1492. The American continent was drawing Europeans on. Some saw in it the chance of a utopia, others saw it as utopia already coming about, in its natural state. All at once two processes of domination were triggered: one supported by the force of arms, and the other by the power of ideas and beliefs. If the defenders of utopian thinking were able to create a lasting achievement, it is because they managed to make their ideas fit with the principles governing the social life of the indigenous peoples: thus a substantial part of what remains from the period of Don Vasco de Quiroga had preceded it. Cultures will not be able to transcend nationalisms and rise to the level of concerns shared by the whole of humanity until they can stand up for their own particular character against ‘globalizing’ trends.
Résumé 1492. Les terres d’Amérique interpellent les européens. Certains y voient l’opportunité d’une utopie, d’autres l’utopie déjà à l’œuvre, à l’état naturel. Instantanément, deux processus de domination se mettent à l’œuvre : l’un soutenu par la force des armes, et l’autre par la puissance des idées et des croyances. Si les défenseurs de la pensée utopique furent capables de réaliser une œuvre durable, c’est parce qu’ils on su assortir leurs idées aux principes qui régissaient la vie sociale des populations autochtones : une bonne part de ce qui subsiste de l’époque de Don Vasco de Quiroga l’avait donc précédée. Les cultures ne pourront dépasser les nationalismes et s’élever au niveau des inquiétudes communes à toute l’humanité que lors qu’elles auront su affirmer le caractère qui leur est propre face aux courants « mondialisants ».
This short paper deals with the difficult articulation of a diverse cultural heritage within a society and the democratic forms of assuring its social cohesion. Special attention is paid to the links between immaterial culture and the environment that transforms it into a structural element of social cohesion. Culture is seen as a 'mould' which shapes a shared behaviour, and democracy can be conceived as a system made up of elements of a cultural nature that go as far as implying safeguarding pluralism, respect and tolerance of all kinds of difference. This is the case with those countries where the structures of the modern state are in the process of disappearing and being redefined in new forms, whose essential feature is acceptance of cultural diversity. If we conceive democracy in terms of heritage and in terms of non-exclusion of cultures dominated by a dominant culture, then it results that Mexico has not experienced true democracy - either in the past or nowadays.
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