Repression of Protest and the Image of Progress (Mexico City 1968)

In 1963, the International Olympic Committee awarded the 1968 Summer Olympic Games to Mexico City based largely on the perception that Mexico — unique among Latin American nations — was a peaceful land led by a stable government. This image of Mexico had been decades in the making and incorporated a blend of celebrating Mexico’s rich history and indigenous culture along with its growing promise as a modern, urban, cosmopolitan nation. Marketing these ideas began in the late 19th century, when a group of elite Mexican leaders and experts, described by historian Mauricio Tenorio-Trillo as the “wizards of progress,” began portraying such an image through displays at the world’s fairs (Tenorio-Trillo, 1996: 18–19). As historian Eric Zolov has explained, these developments continued in the tourism advertising campaigns of the 1960s, exemplified by the slogan, “So foreign…yet so near” (Zolov, 2001: 248).