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Labor geographies of socially embedded work: The multi scalar resistance of Mexican teachers

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  • Paul Bocking

Abstract

Public sector workers experience particular challenges from the state when they organize and take collective action. Accountable to administrators as well as parents, teachers are embedded within complex power relations at scales from the classroom to the district and the state or nation. This article draws on labor geography’s understandings of how worker agency is socially situated, to explore how the capacities for protest of dissident elementary and secondary teachers in Mexico City have been limited. These obstacles are found within their workplaces governed by the local Secretary of Public Education, in broader political dynamics within the city and in a centralization of governance over education policy to the national level. As a result, between 2013 and 2016 , teachers here were less likely to join protests against policies initiated by President Enrique Peña Nieto that were widely deemed harmful to their professional autonomy, and which drew strong resistance in other regions of the country. This article concludes by briefly assessing how, as Peña Nieto’s term concluded, dissident teachers turned towards the national election and an equivocal relationship with the center-left Morena party.

Suggested Citation

  • Paul Bocking, 2018. "Labor geographies of socially embedded work: The multi scalar resistance of Mexican teachers," Environment and Planning A, , vol. 50(8), pages 1670-1687, November.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:envira:v:50:y:2018:i:8:p:1670-1687
    DOI: 10.1177/0308518X18784019
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Noel Castree, 2007. "Labour Geography: A Work in Progress," International Journal of Urban and Regional Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 31(4), pages 853-862, December.
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