The following Bio-Sketches have been prepared by the Mexican Center on the basis of the originals provided by each individual.
Olga Alvarez took her Bachelor's degree in Biology from the University of Texas at Austin, and will receive her Master's of Public Affairs from the LBJ School in May 1996. She has received numerous honors and awards throughout her studies, and has participated in many university-related activities. In 1994-95 she was a graduate student research member of the Policy Research Project team Women in Mexican Politics at the LBJ School of Public Affairs. During the summer of 1995 she will do her professional internship at the U.S. Embassy in Mexico City with the Environmental Attaché.
Josefina Guadalupe Aranda Bezaury was born in 1955 in Mexico D.F. She studied social anthroplogy at the Universidad Iberoamerica, where she took her Bachelor's degree, and at the Escuela Nacional de Antropología e Historia (Master's degree). Currently she is a doctoral student at the UNAM and a researcher at the Instituto de Investigaciones Sociológicas de la Universidad Autónoma Benito Juárez de Oaxaca. Since 1988 she has been state coordinator of the Oaxaca Coffee Producers. Her academic work has focused primarily on peasant women in Mexico; she has published a number of books and articles on this topic, including the widely cited compiled edition Las Mujeres en el Campo.
Vivienne Bennett received her PhD from the University of Texas at Austin and teaches Latin American politics at California State University in San Marcos.
She has lived in San Cristóbal de la Casas and in Monterrey, Mexico, for a total of five years. She has conducted extensive research and published widely on urban popular movements in Mexico, and is currently researching the history of clandestine Maoist popular movements in Mexico during the 1970s. Her book The Politics of Water Urban Protests and Power in Monterrey, Mexico will be published in August 1995 by the University of Pittsburgh Press.
Consuelo Botello de Flores is from Monterrey, N.L. and is married with two children. She took her Bachelor's in Philosophy at the Universidad de Nuevo León and a Diploma in Advanced Studies at the Sorbonne. She has taught at secondary and university levels in Nuevo León and collaborates in the journal Humanitas. She has been a member of the PAN since 1967, and at various times has served as a member of the Party's State Committee. Between 1980 and 1983 she was a member of the Primer Equipo Coordinador Femenino a Nivel Nacional. She was local deputy from 1979 to 1982, and again from 1988 to 1991; and federal deputy from 1985 to 1988, as well as in the current LVI Legislature, 1994-97.
Leticia Calzada is a native of Guanajuato and the mother of two. She obtained her degree in Economics at the Instituto Tecnoloógico de Monterrey and studied postgraduate courses at the University of Sussex and the Universidad Iberoamericana. She held various positions in the Dirección General de Estadística, Secretaría de Educación Pública, and the Consejo Nacional de Fomento Educativo. She designed the political platform for the first campaign of Vicente Fox for the governorship of Guanajuato. She served as technical secretary of the Consejo para la Democracia, and is a member of Mujeres en Lucha por la Democracia, Acuerdo Nacional para la Democracia (ACUDE), and the Movimiento Ciudadano por la Democracia. Currently she is federal deputy in the PRD bloc.
Roderic Ai Camp received his PhD from the University of Arizona in 1970. He joined the Tulane University faculty in 1991, where he currently serves also as chair of the Department of Political Science. Recently he has been guest speaker for the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, and he also gave presentations on the new Zedillo government to the U.S. Department of State and to various committees on international relations. Author of many books on the Mexican political system, his book Political Recruitment Across Two Centuries, Mexico 1884-1991 has recently been published by the University of Texas Press.
Yolanda Castro Apreza was born in Olinalá, Guerrero. She took her Bachelor's in social anthropology at the Universidad Autónoma de Chiapas. She has worked in Chiapas with campesinas for more than ten years in various agricultural communities. Currently she is working in two NGO artisan cooperatives, Unión Regional de Artesanas de los Altos de Chiapas -- J'Pas Joloviletik [las que tejen] and Pas Lumetik [las que hacen barro]. Her work focuses upon the commercialization of production, financial management of the cooperatives, and upon human and civil rights issues for women.
Irma Eugenia Cedillo y Amador is a Federal Deputy for the PRI for the Federal District, and is a member of the Consejo Político del Comité Directivo del PRI. From an early age she has combined her party militancy with an extensive career as a schoolteacher, and has been very active in the education sector. She has served as Secretaria de Acción Social del Comité Directivo del PRI en el D.F. and currently as Secretaria de Participación de la Mujer del FNOC-DF. At various times she has also served as party delegate for the CNOP, the XIV Asamblea Nacional del PRI, and the Movimiento Ciudadano de la UNE.
Ana Lilia Cepeda de León is currently a federal deputy. She achieved this post in 1994 as an external candidate of the PRD. She is a sociologist, with postgraduate training in political science. She was co-founder of the Grupo Mujeres en Lucha por la Democracia in 1988, and for four years was head of the association. In 1991 this
group promoted the creation of the Convención Nacional de Mujeres por la
Democracia which, as a broad cross-party front, supported 42 female candidates for election. She was featured in TIME magazine's special issue "The Global 100", TIME's Roster of Young Leaders for the New Millennium.
Elsa M. Chaney, a political scientist, is visiting research scholar in the Center for International & Comparative Studies, University of Iowa. She has spent the past 25 years researching women in development, politics, and employment in Latin America and the Caribbean, and is the author of the classic book, Supermadre Women in Politics in Latin America.
Joe Foweraker is professor of Government at the University of Essex, United Kingdom. His specialization is social movements, citizenship rights, and political and democratic change. He has written numerous books, monographs, and articles on Brazil, Spain, Mexico, and Latin America. He is co-editor of Popular Movements and Political Change in Mexico, and the author of Popular Mobilization in Mexico; his latest book is Theorizing Social Movements (1995).
Amalia García Medina is from Zacatecas, and is a mother with one child. She studied sociology at the UNAM and history at the Universidad Autónoma de Puebla. She has been candidate for various electoral positions and served as federal deputy for the PRD in the LIV Legislature. She was a member of the II Asamblea de Representantes del Distrito Federal, where she also presided over the Comisión de Seguridad Pública y Protección Civil. Currently she is Secretaria de Asuntos Políticos Nacionales del Comité Ejecutivo Nacional of the PRD. In addition, she is Consejera de la Comisión de Derechos Humanos del D.F., and a member of the Grupo San Angel, Acuerdo por la Democracia (ACUDE), and "De la A a la Z".
Patricia Galeana graduated with Bachelor's and Master's degrees in history at the UNAM, where she has also been a professor. She has also served as academic coordinator of the research institute "Dr. José María Mora" and as General Director of Academic Interchange at the UNAM. She is author of several major books on Nineteenth century Mexican history. In the arena of women's studies she has compiled several works, including Participation of Women in National Life, The Condition of Mexican Women, a University Women's Anthology, and Women, Leadership and Development. She served as Director of the "Instituto Matías Romero" at the Foreign Relations Ministry and is now the Director of the National Archives. Currently she is President of the Mexican Federation of University Women.
María Teresa Gómez Mont y Ureta received her bachelor's degree in Political Science and Public Administration at the Universidad Iberoamericana in 1970 and is about to complete her doctorate in political science at the UNAM. She is federal deputy for the PAN in the LVI Legislature, and since 1990 has acted as Consejera to the PAN in the Federal District. Since 1988 she has worked extensively on the works and life of Manuel Gómez Morín. She has written regularly for the dailies El Nacional and El Financiero, and for the political supplement of Reforma, Enfoque.
Silvia Gómez Tagle is professor/researcher at the Centro de Estudios Sociológicos of the Colegio de México and is author of various books and articles dealing with the Mexican political system, elections and the democratization processes. She also writes regularly for several dailies, including El Financiero. During the 1994 elections she was an active member of Alianza Cívica, which brought together some 400 NGOs to observe the conduct of those elections.
Susana González de Segovia was born in Monterrey in 1937. She has an extensive career in politics for the PAN, having served as alternate local deputy 1988-91; President of the PAN's Municipal Committee for San Pedro Garza García (1988-92); and since 1989 as a member of the Consejo Directivo Estatal del PAN en Nuevo León. Between 1991 and 1993 she was Regidora del Ayuntamiento de San Pedro, Garza García, and currently is local deputy in the State of Nuevo León.
Albert Hannah studies at the LBJ School of Public Affairs, where he specializes in Latin American and environmental issues. His undergraduate degree was in political science at Kalamazoo College. His work experience lies mainly in the fields of journalism and bilingual services. He was a member of the Women in Mexican Politics research team, and currently works as a researcher in the Texas Commission on Alcohol and Drug Abuse.
Marta Lamas is an anthropologist, and has been at the forefront of the feminist movement in Mexico since 1971. She was founding member and activist in Mujeres Trabajadoras Unidas A.C. (MAS/MUTAC). She works extensively in journalism and has regular editorials in El Universal, Unomásuno and La Jornada. Along with others, she founded the journal fem in 1976, the supplement Doblejornada (1987) and the journal Debate Feminista (1990), of which she is the director. In 1992 she founded the Grupo de Información en Reproducción Elegida (GIRE), which she currently directs. She has taught courses on women's and feminist issues at the UNAM, the Escuela Nacional de Antropología e Historia and the Colegio de México.
Cecilia Loría Saviñon was born in 1951. She has degrees in psychology and psychoanalysis and is a university teacher of psychotherapy. She is president of the Grupo de Educación Popular con Mujeres, A.C., and a member of the coordinating committee of the Campaña Gananado Espacios and also of the group "De la A a la Z". This year she is part of Mexico's coordinating committee for the Beijing Conference. She writes occasionally for the Doble Jornada supplement and is author of several books Para nacer de Nuevo (1991), and of Familias en Transformación y Códigos por Transformar (1992).
Sara Lovera is a journalist who studied social work, specializing in agricultural communications. She began her career in journalism in 1968 at the daily newspaper El Día, and since that time has also worked in radio and television. She was founding member of La Jornada, where she continues to work. In that daily she is director of the monthly publication Doble Jornada. In 1987 she founded the Centro de Communicación e Información de la Maujer, A.C., which seeks to develop links between the major means of communication and women. She has received two major national awards for her work in journalism, Rosario Castellanos in 1989 and Al Valor Civil in 1990. She is 45 and has two children.
Lorena Martínez Rodríguez has been active since 1989 within the PRI, often in areas directly related with women's interests and rights. Among the political posts she has held are president of the Consejo Estatal (Aguascalientes) de Mujeres Profesionistas de la CNOP; alternate local deputy for the VII district; General Secretary of the Consejo para la Integración de la Mujer en el Estado de Aguascalientes; Coordinadora Estatal del Movimiento Territorial del PRI; and since 1993 directs the Secretaría de Participación de la Mujer del CEN del FNOC. She currently serves as alternate federal deputy, and in 1995 was appointed Presidenta Ejecutiva del Congreso de Mujeres por el Cambio. Prior to entering party politics she worked as Delegada Federal de la Procuraduría Federal del Consumidor, and as a professor at the University of Aguascalientes.
Alejandra Massolo is Researcher/Professor in the Department of Sociology at the Universidad Autónoma Metropolitana-Iztapalapa in Mexico City. She has a master's degree in urban sociology. She collaborates in the Interdisciplinary Program of Women's Studies (PIEM) at the Colegio de México, which has also published her books Por Amor y Coraje. Mujeres en Movimientos Urbanos de la Ciudad de México, and Los Medios y los Modos. Participación Política y Acción Colectiva de Mujeres.
María Esperanza Morelos Borja was born in Michoacán in 1952 and took her Bachelor's degree in Biological Pharmacology at the Universidad Michoacana de San Nocolás de Hidalgo, followed by a Master's degree in chemistry at the University of Hull, U.K. Since 1993 she has taught at the Universidad La Salle, Morelia. Since 1970 she has been active in the PAN, holding various party positions in Michoacán. She was federal deputy for the PAN in the LII Legislature (1985-88); state deputy between 1989 and 1992; and since 1986 she has been a national council member of the party. In 1994 she was the PAN's candidate for the senate. Currently she is national director for preparation and training in the PAN.
Beatriz Padilla was born in 1964. She graduated with a degree in Political Sciences and Public Administration from the Universidad Nacional de Cuyo, Mendoza, Argentina. She served as Adviser to the Rector of the Universidad Nacional de Cuyo on international cooperation and exchange programs. She also worked for several years as economic policy analyst at the Instituto de Economía y Organización. Currently she is writing her master's thesis on the role of women's non-governmental organizations in the development process in Latin America.
Ana Rosa Payán Cervera was born in 1951. She is an accountant by training, having studied economics and administration at the Universidad de Yucatán. She has served as President of the Community of Catholic Professionals. She entered the PAN in 1983 and has served in a variety of senior party positions in Yucatán since that time, as well as a national counsellor. During the period 1994-97 she is the Presidenta del Comité Directivo Estatal of Yucatán. Since 1987 she has ran in several local and federal elections for the PAN, being successful and serving as federal deputy for the First District between 1988 and 1990. She was candidate for the state governorship in 1993, and between 1991-93 was municipal president of Mérida.
Alma Elisa Reyes de Rizzo was born in Monterrey in 1948. She is married to the current Governor of Nuevo León, Sócrates Rizzo, and they have three children. She graduated with a degree in economics from the Universidad Autónoma de Nuevo León, and took a Master's degree in economics from the University of Chicago, specialilizing in agricultural and labor economics, and public finances. She has been a professor of economics at the ITAM and at the Panamerican University in Mexico City. She has served as President of the DIF in the city of Monterrey (1989-91) and currently is President of the state DIF (1991-97).
Rosario Robles is Federal Deputy for the PRD in the LVI Legislature, and President of the Comisión de Desarrollo Social de la Cámara de Diputados. She has a Bachelor's degree in Economics and a Master's degree in Rural Development, and has served as a faculty member in Economics at the UNAM since 1979. At the UNAM she was a member of the Executive Committee of the UNAM's Labor Union (STUNAM) and was Secretaria de Acción para la Mujer for six years. She was a founder of the PRD, and since that time has been a member of the party's Consejo Nacional. She is a member of the Comisión de Mujeres, and former secretary of the Movimientos Sociales del Comité Ejecutivo Nacional del PRD. An avowed feminist, she is a member of the campaign "Ganando Espacios" and of the group "De la A a la Z". She is also the mother of 11 year-old Mariana.
Gabriela Rocha de Bribiesca is a Montessori teacher, a housewife and a mother. Her involvement in politics began formally in 1976, when her husband was elected municipal president of San Miguel Allende and she began working in the (then) INPI, now DIF, and again in 1990, when he was once again elected to the mayorship. She has extensive experience of political participation in the PRI, particularly in her home state of Guanajuato, where she currently works as principal manager of the home office of Senator Salvador Rocha Díaz. Between 1991 and 1995 she has also been participating in an international research project on education and environmental conservation involving Mexico, the United States and Japan.
Victoria E. Rodríguez took her Bachelor's degree at the Instituto Tecnológico y de Estudios Superiores de Monterrey and her PhD in Political Science at the University of California, Berkeley. Currently she is Assistant Professor at the Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs, at the University of Texas at Austin. Her principal research interests revolve around political and administrative decentralization in Mexico, as well as the current project on Women in Mexican Politics. She is author (with Peter Ward) of Policymaking, Politics and Urban Governance in Chihuahua The Experience of Recent Panista Governments (1992) and Political Change in Baja California Democracy in the Making? (1994), and co-editor of Opposition Government in Mexico (1995). She is also author of a forthcoming volume Decentralization in Mexico The Facade of Power and of several articles and book chapters dealing with Mexican politics and public administration. In 1993-4 she served as a consultant for the World Bank on a project on decentralization and regional development in Mexico.
Patricia Ruiz Anchondo studied Philosophy and Literature at the Universidad Autónoma de Chihuahua. She was one of the principal leaders of the Asamblea de Barrios in the D.F. and is a leader in the Women's Movement of Mexico. She was one of the founding members of the PRD, and served as that party's federal deputy in the LV Legislature (1991-94). She continues to serve as national council member for the PRD, and currently in Coordinator of the Social Security Commission in the Senate.
Gloria Sánchez Hernández was born in Xalapa, Veracruz in 1946. She is married with two children. Her early career was dedicated to teaching in primary, secondary and prepararatoria/normal levels of public education. She was co-founder and General Secretary of the Sindicato de Trabajadores de la Escuela Normal Veracruzana "Enrique C. Rébsamen". She entered the PMT in 1975 and in 1986 she was the PMT's gubernatorial candidate for Veracruz. In 1985, as an independent, she won the VI District of Veracruz as Federal Deputy. Since 1989 she has been active in the consolidation of the PRD in the state of Veracruz and has held senior state positions for that party. She is Federal Deputy for the PRD in the current LVI Legislature.
Cecilia Soto González was born in Hermosillo, Sonora, in 1950. She studied science at the UNAM during the late 1960s and was active in university politics at that time. In 1985 she entered the PARM, holding various national positions in that party. In 1988 she participated in the electoral campaign of the National Democratic Front, and was a deputy in the LII state legislature of Sonora. In 1991 she was federal deputy in the LV Legislature, and was active both as secretary of the Ecology Commission as well as in several other senior commissions of Congress. She resigned from the PARM in 1993 and the following year was registered as the PT's candidate for the Presidency, albeit remaining an independent. She has represented Mexican government delegations in many international congresses, and is currently a member of the Organizing Committee of the IV World Conference on Women to be held in September 1995 in Beijing, China.
Kathleen Staudt received her Bachelor's, Master's and Doctoral degrees in political science from the University of Wisconsin. She is Professor in the Department of Political Science at the University of Texas at El Paso (UTEP), where she has taught for more than ten years and served recently as Chair of the Department. Her research focuses primarily upon development theory, public administration and women in politics in less developed countries, particularly in Africa. Among her numerous books and monographs are Women and the State in Africa, and Women, the State and Development (both 1989), Women, International Development and Politics The Bureaucratic Mire (editor, 1990) and Gender Training and Development Planning (1991)
María Luisa Tarrés received her doctorate in Sociology from the University of Paris. She is Researcher/Professor at the Centro de Estudios Sociológicos, El Colegio de México. Her principal research interests include social movements and collective action, and social and political participation of various sectors, especially women. Recently she edited the book La voluntad de ser Mujeres en los noventa (1993), and is author of many major articles and chapters.
Lilia Venegas has a Master's degree in social anthropology and is a doctoral candidate in sociology at the UNAM. She is researcher at the Instituto Nacional de Antrolopología e Historia and is also professor at the Instituto Tecnológico y de Estudios Superiores de Monterrey. She is author of several chapters and articles dealing with women's involvement in local politics, and recently co-authored Testimonios de participación popular femenina en la defensa del voto, Ciudad Juárez, Chihuahua, 1982-1986.
Peter M. Ward B.A. Hull, M.A. Cambridge, and Ph.D. Liverpool. He has held senior teaching positions at the Universities of London (UCL) and Cambridge before moving to the University of Texas at Austin in 1991, where he is Professor in the Department of Sociology and at the LBJ School of Public Affairs. Since 1993 he has also served as the Director of the Mexican Center of the Institute of Latin American Studies. He is currently completing two major research projects local "opposition" governments in Mexico (with Victoria Rodríguez), and a study of residential land values and land development policy in Mexico. At various times he has served as advisor to the Mexican government and to several international development agencies. Among his most recent books are Housing, the State and the Poor Policy and Practice in Latin American Cities (1985); Welfare Politics in Mexico Papering Over the Cracks (1986); Mexico City The Production and Reproduction of an Urban Environment (1990); and (editor 1994) Methodology for Land and Housing Market Analysis, as well as several major works with Victoria Rodríguez (see above.)
Gloria Zafra is completing a doctorate in sociology at the University of Texas at Austin. Her thesis is on Social Change in Mexico, with special emphasis upon the organization and forms of participation of small businesses in politics in Oaxaca and Chihuahua, 1970-90. Currently she is researcher at the Instituto de Investigaciones Sociológicos de la Universidad Autonoma "Benito Juárez" in Oaxaca. Her publications deal with land invasions in the countryside; labor union organization among teachers; and economic and political organization among the private sector in Oaxaca.