The Participation Paradox of Indigenous Autonomy in Mexico PDF

The Participation Paradox of Indigenous Autonomy in Mexico
Author(s): Jonathan T. Hiskey and Gary L. Goodman

Source: Latin American Politics and Society, Vol. 53, No. 2 (Summer 2011), pp. 61-86
Published by: Distributed by Cambridge University Press on behalf of the Center for
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The Participation Paradox of
Indigenous Autonomy in Mexico
Jonathan T. Hiskey
Gary L. Goodman
ABSTRACT
As indigenous movements around the world seek to strengthen their

collective voice in their respective political systems, efforts continue
to design political institutions that offer both sufficient local auton-
omy and incentives to participate in the broader political system.
The state of Oaxaca, Mexico, offers a test case of one such effort at
indigenous-based institutional design. This article argues that such
reforms often fail to confront the tension between local autonomy
and citizen engagement in politics outside the borders of the com-
munity. Testing this theory through a comparative analysis of voter
turnout rates in municipalities across the state of Oaxaca and the
neighboring state of Guerrero, this study finds that the adoption of
indigenous institutions at the local level is associated with signifi-
cantly lower voter turnout rates for national elections.
With decadedecade
many ofofdemocratic
democraticrule,
Latina new
American rule, a countries
set of challenges has arisennew
thatset of now challenges well into has their arisen third that
goes beyond the "first generation" concerns of free and fair elections
and peaceful alternations in power at the national level. One such issue
is the role indigenous communities will play in these emergent democ-
racies. From the election of Evo Morales as president of Bolivia in 2006
to the ongoing Zapatista conflict in southern Mexico, the collective
voice of indigenous peoples across the region has grown increasingly
louder, albeit in different forms, as their respective political systems
have continued to open up to them.
An increasingly difficult question concerns how best to accommo-
date this voice in the context of a dual transition that has brought West-
ern-style democracy and market-based economies to Latin America, two
systems in tension with many indigenous customs and beliefs. It is with
this question of how indigenous communities can successfully become
part of a transition process that simultaneously empowers and threatens
them that we begin our analysis of the impact of purportedly pro-
indigenous reforms on the voting behavior of citizens in the state of
Oaxaca, Mexico.
As the Zapatista rebellion has demonstrated, the unwillingness or
inability of a political system to provide space for indigenous concerns
can have far-reaching consequences for a country's economic and polit-
© 2011 University of Miami
62 LATIN AMERICAN POLITICS AND SOCIETY 53: 2
ical development processes. Countries across L

struggling to arrive at an institutional framew
nous peoples with, as Van Cott so succinctly s
indigenous and a full and equal citizen of a La
the same time" (2003, 221).
Such an approach represents a significant de
turies of marginalization and political exclusion
have faced. During the region's most recent pe
though indigenous movements in some countr
ure of success (see, e.g., Garcia 2003), in genera
both of Van Cott's goals continues to confront
countries such as Panama and Brazil, indigeno
geared toward assimilation, while in Guatemala
or so has the state moved away from policies
overt extermination (Moog Rodrigues 2002; Co
Bolivia, where Morales's election became the r
success story, the indigenous people faced num
out the country's early years of democratization i
their local autonomy but also become a voice in
2003). Though efforts continue to find this in
know relatively little about the actual consequ
efforts in terms of achieving both local autono
cal engagement by indigenous peoples.
The following pages offer an evaluation of
Oaxaca, which, we argue, reveals the conseq
emphasis on local autonomy at the expense of t
equal participation in politics beyond the com
analysis of municipal-level voter turnout recor
that towns that adopted indigenous reforms have
turnout rates in every national election held sin
into place, when compared with those municipa
those reforms. Though many of the reforms emb
of local participation and may have increased
local politics, they also appear to have led to
from state and national electoral contests. Tho
is a product of many factors, we argue that a fun
paradox of participation in communities adoptin
the obstacles such reforms create for citizen atten
the community borders.
Indigenous-based reforms in general, and th
Oaxaca in particular, have features that make t
motivating citizens to participate in formal pol
of their community, even for such acts as vot
elections. Such reforms tend to emphasize loc
HISKEY AND GOODMAN: INDIGENOUS PARTICIPATION 63
formal adoption of traditional forms of political institutions, whic

include gender- and age-based exclusion from leader selection
processes, and community service obligations as a requisite for enjoy-
ment of full citizen rights. In Oaxaca, the promotion of local autonomy
went as far as a ban on political party activities in most reform towns,
nominally in an effort to curtail the perceived threat of political parties
to indigenous-based mechanisms of leadership selection and interest
aggregation. It is this institutional disconnect between indigenous-based
local politics and the national political system that we view as the cen-
tral obstacle to achieving the goal of both local-level autonomy and a
greater voice for indigenous communities in national politics.
Though such institutions and mechanisms have served as the foun-
dations of certain indigenous people's communal life for centuries, we
see their formal adoption as creating a local institutional framework that,
all else equal, will not be as conducive to citizen participation in formal
politics as would a framework that is more consistent with the national
political system. In other words, most local political systems mirror
those of the national system in which they are embedded, and as such
serve as potential "training grounds" for citizens to participate in poli-
tics. At the very least, they tend not to discourage participation in poli-
tics beyond the borders of the community.
The state of Oaxaca offers an ideal case to examine these proposi-
tions empirically. Within this single state exists a rare, quasi-experimen-
tal setting: some of its 570 municipalities have implemented significant
indigenous-based electoral reforms, while others have not. More impor-
tant, except for those municipalities that make up the state's limited met-
ropolitan area, the vast majority share many of the same general char-
acteristics: they are rural, underdeveloped, and sparsely populated.
Though 418 municipalities eventually adopted the indigenous reforms,
they do not differ significantly from the remaining municipalities that
did not do so. This study capitalizes on this research design feature to
explore the impact these reforms have had on voter turnout rates across
the state from the mid-1990s to 2006.
The potential for a troubling paradox emerges with respect to polit-
ical participation and local autonomy for indigenous communities: as
the latter increases, the former may actually decline. In the process of
exploring this proposition, we move one step closer to a fuller under-
standing of how local institutions may alter political behavior at all
levels of politics, perhaps reaffirming Tip O'Neil's reminder that all pol-
itics is indeed local. And given the resurgence of indigenous movements
across the developing world, with similar calls for the adoption of local
indigenous-based institutions and enhanced autonomy, this question of
how one local institutional change in Oaxaca may have affected wider
political behavior has much greater implications.
The Oaxacan Usos y Costumbre Reforms
In 1995, the state of Oaxaca became the only state in Mexico to forma
recognize the indigenous practice of usos y costumbres , or customar
law, as a legal means of selecting local leaders and managing day-to
day municipal operations.1 The practice of usos y costumbres as it relates
to the selection of local leaders varies widely across the usos commun
ties of Oaxaca, but rests mostly on some form of community-based pro-
cedures that often run counter to the notion of a secret ballot. Many
communities also systematically exclude certain segments of the adu
population from participation in local political affairs through a reliance
on citizen councils or through gender restrictions (Anaya Muñoz 200
Benton 2007, 2008; Eisenstadt 2007).
Though long the de facto selection method for the majority of
Oaxaca's 570 municipalities, the practice was formally prohibited befo
1995, and municipalities were required to register their wsos-select
candidate as a member of the country's ruling party, the Institution
Revolutionary Party (PRI). In exchange for being allowed to select the
local leaders through established community mechanisms under the
façade of formal electoral procedures, municipalities were expected t
submit election returns for state and national-level offices that reported
near-unanimous support for the ruling party's candidates, regardless
the electorate's true preferences (Anaya Muñoz 2004; Rubin 1996).
The beginning of change in this informal bargain began during th
governorship of Heladio Ramírez (1986-92), who campaigned on such
issues as increased recognition of indigenous traditions and a reaffirm
tion of their role in Oaxacan society. By 1990, Ramirez had pushed
reform Oaxaca's constitution in order to formally recognize such indige-
nous practices as the tequio (communal work obligations), as well as
the leader selection mechanisms that fell under the term usos y costum-
bres (Anaya Muñoz 2004). While the proposed reforms had only limit
effects at the time, the efforts paved the way for the 1995 legislation th
officially recognized usos in the state constitution.
Diodoro Carrasco succeeded Ramírez in 1992 and continued his
indigenous-based reform platform. The 1994 Zapatista uprising in the
neighboring state of Chiapas gave further impetus to such reforms,
strengthening movements in Oaxaca and sharpening their calls for the
autonomous self-rule that was emerging as a centerpiece of the San
Andrés Accords signed in early 1996 between Zapatista leaders and gov-
ernment negotiators. In this context, the Oaxacan legislature approved
an amendment to Article 25 of the Oaxacan state constitution that, in
conjunction with numerous changes to state electoral law, legalized a
wide range of indigenous electoral practices (see López Bárcenas 2002;
Eisenstadt 2007).
With these reforms, citizens living in usos municipalities wer

to vote for whomever they wanted in state and national election
being formally allowed to continue their use of nonpartisan, cus
selection methods for local government offices (Bailón Corres
Another provision of the reforms prohibited political party acti
usos municipalities with a population of five thousand or less, a
tion that applied to more than 85 percent of the usos municipali
the surface, such reforms seemed to meet the goals of many ind
movements worldwide, increasing local autonomy while keeping
those political parties that would seek to incorporate or monop
local political organizations.
Without explicit efforts to strengthen indigenous citizens' ties to
national political community, however, the usos legislation effe
insulated these municipalities from the state's rapidly increasing
party electoral competition, increasing the chances that they w
simply continue their clientelisi relations with the PRI. Giv
decades-long presence of the PRI's clientelisi machine in the vast
ity of these small municipalities, the restriction on political part
ity in particular appears a fairly overt attempt by the Oaxacan state
PRI to cement its hold on the electoral support of these towns a
off the rapid encroachment of opposition parties. With limited e
competition at the local level, and political parties banned from
competing for state and national-level offices within the town b
the entrenched political machines of the PRI retained their comp
advantage over would-be political competitors.
Such an institutional framework serves to heighten the possibilit
increased detachment, insulation, and disengagement of citizen
formal politics beyond their local borders. Political organization
ties to both the local and state or national systems arguably are
tial to avoiding the potential isolation and withdrawal of indig
groups from politics. And though an abundance of research on
nous political movements has emerged over the past 20 yea
greatly advances our understanding of how and why indigenous
ments succeed and fail (e.g., Jackson and Warren 2002; Maybury
2002; Selverston-Scher 2001; Van Cott 2000; Yashar 1998), little
offers a systematic assessment of the specific consequences of failur
such reforms.
This study argues that Oaxaca offers a textbook case of flawed and
incomplete reforms producing consequences far beyond the immediate
realm of the institutions in question. As such, the formal adoption of
usos in Oaxaca holds important lessons for indigenous-based reforms
across the developing world. Just as Hiskey and Seligson (2003) found
significantly negative side effects of Bolivia's decentralization reforms of
the mid-1990s, in the form of increased citizen dissatisfaction with the
national political system, so, too, do we expect to find

reforms to have negative effects on voter turnout levels. A
that has historically been highly marginalized, low vote
midst of the country's lengthy democratization process
translate into an even weaker political voice for the citi
Local-Level Indigenous Institutions

and National-Level Participation
Though the concern of this study is how the adoption of indigenou

based selection methods for local leaders affects political behavior
other levels of the political system, we ideally would begin with an
analysis of how usos affect an individual citizen's participation in lo
politics. For if the adoption of usos leads to a decline in participation
the local level, it would perhaps follow that such a pattern would rep
cate itself at higher levels of politics as well. Similarly, if usos produ
an increase in political participation in local affairs, we might expect
see a similar increase at state and national levels of politics. At this point
we can only speculate about the impact usos have on local participa-
tion; and there are compelling reasons to support alternative propo
tions concerning participation rates in usos municipalities.
From one perspective, the formal adoption and practice of usos ma
suggest a greater level of community solidarity, social capital, and "civic-
mindedness" that could conceivably translate into higher levels of pa
ticipation in local levels of politics. Indeed, many usos systems requi
near-unanimity among eligible citizens before an individual can be
selected as the municipal leader, suggesting a heightened emphasis
citizen participation in politics. In interviews with local officials of o
usos municipality in central Oaxaca, San Juan del Rio, in April 2005, t
process of leader selection was described as an all-day affair in the tow
square, where all adult citizens would gather and remain until a con
sensus was reached as to who would serve as the next town mayor.
These types of selection methods would seem conducive to a greate
civic spirit and awareness of politics that perhaps could, in turn, pro
duce higher levels of participation in other levels of the political system.
The counterpoint to this proposition, however, is equally plausibl
Many of the usos practices are decidedly "antiparticipatory" and excl
sionary, making their formal adoption likely to depress participati
rates in local affairs in some cases (Benton 2005; Eisenstadt 2007). F
example, an estimated 18 percent of usos municipalities prohibit th
participation of women in the selection process of local leaders. Othe
municipalities allow only residents of the county seat (cabecera) to pa
ticipate in the selection of the municipal leaders (Eisenstadt 2007). St
others reportedly operate under the thumb of political bosses, who d
not allow for community participation in the workings of local

ment. Such prohibitions would suggest that participation rates
this broad category of indigenous customs will vary considerab
the level of citizen involvement in local politics in some cases
erably lower than in similar towns that do not rely on usos s
methods.
Unfortunately, without data on participation rates in local politics,

the best we can do at this point is offer these observations as compet-
ing propositions that will require further research. Our principal inter-
est, however, is in how this local-level embrace of indigenous institu-
tions alters citizen behavior in state and national-level politics. For it is
indigenous communities' participation in these higher levels of politics
that arguably is the critical next step for their economic and political
development.
Before moving on to the analysis of citizen engagement in national
politics, it is important to note what our metric is for assessing the
impact of usos on voter turnout for national-level elections. We are not
as much interested in looking at how voter turnout rates change before
and after the implementation of usos, due to the highly questionable
nature of voter turnout data in these municipalities before the formal
recognition of usos. Because of these questionable data, it is no surprise
that turnout rates declined across the state after 1995. The average
municipal-level turnout for the 1991 midterm elections was 6l percent,
while for the next midterm elections in 1997, it was only 49 percent. The
bulk of this decline occurred in usos municipalities, where turnout
dropped nearly 16 points over the two elections.
What does interest us is the comparison of voter turnout rates in
1997 and beyond across usos and non -usos municipalities, given their
similar characteristics. Indeed, preliminary work by Cleary suggests that
even a factor like percentage indigenous population does not prove
very useful in distinguishing between usos and non-wsos communities
(Cleary 2007, 2008). 2 So with few exceptions, comparisons between
usos and non-wsos towns offer a very similar system design, sharing
many theoretically important characteristics but differing in one impor-
tant way: some adopted usos while others did not.
Actually, most research on voter turnout suggests that all communi-
ties across the state of Oaxaca will have relatively low levels of citizen
participation in elections. Socioeconomic explanations for voting cer-
tainly indicate that Oaxacans will be less inclined to vote than their
counterparts living in more developed states (Jacobson 1983; Lassen
2005; Lupia and McCubbins 1998; Nagler 1991; Verba and Nie 1972).
Scholars such as Blais and Dobrynska (1998) and Fornos et al. (2004)
similarly would find few of the factors they identify as important deter-
minants of voter turnout, such as the competitiveness of elections and
the number of parties, in the historically one-pa

landscape of Oaxaca. Kostadinova, in examining
a "disenchantment effect" plays a critical role i
turnout (2003, 743). Given the low level of deve
such an effect certainly is likely to be present a
larly, those who argue that the economy drives t
Rosenstone 1980; Radcliff 1992; Scholzman and V
would be hard pressed to find much reason to e
turnout in Oaxaca.
Why might the adoption of indigenous-based selection mechanis

at the local level affect participation in national elections? Several m
anisms could be at work in this posited relationship. First, the enha
local autonomy that comes with the adoption of usos may lead to
further isolation and disengagement of indigenous communities as t
turn increasingly inward, while they see little attention paid to them b
state and national-level representatives. From this possibility emerg
vicious cycle in which candidates for national office pay less attent
to usos communities; that neglect, in turn, makes citizens of thes
municipalities less interested in contests for national office and therefo
less inclined to vote in these elections; and this voter apathy reinfo
the tendency for national candidates to ignore the residents of th
communities.
The prohibition of political parties from campaigning in usos munic-

ipalities with fewer than five thousand people heightens this possibility
of a negative relationship. In interviews conducted for this project, state
electoral officials viewed this provision as one that served to protect
small indigenous communities from being overrun by political party
operatives who would exploit the communities' relative isolation from
state and national-level politics. From another perspective, though, thi
provision simply exacerbates that isolation, making it less likely that cit-
izens in these communities will be inclined to participate in national
elections. Several scholars argue that mobilization of the electorate help
drive turnout (Rosenstone and Hansen 1993; Franklin 1992; Gray and
Caul 2000; Radcliff and Davis 2000). Franklin notes that campaigning by
parties helps voters remember political allegiance, which reinvigorates
their desire to participate in elections (1992). The prohibition on party
activities in small usos communities thus may serve to drive down
turnout rates for all elections.
More generally, the adoption of usos legislation produces a series of
impediments to multiparty competition for state and national offices that
probably translates into less voter interest in these elections. With the
left-of-center PRD (Party of the Democratic Revolution) on the rise in
Oaxaca during the early 1990s, one can easily view the adoption of usos
legislation in 1995 as simply a political maneuver by the PRI's state-level
machine to stop the PRD's advances (Benton 2005). By highlightin

indigenous-based, nonpartisan methods of selecting local leaders
banning political party activity in so many usos towns, the legisla
emphasizes usos y costumbres as the sole legitimate form of poli
activity, casting involvement in partisan political activity as some
antagonistic to the interests of the community and the preservatio
community norms and practices.
Yet another element leading to voter apathy in higher-level e
tions is the relationship between the formal recognition of usos an
clientelistic bargains that sustained these towns during the heyday of
PRI. In a very general sense, such bargains partly involved the exch
of citizens' votes in state and national-level offices for the right to fo
traditional, nonelectoral procedures for selecting local officials. Du
the PRI's one-party regime, this clientelistic exchange may have
included certain particularistic benefits for individuals and commu
who were especially effective at demonstrating their support fo
state and national PRI machines. The recurring economic crises o
1980s and 1990s reduced the availability of these benefits, while
formal recognition of usos removed the primary noneconomic ince
for citizens to turn out and vote for the PRI in state and national elec-
tions. Though local and state-level PRI bosses may still have been able
to inflict some measure of pain on communities that exhibited high
levels of support for the PRD, high abstention rates were not nearly as
threatening to the PRI. Indeed, though low turnout was not ideal for the
PRI, it also did not help the PRD to make significant gains in the state.
On both sides, then, the adoption of usos created an incentive structure
simply to stay home from state and national-level elections.
The limited research that exists on the more general question of
how local institutions may affect political attitudes and behavior beyond
the community level certainly suggests such a connection. Bowler et al.
(2001) find a significant relationship between the local electoral system
used in selected U.S. communities and the level of voter turnout for
local elections. The authors do not examine any potential effects of
these local institutional variations beyond local elections, but their
results are consistent with cross-national work on the impact electoral
systems have on voter turnout and citizens' satisfaction with their polit-
ical system (Anderson and Guillory 1997; Banducci et al. 1999; Jackman
and Miller 1995).
Another set of studies offers support for the linkage of local institu-
tions and national-level attitudes and behaviors. Hiskey and Seligson
(2003) find a significant effect of local institutional performance in
Bolivia on citizens' views of democracy in general and their confidence
in national-level institutions in particular. Bowler and Donovan (2002)
also found a significant relationship between the presence of state-level
direct democracy institutions and feelings

United States.
Furthermore, work on how citizens' views of local elections affect
their willingness to participate in national-level politics offers further
support for the idea that local institutions can have far-reaching effects
on citizens' political attitudes and behaviors (Bowler and Hiskey 2005). 3
Thus, though we know very little about the specific impact of the formal
recognition of indigenous political practices on citizens' political behav-
ior, the extant research on how local institutions affect political attitudes
and behavior more generally gives cause for exploration of this ques-
tion in the case of Oaxaca.
Turnout Rates in Oaxaca and Guerrero
Our efforts to tease out the effects of the adoption of usos on vo

turnout proceed as follows. We first attempt to uncover any system
differences between usos and non-wsos municipalities in order to all
if not eliminate, endogeneity concerns with respect to any differences i
turnout rates between the two groups. We want to be sure that if,
example, there are significant socioeconomic differences between
two groups of municipalities, we control for these differences in sub
quent multivariate analyses in order to be certain that it is not th
"third variables" that are causing differences in voting rates.
In this first step of our analysis we introduce, as a third set of com-
parative cases, the 76 municipalities of the neighboring state of Gue
rero. Like Oaxaca, Guerrero is a state with a significant indigenous p
ulation and a similar socioeconomic development profile. One key
difference is how much the two states recognize indigenous autonomy
and customs. Guerrero exhibits very little of the pro-indigenous ten-
dencies that have characterized Oaxacan politics over the years. With
these additional cases, then, we have the opportunity to assess relative
turnout rates across not only Oaxacan usos and non-wsos but also non-
usos from a different state. This additional level of comparison simply
provides another robustness check for any differences that emerge
between the usos and non- municipalities.
The analysis first compares the mean values of several theoretically
important socioeconomic indicators across the usos and non -usos munici-
palities of Oaxaca and Guerrero in order to establish the core similarities
and differences between these groups of municipalities (see table 1). On
the surface, no clear pattern appears with respect to which group of
municipalities is more likely to exhibit higher or lower levels of voter
turnout. Compared to Guerrero, Oaxaca's direct vote and usos municipal-
ities have a higher percentage of indigenous populations but lower per-
centages of citizens over age 15 with no primary education. Conversely,
Table 1 . Comparing Direct- vote and Usos Municipali
Oaxaca
Guerrero Direct-vote Oaxaca Usos
Municipalities Municipalities Municipa

(N=76) (N=152) (N=418)
Average turnout (1997-2006) 43.7 50.0** 45.1

Indigenous population (%) 19.6** 36.3 36.9
Population 15 and over with
no primary school (%) 28.8** 22.0 22.9
Less than one minimum wage (%) 4.0** 6.1 6.3
Houses with water and
sewerage (%) 12.5 12.1 5.5**
**Difference in group mean is significa

(Tukey's-B).
Sources: Socioeconomic data, INEGI 200
Joseph Klesner.
Guerrero's municipalities have a lowe

ing less than the minimum wage tha
ipalities. Indeed, only in terms of b
palities appear to be the least devel
What is clear from this comparison
tematic socioeconomic differences
of one group of municipalities ha
than the other two. The compariso
deputy elections, however, does rev
usos municipalities of Oaxaca reco
average than either of the other tw
The next step is a multivariate anal
municipalities. The analysis compa
= 418) with their direct-vote counter
the direct-vote municipalities of
(N=76). 4 Through this multilayer
analytical leverage in parsing out a
have had on voter turnout rates for national elections.5
The data for the municipalities of Oaxaca and Guerrero were col-
lected from Mexico's census bureau (INEGI) and its Federal Electoral
Institute (IFE).6 From these two sources, turnout data were calculated
for each municipality for the six federal elections held between 1991
and 2OO6, and municipal-level socioeconomic characteristics were
assembled using the 1990 and 2000 census data. The turnout rates serve
as the dependent variables in the analysis, and the socioeconomic data
provide the basis for a variety of control variables that allow for identi-
fication of the unique effect of the formal

pal turnout rates.
The models of voter turnout across the m
and Oaxaca employ as independent variable
tap those socioeconomic, demographic, and p
associated with voter turnout. For education
a municipality's population over the age of
mary school education, with the expectation
centage, the lower a municipality's turnout r
a municipality's relative "middle class," we
economically active population that reported
one and five minimum wages.7
Our third socioeconomic variable taps th
ment level of a municipality, using the per
community that have both running wat
include the percentage of a municipal popu
nous in the 2000 census. This latter variabl
given the wide range of indigenous popu
municipalities in the state (Eisenstadt 2007).
With all of these measures of municipal d
tion is in line with the standard model of vote
developed communities tending to produce
tion in politics. For our purposes, though, w
the inclusion of these variables in the subse
controls for any underlying differences be
municipalities that may also contribute to diff
Another important control for our model
of migration for a municipality. Recent re
levels of emigration as a significant depres
national elections (Goodman and Hiskey 2008
gration that Oaxaca has witnessed over the p
it is particularly important to control for t
modeling voter turnout. We use the perc
households that reported having at least on
States between 1995 and 2000 as a proxy for
tory activity in the municipality during the p
Because we see partisan competition, or l
that the adoption of usos legislation may aff
politics, we also want to include a control f
nance in a municipality and the strength of
PRD (Benton 2005). We first use a categoric
municipality as "PRI-dominant" if the PRI capt
of the municipality's vote in the previous f
from the previous election to avoid the endo
use of electoral results and turnout rates from the same election. Here
we are simply trying to capture those towns where the PRI dominated
the electoral landscape before the election under study. We also include
the PRD's vote share in the previous election to capture the relative
strength of the principal opposition party in the region. In combination
with the PRI-dominant variable, this should adequately capture the par-
tisan context of the municipality heading into the election in question.
Given the pressures on voters brought to bear by the PRI machine
in its areas of dominance, we expect, at least in the elections of the
1990s, that PRI-dominant municipalities may have high levels of voter
turnout relative to those areas where the PRI has lost its ability to mobi-
lize voters. Conversely, those municipalities where the PRD is strong
could either generate high levels of turnout, due to the increased com-
petitiveness of elections, or could perhaps have lower levels of turnout
as PRI supporters, or clients, simply decide to stay home on election day
(Klesner 2001; Klesner and Lawson 2001).8
We use a state categorical variable to capture any state-level effects
on voter turnout, and another dichotomous variable that compares
municipalities with populations of less than five thousand to the other
municipalities. This latter variable is designed to capture the independ-
ent effects of that feature of the usos legislation discussed above, the ban
on party activity in municipalities with populations of less than five
thousand.9 Our final variable is that central to the analysis - a dichoto-
mous categorization that assigns a value of one to those municipalities
officially recognized as usos y costumbres municipalities.
Table 2 displays the results of our analyses of the four federal
deputy elections from 1997 to 2006. These elections represent four dra-
matically different yet equally important events in Mexico's political
development. The 1997 midterm elections, the first following the 1995
usos legislation, produced the PRI's historic loss of majority control over
Congress. The opposition parties combined to win a slight majority of
the seats in the lower half of Mexico's congress, thus changing, virtually
overnight, the governing role of this institution in Mexican politics. The
year 2000 represents the PRI's loss of the executive branch, a watershed
moment considered by many to mark the culmination of Mexico's dem-
ocratic transition. The 2003 federal elections were the first held under
an opposition presidency, and produced the lowest turnout rate of any
federal election held under the current system. The highly contentious
2006 federal elections witnessed massive postelection protests following
the very narrow victory of PAN presidential candidate Felipe Calderón.
Given the tremendous differences in electoral dynamics that surrounded
these four elections, any systematic effects uncovered across the four
would seem unlikely to be a product of the particular electoral context
but rather a fundamental effect of the variable at hand.
Table 2. Post-1995 Turnout Rates in Oaxaca and Guerrero
Variables 1997 2000 2003

2006
Constant .69 .69 .56 .61
Population with less than primary -.25** -.19** -.12** -.22**

education (.05) (.04) (.05) (.04)
-.27 -.23 -.14 -.27
Population earning between -91** -18 -.86** -.16

1 and 5 minimum wage (.14) (.12) (.14) (.11)
-.33 -.08 -.33 -.07
Households with water and .15** .08 .04 .05

sewerage (.05) (.04) (.05) (.04)
.14 .09 .05 .05
Percent indigenous population .01 -.01 -.01 -.01

(.02) (.01) (.01) (.01)
.02 -.04 -.02 -.01
Percent households with at least -.002** -.004** -.002** -.005**

one member in U.S., 1995-2000 (.001) (.001) (.001) (.001)
-.13 -.26 -.13 -.30
PRI dominant (>.65) in previous .04** .004 .03* .04**

election (=1) (.01) (.01) (.01) (.01)
.14 .01 .11 .10
PRD vote in previous election -.01 -.09** -.05 -.02

(.03) (.03) (.04) (.03)
-.01 -.13 -.05 .02
State (Oaxaca = 1) .02 .04* .05** .12**

(.02) (.02) (.02) (.01)
.04 .12 .14 .36
Municipality with less than 5,000 .04** .01 .03* -.01

(=1) (.01) (.01) (.01) (.01)
.14 .05 .10 -.04
Usos municipality (=1) -.07** -.07** -.08** -.07**

(.01) (.01) (.01) (.01)
-.26 -.29 -.32 -.30
Adjusted R2 .13 .18 .12 .30

F-stat 10.57 15.20 10.14 28.80
(N) (641) (642) (644) (642)
**p<.01; *p<.05
One glance at the results in table 2 reveals that the most sy

consistent, and powerful effect in the four models is the nega
that the usos dummy variable has on voter turnout. Put si
controlling for a host of other important factors, we find
living in those municipalities that formally adopted the u
between 1995 and 1997 voted at much lower rates than their counter-
parts in direct- vote municipalities. The strength and consistency of this
result, given the very different elections under study, is striking. It sug-
gests that when controlling for other factors, turnout rates for federal
deputy elections in usos municipalities were close to eight percentage
points lower than in non-wsos towns.
The impact of the usos variable is all the more noteworthy given the
relatively strong performance of at least some of the model's control
variables. As expected, the greater the percentage of a municipality's
population with less than a primary education, the lower the turnout
rates across all four elections. This result is entirely consistent with most
work on socioeconomic models of voter turnout. What is not so con-
sistent with those models is the performance of the income variable,
where, at least for the midterm elections of 1997 and 2003, the per-
centage of wage earners in the one-to-five minimum wage range is neg-
atively related to voter turnout rates. Given that this coefficient is only
significant for the midterm elections, it may signify the disenchantment
that wage earners held for the electoral process, absent the high-profile
presidential elections that occurred in 2000 and 2006.
Also running somewhat counter to our expectations is the signifi-
cant positive coefficient for the population dummy variable, again for
the midterm elections of 1997 and 2003. Rather than being associated
with lower turnout, it appears that the small municipalities of Oaxaca
were more amenable to being mobilized for the low-profile midterm
elections than their larger neighbors. This finding perhaps highlights the
continued ability of the state-level PRI in Oaxaca (Guerrero has no
municipalities under five thousand population) to "get out the vote" in
these small, rural communities for the less-publicized midterm elections.
The finding also underscores the independent negative effect on turnout
of the formal adoption of usos in these small municipalities.
The other consistent results across the three models are also reveal-
ing. The coefficients for the migration intensity variable are highly sig-
nificant and negative for all four elections, supporting previous findings
that suggest that migration has a consistently negative impact on the
participation profile of municipalities (Goodman and Hiskey 2008).
Voter turnout tended to be higher in PRI-dominant towns, again sug-
gesting that the PRI's mobilizational capacity was not completely lost in
these states during this period. It is notable that the one election in
which this coefficient is not significant is the watershed election of PAN
candidate Vicente Fox in 2000. This nonfinding s

Klesner's (2001) observation that it was the inabil
ditional supporters that damaged the PRI's chanc
We also find that PRD electoral strength is a
turnout for the 2000 election, possibly because
may have seen the writing on the wall for their
Cárdenas, against the impressive candidacy of Fox
overall performance of the models suggests tha
proper set of control variables, and makes all th
central finding that the formal recognition of indi
the local level translates into lower participation
elections.
Before addressing the implications of this finding, two other, slightly

different approaches may be pursued to test the impact of the 1995
formal recognition of usos . Using the same basic models, we can exam-
ine how this collection of independent variables fares in explaining the
1994 and 1991 turnout levels. Our expectation is that the usos variable
may have a positive effect on turnout during this period, given what we
know about the arrangement between usos municipalities and the state-
and national-level PRI.
Usos municipalities before 1995 were expected to produce high

levels of support for the PRI in exchange for the right to employ usos
methods at the local level. The results of this arrangement often were
inflated turnout rates. Though this arrangement slowly changed during
the 1980s, the big change came in 1995 with the formal recognition of
usos , thus ending the decades-old informal bargain.
Table 3 reveals the results of the 1994 and 1991 models of voter
turnout, supporting many of our expectations. First, the overall model
performance again suggests that a reasonably effective set of controls is
included in the models. Second, the strength and significance of the PRI-
dominant categorical variable as a predictor of turnout remains, further
supporting our contention that in Oaxaca and Guerrero, the turnout pat-
terns we find in the post- 1995 elections still include strong remnants of
the one-party era. Third, the diminished importance of both the usos
dummy variable and the migration variable strengthen the results for the
post- 1995 models; for neither variable should we expect to find a sub-
stantial effect, because both tap dynamics that fully emerged only in the
latter part of the 1990s. The positive and sufficient coefficient for the
usos dummy variable for the 1991 model offers support for the conven-
tional wisdom that turnout rates in these municipalities were indeed arti-
ficially high during this period. We are therefore left with stronger evi-
dence that the adoption of these reforms had a deleterious effect on
citizens' willingness to become involved in national elections, compared
to their counterparts in direct-vote municipalities.
Table 3. Modeling Prereform Turnout Rates
Variables 1991 1994
Constant .64 .81
Population with less than primary education -.03** -.29**

(.07) (.04)
-.02 -.37
Population earning between 1 and 5 minimum wage -1.28** -.35**

(.22) (.12)
-.29 -.15
Households with potable water and sewerage .32** .09*

(.08) (.04)
.19 .10
Percent indigenous municipal population -.01 -.01

(.02) (.01)
-.01 -.03
Percent households with at least one member in -.001 -.001*

U.S., 1995-2000 (.001) (.001)
-.02 -.08
PRI dominant (>.65) in previous election (=l)a .07** .02*

(.02) (.01)
.16 .11
PRD vote in previous election -.08* .01

(.07) (.04)
-.05 .01
State (Oaxaca = 1) -.09** .004

(.03) (.02)
-.13 .01
Municipality with less than 5,000 (=1) .10** .03**

(.02) (.01)
.23 .13
Usos municipality (=1) .04* -.02

(.02) (.01)
.10 -.08
Adjusted R2 .18 .13

F-stat 14.97 10.53
(N) (643) (643)
**p<.01; *p< .05

aFor the 1991 mod
1991 election, as th
The negative coefficient for the usos var

despite its lack of significance, merits comme
significant, it would suggest that something a
other than the 1995 formal recognition of th
vote at systematically lower rates. A closer
and particularly in indigenous communities
that voter turnout among many of the usos m
elections that year was greatly influenced by
civil society's response to the Zapatista upri
boring state of Chiapas. Support for the Za
tion to the PRI's rule in Oaxaca and nation
statewide "stay at home" campaign led by p
As Anaya Muñoz notes, the "Zapatista uprisi
on Oaxacan politics," contributing to a dram
based protests and, as a response, heighten
in the state, which happened to be concen
municipalities (2004, 424-25). Though many
not majority indigenous (as measured by th
those communities practicing usos y costumbr
gets for a military seeking out potentially thr
izations and movements. We see this increase in tensions between at
least some usos communities and the state as one potential source of
depressed voter turnout in the usos communities that had very little to
do with the usos institutions themselves.
Another method of checking the strength of the results is displayed
in the results from alternative models in table 4. First, we model turnout
rates only for Oaxaca's 570 municipalities. It may be that even though
we include a state dummy variable, the dynamics of electoral turnout
vary between the two states so much that they mask the role of impor-
tant intrastate processes. Therefore we examine the performance of the
model with only the cases of Oaxaca.
Next we examine the performance of the model for only those
municipalities with a population of one thousand or more. Though we
include a dummy variable to test for the posited effect of a municipal
population below five thousand (the results of which were inconclusive
at best), we have not taken into account a very peculiar but potentially
important feature of many municipalities in Oaxaca that may distort
models of voter turnout. This feature is the simple fact that 105 of the
570 municipalities in Oaxaca have official populations of less than 1,000
individuals.10 We might refer to these as micromunicipalities. In terms of
the voting-age population in these municipalities, then, the numbers (in
2000) ranged from 71 to 631 individuals over the age of 18.
From one perspective, these small numbers should not matter,
because the aggregate voting profile of a municipality, no matter how
Table 4. Alternative Models of Average Turnout Rates, 1
Average Average Average

turnout turnout turnout
Variables (1997-2006) (Oaxaca only) (pop. >1,000)

Constant .63 .70 .59
Population with less than primary -.19** -.20** -.15**

education (.03) (.04) (.03)
-.27 -.27 -.23
Population earning between 1 -.56** -.60** -.33**

and 5 min. wage (.10) (.11) (.10)
-.27 -.28 -.18
Households with water and .09* .11** 05

sewerage (.04) (.04) (.04)
.12 .13 .07
Percent indigenous municipal -.01 -.006 -.004

population (.01) (.01) (.01)
-.03 -.02 -.02
Percent households with at least -.003** -.004** -.003**

one member in U.S., 1995-2000 (.001) (.001) (.0001)
-.26 -.26 -.24
PRI dominant (>.65) in previous .03** .03* .03**

election (=1) (.01) (.01) (.01)
.13 .12 .13
PRD vote in previous election -.04 -.04 -.03

(.02) (.03) (.02)
-.07 -.08 -.05
State (Oaxaca = 1) .06** - .06**

(.01) - (.01)
.20 - .24
Municipality with less than .02 .02 .001

5,000 (=1) (.01) (.01) (.01)
.08 .07 .01
Usos municipality (=1) -.07** -.07** -.08**

(.01) (.01) (.01)
-.35 -.31 -.44
Adjusted R2 .22 .21 .26

F-stat 18.52 18.12 19-34
(N) (641) (566) (537)
**p<.01; *p<.05
large or small, still tells something about the

community. Conversely, with such a small
aggregate turnout rates produced in these m
vulnerable to large, somewhat arbitrary fluct
very little to do with the actual electoral parti
ipality. In a municipality of one hundred eligi
influenza virus that keeps ten people home
a 10 percent drop in turnout. Therefore, if
munity's general proclivity to participate, we
this through the modeling of turnout rates in
In order to address this concern, we run an an
ipalities with a population of more than o
admittedly a fairly arbitrary cutoff point, we
than one thousand may provide a stabler an
profile in terms of their federal election turno
The third method of testing the above r
potential instability of any individual electi
ipality's average turnout rate over multiple
the general tendency of its citizens to particip
fore we also provide the results of a model
among the municipalities of Guerrero and O
between 1997 and 2006. Our hope is that if
across all the various approaches to modeli
stronger support for our contention that the
as a means of selecting local leaders served
ticipation in national politics among citizen
Though table 4 displays only the results
age turnout for 1997-2006 as the dependen
models for each individual year as well, w
results. Clearly, the effect of usos on turnout
gularly strong, significant, and negative ac
no matter how one chooses to analyze it, th
has served to significantly depress the par
communities in national politics. These resu
of fairly stringent tests, including not only t
other variations of the models presented he
the negative impact of usos on turnout rem
We also tested several models with interac
tap a range of theoretically important rela
ent variables. In order to determine whethe
tion was partly a function of whether it w
we tested a model with an interaction term
and the percent indigenous variable (Clear
the coefficient for this term emerge as signif
help the overall model performance. We also use

between the usos variable and those towns with a pop
thousand. Though the independent effect of the uso
remained in all models, the interaction term did not
cant. Finally, we ran several models testing the impa
able on the change in voter turnout rates across time
tematic problems with the turnout rates of usos mu
1997, we might expect to see the formal adoption of
ative influence on the change in turnout over time relat
that took place in similar, non -uso municipalities.
Thus we ran several models using different speci
change in turnout variable, including the relative ch
and 2000 and a similar measure for the average turn
and 1994 compared to the average turnout level of 1
each case, the usos dummy emerged as both statist
tively significant in the expected negative direction, su
over and above any statewide effects that may have
turnout between these elections, the negative influen
of usos remained.13
Though clearly only one of several methods that can be employed
to explore the basic question of this research, the strength and consis-
tency of the results we obtained certainly suggest the significant conse-
quences on citizens' political behavior of the 1995 usos reforms. For if
our findings are correct and indicative of a larger withdrawal from
national politics by citizens in usos communities, these communities
may find themselves in a precarious position as Mexico continues along
it path toward greater democracy.
The Participation Paradox of Local Autonomy
The core finding of this research suggests that an institutional chan

that seeks to empower indigenous communities at the local level m
bear features that also diminish citizen participation in state- a
national-level political arenas. While formal recognition of usos ma
have produced tremendous vitality in some Oaxacan communities, th
institutional change seems to have induced these communities to wi
draw from the larger political systems of which they are a part.
Though more research is necessary, the implications of low
turnout in state and national elections for Oaxacan usos communities can
be potentially devastating - devastating in the sense that as the Mexican
political system becomes increasingly democratized, as the national con-
gress plays a stronger role in the policymaking process, and as state gov-
ernments gain more fiscal power, the political voice of usos communities
is weakening at precisely the time when that voice matters more than
ever before in Mexico's history. Scholars h

quences for other sectors of Mexican society
from the country's political and economic tra
weaker, or at least less effective, political v
during the PRI's one-party-dominant regim
for an already marginalized indigenous popu
damaging (Middlebrook 1995; Shadlen 2004
The risk posed by this process is clear. In
rural municipalities still depend largely on
for their principal source of revenue, comm
continues to decline will provide state and
fewer incentives to expend much political
inconsequential constituencies. The vast ma
palities are small, isolated rural communiti
fore not well positioned to catch the atten
sentatives in far-off urban centers. With low levels of political
participation, their position becomes even worse.
Added to this consequence of diminished turnout is the conclusion
of related scholarship that suggests that communities with high levels of
migration also tend to withdraw from national-level politics and to rely
increasingly on emergent transnational communities as a source of rev-
enue and development. In Oaxaca during the 1990s, emigration among
indigenous communities became more and more pronounced, possibly
reducing even further their economic and political vitality. These
increased emigration rates, combined with the apparent independent
impact of the formal recognition of usos on electoral participation,
potentially marginalize many usos municipalities even further from their
state and national political representatives. Though the analyses in this
study did not find any significant interaction effects on voter turnout
between migration rates and the adoption of usos, our sense is that
these two factors together further exacerbate the tendency of these com-
munities to disengage from their systems and turn toward more local
(and transnational) networks of support.
Not only do usos communities risk losing their political voice, they
also face the potential concrete consequence of not being adequately
connected to the tools of the state in terms of development projects,
expertise, and funding (Fox and Aranda 1996). Across all of these areas,
the isolation that appears to be growing in usos communities promises
further to cut off valuable development processes that, in many cases,
have become the cornerstones of Mexico's social development strategy.
This strategy is based on communities and the state working in part-
nerships in an effort to break from the systematic "development
dependence" that was imposed on localities across Mexico throughout
much of the postrevolutionary period. As other regions of Mexico move
ahead in breaking from this past, the usos communities of

paradoxically, risk increasing their submissive dependence
largesse as their local autonomy increases.
Notes
1. For purely stylistic purposes, we will refer to municipalities that emplo

these sets of practices simply as usos municipalities and the practice itself as us
2. Though not yet published, Geary's papers on indigenous autonomy in
Mexico (2007, 2008) offer a nice overview of many of the larger issues at pl
and possible ulterior motives behind the adoption of usos reforms in Oaxaca
3. With certain exceptions, such as Posner 2004.
4. The number of usos municipalities in Oaxaca increased from 412 to 41
between 1995 and 1997. Because we are primarily concerned with the 1997
2000, and 2003 elections, we include all 418 eventual usos municipalities in o
usos category.
5. We also recognize, of course, the many cultural differences that exist
among the indigenous communities of both states, as well as the differences that
result from the region's tremendous geographic diversity. We contend, though,
that the shared experiences of the citizens of the two states far outweigh these
differences.
6. Data available at www.inegi.gob.mx and www.ife.org.mx, respectively.

Joseph Klesner also kindly made available to the authors voter turnout data for
those years in which IFE data were unavailable.
7. Mexico's system of income calculations is based on an individual's
income relative to the minimum wage set for a particular region.
8. Due to possible high levels of collinearity among some of these vari-
ables, we examined a correlation matrix of the main independent variables and
found few areas of concern. No correlation coefficient is above .60; the highest
is a .59 correlation between the percentage of residents with less than a primary
school education and the percentage of residents earning between one and five
minimum wages. This correlation drops to .56 when including only the 570
municipalities of Oaxaca. As also might be expected, the correlation between
these two variables and the percentage of households with water and plumbing
ranges from .53 to .55. None of these correlations, however, is strong enough to
warrant removing the variable from the analysis. Our thanks to an anonymous
reviewer for calling our attention to this issue.
9. Of Oaxaca's 420 municipalities with a population under 5,000, 357 are
usos municipalities, representing 85 percent of the state's 418 usos towns.
10. One hundred of these 105 with populations under 1,000 are usos
municipalities.
11. These included a variety of alternative control variables, as well as sev-
eral interaction terms that we considered potentially important, such as a term
that described the interaction of the percentage of a municipality's population
classified as indigenous with whether or not the municipality was an usos
municipality. None of these many models produced results even moderately dif-
ferent from those reported here.
12. The change between 1994 and 2000 was specifi

1994turnout)/1994turnout.
13. For example, in the change in turnout model
electoral cycles, where sets of control variables were
used in previous models, the usos unstandardized co
standard error of .017, the beta coefficient was -.203,
was pc.OOl.
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The Participation Paradox of Indigenous Autonomy in Mexico PDF

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The Participation Paradox of Indigenous Autonomy in Mexico

Author(s): Jonathan T. Hiskey and Gary L. Goodman

As indigenous movements around the world seek to strengthen their

© 2011 University of Miami

ical development processes. Countries across L

formal adoption of traditional forms of political institutions, whic

The Oaxacan Usos y Costumbre Reforms

With these reforms, citizens living in usos municipalities wer

national political system, so, too, do we expect to find

Local-Level Indigenous Institutions

Though the concern of this study is how the adoption of indigenou

not allow for community participation in the workings of local

Unfortunately, without data on participation rates in local politics,

the number of parties, in the historically one-pa

Why might the adoption of indigenous-based selection mechanis

The prohibition of political parties from campaigning in usos munic-

machine to stop the PRD's advances (Benton 2005). By highlightin

direct democracy institutions and feelings

Turnout Rates in Oaxaca and Guerrero

Our efforts to tease out the effects of the adoption of usos on vo

Table 1 . Comparing Direct- vote and Usos Municipali

Municipalities Municipalities Municipa

Average turnout (1997-2006) 43.7 50.0** 45.1

**Difference in group mean is significa

Guerrero's municipalities have a lowe

fication of the unique effect of the formal

Table 2. Post-1995 Turnout Rates in Oaxaca and Guerrero

Variables 1997 2000 2003

Constant .69 .69 .56 .61

Population with less than primary -.25** -.19** -.12** -.22**

Population earning between -91** -18 -.86** -.16

Households with water and .15** .08 .04 .05

Percent indigenous population .01 -.01 -.01 -.01

Percent households with at least -.002** -.004** -.002** -.005**

PRI dominant (>.65) in previous .04** .004 .03* .04**

PRD vote in previous election -.01 -.09** -.05 -.02

State (Oaxaca = 1) .02 .04* .05** .12**

Municipality with less than 5,000 .04** .01 .03* -.01

Usos municipality (=1) -.07** -.07** -.08** -.07**

Adjusted R2 .13 .18 .12 .30

(N) (641) (642) (644) (642)

One glance at the results in table 2 reveals that the most sy

candidate Vicente Fox in 2000. This nonfinding s

Before addressing the implications of this finding, two other, slightly

Usos municipalities before 1995 were expected to produce high

Table 3. Modeling Prereform Turnout Rates

Variables 1991 1994

Constant .64 .81

Population with less than primary education -.03** -.29**

Population earning between 1 and 5 minimum wage -1.28** -.35**

Households with potable water and sewerage .32** .09*

Percent indigenous municipal population -.01 -.01

Percent households with at least one member in -.001 -.001*

PRI dominant (>.65) in previous election (=l)a .07** .02*

PRD vote in previous election -.08* .01

State (Oaxaca = 1) -.09** .004

Municipality with less than 5,000 (=1) .10** .03**

Usos municipality (=1) .04* -.02

Adjusted R2 .18 .13

**p<.01; *p< .05

The negative coefficient for the usos var

Table 4. Alternative Models of Average Turnout Rates, 1

Average Average Average

Population with less than primary -.25 -.19 -.12 -.22

Population earning between -91 -18 -.86 -.16

Percent households with at least -.002 -.004 -.002 -.005

State (Oaxaca = 1) .02 .04* .05 .12

Usos municipality (=1) -.07 -.07 -.08 -.07

Population with less than primary education -.03 -.29

Population earning between 1 and 5 minimum wage -1.28 -.35

Municipality with less than 5,000 (=1) .10 .03

Population with less than primary -.19 -.20 -.15**

Population earning between 1 -.56 -.60 -.33**

Percent households with at least -.003 -.004 -.003**

State (Oaxaca = 1) .06 - .06

Usos municipality (=1) -.07 -.07 -.08**