Editor's Pick

ON 20 NOVEMBER 1910, Francisco Madero—seen here, in the centre of the front row, with fellow rebel leaders—launched the Mexican Revolution. Madero, the scion of a wealthy landowning family, had been the opposition candidate in that summer’s presidential election against the country’s longtime dictator, Porfirio Díaz.

A poor mestizo who had distinguished himself as a military commander, Díaz had twice run for president against his mentor Benito Juárez, in 1867 and 1871. He was opposed to presidents serving multiple terms and, when Juárez’s successor, Sebastián Lerdo, was re-elected in 1876, Díaz led a rebellion that overthrew him. He amended the constitution to prohibit re-election, stepping aside for his ally Manuel González in 1880. However, after returning to power four years later, he got rid of term limits and won a series of farcical elections with almost hundred percent of the vote.

Díaz’s regime, known as the Porfiriato, was a prototype of electoral autocracy. It maintained constitutional institutions but was characterised by state repression, press censorship, land expropriation and a ban on unions. The administration came to be dominated by a small group of científicos—technocrats—who introduced capitalist reforms in order to spur foreign investment, resulting in widespread landlessness and food insecurity, despite two-thirds of the population being engaged in agriculture.

Madero established the Partido Nacional Antirreeleccionista in 1909. He was arrested on the eve of the 1910 election and received only one percent of the vote. After securing bail, in October, he escaped to Texas and called for an armed insurrection. He funded guerrillas, led by Pascual Orozco and Pancho Villa, who defeated federal forces in northern Mexico. Díaz resigned, on 25 May 1911, and fled to Paris. Madero was elected president, with a vote share of 99.3 percent, but came under frequent attack from both conservatives and socialists. He was deposed and assassinated two years later.