Liberalismo y pretensiones científicas en Noticias estadísticas del estado de Sonora

This study analyzes Jose Francisco Velasco’s work, Noticias estadisticas del estado de Sonora (1850), to identify the elements of 19 th -century utilitarianism that were typical of liberalism, presented primarily as economic-administrative proposals. It also rescues the book’s pretensions to a scientificity elaborated on the basis of the perspective of descriptive statistics, while emphasizing the importance of the author and the book in relation to the historical moment in which it was elaborated, the consolidation of institutions, and the role of science as a generator of information useful for governments.