Influence Of Historical Events On The Modern State Of Mexico
Mexico has got a lot of history in its land. From the ancient Mayans constructing beautiful temples to their kings and gods to the massive revolution of independence from their conquerors in 1821, Mexico has had its fair share of culture and experience. Mexico, today has changed dramatically in culture and politics, however, there are little ripples of the country’s past that are still present today, from the conquering of Mexico to the independence of Mexico. I believe that the most prominent ripple that has had an impact on Mexico’s history and Mexico today is naivety. For example, the Aztec King, Moctezuma II thought that Hernan Cortes was the serpent god, Quetzalcoatl, and in doing so, he changed the future of Mexico. From what had been a thriving ancient Mexican civilization was now brought to ruins by the overwhelming power of the Spaniards. This relates to present day Mexico, however the same problem didn’t come from the outside, it came from within.
The overwhelming power that struck Mexico is not a person, but an idea. An idea so powerful that it impacts our actions, thoughts, and situations, poverty. Poverty makes humans act in a certain way that an observer would describe certain actions, ideas, or situations as inhuman. There are no other words to describe that what Hernan Cortes and poverty have brought to Mexico other than the word plague. It is something that has once made its way into the homes of the ancient era and now has once again made its way into the modern era. Hernan Cortes destroyed the unique and brilliant culture of the Mayans, a civilization that was essentially at the top of the world in terms of technology, astrology, and engineering, into literal ruins. And poverty has turned the hopeful, young nation of Mexico into a war zone filled with corruption, cartels, drugs, and violence.
As I stated before, Mexico, before its conquering, was a successful and thriving part of Earth’s early start of civilization. There were numerous advances of settlements, technology, culture, and academics. They built towering structures such as temples and monuments to not only make their civilization look more pretty but to honor their kings and gods. It was because of their knowledge of architecture and love of the kings and gods that allowed them to construct temples and structures, so fascinating that people still dream about visiting them after 3000 years. But in 1519, the Spanish conquistador, Hernan Cortes arrived in Mexico. The naive Aztec King, Moctezuma II thought that Hernan Cortes was the serpent god, Quetzalcoatl. A god that would bring prosperity to the Aztec Empire but he could not be more far from the truth. Hernan Cortes was not a god, but a plague. He almost wiped out the culture and history of Ancient Mexico. The irony is that most of the destruction and death didn’t come from the conquistadors but from the tiny bacteria that infiltrated the bodies of the natives. These diseases destroyed the natives from the inside out.
I explain the times of ancient Mexico because I believe that this a perfect example of the saying “History repeats itself”. Before drugs, violence and cartels, Mexico had high promises of being a successful and independent country after World
War II. Mexico had experienced great economic success and in addition, Mexico’s population exploded. The industrialism that was caused by the war became a major key factor in Mexico’s economy. The Mexican military became increasingly faded into the shadows of Mexican authority enforcers as arbiters of national policy. Moreover, Mexico had a a very long streak of civilian presidents, starting with the election of Miguel Alemán in 1946. With him the emphasis shifted from the Cárdenas approach of dividing Mexico’s small agricultural farmland area among many persons to the development of new resources to benefit the economy even more. Massive industrial projects such as the hydraulic and machinery assignments underwent many developments to produce electricity to houses with insufficient living conditions, produce new lands spaces to build new infrastructure, to deal with flood control from sewers to dams, and finally to become the center of regional agricultural-industrial complexes. The nationalizing oil industry became a focused element of producing of natural gas and petrochemicals in an effort to meet burgeoning domestic needs. In addition, economic integration was accomplished by the extension of railroad, highway, and airline networks to nearly all regions. This helped the economic needs that Mexico desperately needed pre-war.
Though Mexico experienced an unbelievable amount of unprecedented economic success during the four to five decades following World War II, they were some notable time periods in where they experienced economic difficulties. Some of Mexico’s economic growth in the 1970s was due to some international loans as well. At the time, the Mexican government planners calculated easy repayment from projected oil revenues. This was due to the fact that there was a vastly huge income from the huge reserves discovered in 1976 in the states ofTabasco and Chiapas. Unfortunately, they were unable to predict the oil surplus of the early 1980s and the steep fall of the world oil prices. The Mexican government heavily struggled to pay even . This, in turn, allowed Mexico to fall into poverty very quickly. What had seemed to be a promising future rapidly turned into declining state on the verge of political and economic implosion.
