Douglas Richmond examines the troubled history of the Yucatán Peninsula in a brisk account of that region's recurrent civil conflicts during the nineteenth century. Chapter 1 locates the origins of the Yucatán's nineteenth-century turmoil in the fractious nature of the pre-Columbian Maya peoples, and their subordination to a white minority under Spanish colonial rule. Chapter 2 explores the fraught history of the Yucatán during Mexico's early national period, emphasizing the 1850s. By then, decades of tension between liberals and conservatives at the national level had spawned infighting among the local elite and triggered a mass uprising by the Maya, known as the Caste War.
Chapter 3 presents a fine-grained analysis of Yucatán's experience during the French Intervention (1862–1867) and the brief reign of the Austrian prince Maximilian Von Habsburg as Mexico's emperor, supported by the French under the pretext that he would deliver Mexico from the clutches of liberalism. Richmond shows that reforms enacted by imperial governor José Salazar Ilarregui diversified the economy and qwelled the Caste War, only to be undermined by the liberal victory over the French and Maximilian. Chapter 4 surveys the restoration of the liberal order in the Yucatán through the mid- 1870s. According to Richmond, there were distinct outcomes. On one hand, it accelerated the concentration of landownership necessary for the mass production of henequen, a lucrative cash crop prized for its durable fiber. On the other hand, the flourishing export economy condemned the Yucatec Maya to servitude and exploitation, and incited ongoing rural rebellion through the 1870s and beyond. Thus, according to Richmond, the continuity of “conflict and carnage” defined Yucatán's history in the nineteenth century as much if not more so than did the changes arising from Mexico's independence.
Richmond expands on the work of Terry Ruggely and others who illuminate the historical realities of Mexico's southwestern periphery after independence. This thoroughly researched book draws on an array of archival materials, diplomatic records, and newspapers. The book offers a useful comparative example for those interested in the interplay of state formation and civil conflict in Latin America after independence. It also adds to the growing number of regional histories of nineteenth-century Mexico that examine the intersection of the national and the local.
The book makes its most decisive contribution to the study of nineteenth-century Mexico in chapter 3, by reconstructing a story obscured by the nationalist narrative of the liberal republic's triumph over Maximilian, the French, and their conservative supporters. Richmond finds that, contrary to its reputation for weakness and ineptitude, the government of Maximilian realized tangible if short-lived improvements in the Yucatán. In this account, Maximilian, his wife Carlota, and governor Ilarregui take center stage as protagonists in an epic historical drama. Moreover, its short length and narrative approach make the book suitable for both advanced undergraduate courses and graduate courses.
Yet, minor shortcomings also characterize this otherwise fine study. The indigenous Maya retreat into the background after the book's first chapter. Their voices are virtually absent in the chapters set in the nineteenth century, which reproduce the perspectives and personalities of governors, soldiers, landowners, and the like, in vivid detail. Any criticism of the book on this count must be tempered by the fact that elites produced the sources on which Richmond relies, if not also by his evident sensitivity to the plight of the Maya.
Finally, the book suffers from stylistic shortcomings that compromise its readability. Instances of this problem stand out, especially in chapter 3, where repeated use of the intransitive verb “to become,” often in the same sentence, occurs with such frequency as to create a distraction. Nevertheless, the aforementioned shortcomings do not detract from this book's many virtues. On balance, it offers an insightful and altogether lively regional history.
