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Resistance to What? How?: Stalled social movements in Cancun
Author(s) -
KRAY CHRISTINE A.
Publication year - 2006
Publication title -
city and society
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.308
H-Index - 25
eISSN - 1548-744X
pISSN - 0893-0465
DOI - 10.1525/city.2006.18.1.66
Subject(s) - bureaucracy , enthusiasm , resistance (ecology) , social movement , poverty , government (linguistics) , power (physics) , democracy , political science , tourism , political economy , public administration , development economics , sociology , law , politics , economics , psychology , social psychology , ecology , linguistics , philosophy , physics , quantum mechanics , biology
This paper explores the utility and futility of the concept of resistance in relationship to urban popular movements in Cancun. While Cancun has become the most popular tourist destination in Mexico, the city is characterized by severe inequalities and neighborhood segregation, the legacy of city planning. Urban settler movements have organized to pressure the city and state governments for land for purchase, public works, and services; yet the power of these movements has been curtailed by government strategies of co‐optation, orchestrated enthusiasm, and the bureaucratization of resistance. Many city residents expressed doubts that democratic elections and settler movements could ever successfully ameliorate their condition of poverty.