Porfirian Radio, Imperial Designs, and the Mexican Nation

The effective government of large areas depends to a very important extent on the efficiency of communications.

Harold Innis, Empire and Communications

Staring out over the gulf waters off the coast of Veracruz, young telegrapher Alejandro Gutiérrez dreamed of accomplishing great things. It was 1902 and the government had selected him to head experiments with German radiotelegraphy equipment. Gutiérrez had once again successfully signaled a fellow radio operator on the steamship Melchor Ocampo, a coast guard vessel. He achieved a clear reception at distances of seventy miles "under bad and good atmospheric conditions." Although deservedly proud of his accomplishment, Gutiérrez and other communications officials had reached a plateau in their experiments, which had been under way for two years. He could not break the seventy-mile mark. Undaunted, he aspired to connect "Veracruz, Frontera, Progreso, Campeche, Tampico, and Túxpan, for the service of the Public Administration." He believed in the future of the technology, in its ability to expand trade, increase the reach of government, and to facilitate Mexico's rise into the membership of modern nations.

European practices especially influenced Mexican officials. They desired acceptance among the leaders of more powerful nation-states and the power they possessed. Europe's scientists and engineers developed amazing machines that lined the pockets of businessmen and rulers with wealth extracted from far-flung colonies and rising nations like Mexico. Radio was one of the newest innovations. The navies and armies of Britain, Italy, Germany, France, and Belgium raced to incorporate the technology. Political and military agents worked diligently to connect offshore islands and remote resources to metropolitan centers. In the process, they defined world protocol. Mexican officials had similar ambitions, albeit more for gaining control over their own politically defined territory and proving they were worthy of sitting at the international policy table.

The administration of President Porfirio Díaz had made progress toward its goals in establishing a radio network. It had just presided over the groundbreaking of the first public radio stations, one on each side of the Gulf of California. Four years later, in 1906, Mexican representatives participated in an important international conference on wireless technology in Berlin, Germany, aligning with the host country against the British Empire. Germany provided a better deal on radio transmitters and receivers, and unlike their British competitor, allowed Mexicans to operate their own radio systems in addition to owning the equipment. In exchange, Díaz's envoys provided loyalty in diplomatic debates over communication networks. Gutiérrez, the telegrapher with a very personal interest in radio, was a part of something much bigger than his goal of beating the seventy-mile-transmission mark, or even connecting Mexico's gulf ports. He was at the center of a grand struggle between global empires and a Mexican government attempting to use these imperial conflicts for its own nationalist endeavors.

In power since 1876, excepting a four-year stint from 1880 to 1884, Díaz brought relative stability, economic growth, and modernization to much of urban Mexico. Leaders of industrialized empires applauded him for his firm (and sometimes ruthless) rule, especially his protection of foreign investments. Although described by later anti-Porfirista historians as a sellout to foreigners, the Díaz administration had nationalist ambitions. Díaz's advisers understood that technological development was crucial to centralizing power and that the only way to build vast miles of railroads, telegraph lines, and waterworks was to invite in outside specialists and capitalists. Although foreigners often made the greatest profits, the Díaz administration argued that the infrastructural improvements would allow for the growth of domestic capital and consumerism. Meanwhile, the government built new professional colleges, including the National School for Engineers and the National Agrarian and Veterinary School, to train a new generation of Mexican professionals to wean the country from outside influences. The Díaz administration believed it was through infrastructural development and education that a stronger national culture would be born via greater economic and personal exchange, and by force, too, if necessary.

Despite some success in educating Mexican specialists and building a stronger domestic economy, aggressive U.S. economic and military actions created anxiety within the Díaz government by the end of the 1890s. U.S. influence had grown too strong. The Spanish-American War (1898) clearly demonstrated the United States' willingness to impose its will with little regard to the sovereignty of Latin American countries. By 1898, U.S. corporations controlled many of Mexico's infrastructural services, including railways and much of the telegraph system. While aspiring to maintain a workable relationship with the United States, Díaz officials feared U.S. domination and strove to counter American influence by expanding European investments and, by the early 1900s, moving toward increased nationalization of the railways. It was under these circumstances that radio development occurred.

In many ways, the history of Porfirian radio is the story of how technology, competing empires, and rising nation-states intertwined. Mexican consulates in Europe and the United States relayed information back home on new, useful technologies. Governments and businesses of industrialized empires benefited from these transfers, often gaining access to cheap resources and at least partial control over how and where new technologies were used. Imperial governments competed for these relationships with developing nations, including Mexico, to form international and political alliances, expand markets for manufactured goods, and to obtain greater access to natural resources. At the same time, the Díaz administration worked to play growing international competition to its advantage.

In the case of radio, wireless technology developed faster in Europe than in the United States; the largest exporters were in Britain, Germany, and France. After exploring their options and buying some experimental equipment from France, Mexican SCOP and military officials ultimately allied with German companies because they were willing to sell equipment to Mexico and allow Mexicans to operate the services. German agents additionally agreed to help build stations and to assist in the training of radio specialists. The German emperor Wilhelm II and the electric company Allgemeine Elektricitäts-Gesellschaft (AEG) did this to undermine...