This work was first published in Spanish in 1991, and now appears in English translation with an updated bibliography. The first edition was received as an important and carefully documented account of royal policy in early colonial New Spain, particularly towards the native Mexicans, embracing the era of the second audiencia (1531–35) and first viceroyalty (1535–50). The first of three sections discusses the second audiencia, with special reference to policy towards Indian administration, encomienda, corregimiento, tribute and forced labour. The second section looks at the administration of Viceroy Antonio de Mendoza, again with reference to encomienda and corregimiento, but also to Mendoza's own economic activities. The final section represents something of a departure, since it is focused on the economic enterprises of a single high-ranking colonial official, the oidor Lorenzo de Tejada. The work has extensive tables covering all the issues discussed, and includes a useful appendix listing appointments of corregidores to towns in New Spain in the period to 1546.

Ruiz Medrano is concerned with major aspects of royal policy towards the Indians, and above all with the way policy was mediated and moderated by colonial officialdom. She thus traces in great detail such crucial issues as the abolition of Indian slavery, policy towards encomienda (particularly through the impact of the New Laws of 1542), or the introduction of corregidores as royal counterweights to encomendero power. Her discussion of all these themes is careful and abundantly documented, and tends above all to demonstrate the willingness of the Crown to allow substantial adjustments to policy by colonial officialdom, provided its essential jurisdiction was maintained. This is accompanied by analysis of the way in which officials exploited circumstances or their authority to pursue self-enrichment. Thus, we witness Viceroy Mendoza raising stock and ranching, involved with a textile workshop, owning a sugar mill in Orizaba, and dabbling in trade with Peru. More surprising to this reviewer is the material on Lorenzo de Tejada; here we see very clearly how (and how easily) powerful Spaniards dispossessed native communities around the Valley of Mexico of their lands, in this case so as to build agricultural estates in favoured locations such as Tacuba. Tejada's estate had water and fulling mills and an irrigation canal ten to fifteen feet deep and two leagues in length, reflecting what could be achieved with virtually limitless access to native labour.

Many scholars will share my experience of teaching courses in Spanish American colonial history to undergraduates who have little or no command of Spanish. This is perfectly possible, given the abundant scholarship available in English, but much of the richness of the field is lost through lack of access to work only available in Spanish. Ruiz Medrano and the University Press of Colorado are to be congratulated for making her work accessible to an English-speaking readership. Some small part of the benefit is lost, perhaps, due to a translation which (though generally correct) is too often affected by Spanish phrasing or grammar. Nevertheless, I will be asking my university library to order several copies of this important monograph.