Authoritarian neoliberalism, economic elites, and educational reform in Mexico, 2013

Abstract

The objective of this essay is to analyze educational reform in Mexico through the shared interests of the economic elites and the political class. Authoritarian neoliberalism is examined using a qualitative methodology of exploratory and descriptive nature. The concept of authoritarian neoliberalism posits that we are living a stage of capitalism in which states have augmented their authoritarian features in decision making, without the consensus of the population, to reinforce processes of capital accumulation. This has allowed them to generate legal scaffolding and reinforce the repressive apparatus to immunize themselves against social protest, renouncing negotiation and co-optation. All this has been done in alliance with the economic and financial elites. The results show that the educational reform was imposed by the economic elites in an agreement with the political power, without any negotiation with the teachers. With the help of the mass media, teachers were blamed for the failures of the educational system, creating a climate of lynching, especially against those who went out to demonstrate in public. We conclude that the educational reform and its imposition –far from aiming at educational quality– sought to control the teaching profession and consolidate the precarious labor conditions that are characteristic of the neoliberal model.