Abstract

MONTERROSA CUBIAS, Luis Gerardo. The Inter-secretarial Demographic Commission and the immigration problem in the Soconusco region during the 1930s. LiminaR [online]. 2022, vol.20, n.1, e892.  Epub Sep 12, 2022. ISSN 2007-8900.  https://doi.org/10.29043/liminar.v20i1.892.

In this article I analyze the work of the Inter-secretarial Demographic Commission, created in Mexico by executive decree in 1935. I review the immigration policy sanctioned by the post-revolutionary governments and the socioeconomic scenario of the southern border that the commissioners found when they arrived in Tapachula, Chiapas. I also examine the diagnosis of their first supervisor, Jorge Ferretis, and the problems they faced in their primary task of granting naturalization to many Soconusco residents who lived in legal limbo. By examining the archives of the Ministry of Foreign Relations and the Municipal Historical Archive of Tapachula, I answer the question that guided my research: Why was the Commission’s work, originally scheduled for two years in Soconusco, extended for more than a decade?

Keywords : migration; Cardenas presidency; population policy; coffee farms; Inter-secretarial Demographic Commission (Mexico).