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Chapter 3 Gonzalo Aguirre Beltrn: Applied Anthropology and Indigenous Policy

Thomas Weaver
The demand for equality represented by the civil rights movement that began in the U.S. in the 1960s, soon spread to other parts of the world. In Mexico, with agitation from a Marxist movement present from early in the twentieth century, the call came in 1968. It found Gonzalo Aguirre Beltrn at the center of the storm and symbol of the governments assimilationist policy and its failure to resolve the social problems that beset the Mexican Indian. The problems of poverty and domination identified by anthropologists and others at the beginning of the century still persisted. Critical anthropologists raised the public ire by emphasizing the embarrassing conditions of the Mexican Indian. The result after the 1968 riots in Mexico was that Marxist anthropologists were given responsibility for operation of the Indian Institute and other important ministries, such as Agrarian Reform and Education. This was in direct opposition to the mainly conservative and assimilationist policies of Aguirre Beltrn. Gonzalo Aguirre Beltrn (19081996) was the first person to receive the Society for Applied Anthropologys Malinowski Award (as revived in 1970).1 Aguirre Beltrn received a medical degree from the National University of Mexico in 1931. In the nine years after this, he carried out archival and community studies in land tenure conflict among indigenous groups (1940a) and pioneering research on Blacks in Mexico (1940b). After the publication of these two studies he undertook postgraduate work in anthropology with Melville Herskovits and Irving Hallowell at Northwestern University in 194546. His earlier ethnohistory and fieldwork with Blacks in Mexico was revised as a result of his contact with Herskovits. On his return to Mexico Aguirre Beltrn was appointed director of the Direccin General de Asuntos Indgenas (Indian Affairs) in the Secretara de Educacin Publca. Asuntos Indgenas became the Instituto Nacional Indigenista (INI, National Indian Institute) in 1948. In 1951 he was appointed director of the first Indian coordinating center in the country in Chiapas, and in 1952 he was appointed assistant director of INI, as it is most commonly known. He served as president of the University of Vera Cruz for seven years beginning in 1956 and as elected representative to the Mexican National Congress from 1963 to 1966. After this he became director of the Interamerican Indian Institute. In 1970, Aguirre Beltrn became the third director of INI and Assistant Secretary for Popular Culture and Extracurricular Education. As a result of these appointments he became responsible in 1970 for charting and executing indigenous policy in Mexico, a responsibility he fulfilled for almost three decades. _______________
Thomas Weaver (Ph.D., University of CaliforniaBerkeley, 1965) is Professor Emeritus of Anthropology at the University of Arizona. Copyright 2002 by the Society for Applied Anthropology. All rights reserved.

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35 It is difficult to discuss the early career of Aguirre Beltrn without also considering the influence of fellow anthropologist Julio de la Fuente. De la Fuente worked with Aguirre Beltrn, first in Chiapas, and later as assistant director of the Indian Institute. He introduced regionalism and functionalism to the collaboration as a result of his work with Malinowski in a study of the regional market systems in Oaxaca in 1940 and his reading of Robert Redfields studies of Tepoztlan and of acculturation in the Yucatan peninsula (Hewitt de Alcntara 1984:4449). Aguirre Beltrns contribution to the collaboration included the acculturation approach of Herskovits and Redfield, which he converted into an assimilationist policy (Weaver 1982). Aguirre Beltrns publications included works on Black ethnohistory, acculturation, land reform, medical anthropology (1995), and the education and social condition of Indians (1979, 1992). Aguirre Beltrns Malinowski Award address, entitled Applied Anthropology in Mexico (1974), sketched the development of anthropology in Mexico. The social and political value of anthropology was recognized earlier in Mexico than in many other countries. All major anthropologists came to hold high government offices in education, land tenure, indigenous affairs, and other topics. This began with Manuel Gamio and Juan Comas in the second decade of this century (Nahmad Sitton and Weaver 1991). But the wedding of anthropology and public service was by Moiss Senz, a Columbia University Ph.D. in education, who suggested that anthropology would be of value only if it considered the realities of current living conditions. Moiss Senz began his tenure as Secretary of Education as an incorporationist but ended as an indigenist believing in a nation built on pluralism. Early Spanish colonial indigenous policy had relegated Indians to minority status because they were considered to possess inferior reasoning capabilities. After gaining independence from Spain, Mexico launched an immigration policy with the goal of whitening the race by encouraging the immigration of Europeans. Later, the encouragement of foreign investment and economic development by President Porfirio Daz after the 1890s exacerbated the condition of an indigenous population that had been disorganized and disenfranchised by Spanish policies and actions. In 1917 Manuel Gamio, a child of the hacendado class who studied at Columbia University and was influenced by Franz Boas, commenced what was to be the major direction of Mexican indigenous policy for the remainder of the century. This included, on the one hand, recognition of the plight of the Indian, and on the other, the development of programs designed for the national integration of the Indian (Aguirre Beltrn 1974:3). The development of regional coordinating centers by anthropologist Alfonso Caso was an important advance in furthering the policy of assimilation. Other influences in Mexicos indigenous policy came from the work of Robert Redfield in Yucatan and of the Institute of Social Anthropology in the Tarascan Project directed by George Foster. It can be seen that community study, functionalism, acculturation, and a regional approach were the basis for the development of Aguirre Beltrns assimilationist indigenous policy. The key to Aguirre Beltrns indigenous policy was the utilization of anthropologists and other social scientists to research, plan, and put into action an integral strategy to assimilate Indians into the Mexican Nation. Using the coordinating centers with regional headquarters and offices located in the places where Indians lived, Aguirre Beltrn created interdisciplinary teams to service Indians in all aspects of their lives. Integral action also meant that attempts were made to coordinate the responsibilities and services provided by other federal agencies. These included bilingual education, land tenure, economy, loans, legal advice, boarding and local schools, and utilization of the native language. The principle that underlay this program was ideological SfAA Malinowski Award Papers Chapter 3

36 integration, . . . [that is] complete and equal participation of social classes and categories of population in the task of overall development. This means Indians and non-Indians must share equally . . . as much in obtaining goods and services leading to economic and moral growth, as in active contribution to the progress of the intercultural region and to the nation as a whole (Aguirre Beltrn 1974:5). A clear and more extensive description of Aguirre Beltrns indigenous policy was expressed in his book, Regions of Refuge, first published in 1967, and in other publications. (The fourth edition of Regions of Refuge was translated and published by the Society for Applied Anthropology in 1979.) Aguirre Beltrn was one of the most important anthropologists in Mexico and was honored and eulogized by his countrymen (Anonymous 1995). He was a founding member of the Mexican Academies of Education and of Scientific Investigation and elected member of the Mexican Academy of Medicine and of the Mexican National Academy of Science. Aguirre Beltrn served as president of the Mexican Society of the History and Philosophy of Medicine. He received a special citation from the Society for Medical Anthropology, many honorary doctorates, and numerous named awards and prizes.
Notes This annual award is given to a senior colleague in recognition of efforts to understand and serve the needs of the world through social science. See Thomas Weavers The Malinowski Award and the History of Applied Anthropology (2002b) for a brief history of this award and an overview of the recipients and their work, and Weavers Malinowski as Applied Anthropologist (2002a) for an introduction to Bronislaw Malinowski and his work. References Cited Aguirre Beltrn, Gonzalo 1940a El Seoro de Cuauhtochco: Lucas Agrarias en Mxico Durante el Virreinato. Mxico: Ediciones Fuente Cultural. 1940b La Poblacin Negra de Mxico, Estudio Etnohistrico. Mxico: Ediciones Fuente Cultural. 1974 Applied Anthropology in Mexico. Human Organization 33(1):16. (Republished at <http://www.sfaa.net/>.) 1979 Regions of Refuge. Boulder, CO: Society for Applied Anthropology. Translation of the Fourth Edition. Originally published in 1967 as Regiones de Refugio, El Desarrollo de la Comunidad y El Proceso Dominical en Mestizoamrica. Mxico: Instituto Indigenista Interamericano. 1992 El Proceso de Aculturacin. Cuarta Edicin. Mxico: Fondo de Cultura Econmica. Primera edicin publcado en 1957 por la Universidad Autnoma de Mxico. 1995 Antropologa Mdica, sus Desarrollos Tericos en Mxico. Segunda Edicin. Mxico: Fondo de Cultura Econmica. Primera edicin publcado por CIESAS en 1986. Anonymous 1995 Gonzalo Aguirre Beltrn, Homenaje Nacional. Xalapa, Veracruz: Universidad Veracruzana. Gaceta Numero 32, Septiembre.
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Hewitt de Alcntara, Cynthia 1984 Anthropological Perspectives on Rural Mexico. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul. Nahmad Sitton, Salomon, and Thomas Weaver 1991 Manuel Gamio, El Primer Antroplogo Aplicado y sus Conexiones con Antroplogos Norte Americanos. Amrica Indgena 4:292321.

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Weaver, Thomas 1982 From Primitive to Urban Anthropology. In Crisis in Anthropology: View from Spring Hill, 1980. E. A. Hoebel, R. Currier, and S. Kaiser, eds. Pp. 203221. New York: Garland Publishing, Inc. 2002a Malinowski as Applied Anthropologist. In The Dynamics of Applied Anthropology in the Twentieth Century: The Malinowski Award Papers. T. Weaver, ed. < http://www.sfaa.net/>. Oklahoma City: Society for Applied Anthropology. 2002b The Malinowski Award and the History of Applied Anthropology. In The Dynamics of Applied Anthropology in the Twentieth Century: The Malinowski Award Papers. T. Weaver, ed. <http://www.sfaa.net/>. Oklahoma City: Society for Applied Anthropology.

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Applied Anthropology in Mexico


Gonzalo Aguirre Beltrn
First, I should like to thank the Society for Applied Anthropology for the opportunity extended me to speak before such a distinguished audience.1 Mexicos longstanding interest in utilizing the social sciences in the quest for better and more just relationships among human groups is well known, and, therefore, I feel it appropriate tonight to address my remarks to the field of Mexican social anthropology, including current trends in this discipline. The initial task confronting students of anthropology in Mexico was that of defining its content. At the beginning of the present century, anthropology began to explore new paths. In Europe, the British took as their model the positivist sociology of Durkheim, oriented toward the study of social relations; whereas in the United States the school headed by Boas supported a broader range of interests, including within the scope of cultural anthropology human behavior in both its historical and contemporary dimensions. In Mexico the conjunction of the two trends produced a generally broad approach; but, because of changes in social structure occasioned by the Revolution, the study of social relations and related problems was stressed. The goal was knowledge which could be immediately applied. At a time when the social movement of 1910 was still in its infancy, Manuel Gamio, in a work which today is considered classic, stated the necessity of studying human populations in order to assure just application of laws, and assigned this task to anthropology. However, it was Professor Moiss Senz who shaped anthropology into the form which the discipline has today in Mexico. Given the problems faced by the revolutionary administration, particularly the national integration of a large indigenous population, Senz felt that anthropological studies could be of immediate value only if they took account of the realities of the contemporary situation. That is, archeology, linguistics, and ethnography were placed at the service of rural sociology, the discipline to which fell the ultimate responsibility of assisting the peasant population to satisfy its needs and overcome its handicaps. To this combination of anthropology and sociology Senz gave the name social anthropology. Also, just as with Gamio, Senz believed that the acquired knowledge (of anthropology) should be immediately applicable. As a consequence, the distinction between social anthropology and applied anthropology (in Mexico) was essentially obliterated. While it may be true that other fields of anthropology also have potential for application, social anthropology (in Mexico) is specifically oriented to the study of changes in the social relations and cultural systems of marginal populations, with the ultimate goal of facilitating their integration into the national society. Thus, in reality, it is not easy to distinguish between applied social anthropology and Indian policy. In fact, for many years in Mexico, social anthropology had the sole function of studying Indian problems and proposing solutions. Only recently have __________
This address was previously published in Human Organization 33,1(1974):16.

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39 Mexican social anthropologists begun to turn their attention to such other matters as agrarian problems, land tenure, migration, and urbanization. Considering the identification of social anthropology with Indian policy, we perceive that the antecedents of our discipline lie in the epoch of colonial domination. As a result of the discovery of the New World and capitalist expansion, it became necessary for the conquerors to design a policy to deal with the Indian population. The exploitation of some men by others required rationalization and it was found in the aristocratic ideal of Aristotle, the hierarchical universe of Thomas Aquinas, and the unscrupulous nationalism of Machiavelli. Gins de Seplveda contributed the political theory of the imperial metropolis based on the notion that the Indians possessed an inferior reasoning capacity which placed on more civilized societies the obligation of intervening in their lives, even of usurping their sovereignty. The goal of such intervention was to guide and help the Indians, not only through conversion to Christianity, but through imposing, by force if necessary, benevolent and paternal institutions that would lead them to the true faith and to civilization. The Indian policy adopted by the colonial administration relegated Indians to the status of minors in age, and placed them in the social structure as a caste of serfs. The first missionaries (Las Casas, Sahagn, Vasco de Quiroga, and others) violently opposed the metropolitan policy, or accepted it in part in order to propose alternatives which they intended to put into practice. This was the case with the hospitales-pueblo, the College of Santa Cruz in Tlatelolco, the conquest of Verapaz, and other projects that never became more than utopias temporarily contradicting policies of colonial expansion. The strength of the educated elite by the end of the colonial period, as well as the influence it received from the French and North American Revolutions, led to Mexican Independence, and with it, the immediate need for the creation of a bourgeoisie that could build a nation. The patricians of that time encountered problems in the form of ethnic heterogeneity, lack of geographic articulation, multiplicity of languages, differing degrees of cultural evolution, and such inequities in the distribution of economic goods that only a limited few could make use of the property and the wealth of the country. The Indian policy of the Independence period was tied to the liberal philosophy of capitalism which by that time had gained sway in the Western world, and which advocated laissez-faire as a means of promoting the survival of the fittest. In Mexico, those who regarded themselves as the fittest were so few in number that, among other proposals, they advocated an immigration policy which would give them proportionately greater strength and solve the problem of heterogeneity by racially whitening the country. At the same time, the new expression of individualism led to destruction of the colonial system and secularization of institutions through separating civil and religious affairs. Overthrow of the colonial system had two results: (1) disorganization within indigenous communities; and (2) distribution of the land among members of these communities as private property. Immigration failed to integrate the nation, and, on the contrary, resulted in loss of one large part of Mexico. Secularization and individualization of institutions destroyed a considerable number of Indian communities which fell under the dominion of the hacienda. The growth and modernization of communications at the end of the last century combined with the investment of foreign capital to further despoil Indian communities. As a result, the nation was left alienated by a scientific oligarchy that Justo Sierra, speaking more from fancy than from fact, called the Mexican bourgeoisie.

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40 In spite of the above, the beginning of industrialization in Mexico produced remarkable changes in scientific thought. In 1904 Jos Lpez Portillo in a small work entitled La Raza Indgena, began a frontal attack on the prevalent theory of Social Darwinism which left Indian groups marginal to the national society. He proposed broad concessions of economic, political, and civil liberties to the Indian communities to raise the intellectual level of the natives. He postulated that with free traffic and trade, the mixture of races would eventually produce both physical and spiritual integration; and concluded with an observation now commonly accepted in social anthropology: The true division that exists among men does not depend on race, but on culture. In 1910 Ricardo Garca Granados wrote his famous essay, El Concepto Cientfico de la Historia, to refute Spenserian ideas. In this rebuttal he expressed the same conviction as Lpez Portillo, widening its social aspects as follows: Through the centuries there has never existed the invariable superiority of any race. The diversities among men are not basically anthropological, but the product of culture. There is no reason to reject the idea that any race that now exists or is in the process of formation, would be able to raise itself to the highest level of civilization. Races raise themselves or fall according to the efficiency or deficiency of their social conditions as well as in relation to historical circumstances. The ideas generated by the industrial movement made obsolete the agrarian structure of the country. Andrs Molina Enrquez developed an evolutionary scheme based on concepts of land tenure, and placed the ethnic groups of the country in particular categories. At the bottom of the scale were those which lacked any notion of territorial rights. Above them were groups which had developed an elementary concept of territory; and still farther along were those which recognized territorial possession. Most advanced were groups which embraced the idea of private property. This last concept was only understood by the enlightened elite. In focusing on the agrarian problem, Mexican Social Anthropology is in debt to the anarchical philosopher Ricardo Flores Magn. The anarchism of Flores Magn and his slogan Tierra y Libertad (taken from the Russian narodniki of the middle of the last century) crystalized in the land movement of Zapata, in the constitution of 1917, and in agrarian reform legislation. The redistribution of land, carried to its highest level during the regime of President Crdenas, by itself obtained the incorporation of large masses of people into the national life, thereby enriching the cultural and human resources of the country. The ideas of all the aforementioned persons are important to social anthropology and to indigenist policy in Mexico. Within the mental climate which placed social and cultural factors above biological ones and gave emphasis to the problems of land tenure, Manuel Gamio produced his opus Forjando Patria which signaled the real beginning of contemporary social anthropology in Mexico. Gamio is known in the academic world for his insistence on applying anthropology to the governing of men and for his rejection of studies whose results are buried in university archives to be consulted by only a chosen few. Research, according to him, was intended to discover through scientific means the characteristics and the conditions of human societies in order to improve them. With reference to Mexico, the need for research and knowledge of this type seemed evident and vital to the conduct of good government. SfAA Malinowski Award Papers Chapter 3

41 The ultimate goal of social anthropology for Gamio was to build the notion of nationality. The idea was not original with him, but was derived from the philosophies of earlier social scientists. It can be said that all Mexican anthropological thought since the Jesuit Clavijero supported this idea, the most basic concept in countries emerging from European colonialism with independent status, but lacking a national spirit. Gamio, in contemplating the situation of the country when the Revolution began, realized that Mexico did not constitute a true national society. Although integrated into one political unit which included a dominant minority and an indeterminate number of small patrias consisting of many Indian groups, Mexico was so heterogeneous it was impossible to speak of her as a single nation. The movement to establish rural schools, cultural missions, and other informal educational agencies which could reinterpret Indian cultures in modern terms had as its aim the incorporation of marginal groups into the mainstream, although the rationale for achieving this aim was broader than simply that of overcoming real or presumed deficiencies within the indigenous population. The community studies of Robert Redfield, made with the moral support of Gamio, furnished knowledge about the Indian population and mechanisms of the acculturation process. These community studies had a double value. On the one hand, they contributed to the growth of the science of man, documenting preconceived sociological schemes and giving profundity to historical perspectives. Additionally, they expanded the amount of fieldwork and extended the area of investigation to non-Indian communities. On the other hand, they served as instruments of professional growth, uniting teachers and students in research and publication. The Institute of Social Anthropology of the Smithsonian Institution had an enormous and lasting influence on the consolidation of social anthropology in Mexico. The Tarascan Project, implemented as an application of community studies, showed how useful social science could be for the development of an Indian group, particularly when it made use of the language and the popular culture of the group as a starting point. North American influence was not the only one. A European Anthropologist, Bronislaw Malinowski, left his mark on Mexican social anthropology through his association with Julio de la Fuente. Both studied the market at Qaxaca and made clear the regional character of integration at the Zapotec, Mixe, and Castilian villages dispersed throughout the valley. In addition, they studied the function the market played in this integration. With this work, they crossed the limits of single community studies and provided the basis for later development of a regional approach. Malinowski came to Mexico attracted by the chain of transformations that the Revolution produced in the social structure of the country. His theoretical and practical interestin the decade of the thirtieswas centered on social change and on the application of the postulates of the science of man to the problems of administration. His stay in Mexico provided him a perspective quite distinct from that previously held by colonial administrators. In addition to the above-mentioned currents, the Mexican Revolution liberated others, such as extending to greater numbers of people the benefits of health care, better income, and political participation. Alfonso Caso institutionalized and gave expression to these ideas when he created coordinating centers as agencies of integral action and regional development. In this task he was helped by a group of anthropologists who, through the interplay of theory and practice, have over the past 20 years produced a model which has become the standard for Mexico with respect to matters of national integration. SfAA Malinowski Award Papers Chapter 3

42 The basic elements of this model can be summarized in terms of integral action, planning, and research. The idea contains three other postulates: functional coordination, operative regionalization, and ideological mobilization. To emphasize the importance given to each of these postulates, we must examine them separately. Research, planning, and integral action provide a foundation for the application of anthropology to the governing of heterogeneous societies. The thesis of integral action is recognition of the problems under consideration as dynamic biological, psychological, social, and cultural totalities which must be considered in their complete historical and geographical contexts. Problem solving requires multidisciplinary teams of researchers, since groups of experts with specialized techniques offer greater possibilities for adequate and comprehensive studies. Implementation necessarily is left in the hands of the professionals within each distinct branch of knowledge. This kind of integral action, which can also be called sectorial (divided into sectors or spheres of knowledge), is the one used by Mexican anthropologists in studying the population of the Valley of Teotihuacn, as well as in the movement that developed the Mexican rural school. In both cases, but on different levels of intellectual excellence, the region and the community were contemplated as totalities. Their integration required work embracing the strategic components of human activity in all its complexity. Integral action joins fields of activity that under normal conditions are carried out separately. Education, health, economy, agriculture, stock raising, and other programs that government departments conceive as separate functions, are united and juxtaposed, aggregating and interrelating in ways that mutually reinforce and support each other. But, integral action is even more comprehensive than this. A focus of a different type is concerned with ecology, regarding man and his environment as a relatively homogeneous, sociogeographic unit which is called a region. The theory of Regions of Refuge, for which I am in a great part responsible, is based on an approach of this kind and facilitates the study of areas in which Indians and non-Indians live together in mutual dependency. Integral action includes examination of the physical composition of the region and the communities contained within it: the metropolis and its hinterland, the main city and its satellites, the village and its barrios, the natural resources and their potentialities. Thus projected, it reveals an ecological integration that emphasizes the permanent interdependence of man and the environment in which he lives. Such an approach not only overcomes the deficiency of narrow focus in simple community development, but also transcends the superficiality of the ordinary planning of a more general nature. Within intercultural regions of refuge the population is divided into ethnic categories with historically assigned statuses of servitude and privilege. Ladinos and indios, gente de razn and naturales, vecinos and paisanos are names that identify sectors of the population with different cultures and languages; but, more importantly, they are ethnic groups which are unequally situated in a caste organization. Integral action puts this separation into perspective, taking into account human groups and conflicts, qualifying cultural differences, and identifying the degree of social evolution necessary to assure, through unification, equivalent development of the ethnic categories of which the region is composed. With respect to these categories, integral action is concerned with the critical education of all the interacting groups, since it strives for a non-alienated integration. Education for freedom cannot include privileges for one group and discrimination against others. Democracy, as a model for Indian education, must stress intercultural understanding as an instrument to build the nation. SfAA Malinowski Award Papers Chapter 3

43 A fourth form of integral action has social structure as a frame of reference. An imperialist philosophy concedes the benefits of development to a minority elite which ascribes to itself the status of a dominant class while exploiting or condemning to marginality groups which exceed it in size. Indians are among the marginal groups (in Mexico), but their marginality is not complete segregation. Individually and temporarily they form part of the proletariat or of the lumpenproletariat and they contribute in their limited way to raise the standard of living of the culturally and economically more advanced. Integral action has as a goal a structural reintegration leading to profound changes in the social relations of production, distribution, and consumption. Because of its transcendency, this effort requires the most attention. Agrarian reform, fiscal reform, and credit reform are important because their achievement alters the structure of the system and some of its strategic components. The results can be known in a short period of time and they constitute the basis from which other reforms can be initiated to consolidate social change. Educationthrough the redistribution of techniques, knowledge, and valuesalso modifies the social structure. It is a slow process, but such changes are lasting and of great strength. Through approaching problems from diverse angles, integral action is productive for research, planning, and implementation. As it becomes more profound, it reveals the numerous facets that must be considered in a unified approach. In the case of the intercultural regions of refuge, a new and distinct point of view is indispensable. In spite of the varied implication of integral action, ideological implications are very often evaded in practice, discussion, and analysis; yet ideological integration constitutes the very reason for the existence of the indigenous movement. Through ideological integration, we seek complete and equal participation of social classes and categories of population in the task of overall development. This means that Indians and non-Indians must share equally in national integration, as much in obtaining goods and services leading to economic and moral growth, as in active contribution to the progress of the intercultural region and to the nation as a whole. Thus, marginal people can free themselves from the undesirable state in which they have been maintained and be incorporated into the evolving society as full citizens with complete rights, obligations, and loyalties. This ideological integration, based on the equal participation of all the inhabitants, is the thesis that permanently sustains the Mexican Revolution and toward whose achievement the struggle continues. A second basic postulate of Indian action programs is a complement of integral action known as functional coordination. Sectionally oriented, this postulate involves concentration of specific effort at only one point, within one region and under one authority and orientation, with the aim of adapting the total program to the peculiar character of Indian communities which function as a unit. Functional coordination is the complement of multilateral action. It is the sum of a set of efforts of different kinds, but not simply the sum. Rather, it is the mutual reinforcement of a series of unilaterally implemented projects to stimulate regional development. Coordination, in a certain way, suggests the partial cession of freedom to act; but this cession is only partial, because at the same time independence is retained. Coordination is not the subordination of some to others, but the union and cooperation of all. The third postulate, that of operative regionalization, derives from the need for an ecological integration which can replace and go beyond the limited focus of community development and the generalized view characteristic of planning at the national level. Operative regionalization has as its basis a theory of rational development which contemplates the linking SfAA Malinowski Award Papers Chapter 3

44 of Indian communities into a region and the joining of this region with others of the country and with the totality of global society. The fourth and final postulate of Indian action programs, and by no means the least important, is that of moral and ideological mobilization as a necessary condition for the establishment of a just society: the abolition of overt and covert exploitation; the creation of equal social opportunities for Indians and non-Indians; the development and enrichment of the resources of downtrodden cultures; the provision of aid of all kinds to those who are socially, economically, and culturally dependent in order to permit them the experience of their own development; the right to united and active participation in making political decisions; and the formation of public conscience that recognizes integration of the Indian as necessary for national happiness. These are the elements involved in ideological mobilization. The social crisis which Mexico underwent in 1968 placed in doubt the capacity of the revolutionary movement of 1910 to resolve problems of development and integration within the context of the postulates presented above. Some critical anthropologists questioned not only the raison detre of Indian policy (indigenismo), but anthropology itself. The current administration in my country has given decisive support to applied anthropology by increasing both the number of programs and the budgets for each, in an attempt to modify substantially the undesirable situation created by the regions of refuge and, thus, promote national integration. But, at the same time, the government has placed the responsibility for directing the oldest anthropological institution of Mexico in the hands of the critical anthropologists in order to assure an open door for their ideas. It has done this because of its conviction that the new generation will continue confronting the tasks of integration and development in moral terms, and not purely and simply as scientific problems.
Notes Dr. James Officer, Professor of Anthropology at the University of Arizona, provided valuable assistance in translating and editing this presentation for publication.
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