Naturalizing Neoliberalism and the De-Mexicanization of the Tequila Industry

Abstract

Although scholars agree that nationalism remains an important aspect of the new vocabulary of neoliberalism, little is known about how these discourses operate on the ground and in particular contexts. In this paper, we investigate how a specific adaption of national identity, one that underscores the values of cultural integrity, is used to naturalize neoliberal shifts in the tequila industry. Tequila has long circulated in the images and myths of Mexican identity. However, in the last two decades, the Mexican government has increasingly relied on tequila's reputation as the nation's 'spirit' to obscure changes in tequila regulatory policies that are linked to broader neoliberal changes in Mexico. Extralocal actors-in particular, multinational companies-have more influence over the direction the industry is taking and the institutions that regulate it, while tequila production is increasingly untethered from the communities and traditions that make it distinct. Here, we examine how private and public actors mobilize the language of authenticity, place, and quality to justify the adoption of neoliberal measures in the tequila industry.

Distilling agro‐extractivism: Agave and tequila production in Mexico

“…This relationship of dependence on smallholder farmers to supply agave during times of high demand was reinforced during the period of state‐led import‐substituting industrialization (ISI) from 1940 to 1982, which sought to protect industries like tequila manufacturing from foreign competition. Given the long maturation period of blue agave, the absence of regional long‐term planning and coordination between large tequila producers led to cycles of oversupply and shortage of the most important primary material for making tequila (Bowen & Gaytán, 2012; Gaytán & Bowen, 2015; Luna Zamora, 1999; Zizumbo Villarreal, Colunga García, Vargas Ponce, Rosales Adame, & Nieto‐Olivares, 2009). Some small‐scale farmers sought to mitigate the risks associated with this boom and bust cycle by only planting agave on marginal lands and/or by intercropping agave with maize, beans and other crops during the first 4 years of its growth, whereas others resorted to selling their labour.…”

“…The largest tequila firms in Jalisco petitioned for the DO through the Tequila Industry's Regional Chamber (now the National Chamber of the Tequila Industry [CNIT]). In this way, tequila became the first product outside of Europe to be protected by a DO (Gaytán & Bowen, 2015). The DO sought to restrict the use of the label ‘tequila’ to agave distillates produced from at least 51% A. tequilana Weber var.…”

“…azul grown anywhere in the state of Jalisco (including parts of the state where it had never been cultivated) and in specific municipalities of the neighbouring states of Guanajuato, Michoacán and Nayarit. In 1977, the DO for tequila was expanded to include several municipalities in the state of Tamaulipas, which borders the United States, in spite of the region's lack of history in agave or tequila production and only because ‘[w]ealthy agroindustrialists from Tamaulipas who had planted agave there in the late 1960s, in anticipation of increased US demand for tequila, pushed for its inclusion’ (Gaytán & Bowen, 2015, p. 277). As Bowen and Valenzuela (2009, p. 118) observe, the large size of the area included in the DO for tequila ‘allows the tequila firms to adopt a ‘frontier’ production strategy, externalizing ecological and social costs and moving on to another area after resources have been exhausted’.…”

“…This has led to a lucrative tourist industry. According to Gaytán and Bowen (2015), two companies, Tequila Herradura (Brown‐Forman) and Cuervo, have been able to capture the bulk of tourist flow (see also Hernández López, 2009).…”

“…Until the turn of the millennium, almost all of the agave used to make tequila was grown in and around Tequila and in the Highlands of Jalisco. However, after the agave shortage between 1999 and 2003 and in the context of rapidly increasing external demand within the framework of NAFTA, the largest tequila companies began taking control of agave production and expanding it into other parts of Jalisco and into neighbouring states recognized by the DO (Bowen & Gerritsen, 2007; Bowen & Valenzuela, 2009; Gaytán & Bowen, 2015). It was a strategy to overcome the cycles of abundance and shortage that characterized the supply of agave for tequila production during the 20th century.…”