Brief aus Mexiko

Abstract

In this article, I propose to examine the origins and follow the process of the development of philosophy in Mexico, its periods, currents and most important features, and some of the problems that it is confronting in modern times. One of the guiding ideas that structure this reflection is that philosophy in Mexico has developed along the horizon of a series of economic, political and social events to which philosophy itself has attempted to respond but that, in a manner both simultaneous and decisive, have contributed to configuring philosophy itself. Among these events I would emphasize, first, the experience of the Mexican Revolution, but would add the experience of the Russian Revolution, World Wars I and II, the explosion of the atomic bomb and, later, the Cuban Revolution, the 1968 Student Movement in Mexico, the nuclear catastrophe in Chernobyl, the fall of the Berlin Wall and, more recently, the emergence of the Neo-Zapatista movement in the country, as well as the ecological disasters that characterized the 20^th century. Nor can we ignore the great challenges that have emerged in recent decades due to the worldwide scourge of inequality, and the extensive migratory movements from poor countries to rich ones caused by the overwhelming force of diverse forms of political and religious fundamentalism, climate change and new forms and waves of violence on both the national and international levels. The recent development of philosophy in Mexico has been marked by growing professionalization and specialization and the formation of a solid community of philosophers with specialized journals that provide spaces for reasoned public discussion and debate that is subject to the argumentative constraints proper to the discipline and conforms to the criteria established by a community that finds itself coming into ever-closer contact with other philosophical communities in and beyond the Spanish-American world. However, and paradoxically, beside this emphasis on specialization, philosophy has lost some of its presence in the public space and grand national discussions and debates. As another central element of its discourse in recent decades we can mention the fact that, parallel to increasing specialization, philosophy in Mexico has been conducted, through its own development, towards greater interaction and dialogue with other sciences and disciplines, leading it to insert itself into a learning process that has allowed it to potentiate the development and advancement of philosophy itself.