Women and Social Change in a Mexican Town

The role of women has occupied a secondary position in the studies of change in Latin American communities. An emerging pattern is matrifocal households resulting from migratory wage-labor patterns. Increasingly self-sufficient women form core formal and informal social linkages which are important aspects of the social structure of the town. In the case of Mina, a small town in northern Mexico, women played an important part in the local politics, resulting in the election of a woman mayor. This election is interpreted as a result of stalemated male-dominated factions and the influence of a large group of formally and informally organized women. Women's roles and organizations must be included in studies of transitional peasantry as societies take on matrifocal-transitional patterns.