%0 Journal Article
%A Dobado González, Rafael
%A Gómez Galvarriato, Aurora
%A Williamson, Jeffrey G.
%T Globalization, De-Industrialization and Mexican Exceptionalism 1750-1879
%D 2006
%U https://hdl.handle.net/20.500.14352/52357
%X Like the rest of the poor periphery, Mexico had to deal with de-industrialization forces between1750 and 1913, those critical 150 years when the economic gap between the industrial core andthe primary-product-producing periphery widened to such huge dimensions. Yet, fromindependence to mid-century Mexico did better on this score than did most countries around theperiphery. This paper explores the sources of Mexican exceptionalism with de-industrialization. Itdecomposes those sources into those attributable to productivity events in the core and toglobalization forces connecting core to periphery, and to those attributable to domestic forcesspecific to Mexico. It uses a neo-Ricardian model (with non-tradable foodstuffs) to implement thedecomposition, and advocates a price dual approach, and develops a new price and wage database 1750-1878. There were three forces at work that account for Mexican exceptionalism: first,the terms of trade and Dutch disease effects were much weaker; second, Mexico maintainedsecular wage competitiveness with the core; and third, Mexico had the autonomy to deviseeffective ways to foster industry. The first appears to have been the most important.
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