Entre race et révolution : l’horizon ibéro-américain du mouvement étudiant mexicain (1916-1945)

Abstract

This article analyzes the international relations of the Mexican student movement during the Revolution (1910-1940). Founded in 1916, the Mexican student movement quickly supported the Ibero-Americanist project, whose aim was to defend the raza and to unite the subcontinent and the Iberian peninsula. Defending the “race”, an ethnocultural notion, was conceived as a revolutionary task, synonymous with anti-imperialism and with spiritual, political, cultural and economic reconciliation of Ibero-American people. This article first stresses that, between 1916 and 1931, Mexican student leaders acted as ardent defenders of the raza against panamericanism and US imperialism. Afterwards, in the beginning of the 1930’s, Mexican young intellectuals succeeded in organizing two large Ibero-American Student Confederations. These international organizations (one was neutral and the other Catholic) were willing to regenerate the race and contributed to the circulation of the Mexican Revolution in Spain and Latin America. The Spanish Civil War eventually broke the racial consensus that existed between radical and Catholic students in Mexico and transformed their international horizon.

Keywords

• revolution
• race
• students
• ibero-americanism