Third World Quarterly

ISSN: 0143-6597 (Print) 1360-2241 (Online) Journal homepage: https://www.tandfonline.com/loi/ctwq20

Globalising cities at the crossroads of migration:

Puebla, Tijuana and Monterrey

Marianne H. Marchand & Adriana Sletza Ortega Ramírez

To cite this article: Marianne H. Marchand & Adriana Sletza Ortega Ramírez (2019): Globalising
cities at the crossroads of migration: Puebla, Tijuana and Monterrey, Third World Quarterly, DOI:
10.1080/01436597.2018.1540274

To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.1080/01436597.2018.1540274

Published online: 25 Jan 2019.

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Third World Quarterly
https://doi.org/10.1080/01436597.2018.1540274

Globalising cities at the crossroads of migration: Puebla,

Tijuana and Monterrey
Marianne H. Marchanda and Adriana Sletza Ortega Ramírezb
a
Relaciones Internacionales y Ciencia Política, Universidad de las Américas Puebla, Puebla, Mexico;
b
Relaciones Internacionales, Facultad de Derecho y Ciencias Sociales, Benemérita Universidad
Autonoma de Puebla, Puebla, Mexico

ABSTRACT ARTICLE HISTORY

This article is part of a larger project that focuses in part on the migration Received 12 February 2018
dynamics in large Mexican metropolitan areas or globalising cities. In Accepted 22 October 2018
particular, it develops a comparative analysis of the urbanised region
of Puebla-Tlaxcala, the metropolis of Monterrey and Tijuana. All three KEYWORDS
metropolitan areas are important industrial centres that attract rural– Mexico
urban as well as interstate migrations. Moreover, these urban centres transnational migration
are situated at routes used by migrants from Central and South America assemblages
to get to the US. Yet, despite the increasing impact of migration(s) on urban assemblages
urban areas, very little is known about its characteristics and municipal Worlding cities
authorities have not identified inward or transmigration as issues of
political importance. For our analysis we intend to map the different
migrations through addressing the following question: How are migra-
tions transforming the urban areas of Monterrey, Tijuana and Puebla-
Tlaxcala and how are they inserted in and contributing to urban
assemblages in these metropolitan zones? For this particular article we
have chosen three distinct migratory groups to contrast: Germans in
Puebla-Tlaxcala, Haitians in Tijuana and Indigenous populations in
Monterrey.

‘We are not going to deport law-abiding New Yorkers.

We will not tear families apart.

We will not leave children without their parents’.

Bill de Blasio, 25 January 2017

Introduction
As recent events in the US have shown, cities are increasingly important actors in domestic
politics. The anti-immigrant and anti-refugee executive orders signed by President Trump
have triggered responses from mayors across the country, maintaining or converting their

CONTACT Marianne H. Marchand marianne.udlap@gmail.com

© 2018 Global South Ltd
2 M. H. MARCHAND AND A. S. ORTEGA RAMÍREZ

cities into sanctuaries and refusing to collaborate with federal agencies on such issues as
deportations of undocumented migrants, as reflected in the quote by New York City’s mayor
Bill de Blasio.1 Although this situation may be unprecedented in many respects, not in the
least because of the political turmoil in the US after Donald Trump was sworn into power, it
is clear that cities are increasingly important actors. In addition to their more pronounced
role in domestic politics, cities have also entered the international stage. Scholars such as
Saskia Sassen and Manuel Castells have focused, in particular, on (global) cities’ roles as nodes
and sites of globalisation.2 These early analyses of global cities reflected a turn in urban
studies by going beyond a ‘local’ focus on urban development and its ramifications, consid-
ering cities important actors in the global political economy, where processes and flows of
globalisation are being (re-)territorialised or (re-)embedded and where such processes and
flows take on signification. In Jerome Hoddos words:
As nodes, cities concentrate social interactions and are the sources of innovations, new ideas,
culture, and power. In addition, cities act as transformers, increasing the density, speed, and
reach of sociospatial networks. Thus, they are the most important places for organizing and
producing globalization, and an adequate understanding of globalization makes cities more,
not less, important.3

In the early literature on global cities the focus was mainly on those cities, such as London,
New York and Tokyo, considered most important in the process of globalisation.4 Following
this early work, geographers at the University of Loughborough in the Globalization and
World Cities Research Network (GaWC) established a hierarchy of global cities or, in their
terms, world cities and their connectivity to other (global) cities, thus implicitly emphasising
the disarticulation of global cities from their immediate regional surroundings. The classifi-
cation of world cities established by the GaWC takes us beyond the original selective group
of primary global cities as it includes 707 cities worldwide.5 The inclusion of many cities
located in the Global South and ranking them according to the GaWC classification ranging
from ‘alpha ++ cities’ to ‘cities with sufficiency of services’6 opens up the possibility to analyse
the potentially distinct trajectories, characteristics and processes of global(ising) cities in
the Global South. This article sets out to do precisely this by analysing the three Mexican
cities of Puebla, Monterrey and Tijuana, and their globalising trajectories. There are various
reasons why we chose these three cities for our analysis. First, the choice of these cities relies
in their relative comparability. All three are large metropolitan areas of more than 1.5 million
in the case of Tijuana, more than 2.5 million in the case of Puebla-Tlaxcala and more than 4
million inhabitants in the case of Monterrey. This makes these cities the third, fourth and
sixth largest metropolitan areas, after Mexico City and Guadalajara. Although all three cities
have their particularities, their (population) size, role in respective regional economies and
their geographic locations make these three cities interesting to compare. It also allows us
to look at these ‘second tier’ cities’ experiences in dealing with transnational and global
pressures. In other words, it will focus on how these cities are embedded in globalising
processes and how such processes are transforming them, in particular in relation to migra-
tory dynamics within these urban areas. Additionally, the analysis is part of a larger multidi-
mensional research project, comparing these three cities across various issues, including
their role as energy consumers and nodes in energy generating networks, their environ-
mental sustainability, their level of security from a citizen’s perspective, their involvement
in cultural policies, as well as being nodes in different types of migration flows.
 Third World Quarterly 3

In addressing migration dimensions in a Mexican urban context, the article will critically
engage with the global cities’ literature and entertain the question whether, and to which
extent, the trajectories and characteristics of first tier global cities can be extrapolated to
globalising cities in the Global South. As such it aims to generate insights on globalising
cities in the Global South, in particular on how migration dynamics play a part in this. To do
so, we will critically engage with two bodies of literature in the next section, that on global
and globalising cities and that on migratory dynamics in an urban context.

Global/globalising cities and migration dynamics: a critical review

of the literature
In a theoretical recapitulation of her earlier work, Saskia Sassen identifies seven hypotheses
that supposedly identify the main characteristics of global cities. She emphasises in particular
the reconfiguration of urban conglomerations or global cities as part of overall processes of
globalisation resulting in a concentration of global firms’ headquarters, and an outsourcing
of advanced professional services, including accounting, legal, technological (IT) and adver-
tising services. Moreover, these cities become increasingly interconnected while disembed-
ding themselves from their hinterlands or regional economies.7 Finally, these restructurings
of global cities also engender a growing informal sector which often provides goods and
services to an increasing (undocumented) migrant population.
In terms of migratory flows, global cities tend to attract two kinds of migrants in particular.
On the one hand we find highly qualified or skilled workers, including expats whose mobility
is connected to the needs of the company for which they are working, and on the other
hand, so-called low-skilled or ‘unskilled’ migrant workers who are attracted to these urban
centres because of their ‘job opportunities’. Many of these undocumented migrants end up
in the service sector, working as office cleaners, in hotels and restaurants or as nannies or
domestic workers, or in the construction sector.
Manuel Castells is an urban sociologist who has analysed the connections between glo-
balisation and cities. He puts some qualifiers on the term ‘global cities’ because, in his view,
all cities are embedded in and connected to processes of globalisation and naming some
of them would create new hierarchies:
Thus, the global city phenomenon cannot be reduced to a few urban cores at the top of the
hierarchy. It is a process that connects advanced services, producer centers and markets in a
global network, with different intensity and at a different scale depending upon the relative
importance of the activities located in each area vis-à-vis the global network. Inside each coun-
try, the networking architecture reproduces itself into regional and local centers, so that the
whole system becomes interconnected at the global level.8

Castells distinguishes between the space of flows and the space of places, arguing that
the first involves ‘the material organization of time-sharing social practices that work through
flows’. In order to function the space of flows needs a ‘circuit of electronic exchanges’, ‘nodes
and hubs’ in the form of global cities and a ‘spatial organization of the dominant, managerial
elites’. As such ‘techno-financial managerial elites’ are cosmopolitan and they have created
their own communities which are segregated through real estate prices and articulated
through ‘personal micro-networks’. Examples of these include gated communities and elite
country or golf clubs. Another manifestation of such spatial organisation of and by
4 M. H. MARCHAND AND A. S. ORTEGA RAMÍREZ

managerial elites is a certain homogenisation of lifestyles and a ‘unifying, symbolic environ-

ment’ around the world, in the form of VIP lounges at airports, 5-star hotels and architectural
design, all reflecting a cosmopolitan lifestyle.9
In contrast to the space of flows, Castells identifies the space of places, which is a reflection
of the local, and where most people continue to live. He defines place as a ‘locale whose
form, function, and meaning are self-contained within the boundaries of physical contigu-
ity’.10 In other words, identity formation and belonging are articulated in local terms, for
instance in the form of pertaining to a neighbourhood which has been recognised for its
specific characteristics, folklore, history, etc. Obviously, global cities are not homogeneously
‘globalised’ and while they may function on the one hand as nodes and hubs in the global
political economy (GPE), they also continue to be embedded in the space of places. As their
function as nodes and hubs in the GPE transforms these cities, there will be increasing ten-
sions and struggles between the space of flows and the space of places, or those actors and
activities representing these two spaces. Among other things, urban development projects
catering to the needs of the managerial elites and the gentrification of lower- and mid-
dle-class neighbourhoods, not only reflect increasing inequalities and expulsions, in the
words of Sassen,11 but is also met with resistances of groups who are (re-)claiming the right
to the city.12 Since the Habitat III Conference in Quito during October 2016, this right to the
city is now enshrined in the New Urban Agenda: Quito Declaration on Sustainable Cities and
Human Settlements for All.13 Yet, while increasing attention is paid to growing urban inequal-
ities, marginalisations of urban dwellers and the impact of globalisation on urban spaces,
in other words the space of places, the space of flows and concomitant globalising processes
continue to develop and expand. One of the issues that Castells is not including in his dis-
cussion is where to ‘locate’ lower skilled, undocumented immigrant populations: in the space
of flows or in that of places? While these migrants are obviously a mobile population, they
are not necessarily cosmopolitan according to Castells description. Through the creation of
immigrant enclaves in the form of small shops and businesses, they contribute to the recon-
figurations of the space of places.
Instead of focusing on the top tier of cities or global cities, James Spencer focuses on
urbanisation and globalisation in the Global South. For him global cities are not necessarily
tied to size or economic importance and can be found anywhere. He suggests approaching
urbanisation through the concept of a global urban ecosystem:
[…] cities are the new ecosystem of daily human life regulating, supporting and reflecting a
period that some have come to call the Global ‘Anthropocene’ – a planetary age in which geo-
logic and natural systems of the earth are best understood by understanding human behavior.14

In Spencer’s view the global urban ecosystem consists of patches or spatially defined
complex relations, in other words urban formations, which in turn are connected globally
through corridors.15 While Spencer distances himself from the global cities’ literature as rep-
resented by Sassen, he incorporates some elements of Castells’ spaces of flows and places
in his thinking on corridors and patches. His most interesting contributions to an under-
standing of urbanisation and globalisation are his focus on the cities in the Global South,
which he takes beyond a World-systems analysis of cities in the periphery and semi-periphery.
He is less interested in the hierarchical nature of a city system and focuses on how an urban
ecosystem is influencing daily human life. Yet, his approach can be criticised for seeing cities
as relatively stable entities that are embedded in an overall (eco)system. It is also unclear
 Third World Quarterly 5

how migrants fit into this urban ecosystem. Do they transform the ecosystem or are they
constructing micro-ecosystems that address their needs?
Anyanya Roy shares Spencer’s focus on global cities in the Global South. Taking a post-
colonial perspective, she uses instead the concept of ‘worlding cities’.16 She argues that
through ‘worlding’ the study of global cities can be decolonised, as it challenges the dichot-
omy between theorising about urbanisation in the Global North and ethnographic studies
of cities in the Global South. She maintains that the insertion of cities from the Global South
into the GPE does not necessarily reflect the experiences from a transnational elite but also
involves a ‘worlding from below’ through ‘circuits of migration, resource evacuation, and
commodity exchange’.17 In other words, worlding allows us to visibilise migrants, in particular
lower skilled and undocumented migrants, and their contributions to urban spaces as well
as transnational connectivities.
It is in particular the notion that cities are stable, circumscribed entities that the concept
of worlding and assemblage thinking reject. In the view of Kamalipour and Peimani cities
are the perfect social entity to analyse through the lens of assemblage thinking as it allows
for approaching the city as a ‘multiplicity’ and ‘as an ongoing process of construction’ and
not as a stable, fixed entity. Moreover, they argue that ‘an assemblage is the result of the
“interactions” between elements rather than the properties of the components and it is
defined by the “co-functioning” of the individual elements in terms of stabilizing/destabiliz-
ing’.18 According to McCahn, Roy and Ward, assemblage theory and worlding have much in
common, although they also identify some differences in the way both concepts understand
relationality and power in an urban context:
Worlding is concerned with new geographies of hegemony, while assemblage is more attuned
to their fragilities and indeterminacies. Worlding is intent on foregrounding not only the assem-
bling of urban policy but also the worldly aspirations of subaltern subjects, of how the cita-
tionary structure of late capitalism can function through the mass dreams of ordinary urban
residents.19

It goes beyond the scope of this article to fully elaborate the intricacies of assemblage
and worlding cities theories, but both have made some important contributions to the study
of the urban, especially their ‘bottom-up’ approach to studying the city and the notion that
there are multiple articulations of the city in overlapping and intersecting socio-spatial net-
works. In other words, the city is produced and reproduced over time.
While migration studies have focused on cities in relation to rural–urban migration flows,
these analyses were enshrined in modernisation theory where the urban represented the
modern. It is only recently that migration scholars have turned to analysing why cities not
only attract, but also expulse, migrants20 or what the socio-spatial connections between
cities and migrants are and how the latter shape these spaces.21 In particular, transnational/
migration studies scholars have started to analyse migration circuits and their interconnect-
edness with global or transnational cities. Federico Besserer and Daniela Oliver suggest that
‘the transnational city is a conglomerate of transnational social spaces that subjects construct
between urban poles’.22 In other words, transnational cities are not just connected through
its migrants to other cities, but their local identities are also (re-)produced over time by
different groups of immigrants. For Nina Glick Schiller the implication is that we need to
introduce a multi-scalar approach in order to understand the ‘interpenetrating scales of
relationality’ of different groups inhabiting the city and how such connections and
6 M. H. MARCHAND AND A. S. ORTEGA RAMÍREZ

identifications are being ‘produced and reproduced within both time and space’.23 As already
seen above, Besserer and Oliver tend to focus on the transnational relationalities (of migrant
communities) between non-contiguous urban spaces, while also focusing on their (re-)pro-
ducing these spaces.
Based on these insights, we will do an exploratory study of how three Mexican globalising
cities are being produced and reproduced through processes of ‘worlding from below’, espe-
cially circuits of migration, as well as through connectivities engendered by global capital
flows which are articulated socio-spatially. As this is an initial, exploratory study we will
provide three vignettes of different migrant communities to illustrate how they are ‘worlding’
the three cities of Monterrey, Puebla and Tijuana from ‘below’. The concept of ‘worlding from
below’ is being used to make visible how migrants and migrant communities are articulating
these three cities’ transnational connectivities. In other words, it is the ‘worlding from below’
approach’s focus on migrants and migrant communities or networks that is contrasted with
dominant theorising on the importance of global capital and ICT flows in the process of
globalising cities. As such it leaves open the issue of the socio-economic make-up of specific
migrant communities. It suggests that ‘worlding from below’ through migration is reconfig-
uring cities’ roles and position(ing) in the global political economy.
The three vignettes selected for this article reflect different types of migrations and serve
to illustrate the complexities and differences among the latter and the ways in which they
articulate ‘worlding’ processes within these three cities. In other words, we are not looking
to compare similar migration flows, but rather ‘expose’ the complexities of the migration
problématique in the context of these cities.
Borrowing from urban assemblage theory, the article will analyse to what extent and in
what forms circuits of migration and global capital flows interconnect to articulate assem-
blages that produce these urban formations. To do this we will first provide an overview of
how these cities have inserted themselves into the GPE. Subsequently, we will provide migra-
tory vignettes in relation to these cities and the transformations that both capital flows and
such migratory patterns have produced.

Puebla, Tijuana and Monterrey and their insertion into the GPE
The official Mexican federal government policy for urban development states that ‘the objec-
tive is to control the expansion of urban “sprawl” and consolidate cities in order to improve
the quality of life of its inhabitants’.24 While this focus suggests an inclusive approach to
urban development and even invokes the right to the city, in line with the UN Habitat Quito
Declaration, it is in sharp contrast with recent developments that have highlighted the need
of cities or metropolitan areas to become more competitive.25 According to these authors,
Monterrey, Puebla and Tijuana ranked among the 25 most competitive Mexican cities in
2003 and 2011, although all three went down in their overall ranking of all cities, they simul-
taneously improved their total amount of points on a scale of 1–100.26
As globalising cities that are becoming part of the space of global flows, Puebla, Tijuana
and Monterrey have pursued their competitiveness through attracting foreign direct invest-
ment, inserting themselves into industrial corridors as a way to connect with regions and
cities in North America and, more recently, by projecting to become ‘smart cities’. Yet these
pursuits have come at certain costs. Tijuana, and to a lesser extent Puebla, have relied on a
maquiladora model of development which is based on cheap labour, while Monterrey and
 Third World Quarterly 7

Puebla have also expanded their manufacturing base, especially the automotive sector in
the case of the latter. The territorial expansion to accommodate industries, whether or not
in designated industrial parks, has often occurred at the expense of communal ejido lands.27
As a result, these three metropolitan areas with their respective economic developments
have turned into poles of attraction for internal migration from nearby rural areas, as well
as inter-state, inter-metropolitan migrations and international migrations.28
Rural–urban migrations to these metropolitan areas include people who had farm lands
in the periphery of these cities, but which have been absorbed by the process of unbridled
urbanisation. Indigenous people have also increasingly moved to urban areas. Indigenous
people from different parts of Mexico have settled in Monterrey and Tijuana, while Puebla
is the destination of in-state indigenous communities whose forms of subsistence are
affected by urbanisation.
Inter-state and inter-metropolitan migrations are the main causes for the population
growing in metropolitan and urban areas in Mexico where formal and informal jobs, services
and public spending are concentrated. Compared to Puebla and Monterrey, Tijuana is mostly
characterised by inter-state migrations from different regions of Mexico attracted to this
border city precisely because of its location.
Much of the recent discussions among academics, policymakers and members of civil
society about migration in Mexico have focused on Mexican migration to the US, and to a
lesser extent to Canada, as well as trans-migratory flows from the northern triangle in Central
America. While it has now been well-documented that for the last couple of years more
Mexican migrants are returning to Mexico than are actually leaving, resulting in a net ‘neg-
ative outflow’, this has been obfuscated by the increasing amount of Central American
migrants trying to reach the US.29
Yet, these migrations do not cover the entire range of international migratory dynamics
in which the Mexican state is inserted and which it is also producing. Due to FDI by trans-
national companies in general, and in the three cities in particular, there is now a considerable
inflow of highly skilled workers into these metropolitan areas. Puebla is the destination of
many German expats who are employed by the Volkswagen or Audi corporations, while
Korean expats have moved to Monterrey due to the presence of the KIA factory. Moreover,
Mexican migrants have also inserted themselves into transnational migratory flows as tem-
porary workers, in particular through the Seasonal Agricultural Workers Program (SAWP)
with Canada and the different temporary worker programmes for agricultural, skilled and
unskilled workers (H2A, H1B, H2B, TN) in the case of the US.
Finally, transmigrants do not only come from Central America, but also from other coun-
tries and continents, including Haiti, China and Sub-Saharan Africa. In crossing Mexican
territory, transmigrants have carved out migration corridors that are under constant trans-
formation due to significant levels of violence and insecurities generated by organised crime
and local authorities, and whom migrants try to avoid on their way north.
These international migrations have produced migratory corridors in Puebla, Monterrey
and Tijuana that are associated with global spaces of flows in North America, Europe and
Asia as well as Sub-Saharan Africa. They also produce new connectivities for these cities with
their counterparts. Illustrative of such connectivities are ‘Puebla York’, reflecting the predom-
inance of migrants from Puebla in New York City, or ‘Little Monterrey’, which was coined due
to settlement of middle-class Regiomontanos30 in San Antonio, Texas, as a result of the inse-
curities generated in the context of the War on Organized Crime by the Calderón Government.
8 M. H. MARCHAND AND A. S. ORTEGA RAMÍREZ

These migratory flows and their insertion into the global space of flows not only reflect the
dynamics of the GPE but also produce differentiated opportunities and inequalities for
migrants and their families.

Puebla, Tijuana and Monterrey: migratory dynamics and urban assemblages

In this section we will analyse migratory dynamics in the context of the three cities previously
mentioned. It engages in an exploratory study of how migrants both produce and are being
produced through urban assemblages. For this exploratory study we will provide three
vignettes of distinct groups of migrants for each city: Haitian migrants in Tijuana, German
expats in Puebla and indigenous people in Monterrey. Although reflecting dissimilar migra-
tions, all three groups have (re)produced parts of these three cities. Obviously, each of these
metropolitan areas are nodes in multiple migratory flows and these vignettes are a first,
partial approximation of migratory urban assemblages in wording, how they are being
“worlded,” and provide a contrast of skilled, lesser skilled and irregular or undocumented
migrants. As was discussed above, assemblage theory suggests that an ‘assemblage, as a
series of dispersed but mutually implicated and messy networks, draws together enunciation
and dissolution, causality and effect, organic and nonorganic forces’.31 What we will explore
is how such messy networks involve the socio-spatial articulation of metropolitan areas
through different immigrant groups.

Puebla and its German expats

For many Poblanos the Volkswagen plant, the largest in North America, has been definitive
for the city’s economic prosperity since 1965. With the recent addition of the Audi factory,
the city and state of Puebla are intricately connected to Germany and its automotive sector.
So much so that Puebla is a twin city with Wolfsburg in Germany, where Volkswagen’s head-
quarters are situated. It is also through Volkswagen in particular that Puebla is connected
globally, as the plant exports many of its vehicles to North America, other parts of Latin
America and Germany.
Although Germans have arrived in Puebla as early as the second half of the nineteenth
century, long before the Volkswagen plant opened in the 1960s, it is the latter migration
that has had and continues to have an impact. As a result of the two car companies’ presence,
Germans are the largest group of temporary and permanent residents. According to the
National Migration Institute (Instituto Nacional de Migración or INM), between 2001 and 2015,
31% of foreigners with a temporary residence permit are Germans and they constitute 15%
of foreigners holding a permanent resident permit.32 This is in contrast with the rest of Mexico,
where Americans are the largest group of foreigners. In Puebla, US citizens are the third
largest group with permanent residency and the second largest group of temporary
residents.
It is not just in numerical terms that a German presence is being felt. In an interview with
the Honorary Consul of Germany Marko Foitzik, he explained that the German community
in Puebla is not very well organised. According to him, Germans do not like to organise
themselves in any kind of formal association and many of those living in Puebla have not
even registered themselves at the Consulate.33 Despite this observation about the relative
lack of organisation by Germans, their presence is felt in several ways. Although not formally
 Third World Quarterly 9

organised Germans in Puebla are networked through the closed Facebook group of Deutsche
in Puebla und Umgebung, with more than 950 members, and other groups and websites such
as the Deutsche Katholische Gemeinde in Mexiko (mexikath.net), the Mexico Business Network
(located on a German server) and the now discontinued google site Deutsche in Puebla.34
There are other nodal points for the ‘messy networks’ of Germans in Puebla. One such node
is the Colegio Humboldt, which was founded in 1911 and is a reflection of the first wave of
German migrants into Puebla. The Colegio Humboldt provides education from kindergarten
through high school offering in its own words ‘trilingual and bicultural education’.35 Its role
in the German community and in fostering connectivity with Germany is manifold. It provides
schooling in their mother tongue for the children of German expat families and through its
exchange programmes with German schools, children of Mexican families can study a semes-
ter abroad. Also, the school fulfils an important function by organising events evidencing
German culture and that provide spaces for encounters between Germans and other inhab-
itants of the Puebla metropolitan area. One such occasion is the October Fest which is a yearly
returning event. Beyond this function, the Colegio Humboldt also provides a point of infor-
mation and exchange for people who wish to rent a house or sell some of their possessions
when they are moving.
While the Colegio Humboldt is one of the most clearly articulated nodes, it is not the only
one. Restaurants serving German food and stores such as bakeries that sell German products
constitute other, interconnected, nodes. It is interesting that some supermarkets located
closely to the areas where Germans live have also stocked typically German products such
as sauerkraut and sausages. Germans recently arrived tend to use the Facebook group and
similar internet sites to inform themselves about such venues. In general, businesses catering
to the needs of the German community have been developed. For instance, various real
estate agents now serve as intermediaries to new arrivals by offering a listing of either fur-
nished or unfurnished rental places in popular areas, mostly gated communities, as these
are perceived as providing much needed security. Among such gated communities are Santa
Cruz Guadalupe, which is relatively close to the Colegio Humboldt, and the recently devel-
oped Lomas de Angelópolis, which already has about 70,000 inhabitants.36 For those who
wish to play golf are the more expensive communities of La Vista in Puebla and El Cristo,
which is in the near-by municipality of Atlixco.
Another type of service industry is the language schools which offer German to Mexicans,
who wish to engage with the German community or work in a German language environ-
ment such as Volkswagen or Audi, but which offer also Spanish lessons to German workers
and their spouses. The interconnectedness between these transnational firms and language
schools is not just indirectly through their employees, family members and those interested
in establishing some kind of relation with Germany or these firms, but also in a very direct
way as Volkswagen has its own language school which provides language training in five
languages (German, English, Spanish, French and Chinese) as well as intercultural training.37
There are many other examples of how Puebla has been produced as a transnational city
with ties to Germany and the role that German immigrants or expats have played in this
process, creating ‘messy networks’ across different socio-spatial dimensions, ranging from
schools, to gated communities to restaurants and specialised stores, supermarkets and even
organisations for animal protection, in which Germans have been very active.
Notwithstanding the claim of the German consul that Germans are rather dispersed in
Puebla, this vignette suggests an assemblage is emerging around the interconnections
10 M. H. MARCHAND AND A. S. ORTEGA RAMÍREZ

between actants or formal structures, such as the VW and Audi factories, the Colegio
Humboldt building or German style food products, and different populations, including
German expats, Mexican and German exchange students, and Poblanos interested in German
culture and language, possibly to pursue a career in the automotive industry. Interestingly,
certain parts of this assemblage are relatively stable, such as the interactions related to the
VW plant or the Colegio Humboldt, while others are less articulated and visible, such as the
real estate business that has emerged around German expats. Also, while the city and
state governments are part of this assemblage through strengthening economic ties and
serve as an ‘enabler’ for FDI, they are not providing special services to German expats. This
can be gleaned from the website of the State Coordination for International Affairs and
Support for Migrants from Puebla or CEAIAMP, which provides two main objectives:
(1) providing support for migrants from the state of Puebla, either abroad or having returned
home; and (2) promoting Puebla internationally, in order to attract FDI and foster interna-
tional cooperation.38 In other words, neither the city nor the state have any programmes
specifically dealing with immigrants from different parts of the world or facilitating their
temporary or permanent stay in the city or state.
Against this background it is interesting to note that the INM, which expedites temporary
and permanent residence cards, has informally played a role as facilitator. In informal com-
munications with personnel from the Institute it is clear that for German workers and their
families, and for Europeans and Americans in general, the bureaucratic formalities or red
tape are less arduous than for someone arriving, for example, from a country in the Southern
cone. Maybe it is because of this informal ‘preferential treatment’ that many Germans reject
being labelled immigrants, but rather tend to identify themselves as ‘expats’ as the latter
category embodies a subjectivity that reflects mobility in terms of being able to cross borders
and live in transnationalised spaces.

Tijuana: a city welcoming migrants

Tijuana, being a border city, has a long history of being part of the global space of flows.
Because of its maquiladoras it has multiple connectivities with cities in Asia, North America
and Europe. At the same time, it has attracted many people from the interior and south of
Mexico. Although many of these internal migrants have possibly come with the objective
of crossing the border into the US, many have actually stayed on the Mexican side of the
border and work in the maquilas or other sectors of the economy, such as hotels, restaurants
or construction. Added to the continuing flow of people arriving from other parts of Mexico,
return migrants have also settled in Tijuana, either temporarily or for a longer period of time.
These flows of people into the city have contributed to the construction of its identity as a
city that welcomes immigrants. The intersections of migrations in Tijuana reflect complex
urban assemblages around these migrations. The most recent and visible inflow of migrants
into Tijuana consists of Haitians and people from Sub-Saharan Africa. Haitians started to
arrive from May 2016 onward and many indicated that they were looking for asylum in the
US. In interviews with local authorities and representatives of migrant shelters as well as
members of the business community, we received different accounts of why these migrants
suddenly arrived in Tijuana, but the common and dominant trope repeated multiple times
was that Tijuana distinguished itself from other cities in that it is a city of immigrants and
therefore welcomes migrants. As Melba Adriana Olvera, president of the Baja California State
 Third World Quarterly 11

Human Rights Commission, explained, these people from Haiti and Sub-Saharan Africa
arrived in Tijuana because they consider it a ‘safe border’ as opposed to other border crossings
between Mexico and the US. Moreover, according to accounts by the people working in
migrant shelters, many Haitians residing in Brazil had been working in the construction
industry to prepare the country for the Olympic Games but were forced to leave due to the
country’s economic problems. At that point they received information from the Haitian
community in the US about the possibility of filing for Temporary Protected Status (TPS) and
enter the US. Thus, they began their long journey from Brazil to Tijuana.39 Indeed, when we
arrived in Tijuana in October 2016, many of the Haitian migrants were waiting for their turn
to have an interview with the American authorities. Initially the authorities did not limit the
amount of daily appointments, but during the summer they started to cap these to 100 per
day and in September they lowered it to 50. As a result, people had to wait for close to two
months before they could appear before the US authorities. When we visited Tijuana during
the second week of October, appointments were scheduled for 5 and 6 December. According
to Sister Margarita, coordinator of the Desayunador Salesiano, this situation had created a
bottleneck as around 200–300 migrants were arriving daily in Tijuana and the city started
to face a humanitarian crisis.40 By January 2017 the situation had not improved and there
were estimates that more than 4000 Haitians were staying in Tijuana and, by then, around
30 migrant shelters were in operation.41 Since then, and with the changes in US migration
policies after 20 January 2017, as Donald Trump assumed power as president of the US,
Mexican authorities have reacted to these new circumstances. On 20 February 2017 Rodulfo
Figueroa Pacheco, the INM delegate in Baja California, announced that the Mexican author-
ities would regularise the migratory status of about 4000 Haitians which were still in Tijuana
and allow them to work. Interestingly, the additional argument provided by the authorities
was that these measures would also ensure that the Haitians would leave the shelters and
thus create the much-needed space to receive and attend deported Mexican migrants.42
One of the shelters, the Christian Church Iglesia de Embajadores de Cristo, recently donated
land for the construction of 24 houses for Haitian migrants, which was immediately baptised
‘Little Haiti’.43 The action by the church received positive feedback, but also reactions of a
more xenophobic nature, namely that the Haitians should be sent back to Haiti and that the
church should care first about returned and deported Mexican migrants from the US.44
Migrant shelters such as the Casa del Migrante de Tijuana and civil society organisations
defending migrant rights, organised in the Coalition for the Defense of Migrants (Coalición
pro Defensa del Migrante, AC or COALIPRO), have over 30 years of experience in responding
and adapting to American migration policies.45 In so doing they have built and ‘knitted’ their
transnational networks and alliances with counterparts such as the American Civil Liberties
Union-San Diego (ACLU) and the American Friends Service Committee (AFSC) on the other
side of the border in order to build mutual support and define common strategies. Last year
COALIPRO and the AFSC published a report on Mexican internally displaced persons (IDPs)
who, fleeing the violence in their communities, have been filing for asylum in the US. Yet,
their chances for getting refugee status are very small as is explained in the chapter entitled
‘The mirage of asylum in the United States’.46 With the recently announced changes in
American migration policies by President Donald Trump, the prospects of migrants and
asylum seekers alike will not improve.
What the above account reveals is that Tijuana is made up of an interconnected migration
assemblage that involves migrants, civil society and operates transnationally. We are not
12 M. H. MARCHAND AND A. S. ORTEGA RAMÍREZ

even including the role the migration industry, with its coyotes, polleros, travel agencies,
hotels, counterfeiters and transportation companies, plays in adding even more complexities
to such assemblage. Yet, the interconnected networks that make up the urban migration
assemblage called Tijuana, and which inform the notion that Tijuana is a city made by and
welcoming migrants, are facing a range of practical and political challenges that may well
create insurmountable contradictions. When the Haitians arrived in Tijuana, the migrant
shelters organised in COALIPRO acted swiftly and immediately started to accommodate the
new arrivals. In some cases, this meant transforming a soup kitchen into a shelter where
people could stay overnight. This was the case of the Desayunador Salesiano, for instance.47
In addition, new shelters were opened in order to accommodate the increasing flow of
people. The shelters were able to mobilise Tijuana’s general population which started to
donate food, blankets and personal hygiene items in large amounts. According to some
accounts, 98% of the necessities were donated by Tijuana’s population, as, in particular,
federal government agencies have not responded to the situation.48 While local and state
agencies have provided some support, civil society organisations have complained about
the lack of support from the federal government and the fact that there is still no govern-
ment-run migrant shelter.49 The role of migrant shelters in dealing with what is generally
considered an incipient humanitarian crisis has been impressive, yet their actions are also
contributing to new tensions that may even undermine Tijuana’s self-image of welcoming
migrants. As some of the coordinators of the shelters told us, they have been increasingly
criticised by the press for helping foreign migrants at the expense of assisting Mexican
migrants who returned voluntarily or who were deported. While the shelters have denied
that this is the case, and they even showed us some figures of how many people they have
helped and their nationalities, they also shared concerns about emerging xenophobia
directed at Haitians and Africans who are much more visible than, for instance, their Central
American counterparts. As many of these migrants, mostly young men, were forced to sleep
in makeshift tents or in the streets in front of the shelters because of the impossibility to
provide a roof for all of them, the workers at the shelters were weary of the possible linkages
between an emerging xenophobic discourse and concerns about (in)security in the city. This
was one of the reasons why they tried to convince the local business community, especially
the construction sector, to hire these young men and keep them busy, so that they could
not ‘get into trouble’. Yet, according to Sister Margarita, she had received some feedback that
local Mexican construction workers already started to complain because of losing their jobs
to Haitian workers, who supposedly work harder than they do.50

Monterrey and its indigenous immigrants

Monterrey is one of the most important cities in Mexico, second after Mexico City´s metro-
politan area in terms of population and GDP. It has also attracted much FDI and of the three
cities we are analysing for the overall research project, it is the highest ranked in comparison
to Tijuana and Puebla according to the GaWC website.51 Monterrey has a long trajectory of
private sector-led industrialisation, which distinguishes it from Mexico City in particular,
where industrialisation in the 1950s and 1960s was part of a state-led import-substitution
industrialisation development strategy. The different industries in Monterrey have attracted
both international as well as domestic migration flows, ranging from high- to low-skilled
labour. For instance, in 2016 the INM emitted 8332 temporary and permanent residence
 Third World Quarterly 13

permits for the state of Nuevo León of which Monterrey is the capital.52 Moreover, in 2009
Nuevo León was ranked fifth among the states with most foreign residents, with a total of
12,410 persons or 4% of the total amount of foreigners residing in Mexico.53 As few reliable
statistics exist about how many foreigners are living in Mexican cities, it is estimated that
most foreigners in Nuevo León are living in the city of Monterrey itself, with the rest in its
surrounding metropolitan area. This makes Monterrey the fourth municipality or delegation
(of Mexico City)54 in Mexico with most foreign residents in 2009.55 Although Monterrey’s
metropolitan area is considered to have high levels of immigration, in 2010 only 3.37% of
its population (of about 4 million people) was either internal or international migrant. Yet,
Monterrey is still considered a relatively attractive city for immigrants. Using a National Survey
of Social Mobility in Mexico conducted in 2006 (EMOVI), Huerta Wong concludes that ‘the
people who migrated to Nuevo León live better than those who emigrated to the United
States or some other place [in Mexico]’.56
Of different immigrations into the metropolitan area of Monterrey, one of the groups that
stands out is indigenous people who make up a significant part of the flow of internal
migrants. Most of them come from different central and southern states of Mexico, including
San Luis Potosí, Hidalgo, Puebla and Veracruz, and they have migrated to the city of Monterrey
since the 1970s. Being one of the major industrial centres in the country, Monterrey has
converted itself into a pole of attraction for immigrants who can do low-skilled jobs.57 As Table
1 shows, there are several indigenous groups living in Nuevo León.58
According to 2010 census data, 90% of the indigenous population in the state of Nuevo
León is concentrated in its capital, the city of Monterrey.59 It appears that the other munic-
ipalities that are part of Monterrey’s metropolitan area are less attractive to indigenous
populations (see Table 2). While these indigenous migrations form part of overall rural–urban
migratory flows, the indigenous groups which have settled in Monterrey stand out for their
political activism as well as their educational achievements. In this third vignette about
migrants in metropolitan areas, we will try to picture the rural–urban assemblages that they
have constructed and in which they have inserted themselves. In addition, we intend to
trace how these assemblages have reconfigured parts of Monterrey’s urban landscape.
Scholars have researched the situation of indigenous immigrants in Monterrey. Among
the issues that they emphasise are discrimination and social injustice.60 Through this process
indigenous migrants´ ethnicity is being re-articulated as they start to engage in identity
politics, organise on the basis of their ethnicity and mediate between their indigenous com-
munities and the primarily ‘mestizo’ environment. In addition, Monterrey has become an

Table 1.  Principal indigenous languages spoken in Nuevo

León in the population of over 5 years old (2010).
Indigenous
language Number of speakers %
Náhuatl 21,638 54
Huasteco 5,948 14.8
Otomí 1,391 3.5
Zapoteco 889 2.2
Mixteco 572 1.4
Totonaco 458 1.1
Mazahua 428 1
Other 8813 22
Total 40137 100
Source: Elaborated with data from INEGI, 2015, Table 7.2.
14 M. H. MARCHAND AND A. S. ORTEGA RAMÍREZ

Table 2. Indigenous population living in the different municipalities of the Metropolitan Area of
Monterrey (2000–2010).
Municipality 2000 2005 2010
Apodaca 2259 4662 7262
Cadereyta Jiménez 821 648 1172
García 303 1183 6123
San Pedro Garza García 2347 3203 3429
Gral. Escobedo 2679 5782 8273
Guadalupe 3783 6302 7087
Juárez 828 2623 6821
Monterrey 10,918 18,519 21,477
Salinas Victoria 280 1053 1564
San Nicolás de los Garza 1887 4798 3981
Santa Catarina 1771 4507 5761
Santiago 290 644 1125
Total indigenous population in Metropolitan Area of Monterrey 28,166 53,924 74,075
Total indigenous population in the state of Nuevo Léon 29,602 57,731 81,909
Total population of Nuevo León 3,834,141 4,199,292 4,653,458
Total indigenous population as percentage of total population in 0.77% 1.37% 1.76%
Nuevo Léon
Source: Elaborated with the data from INEGI Censo General de Población y Vivienda, México (2000, 2005, 2010).61

attractive place for young indigenous immigrants to go to high school and university. In the
period 2000–2010 there was a 432% increase of young indigenous immigrants living in
Nuevo León and attending high school or preparatoría.62
The socio-spatial and economic insertion of indigenous people into the metropolitan
area of Monterrey reveals some interesting emerging assemblages. Many live in so-called
low-income areas (barrios populares) located in the centre of town and close to the railroad
tracks and bus station. As García Tello suggests:
This is what happened in the first quadrant of the City of Monterrey, where the bus terminal,
the Alameda and the Macroplaza are located. The area close to the bus terminal was converted
in a site where the families and persons who arrived for the first time at the city would find a
place to sleep, eat and establish contacts with other countrymen (paisanos). Public recreational
areas like the Macroplaza and the Alameda Mariano Escobedo began to be frequented and
slowly appropriated.63

Indigenous immigrants in the metropolitan area of Monterrey have tended to settle in

accordance to their ethnic group.64 The advantage of such concentrations for indigenous
immigrants, as opposed to those who live more dispersed, is a heightened visibility toward
the local authorities and the facilitating of organising and communication among themselves
with, as a result, better access to social programmes and services.65 Such visibility has also
made indigenous immigrants in Nuevo Léon a target of the Centro de Atención al Migrante
del Estado de Nuevo Léon as the person in charge, Laura Gómez Ramírez, explained to us
during an interview. She mentioned that she was involved in a working group on indigenous
immigrants in the state with other government agencies.66 This is quite unusual as the offices
for attending migrants in other states usually only focus on their (state) citizens abroad and
those who have been deported or returned voluntarily. While this is also true for the Centro
de Atención al Migrante del Estado de Nuevo Léon which has as its main objectives attending
migrants from Nuevo Léon living in the US, those who have returned from the US and for-
eigners who live in Nuevo Léon, Gómez Ramírez explained that the indigenous migrants
living in the state now also receive some attention.67 This new focus of her agency was
articulated in response to the initiative by the ministry of education in Nuevo León which
 Third World Quarterly 15

had embarked upon an intersectoral approach to address the needs of the indigenous
(migrant) population.
Another example of how indigenous immigrants have been able to pressure government
agencies to address some of their needs, and in the process knitting alliances and assem-
blages, is the case of the Huastecos who are street vendors and have been involved in political
struggles about occupying spaces in Monterrey’s public markets.68 The Huastecos have been
able to present their demands before the authorities and involve the National Commission
of the Development of Indigenous Peoples (Comisión Nacional de Desarrollo de los Pueblos
Indígenas). The recognition by this Commission of the specific problems faced by indigenous
immigrants and their claims to improve their situation have allowed them, in turn, to
strengthen their positions before the city and state governments.

Conclusion
This article addresses how the three Mexican cities of Puebla, Tijuana and Monterrey have under-
gone substantive transformations through their insertion into processes of globalisation. In
particular, the article focuses on how such processes of globalisation are connected to the (re)
articulations of urban assemblages around migrations. Each of these cities is characterised by
different migratory flows, including emigrations, immigrations, internal migrations, transmigra-
tions and return migrations. To illustrate these migration-related urban assemblages we have
chosen three distinct groups for each of the three cities: German expats in the case of Puebla,
Haitians in Tijuana and indigenous migrants in Monterrey. As such these three groups contrast
skilled, lesser skilled and irregular or undocumented migrants.
The research reveals that what these urban assemblages have in common is a certain level
of ‘messiness’ in terms of their articulations. For instance, the presence of German expats in
Puebla has generated intricate networks of service providers, ranging from real estate agents,
to retail stores and restaurants catering to the needs and tastes of the German community. Yet,
as the Honorary Consul Marco Foitzik suggested, Germans are not organised and like to be
‘assimilated’ into Poblano society. Yet, their mere presence has generated a ‘service industry’
which precisely highlights their distinctiveness, and non-assimilation, in terms of their needs
and preferences. Moreover, local authorities do not view the German expats as a population
group that needs specific attention. In terms of their migratory status, they are ‘invisible’ to these
local authorities who do not specifically attend to their possible needs and interests.
Although the arrival of the Haitians in Tijuana is very recent, and thus it may be too early
for new urban assemblages to have developed, existing networks and assemblages have
been articulated to attend to the needs and expectations of the Haitian immigrants. As those
we interviewed told us, the existing network of migrant shelters has so far absorbed the
brunt of providing meals, accommodation and medical attention. The arrival of the Haitian
migrants also meant that the shelters had to improvise and change many of their routine
activities in order to deal with the thousands of immigrants that arrived in a short period of
time. In other words, existing assemblages and networks were transformed and adapted to
confront the new situation.
Finally, in the case of Monterrey, indigenous migrants have been attracted to the city for its
economic opportunities and their presence has slowly transformed parts of the city. No indig-
enous groups are originally from the state of Nuevo Léon, yet their presence in the state, and
in particular in the metropolitan area of Monterrey, has forced municipal and state governments
16 M. H. MARCHAND AND A. S. ORTEGA RAMÍREZ

to address their needs and demands. In particular, different indigenous groups have been able
to organise politically and gain not only access to education, but they also have been assigned
spaces in the city’s public markets, allowing them to sell their goods as street vendors. One of
the latest developments in the often confrontational ‘assemblages’ between indigenous groups
and government institutions is the recognition of these indigenous groups as migrants by the
Centro de Atención al Migrante del Estado de Nuevo Léon. This is all the more remarkable as similar
offices in other states direct themselves only to Mexican migrants abroad and recent returnees.
What these three migrant groups have in common is that they are all part of urban assem-
blages, which are not only linked to transformations of these three globalising cities, but also
have left a mark on these cities’ identities. Yet, it is remarkable that local authorities have only
partially attended to the different migrant populations in their cities. To start, few statistics are
available about different migrant populations in these cities. Moreover, the state offices for
attending migrants (Oficinas de atención a migrantes) tend to focus on Mexican migrants (orig-
inating from the states in question) abroad and return migrants, but not the different migrant
groups that are present in the respective states or municipalities. As a result, many of such
migrant groups and their roles in ‘producing’ these cities are being ‘invisibilised’. Of the three
cities, civil society in Tijuana has been most active in addressing the needs and demands of
different migrant groups. In the case of Monterrey, civil society organising has been in the
hands of indigenous groups, which has resulted in the authorities now treating the indigenous
population as immigrants. In Puebla, on the other hand, little organising has happened in the
case of the German expats. However, civil society groups have addressed the human rights
violations toward migrants from Central America. Overall, one of the conclusions we can draw
is that these globalising cities in Mexico, while facing a wide range of migration issues, are not
yet addressing these issues in a coherent, encompassing way.
The main objective of this article is to contribute to the ‘worlding’ of cities in the Global
South, by analysing how assemblages have been generated around different migrations in
Mexican urban contexts. From the three vignettes it is clear that such urban migration assem-
blages are in the process of being created, or  “ in wording”, and are being partially stabilised,
but tat the same time it is also clear that these assemblages continue to be in flux and make
several migrant populations invisible.

Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Funding
This work was supported by the Mexican Consejo Nacional de Ciencia y Tecnología (CONACYT)
[PDCPN 2014-247777].

Acknowledgements
We wish to thank the anonymous reviewers for their constructive comments, our colleague José Luis
Sánchez Gavi for sharing his field notes, and our research assistants who have supported us with
collecting information and transcribing interviews: Brenda Ramírez Contreras, Andrea Márquez
Castillo, Daniela Moyano Leyva, Elba Alejandra Pérez López, María José Goytia Morúa, Jessica Elizabeth
Rojas Rodríguez, Mariana Granados Carranza, Yuliana Ivett Lorenzo Martínez and Hugo Nava.
 Third World Quarterly 17

Notes on contributors
Marianne H. Marchand holds a chair in International Relations at the Universidad de las Américas
Puebla (Mexico). Her current research focuses on gender and migration as well as urban migration
assemblages.
Adriana Sletza Ortega Ramírez is a Professor of International Relations at the Benemérita Universidad
Autónoma de Puebla (BUAP) in Mexico. Her work focuses on local migration policies and
paradiplomacy.

Notes
1. Twitter, @NYCMayorsOffice, https://twitter.com/NYCMayorsOffice/status/824411399615107073
2. Sassen, The Global City; Sassen, The Global City (2nd ed.); Castells, The Information Age: Economy,
Society, and Culture.
3. Hodos, Second Cities: Globalization and Local Politics, 3.
4. Sassen, The Global City; Sassen, The Global City (2nd ed.).
5. See Globalization and World Cities Research Network: http://www.lboro.ac.uk/gawc/
world2016.html
6. The GaWC classification for world cities is as follows: ‘Cities are assessed in terms of their ad-
vanced producer services using the interlocking network model [ . . .]. Indirect measures of
flows are derived to compute a city’s network connectivity – this measures a city’s integration
into the world city network. The connectivity measures are used to classify cities into levels of
world city network integration. These levels are interpreted as follows:
alpha++ cities In all analyses, London and New York stand out as clearly more integrated than
all other cities and constitute their own high level of integration
alpha + cities Other highly integrated cities that complement London and New York, largely
filling in advanced service needs for the Pacific Asia
alpha & alpha- cities Very important world cities that link major economic regions and states
into the world economy
All beta level cities These are important world cities that are instrumental in linking their re-
gion or state into the world economy
All gamma level cities These can be world cities linking smaller regions or states into the
world economy, or important world cities whose major global capacity is not in advanced pro-
ducer services
Cities with sufficiency of services These are cities that are not world cities as defined here but
they have sufficient services so as not to be overtly dependent on world cities. Two specialised
categories of city are common at this level of integration: smaller capital cities and traditional
centres of manufacturing regions’: http://www.lboro.ac.uk/gawc/gawcworlds.html
7. Sassen, “The Global City, Introducing a concept,” 28–30.
8. Castells, The Information Age: Economy, Society, and Culture, 380.
9. Ibid., 412–17.
10. Ibid., 423.
11. Sassen, Expulsions.
12. Borja, La Ciudad Conquistada.
13. UNGA A/RES/71/256 (2016).
14. Spencer, Globalization and Urbanization, 14.
15. Ibid., 21–4.
16. Roy, “Worlding the South,” 17.
17. Simone, “On the Worlding of African cities,” 17.
18. Kamalipour and Peimani, “Assemblage Thinking and the City,” 405.
19. McCann et al., “Assembling/Worlding Cities,” 589.
20. Hernández-Léon, Metropolitan Migrants.
21. Besserer and Oliver, Ensamblando la Ciudad Transnacional; Glick Schiller, “Transnationality:
Transnationality and the City.”
18 M. H. MARCHAND AND A. S. ORTEGA RAMÍREZ

22. Besserer and Oliver, Ensamblando la Ciudad Transnacional, 22.

23. Glick Schiller, “Transnationality: Transnationality and the City,” 291.
24. “Programa Sectorial de Desarrollo Agrario, Territorial y Urbano 2013–2018”.
25. Cabrero et al., Ciudades Competitivas-Ciudades Cooperativas; Cabrero, Retos de la Competitividad
Urbana en México.
26. Ibid.
27. Olivera, La urbanización social y privada del ejido; Rappo M. et al. Transformaciones, Migraciones
y Conflictos Socio-Ambientales de la Zona Metropolitana de Puebla.
28. Conapo, “Análisis y caracterización de los migrantes internos en el sistema urbano nacional”;
Conapo, “Migración Interna 2000”; Conapo, “Migración Interna 2010.”
29. Dominguez Villegas and Rietig, Migrants Deported from the United States and Mexico to the
Northern Triangle; Gonzalez-Barrera and Krogstad, “What We Know About Illegal Immigration
From Mexico”; Krogstad, “5 Facts About Mexico and Immigration to the US”; Li Ng et  al.,
Yearbook of Migration and Remittances Mexico 2016.
30. Regiomontano is the Mexican name for people from Monterrey.
31. Puar, Terrorist Assemblages, 211.
32. Unidad de Política Migratoria, “Boletín Estadístico 2015.Documentación y Condición de
Estancia.”
33. Interview, January 2016.
34. See Mexikath.net (Deutsche Katholische Gemeinde in Mexiko): https://mexikath.net/; Mexico
Business Network: https://www.xing.com/communities/groups/mexico-business-net-
work-1066656; Deutsche in Puebla (google site): https://sites.google.com/site/deutschepueb-
la/home; Deutsche in Puebla und Umgebung: https://www.facebook.com/search/top/?q=-
deutsche%20in%20puebla%20und%20umgebung
35. See Colegio Humboldt: http://www.colegio-humboldt.edu.mx/modeloeducativo.php
36. “Lomas de Angelópolis… ¿nuevo municipio de Puebla?” Puebla dos22, 7 October 2016. http://
pueblados22.mx/lomas-de-angelopolis-municipio-puebla/
37. See Centro de Idiomas & Estudios Superiores: http://idiomasvw.com.mx/
38. See Coordinación Estatal de Asuntos Internacionales y Apoyo a Migrantes Poblanos (CEAIAMP):
http://ceai.pue.gob.mx/nosotros
39. Charles, Jacqueline. 2016. “New Migration: Haitians Carve a Dangerous 7,000-mile Path to the
US.” Miami Herald, September 24. http://www.miamiherald.com/news/nation-world/world/
americas/haiti/article103920086.html
40. Interview, October 2016.
41. Semple, Kirk. 2017. “As Migrants Strain Border Towns, Pressure Builds on Mexico to Act.” New
York Times, January 27. https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/27/world/americas/mexico-
border-tijuana-migrants-haitians-trump-wall.html?_r=0
42. “Regularizarán en BC situación migratoria de 4 mil haitianos.” 2017. La Jornada, February 21.
http://www.jornada.com.mx/2017/02/21/politica/006n1pol
43. Sotelo Bustamante, Iván. 2017. “Pequeña Haití en Tijuana forma parte de un proceso de cambio
a nivel global.” Starmedia, March 28. http://www.starmedia.com/noticias/pequena-haiti-
tijuana-migracion/
44. See Templo Embajadores De Jesús Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Templo-
Embajadores-De-Jes%C3%BAs/367145106778361
45. See Coalición Pro Defensa del Migrante: http://www.coalipro.org.mx/programas.html
46. Coalición Pro Defensa del Migrante AC and American Friends Service Committee-LAC. Vidas en
la Incertidumbre, translation by the authors.
47. Interview, October 2016.
48. Interviews, October 2016.
49. Semple, Kirk. 2017. “As Migrants Strain Border Towns, Pressure Builds on Mexico to Act.” New
York Times, January 27. https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/27/world/americas/mexico-
border-tijuana-migrants-haitians-trump-wall.html?_r=0
50. Interview, October 2016.
51. See The World According to GaWC 2016: http://www.lboro.ac.uk/gawc/world2016t.html
 Third World Quarterly 19

52. Unidad Política Migratoria, “Estadísticas Migratorias: Síntesis 2016.”

53. Rodríguez Chávez and Cobo, Extranjeros Residentes en México, 26.
54. Delegación or delegation is an administrative sub-unit in Mexico City (previously the Distrito
Federal or Federal District).
55. Rodríguez Chávez and Cobo, Extranjeros Residentes en México, 26.
56. Huerta Wong, “Sin mayor opción que ‘echarle ganas,´” 92, translation by the authors.
57. Durin and Moreno Zúñiga, “Caracterización socio-demográfica de la población hablante de
lengua indígena en el área metropolitana de Monterrey.”
58. INEGI (the National Bureau of Statistics and Geography in Mexico) constructs statistics of indig-
enous population considering indigenous language spoken.
59. INEGI, Anuario estadístico y geográfico de Nuevo León 2015.
60. Durin y García Tello, “Etnicidad y educación superior: Indígenas universitarios en Monterrey.”
61. INEGI (the National Bureauof Statistics and Geography in Mexico) Censo General de Población y
Vivienda.
62. Olvera Guidiño et al., Indígenas y educación. Diagnóstico del nivel medio superior en Nuevo León.
63. García Tello, “La espacialidad de los indígenas en el área metropolitana de Monterrey,” 64–6;
translation by the authors.
64. For instance, the Mixtecos are living in the colonia Héctor Caballero in the municipality of
Juárez, while the Otomies can be found in the colonias of Genaro Vázquez and Lomas Modelo,
and the Mazahuas in the area of Alianza and San Bernabé (all in the city of Monterrey). Finally,
about 20 Nahua speaking families from Veracruz have settled in the colonia Arboledas de los
Naranjos, municipality of Juárez; Ibid.
65. García Tello, “La espacialidad de los indígenas en el área metropolitana de Monterrey,” 64.
66. Interview, 26 January 2016.
67. Interview, 26 January 2016.
68. Durin and García Tello, “Etnicidad y educación superior: Indígenas universitarios en Monterrey.”

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