for the rights of all social classes have been included.

Main Mexican social movements today

1- Movement "Our daughters back home"

Iose / Public domain

Formed by relatives and friends of young women who have been murdered or are missing in the State of Chihuahua. The movement arose in 2001, when 5 young people disappeared in a period of two months in Chihuahua.

The movement is made up of professionals and human rights defenders who fight for justice, visibility and complaints of femicides, and at the same time provide support to the families of disappeared women.

The movement's objective is to protect the rights of Mexican women, since according to figures from the National Citizen Observatory of Femicide, between 2013-2014 six women were murdered daily in Mexico.

The rapes, deaths, and constant disappearances have become a terrible reality for those who live in Ciudad Juárez and Chihuahua, where being a woman is living in danger of death.

It is estimated that since 1993 more than 600 girls and women have been murdered in Ciudad Juárez.

The victims are usually poor women, students, workers, and employees of maquiladoras (factories and assembly centers of foreign companies operating in Mexico).

The movement Our Daughters Back Home constantly fights to denounce gender violence and request help from the State.

2- Citizen movement for justice June 5

ProtoplasmaKid / CC BY-SA (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)

Dated June 5, 2009, it is made up of the parents and representatives who lost their children that day as a result of a terrible event in which 49 babies died after the daycare center where they were burned.

The ABC nursery located in Hermosillo, Sonora, did not have the minimum security and civil protection requirements, which meant that the fire could not be controlled.

The nursery belonged to the Mexican Institute of Social Security, which allowed the institutions to define the standards of the place in relation to child safety and care.

The ABC nursery did not have the necessary facilities to face an emergency of such magnitude, hence the parents originated the movement in order to obtain justice for what happened.

Eight years have already passed and the authorities have not condemned anyone for the events despite the fact that each year the movement carries out different actions to attract national and international attention through marches, cultural festivals, cycles of informative conferences, support talks and legal work.

Currently they continue to fight for those involved to receive criminal punishment in different international and local instances.

3- Movement for peace, with justice and dignity

Zapata / CC BY-SA (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0)

It is a movement that was born as a response by Mexican civil society to the violence that the country suffers as a result of the war against drug trafficking.

The movement began on April 26, 2011 when the poet Javier Sicilia called on Mexicans to demonstrate against the violence produced by criminal groups and state security forces.

The poet starts the movement following the death of his son at the hands of organized crime.

The main objectives of the movement are:

• Clarify murders and disappearances
• Put an end to the war strategy and take a citizen security approach
• Fight corruption and impunity
• Fight the proceeds of crime
• Provide care for the youth involved
• Establish a true participatory democracy.

The movement continues its struggle today advocating for the thousands of disappearances that occur in Mexico year after year.

4- Movement of San Salvador Atenco

Aeneas De Troya / CC BY (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0)

The federal government, led by President Vicente Fox, issued in October 2001 a series of expropriation treaties for agricultural land in Texcoco. The reason was that this area would be where the New Mexico City Airport would be located.

This decision met with the refusal of the peasants, as well as ecological and agrarian organizations or institutions linked to the Zapatista Army of National Liberation (EZLN).

They organized and marched to the Official Residence of Los Pinos, where they maintained resistance for months. However, the most tense fronts occurred in the city of San Salvador de Atenco, where during the riots, the security forces and the social movement clashed, resulting in the death of two people (Alexis Benhumea and Javier Cortés) and more than 200 arrests.

Finally, Vicente Fox canceled the construction project for the metropolitan airport in Texcoco.

5- Writers movement for Ciudad Juárez

Susana Chávez. Zerk / CC BY-SA (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)

The movement arose after the death of the poet, activist, and human rights defender Susana Chávez, who was found murdered and mutilated in Ciudad Juárez on January 6, 2011.

As a result of the tragic event, different writers organized and started a cultural movement that is still in force today.

Its objective is to practice culture permanently through the recovery of public spaces taken over by criminals, the use of social networks and blogs, and constant readings in forums, cafes, buses, libraries and schools.

The movement continues active and readings and different meetings have already been held in more than 170 cities in 26 countries in America, Asia, Europe and Africa.

The ideal is and continues to be to promote reading as a form of protest and fight against violence and especially gender violence in Mexico and the world.

6- LGBTTTI Movement

MexDIver / CC BY-SA (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0)

Since 1971, the movement of lesbians, gays, bisexuals, transsexuals, transvestites, transgenders and intersexuals (LGBTTTI), was part of the mobilizations of the Mexican left against the government's repression.

A turning point with which they managed to consolidate themselves as a true movement in the country was with the celebration in 1979 of the first gay Pride march in Mexico.

Since then, it has been thanks to the constant pressure of groups such as the Homosexual Front for Revolutionary Action or the Homosexual Liberation Group, that the LGBTTTI movement became an important part of Mexican politics and society.

One of its major milestones was the approval of the full constituent assembly in January 2017 of the recognition of equal rights of families formed by LGBTTTI people and equal civil marriage.

However, despite the many triumphs obtained by the movement, discrimination based on sexual orientation is a daily Mexican problem, hence there is still a long way to go in the fight for respect for sexual diversity.

Associations such as the Fundación Arcoíris in Mexico continue working to improve the situation of this minority in danger of social exclusion.

7- Movement "Save Wirikuta"

Wirikuta representatives. Eneas De Troya from Mexico City, México / CC BY (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0)

Considered one of the most important ecological movements in Mexico. It arose with the objective of fighting for the protection of Wirikuta, a town located in the state of San Luis de Potosí that, in addition to being a rich nature reserve, is the sacred territory of the Wixarika people.

It is believed that this area is the matrix of life of that town and its entire culture, who consider Wirikuta as the sacred heart of Mexico.

Since 2005, the Mexican government has granted concessions to foreign companies to exploit mineral resources in areas that are even protected natural areas.

This has caused the alarm and discontent of civil society and environmental groups who today lead the "Save Wirikuta" movement.

8- Movement # yoSoy132

ProtoplasmaKid / CC BY-SA (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)

The movement, of great international fame, emerged in 2012 when the current Mexican president Enrique Peña Nieto attended the Ibero-American University and was greeted with boos and insults.

The following day, the media announced that the protesters were people from outside the university and paid to be there.

Hence, the students, 131 in their entirety, carried out a video on social networks clarifying that the demonstrations had taken place of their own free will.

Since then, the statement # yosoy132 was used in numerous social networks, and the movement began to organize throughout Mexico, carrying out mass marches demanding transparency and democratization of the media, education and the economy. A movement that is still present.

9- Movements for the Ayotzinapa case

Shortep 0001 / CC BY-SA (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0)

The movement arose in 2014, when in a series of protests and demonstrations between the municipal police, the Mexican army and students from the Ayotzinapa Rural Normal School, journalists and civilians were injured, nine dead and 43 students disappeared.

The families of the disappeared students continue to demand that the State answer for these disappearances. However, the government and army remain silent.

Hence the emergence of this movement whose objective has been to inform the international community and put pressure on Mexican civil society through numerous marches and protests.

The purpose is to do justice and obtain information regarding the whereabouts of those 43 students.

10- Magisterial movements

Luisalvaz / CC BY-SA (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0)

They reached a great boom between 2015 and 2016, after protests, marches, clashes with the police, blockades and sit-ins, with the aim of rejecting the educational reform proposals instituted by former President Enrique Peña Nieto.

Numerous teacher leaders have been detained, however, the movements continue to put pressure on the government.

11- Movements against gasoline

ProtoplasmaKid / CC BY-SA (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0)

Arisen in the current year 2017 and carried out by different unions, unions, activists and citizens with the aim of opposing the “gasolinezo”, namely the increase in the price of gasoline proposed by former president Enrique Peña Nieto.

12- #MeToo Movement

Karla Souza, promoter in Mexico of the #MeTooNotimexTV movement / CC BY (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0)

#MeToo is a movement that activist Tarana Burke started in 2006, but which began to gain worldwide notoriety in 2017 after a report by The New York Times about alleged sexual abuse that film producer Harvey Weinstein exercised with actresses.

The movement calls on all women in the world to share their humiliations and cases of sexual abuse suffered. Mexico was no exception and there are many women who through social networks - and using the hashtag # MeToo - expressed their unpleasant experiences.

Renowned actresses such as Karla Souza, Dulce María or Kate del Castillo were champion of the movement by making their cases of abuse public. Subsequently, a campaign was launched against Barona and other writers also accused of engaging in sexual violence. The hashtag in that case was #Metooescritoresmexicanos.

Articles of interest

Social problems of Mexico.

Environmental problems of Mexico.

Social movements of Colombia.

Colombia's social problems.

1. (2014). Brief chronology of the main social movements that occurred in Mexico. Retrieved on July 30, 2017 from kioscomedios.wordpress.com.
2. (2016). Brief chronology of the LGBT movement in Mexico. Retrieved on July 30, 2017 from feathersatomicas.com.
3. Ayotzinapa case. Retrieved on July 30, 2017 from telesurtv.net.
4. Driver, A. Femicide in Juárez is not a myth. (2015). Retrieved on July 30, 2017 from texasobserver.org.
5. Writers by Ciudad Juárez. Retrieved on July 30, 2017 from día.unam.mx.
6. Rainbow Foundation. Retrieved on July 30, 2017 from día.unam.mx.
7. Mexico. Retrieved on July 29, 2017 from latinamericansocialmovements.org.
8. Citizen movement for justice June 5. Retrieved on July 29, 2017 from Movimiento5dejunio.org.