URBANIZATION, INDUSTRIALIZATION AND VOTING IN MEXICO: A LONGITUDINAL ANALYSIS OF OFFICIAL AND OPPOSITION PARTY SUPPORT

This study analyzes Mexican voting patterns by city or municipio (N=318) in 5 electoral contests across a 6-yr time span; the electoral contests are for federal positions of Congressional Deputy (1961, 1964 & 1967), Senator (1964), & President (1964). The vote in each contest is broken down by 3 parties, the official state party (PRI), the socialist left (PPS), & the nat'list right (PAN). The principal focus is on demographic r's of party support & participation. The analysis is in 2 parts: 1st a large array of r coefficients are analyzed indicating that Ur'ization & industr'ization produce greater electoral competition but less extensive participation; 2nd, a factor analysis of the demographic r's of voting is conducted yielding 2 basic dimensions that are termed "societal scale" & "Ur'ization." While neither of these contributes greatly to the explained variance in voting patterns, Ur'ization is the more effective predictor. The data are employed to evaluate 7 hyp's drawn from the literature in pol'al sociol. Substantively most of these hyp's are refuted in the Mexican case, eg, greater Ur'ization & industr'ization does not produce pol'al instability, greater participation does not draw out dissident voters, etc. An appeal is presented for more comparative res that will base generalizations upon more refined conceptions of nat'l pol'al systems & integrate the findings of sample surveys with aggregate analyses of soc structure. AA.