The history of Chinese immigration to Mexico spans the decades between the 1880s and the 1980s. Between the years 1880 and 1910, during the term of President Porfirio Díaz

Porfirio Díaz

José de la Cruz Porfirio Díaz Mori was a Mexican-American War volunteer and French intervention hero, an accomplished general and the President of Mexico continuously from 1876 to 1911, with the exception of a brief term in 1876 when he left Juan N...

, the Mexican government was trying to modernize the country, especially in building railroads and developing the sparsely populated northern states. When the government could not attract enough European immigrants, it was decided to allow Chinese migrant workers into the country. At first, small Chinese communities appeared mostly in the north of the country, but by the early 20th century, Chinese communities could be found in many parts of the country, including the capital of Mexico City. By 1930, the number of Chinese in the country was about 18,000.

However, strong anti-Chinese sentiment, especially in Sonora

Sonora

Sonora officially Estado Libre y Soberano de Sonora is one of the 31 states which, with the Federal District, comprise the 32 Federal Entities of Mexico. It is divided into 72 municipalities; the capital city is Hermosillo....

 and Sinaloa

Sinaloa

Sinaloa officially Estado Libre y Soberano de Sinaloa is one of the 31 states which, with the Federal District, comprise the 32 Federal Entities of Mexico. It is divided in 18 municipalities and its capital city is Culiacán Rosales....

 led to deportations and illegal expulsions of Chinese-Mexican families in the 1930s with an official count of 618 Chinese-Mexicans by 1940. Soon after the first wave of expulsions, efforts began to repatriate Chinese-Mexican families which resulted in two major returns and various small groups returning between the late 1930s and the 1980s. Today, there are two principal Chinese communities in Mexico, one in Mexicali

Mexicali

Mexicali is the capital of the State of Baja California, seat of the Municipality of Mexicali, and 2nd largest city in Baja California. The City of Mexicali has a population of 689,775, according to the 2010 census, while the population of the entire metropolitan area reaches 936,826.The city...

 and the other in Mexico City

Mexico City

Mexico City is the Federal District , capital of Mexico and seat of the federal powers of the Mexican Union. It is a federal entity within Mexico which is not part of any one of the 31 Mexican states but belongs to the federation as a whole...

.

Immigration to Mexico

While Argentina

Argentina

Argentina , officially the Argentine Republic , is the second largest country in South America by land area, after Brazil. It is constituted as a federation of 23 provinces and an autonomous city, Buenos Aires...

, Brazil

Brazil

Brazil , officially the Federative Republic of Brazil , is the largest country in South America. It is the world's fifth largest country, both by geographical area and by population with over 192 million people...

, Canada

Canada

Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...

 and the United States

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 received millions of immigrants in the late 19th and early 20th century, very few came to Mexico. The country had its highest percentage of foreign immigrants in 1930, but it was still less than one percent of the total population. One reason for this is that from the 1820s to the 1920s, Mexico was mired in political instability and civil war. Another reason is that it did not have the vast areas of open land that attracted farmers to places like the United States and Argentina. Despite the small numbers, those immigrants who did come had a profound effect on their host country economically. European and U.S. investors came to dominate mining, oil and cash crop agriculture. European and Chinese immigrants took over banking and wholesale commerce as well as pioneering the industrialization of Mexico.

Most Europeans who came to Mexico in the 19th century were young bachelors whose aim was to make their fortune then return to their home country to marry and retire. Most of these never considered themselves more than temporary residents and never integrated into Mexican society. Many Americans came to settle Texas in the 19th century but this eventually led to its succession and then the Mexican-American War. This soured many in Mexico to the idea of mass immigration.

Despite this, there was concerted effort from 1876 to 1910 to encourage European immigration to “whiten” the population as well as bring capital into the country. The push here was to populate and develop the empty northern states as well as to promote European education and customs into rural areas dominated by indigenous people. It was thought that this would modernize the country and globalize its economy. However, the government could not entice enough Europeans to settle in the desert northern states due to the climate.

Most of the white Europeans and Americans who did arrive during the late 19th and early 20th century were associated with companies interested in railroads and mines. These companies brought in Chinese and other coolie labor. Asians, predominantly Chinese, became Mexico’s fastest-growing immigrant group from the 1880s to the 1920s, exploding from about 1,500 in 1895 to 20,000 in 1910. Despite being the force behind the last major wave of immigration to Mexico, Porfirio Díaz himself became leery of foreign presence. He nationalized the foreign-built railroads and signed the first restrictive immigration legislation in the last years before the Mexican Revolution

Mexican Revolution

The Mexican Revolution was a major armed struggle that started in 1910, with an uprising led by Francisco I. Madero against longtime autocrat Porfirio Díaz. The Revolution was characterized by several socialist, liberal, anarchist, populist, and agrarianist movements. Over time the Revolution...

.

Arrival in 19th century

Very early Chinese immigration to Mexico started in the 1870s, as efforts to entice Europeans to settle in the desert north failed. One of the main reasons for this was that many Europeans could not or would not tolerate the hot arid conditions. It was then thought to bring Chinese from areas of that country with similar climates. Matías Romero

Matías Romero

Matías Romero is a town and municipality in Oaxaca in south-western Mexico. The municipality covers an area of 1,459.54 km².It is part of the Juchitán District in the west of the Istmo de Tehuantepec region....

 pushed to allow for this early Chinese immigration as the indigenous population as considered to be weak and lazy. He argued that the Chinese were industrious, submissive to authority and would work cheaply. The proposal was accepted but to only allow Chinese men into the country as guest workers. They were not supposed to build their own communities or mix with the Mexican population. All were supposed to return to China eventually. Resistance to the entrance of Chinese began even at this time because of the obvious difference in appearance plus news of the violence directed at the Chinese in California. One of the first ships to arrive from China had 500 Chinese immigrant workers aboard with a destination of the new railroad being built in Tehuantepec

Tehuantepec

Tehuantepec is a city and municipality in the southeast of the Mexican state of Oaxaca. It is part of the Tehuantepec District in the west of the Istmo Region. The area was important in pre Hispanic period as part of a trade route that connected Central America with what is now the center of...

.

Chinese immigration was institutionalized in 1893 by the bilateral Treaty of Amity, Commerce and Navigation, which gave the Chinese immigrants to Mexico the same legal rights as Mexican nationals. Some Chinese had arrived earlier than this, establishing small colonies in Guaymas

Guaymas

Guaymas is a city and municipality located in the southwest part of the state of Sonora in northwestern Mexico. The city is located 117 km south of the state capital of Hermosillo, and 242 miles from the U.S. border, and is the principal port for the state. The municipality is located in the...

 and Ensenada

Ensenada, Baja California

Ensenada is a coastal city in Mexico and the third-largest city in Baja California. It is located south of San Diego on the Baja California Peninsula. The city is locally referred to as La Cenicienta del Pacífico, or, The Cinderella of the Pacific...

, but by 1895 there were still fewer than 1,000 Chinese nationals in the country. The major wave of Chinese immigration occurred between 1895 and 1910, with about seventy percent coming from the United States, which had been adopting anti-Chinese measures. However, several thousand Chinese were allowed to enter the country directly from China during the Cantu regime, more than 2,000 in 1919 alone. Many Chinese were also brought in from the U.S. and directly from China by U.S. companies to build railroads, work in mines and work cotton fields, despite protests by Mexican workers. This immigration caused Chinese communities to appear in a number of places in the country, including Manzanillo

Manzanillo, Colima

The name Manzanillo refers to the city as well as its surrounding municipality in the Mexican state of Colima. The city, located on the Pacific Ocean, contains Mexico's busiest port. Manzanillo was the third port created by the Spanish in the Pacific during the New Spain period...

, Ciudad Juárez

Ciudad Juárez

Ciudad Juárez , officially known today as Heroica Ciudad Juárez, but abbreviated Juárez and formerly known as El Paso del Norte, is a city and seat of the municipality of Juárez in the Mexican state of Chihuahua. Juárez's estimated population is 1.5 million people. The city lies on the Rio Grande...

, Salina Cruz

Salina Cruz

Salina Cruz is a major seaport on the Pacific coast of the Mexican state of Oaxaca. It is the state's third-largest city and is municipal seat of the municipality of the same name.It is part of the Tehuantepec District in the west of the Istmo Region....

, Mazatlán

Mazatlán

Mazatlán is a city in the Mexican state of Sinaloa; the surrounding municipio for which the city serves as the municipal seat is Mazatlán Municipality. It is located at on the Pacific coast, across from the southernmost tip of the Baja California peninsula.Mazatlán is a Nahuatl word meaning...

, Tampico, Veracruz

Veracruz, Veracruz

Veracruz, officially known as Heroica Veracruz, is a major port city and municipality on the Gulf of Mexico in the Mexican state of Veracruz. The city is located in the central part of the state. It is located along Federal Highway 140 from the state capital Xalapa, and is the state's most...

 and Piedras Negras

Piedras Negras, Coahuila

-Natural Resources:This region generates a large amount of the national production of coal, one of the most economically important non-metallic minerals in the state.-Tourism:Piedras Negras' main tourist attractions are:...

, concentrating in northern Mexico because of its proximity to the United States and the existence of opportunities in the developing economy.

Whether directly from China or from the United States, Chinese immigrants were overwhelmingly men (98%) and between the ages of 15 and 29 according to the Registro Nacional de Extranjeros (National Foreigner Registry). These laborers could be found in cotton fields, hemp

Hemp

Hemp is mostly used as a name for low tetrahydrocannabinol strains of the plant Cannabis sativa, of fiber and/or oilseed varieties. In modern times, hemp has been used for industrial purposes including paper, textiles, biodegradable plastics, construction, health food and fuel with modest...

 plantations, mines and other labor intensive areas from the desert north to the Yucatán

Yucatán Peninsula

The Yucatán Peninsula, in southeastern Mexico, separates the Caribbean Sea from the Gulf of Mexico, with the northern coastline on the Yucatán Channel...

.

These immigrants soon went from laborers to merchants, starting their own small enterprises. By the time of the Mexican Revolution, a number of Chinese merchants had considerable control of segments of the economy, especially in new markets created by the railroads and mines in states such as Sonora. These Chinese businesses were concentrated in and were dominant in Sonora and Baja California

Baja California

Baja California officially Estado Libre y Soberano de Baja California is one of the 31 states which, with the Federal District, comprise the 32 Federal Entities of Mexico. It is both the northernmost and westernmost state of Mexico. Before becoming a state in 1953, the area was known as the North...

, but entrepreneurial opportunities brought Chinese into other places such as Nogales

Nogales, Sonora

Heroica Nogales , more commonly known as Nogales, is a city and its surrounding municipality on the northern border of the Mexican State of Sonora. The municipality covers an area of 1,675 km², and borders to the north the city of Nogales, Arizona, United States, across the U.S.-Mexico border...

, Torreón

Torreón

Torreón is a city and seat of the surrounding municipality of the same name in the Mexican state of Coahuila. As of 2010, the city's population was 608,836 with 639,629 in the municipality. The metropolitan population, including Matamoros, Coahuila, and Gómez Palacio and Lerdo in adjacent Durango,...

 and Monterrey

Monterrey

Monterrey , is the capital city of the northeastern state of Nuevo León in the country of Mexico. The city is anchor to the third-largest metropolitan area in Mexico and is ranked as the ninth-largest city in the nation. Monterrey serves as a commercial center in the north of the country and is the...

.
By 1910, the Chinese numbered 4,486 in Sonora alone, and were by far the largest numerous foreign presence. This concentration in certain towns and businesses gave the Chinese prominence despite the fact that they comprised only between one and two percent of the overall population in Sonora between 1910 and 1930. Initially, Chinese enterprises were welcomed and protected by municipal authorities because they generated revenue and provided necessary goods. While some large—scale businesses grew, most Chinese enterprises were small, selling goods in markets, in the streets and door to door.

The economic success of the Chinese in Sonora and other areas of Mexico came from its role as “middleman minority.” They filled strategic niches in Mexico’s economy. Mexican society has traditionally been divided into rich and poor with no middle class. The American and other foreign entrepreneurs in the northern states constituted a high class, while the native Mexican population remained as the lower class. The Chinese, being neither, became a kind of middleman between the two classes. The Chinese’s success was also due to a strong work ethic and frugality, but it was also due to informal and reciprocal work relationships mostly restricted to the ethnic community. Established Chinese in Mexico would hire incoming Chinese, especially from China itself, as a source of cheap and loyal labor. These new immigrants would gain business knowledge and experience along with their salaries. Many Chinese social networks developed in Mexico, especially in Mexicali which also produced a kind of informal money lending in the Chinese community, called “hui.”

As part of their integration into Mexican society, most Chinese adopted a Mexican first name then used their Chinese names as surnames, which was done by Chinese in many parts of Latin America. Some learned Spanish and sought naturalized Mexican citizenship. The Chinese of Mexicali started the Asociación China, a social organization partly devoted to obtaining Chinese wives from overseas. The group still remains to this day. However, most Chinese men did marry Mexican women, but they retained most of their customs and cultural heritage. Most of these marriages were to women known from business contacts with their families. In some cases, the marriages were encouraged by the Mexican woman’s family, but in other cases secret relationships developed.

In Baja California, most Chinese initially migrated to Mexicali at the turn of the century and signed on as laborers for the Colorado River Land Company, an American enterprise dedicated to building developing farmland along the Colorado River and its delta. These Chinese came from the U.S. and directly from China, lured by the promise of high wages which never materialized. The Americans did not directly supervise the initial clearing and irrigation work. They leased out parcels of 1000 acres (4 km²) to contractors, most of whom were Chinese, who would then contract Chinese labor to create cotton farms. By 1919, there were fifty Chinese-owned cotton farms occupying nearly 75000 acres (303.5 km²) producing 80% of the cotton grown in the Mexicali Valley. After the initial irrigation and clearing projects, many Chinese congregated in an area of Mexicali now known as La Chinesca. By 1920, ethnic Chinese residents outnumbered Mexicans 10,000 to 700. This area boomed during the Prohibition

Prohibition in the United States

Prohibition in the United States was a national ban on the sale, manufacture, and transportation of alcohol, in place from 1920 to 1933. The ban was mandated by the Eighteenth Amendment to the Constitution, and the Volstead Act set down the rules for enforcing the ban, as well as defining which...

 years when Americans crossed the border to drink and gamble. Eventually, La Chinesca housed virtually all the city’s casinos, bordellos and opium

Opium

Opium is the dried latex obtained from the opium poppy . Opium contains up to 12% morphine, an alkaloid, which is frequently processed chemically to produce heroin for the illegal drug trade. The latex also includes codeine and non-narcotic alkaloids such as papaverine, thebaine and noscapine...

 dens.

Another area which formed a well-defined Chinese community was Mexico City. At the turn of the century, there were only forty Chinese registered here, but by 1910, there were 1,482. By the 1920s, the community, centered on Dolores Street just south of the Alameda Central

Mexico City Alameda Central

Alameda Central is a public municipal park in downtown Mexico City, adjacent to the Palacio de Bellas Artes, between Juarez Avenue and Hidalgo Avenue.-Description:...

 and Palacio de Bellas Artes

Palacio de Bellas Artes

The Palacio de Bellas Artes is the most important cultural center in Mexico City as well as the rest of the country of Mexico...

,, was firmly established and growing. One reason for this was that at the beginning of the Mexican Revolution, many Chinese in the north migrated south to here, both to flee the violence and the growing anti-Chinese sentiment. These people joined with the Chinese already living in the capital, who had businesses in which to employ the “new Chinese.” The Chinese community expanded by forming new businesses in and around the historic center of the city. One common business was the “café de chinos” or Chinese cafés serving both Chinese and Mexican food. These can still be found in Mexico City today. One area outside of “Barrio Chino” which became home to many Chinese business was Bucareli Street. Here a clock was built and donated by the Chinese community to commemorate the Centennial of Mexico’s Independence in 1910. The original was destroyed during the Decena tragic but it was replaced.

In the 1920s, Chinese communities in Mexico, especially in Baja California, were numerous and politically powerful locally. However, they were also split into two factions, which roughly aligned with the political situation in China at the time. One was called the Chee Kung Tong (a more conservative group) and the other Partido Nacionalista China, who supported the more westerned movement of Sun Yat Sen. These two divided business territories, especially in areas such as casinos along the border and large markets. The political struggles betweent these two groups gave the Chinese a violent reputation, especially in northern Mexico.

During the period from 1895 to 1926, Chinese immigration grew rapidly, with the total Chinese population reaching more than 24,000 from a little over 1,000. However, expulsion and deportation in the 1930s would shrink this population to under 5,000 throughout Mexico in 1940.

Anti Chinese movement

An anti-Chinese movement emerged during the Mexican Revolution and peaked during the Depression. The experience and treatment of the Chinese in Mexico was similar to what they experienced in California in the second half of the 19th century. They were initially welcomed into unpopulated areas which needed large amounts of cheap manpower. The frontier situation in both areas also allowed the Chinese to carve out economic niches for themselves. The Chinese as a whole turned out to be hardworking, frugal, mutually supportive within their communities, and often succeeding as entrepreneurs in agriculture and small commercial enterprises. In both cases, when their numbers reached a certain percentage of the local population and when they attained a certain amount of monetary success, backlashes occurred on both sides of the border.

Mexican Revolution

In both Sonora and the Mexicali area, the Chinese came to dominate the merchant class, with Mexicali the undisputed center of Chinese settlement, economics and culture in northwestern Mexico by 1925. At the same time, resentment and hostility was growing toward the Chinese by the native Mexican population. Anti-Chinese sentiment had been voiced before the Mexican Revolution that began in 1910. However, it was the revolution alone with its emphasis on patriotism and nationalism that sparked anti-foreigner resentment as opposed to Diaz’s emphasis on things foreign. The Revolution culminated in multifaceted effort to “Mexicanize” the country and economy. This effort was strongest in the north. While Chinese persecution was mostly limited to the north, it had national implications, mostly due to the political clout of Revolution leaders coming out of the northern border states.

During Mexican Revolution and the years after, a notion of “Mexicaness” (mexicanidad) was an important one politically and legally. Prior to the 1917 Constitution, people in Mexico were classed by race: white European, mestizo

Mestizo

Mestizo is a term traditionally used in Latin America, Philippines and Spain for people of mixed European and Native American heritage or descent...

 (mixed European and indigenous), indigenous and, to some extent African was acknowledged. This was a carryover from the colonial era caste system, which did not include Asians. After the Revolution, the mestizo was adopted as a kind of ideal or “cosmic” Mexican race. All foreigners were reminded of their outsider status by Revolution leaders and became targets of movements to end foreign influence in the country. This was an open expression of the resentment that built up in Mexico during the Porfirio Díaz years. During the Revolution, many Europeans and Americans in the country left. However, since the Chinese were still barred from the United States, their numbers actually increased.

As part of this nation-building effort, the notion of race was abolished by the time of the 1930 census. Prior census did take race into account and those of Chinese origin were so noted. However, the lack of a race category, plus the complicated laws concerning nationality blurred the line as to who was Mexican and who was not. This not only affected those who had immigrated from China, but also their Mexican wives and mixed-race children. Depending on when wives married their husbands and when children were born, among other factors, wives and children could be considered to be Chinese rather than Mexican nationals. While it cannot be proven that information taken from this census was used in the mass deportation of Chinese men and their families in the 1930s, their uncertain legal status reflected by it would give them little to no protection against deportations.

Rise of anti-Chinese sentiment

Anti-Chinese propaganda in Mexico was prominent in the 1920s and 1930s and mimicked that of the United States in the 19th century. The Chinese were painted as without hygiene, and responsible for vices such as opium smoking and gambling. They were blamed for spreading diseases, degenerating the Mexican race, corrupting morals, inciting civil unrest and generally undermining Mexico’s social and political makeup. Their lack of assimilation was also attacked. Another accusation was that Chinese men (and almost all Chinese immigrants in Mexico were men) had been stealing employment and Mexican women from Mexican men who had gone off to fight in the Revolution or in World War I.

However, the greatest resentment was economic. The Chinese were accused of competing unfairly for jobs, especially as the formerly empty northern states began to experience a surplus of labor both due to increasing population and cutbacks in industries such as mining and petroleum. After World War I and again during the Depression, the United States repatriated Mexican workers, which added to the problem. As for Chinese businesses, these were accused of competing unfairly and for illegal lending practices and excluding Mexican labor. Sentiment arose that jobs in Mexico should be reserved for Mexican workers. Various state and federal laws were enacted to this effect in the 1920s. This anti-Chinese sentiment spilled over onto those Mexicans who had business and social ties with the Chinese, being called “chineros” and “chineras.” Marriages between Chinese men and Mexican women were banned in the early 1920s with women married to Chinese men being labeled as “traitors” to the nation and race.

Anti-Chinese movements

Overall resentment eventually grew into formal anti-Chinese movements in northern Mexico, with most of the people active in these groups coming from the same social class or even the same business circles as the targeted Chinese. Most of these groups were formed between 1922 and 1927, with names such as the Comité Pro-Raza and Comité Anti-Chino de Sinaloa. The first of these was the Commercial Association of Businessmen in the small mining town of Magdalena de Kino

Magdalena de Kino

Magdalena de Kino is a city and surrounding municipality located in the Mexican state of Sonora covering approximately 560 square miles . According to the 2005 census, the city's population was 23,101, and the municipality's population was 25,500. Magdalena de Kino is in the northern section of...

. It was led by José María Arana with the purpose of “defending Mexican merchants and rid Sonora of Chinese business owners. Collectively, these groups pushed for the exclusion or expulsion of Chinese-Mexicans. The first major convention of these groups took place in 1925 in Nogales and formed the Comité Directivo de Antichinismo Nacional. A second umbrella group, the Liga Nacional Obrera Antichina, was formed in Tamaulipas

Tamaulipas

Tamaulipas officially Estado Libre y Soberano de Tamaulipas is one of the 31 states which, with the Federal District, comprise the 32 Federal Entities of Mexico. It is divided in 43 municipalities and its capital city is Ciudad Victoria. The capital city was named after Guadalupe Victoria, the...

 the same year. These groups, along with many in the state and federal governments, pushed laws to segregate Chinese, prohibit interracial marriage and eventually deportation. These groups were not considered to be illicit, but rather were tolerated and even accepted by state governments and even presidents such as Álvaro Obregón

Álvaro Obregón

General Álvaro Obregón Salido was the President of Mexico from 1920 to 1924. He was assassinated in 1928, shortly after winning election to another presidential term....

 and Plutarco Elías Calles

Plutarco Elías Calles

Plutarco Elías Calles was a Mexican general and politician. He was president of Mexico from 1924 to 1928, but he continued to be the de facto ruler from 1928–1935, a period known as the maximato...

. Eventually, the federal government itself perceived Chinese migration as a national concern and commissioned various studies to address the alleged threats.

While it did not meet the same scale as what happened in the United States, hundreds of Chinese in northern Mexico were tortured and murdered in the 1920s and 1930s. The most serious act occurred earlier. It was the 1911 massacre of over 300 Chinese in Torreón, Coahuila, which was carried out by a faction of Pancho Villa

Pancho Villa

José Doroteo Arango Arámbula – better known by his pseudonym Francisco Villa or its hypocorism Pancho Villa – was one of the most prominent Mexican Revolutionary generals....

’s army. This army would sack Chinese homes and businesses as well. This event galvanized the anti-Chinese movement in Mexico. Francisco I. Madero

Francisco I. Madero

Francisco Ignacio Madero González was a politician, writer and revolutionary who served as President of Mexico from 1911 to 1913. As a respectable upper-class politician, he supplied a center around which opposition to the dictatorship of Porfirio Díaz could coalesce...

 offered to pay an indemnity of three million pesos to the Chinese government for the act but this never happened due to the coup by Victoriano Huerta

Victoriano Huerta

José Victoriano Huerta Márquez was a Mexican military officer and president of Mexico. Huerta's supporters were known as Huertistas during the Mexican Revolution...

.

Anti-Chinese sentiment in Sonora, Baja California and Mexico City

Owing to their visible presence, Chinese had experienced prejudice since they first arrived in Sonora. Negative attitudes and jokes abounded, and some people perceived Chinese as different and foreign. Anti Chinese sentiment first grew strong in Sonora and became the principal center of anti-Chinese campaigns in Mexico. The powerful political leadership of this state pushed the federal government to cancel further immigration from China in 1921, with the nullification of the Treaty of Amity, Commerce and Navigation, with all foreign manual labor prohibited eight years later. The Chinese consulate in Nogales was closed in 1922.

The strength of Chinese numbers in Mexicali afforded a certain amount of protection and made it a refuge for Chinese fleeing persecution in other areas, especially for Chinese in Sonora and Sinaloa after 1915. However, even here health and building codes were being selectively enforced against Chinese establishments in La Chinesca as early as 1925. The formal anti-Chinese organizations moved into Baja California in the 1930s, but it never had the strength it did in Sonora. The end of the Chinese era did not come until 1937 when President Lázaro Cárdenas

Lázaro Cárdenas

Lázaro Cárdenas del Río was President of Mexico from 1934 to 1940.-Early life:Lázaro Cárdenas was born on May 21, 1895 in a lower-middle class family in the village of Jiquilpan, Michoacán. He supported his family from age 16 after the death of his father...

 expropriated most foreign land holdings and forced thousands of Chinese off of more than thirty large cotton farms. These Chinese were forced to move to Mexicali or out of the country.

In other areas, including Mexico City, Chinese were being forced to live in ghettos starting in the 1920s, separating them due to supposed hygiene and moral reasons. Despite efforts by anti-Chinese groups such as the Unión Nacionalista Mexicana and the Campaña Pro-raza de Distrito Federal against Chinese businesses and the beginning of explusions from the country, the Chinese still managed to open business in and around the historic center of the city. They also took in Chinese fleeing from other parts of the country.

Deportations and expulsions

Early deportations of Chinese-Mexican leaders were authorized by Alvaro Obregon due to the violence between the Chinese factions in Mexicali in the 1920s. However, mass deportations did not occur until the 1930s, when nearly 70% of the country Chinese and Chinese-Mexican population was deported or otherwise expelled out of the country.

Mass expulsions were mostly carried out in Sonora and Sinaloa

Sinaloa

Sinaloa officially Estado Libre y Soberano de Sinaloa is one of the 31 states which, with the Federal District, comprise the 32 Federal Entities of Mexico. It is divided in 18 municipalities and its capital city is Culiacán Rosales....

 in part because of their large populations, but Chinese were deported from all over the country. Some were deported directly to China but many others were forced to enter the United States through the border with Sonora, even though Chinese exclusion laws were still in effect there. In a number of cases, Chinese were being deported without having time to sell or otherwise settle their possessions in Mexico. The governor of Sonora Francisco S. Elias had judges removed if they issued “amparo

Amparo (law)

The writ of amparo is a remedy for the protection of constitutional rights, found in certain jurisdictions...

” or protection orders in favor of Chinese being deported. The following governor, Rodolfo Elias Calles, was responsible for the expulsion of most Chinese-Mexican families into U.S. territories. Despite the diplomatic problems this caused, Elias Calles did not stop expelling these families until he himself was expelled from Sonora. However, by that time almost all of Sonora’s Chinese-Mexicans had disappeared. By the 1940 census, only 92 Chinese were still living in Sonora, with more than two-thirds of these having acquired Mexican citizenship. This had the unintended consequence of nearly collapsing the Sonoran economy. The governor of Baja California, Abelardo L. Rodriguez

Abelardo L. Rodríguez

Abelardo Rodríguez Luján, commonly known as Abelardo L. Rodríguez was the interim president of Mexico from 1932–1934, completing the term of Pascual Ortiz after his resignation.-Early life:...

 would also actively participate in the deportation of Chinese in his state. The legal rationale was the violence associated with the two Chinese mafia but those not connected were being deported as well. The state of Sinaloa reduced its Chinese population from 2,123 to 165 in the same time period.

Many in the northern border states moved to other areas of Mexico in order to avoid being expelled from the country. Some fled to the states of Baja California or Chihuahua, where anti-Chinese movements were not as strong. Another place that many Chinese fled to was Mexico City. However, entire Chinese-Mexican families were escorted to the Sonoran border with the United States and dumped into Arizona

Arizona

Arizona ; is a state located in the southwestern region of the United States. It is also part of the western United States and the mountain west. The capital and largest city is Phoenix...

, by being pushed through gaps in the border fence. This strained relations between Mexico and the United States. The U.S. held most of these families in immigration jails in the Southwest, then deported them to China. By 1934, the U.S. presented complaints from over 3,000 Chinese-Mexicans on foreign soil. In the end, Mexico paid only a fraction of the costs demanded from it by the U.S. government for deportations of these people to China.

Mexican-Chinese community in Guangdong and Macau

Face with persecution and mass deportations, many voluntarily left Mexico for China. Those who left involuntarily were mostly those rounded up as entire families and either sent directly to China or forced to cross the border illegally into the United States. This included Mexican women married to Chinese men and their mixed-race children.
After arriving in China, most Chinese-Mexican families settled in Guangdong

Guangdong

Guangdong is a province on the South China Sea coast of the People's Republic of China. The province was previously often written with the alternative English name Kwangtung Province...

 Province and Portuguese Macau

Macau

Macau , also spelled Macao , is, along with Hong Kong, one of the two special administrative regions of the People's Republic of China...

, developing Chinese-Mexican enclaves. Macau was attractive for these refugees because it had a cosmopolitan atmosphere more accepting of mixed race unions and its Portuguese influence gave it a familiar Latin cultural aspect. It was also home to many different types of refugees in the early 20th century as its population doubled to 150,000 people. The Catholic Church in Macau became crucial to this community as a place to meet, meet others, make connections back to Mexico, spiritual and economic support.

Most in the community never accepted their expulsion from Mexico and would struggle for years for the right to return to Mexico. These people’s identity as “Mexican” became more salient as they experienced the hardships of China in the 20th century, living through the Japanese invasion of World War II, the Second Sino-Japanese War

Second Sino-Japanese War

The Second Sino-Japanese War was a military conflict fought primarily between the Republic of China and the Empire of Japan. From 1937 to 1941, China fought Japan with some economic help from Germany , the Soviet Union and the United States...

, the Communist Revolution

Chinese Civil War

The Chinese Civil War was a civil war fought between the Kuomintang , the governing party of the Republic of China, and the Communist Party of China , for the control of China which eventually led to China's division into two Chinas, Republic of China and People's Republic of...

 and the Cold War

Cold War

The Cold War was the continuing state from roughly 1946 to 1991 of political conflict, military tension, proxy wars, and economic competition between the Communist World—primarily the Soviet Union and its satellite states and allies—and the powers of the Western world, primarily the United States...

. For the Mexican women, life was especially difficult as gender norms in China were very different than in Mexico. Some of their husbands already had wives in China and they found themselves relegated to second wife or concubine status. This would often lead to break up with Mexican-Chinese children divided between households.

The size of the Mexican-Chinese community in Macau and Guangdong fluctuated over the 20th century as some moved to other places in China and others managed to return to Mexico. The community became spread out in this region and moved around. By the late 1950s, the community was well-enough known in this part of China that the phrase “being like a Mexican” came to mean someone who is poor and stateless.

Repatriation

While in China, Chinese-Mexicans campaigned to be allowed to return to Mexico from the 1930s to the 1960s. Renouncing and or disregarding their Chinese heritage was part of this, especially in the Cold War era. One reason Chinese-Mexican families were pushed to do this was the problems they faced in China which included economic hardships, alienation from Chinese culture and the upheavals that occurred in that country made Mexico a far more desirable place to live. To press their case, Chinese-Mexican related their mixed race status to the concept of “mestizaje” the Mexican nation’s notion that its identity is based on the blending of races and cultures.

From the early 1930s to at least the 1980s, smaller groups to Mexico. The first major success was when Lázaro Cárdenas permitted the return of at least 400 Mexican women and many more Mexican Chinese children in 1937 and 1938. However, their Chinese husbands and fathers were not permitted to return.

In the late 1950s, the Lions Club in Mexico became involved in the campaign to repatriate Chinese-Mexicans. This organization has been traditionally identified with middle-class professionals, businessmen and others who had supported the expulsion of the Chinese a generation earlier. However, these same groups, were now also anti-Communist, and so this aspect of the effort was to liberate Mexicans from a communist government. Branches of this organization in the northern states wrote letters to the federal government pressuring them to document and repatriate these Mexican nationals in China. This led to the second major repatriation under President Adolfo López Mateos

Adolfo López Mateos

Adolfo López Mateos was a Mexican politician affiliated to the Institutional Revolutionary Party who served as President of Mexico from 1958 to 1964...

 in 1960. Although there was still resistance to the return of Chinese-Mexican, especially in Sonora, the work of the Lions Club and others was able to overcome this.

Chinese-Mexicans today

There are two major Chinese communities or “Chinatowns” in Mexico today: La Chinesca in Mexicali and Barrio Chino in Mexico City.

Mexicali

Mexicali’s Chinese community or “La Chinesca” may be the larger Chinatown

Chinatown

A Chinatown is an ethnic enclave of overseas Chinese people, although it is often generalized to include various Southeast Asian people. Chinatowns exist throughout the world, including East Asia, Southeast Asia, the Americas, Australasia, and Europe. Binondo's Chinatown located in Manila,...

 in Mexico with a population about 5,000 people. Part of the reason for this is that many repatriated Chinese came here as well as refugees from the defeated Nationalist China. However, since the mid 20th century, there have been few new Chinese entering the city and many Mexicans have moved here, diluting the Chinese population which was already heavily mixed. There are about 10,000 full-blooded Chinese, down from 35,000 in the 1920s. Marriage of these people to full-blooded Mexicans is diluting the community further. Nowadays, there are about there are 50,000 residents more than thought who are of Chinese descent. Chinese Mexicans in Mexicali consider themselves equally “cachanilla,” a term used for locals, as any other resident of the city, even if they speak Cantonese in addition to Spanish. However, Chinese-Mexicans still stand out here as owners of retail establishments, service industries and real estate concerns.

Mexicali still has more Chinese, mostly Cantonese, restaurants per capita than any other city in Mexico, with over a thousand in the city. However, this cuisine has modified over the years to local tastes. Most dishes here are served with a small bowl of a condiment much like steak sauce, which is an addition from northern Mexican cuisine. Chinese dishes are also supplemented with tortillas, seasoned rice and barbecued meats.

La Chinesca still survives as the center of Chinese-Mexican identity and culture. Local Chinese associations work to preserve the Chinese language and culture through classes in Cantonese, calligraphy and the sponsorship of Chinese festivals. However, few live in this area of town anymore, as it has deteriorated along with the rest of the historic center. Most of those with Chinese heritage live in the south and west of the city, along with the rest of the population. Attempts to revitalize La Chinesca and make it an attraction for tourists have not been successful.

Mexico City

Mexico City’s Chinese community or “Barrio Chino” may be the smallest Chinatown

Chinatown

A Chinatown is an ethnic enclave of overseas Chinese people, although it is often generalized to include various Southeast Asian people. Chinatowns exist throughout the world, including East Asia, Southeast Asia, the Americas, Australasia, and Europe. Binondo's Chinatown located in Manila,...

 in the world. Barrio Chino today is only two blocks along Dolores Street and extends only one block east and west of the street, with only seven restaurants and a few import businesses as of 2003. The buildings in Barrio Chino are no different from the rest of the city, but businesses here are either restaurants or importers. Most of the shops and restaurants here had abundant Chinese-style decorations and altars, but statues of the Virgin of Guadalupe

Our Lady of Guadalupe

Our Lady of Guadalupe , also known as the Virgin of Guadalupe is a celebrated Catholic icon of the Virgin Mary.According to tradition, on December 9, 1531 Juan Diego, a simple indigenous peasant, had a vision of a young woman while he was on a hill in the Tepeyac desert, near Mexico City. The lady...

 and San Judas Tadeo (a popular saint in Mexico) can be seen as well.

Other than the expulsion of the Chinese in the 1930s, another reason for the small size of this Chinatown is that the Chinese-Mexican population of Mexico City has mixed with the native population and is spread out in the city. According to the government of Mexico City, about 3,000 families in the city have Chinese heritage. In many parts of the older sections of the city, there are “cafes de chinos” (Chinese cafes), which are eateries that serve Chinese and Mexican food.

However, Barrio Chino remains the symbolic home for many of these Chinese-Mexicans, who congregate there for camaraderie and to pass on their culture. The Comunidad China de México, A.C., established in 1980, sponsors Chinese festivals, classes and other activities to preserve and promote Chinese-Mexican culture. The largest annual event by far is the Chinese New Year

Chinese New Year

Chinese New Year – often called Chinese Lunar New Year although it actually is lunisolar – is the most important of the traditional Chinese holidays. It is an all East and South-East-Asia celebration...

’s celebration, which not only attracts thousands of visitors from the rest of the city, it also has major sponsors such as the Cuauhtemoc borough

Cuauhtémoc, D.F.

Cuauhtémoc, named after the former Aztec leader, is one of the 16 boroughs of the Federal district of Mexico City. It consists of the oldest parts of the city, extending over what was the entire city in the 1920s. This area is the historic and culture center of the city, although it is not the...

and Coca Cola.

Further reading

• Romero, Robert Chao. The Chinese in Mexico, 1882-1940 (University of Arizona Press; 2010) 254 pages; Studies Mexico as an alternative destination for Chinese immigrants after the United States passed the Exclusion Act of 1882.