Mexico, Relationships, Reciprocal Favors

Favor for Favor

Favor con favor se paga. “A favor is paid with a favor.” In 2011, Evangelina Tapia Tovar and Genaro Zalpa studied corruption in Mexican sayings in the journal Relaciones, of El Colegio de Michoacán. One section of their article is titled “Más vale tener palancas que dinero” (Better to have levers than money).

A palanca, they write, “va creando un compromiso con la persona que lo hizo” (creates a commitment to the person who did it). One person they quote says that whoever has pulled a lever once “ya está comprometido a volverlo a hacer” (is already committed to doing it again). The authors write that levers contribute to “tortuguismo burocrático” (bureaucratic slowness), which pushes people to look for faster paths, even illegitimate ones.

The Returned Hand

In Mexican communities, mano vuelta, “the returned hand,” is a form of reciprocity in which effort is repaid with effort. A 2022 article in the Revista Latinoamericana de Antropología del Trabajo describes it as the creation of “una deuda social” (a social debt) “que se deberá pagar prestando un esfuerzo” (that must be paid by lending effort). Different regions, the article notes, call it mano de vuelta, guelaguetza or tequio.

Influence as a Habit

The Diccionario del español de México of El Colegio de México defines influyentismo as a practice in which a person “se ve favorecida por la relación que mantiene con otra que ocupa un cargo público o alguna posición de poder” (is favored by a relationship with someone in public office or a position of power).

On June 3, 2019, President Andrés Manuel López Obrador said: “Estoy a punto de escribir un memorándum contra el influyentismo y si no aplica para mis familiares no aplica para nadie” (I am about to write a memorandum against influyentismo, and if it does not apply to my relatives, it does not apply to anyone). (Video in Spanish.)

Votes and Posts

In July 2011, the columnist Ricardo Alemán wrote in Excélsior that Elba Esther Gordillo, leader of the teachers’ union, “pactó porciones de poder a cambio de votos” (agreed to portions of power in exchange for votes) in 2006. In his account, President Felipe Calderón paid with the National Lottery, control of ISSSTE, the public employees’ social security institute, and a place in the Ministry of Education.

Gordillo has denied any agreement with Calderón. In 2023, she acknowledged that she had approved the appointment of Miguel Ángel Yunes Linares at ISSSTE. The account of the deal remains the columnist’s claim.

Networks of Exchange

In 1975, the anthropologist Larissa Adler de Lomnitz described the Cerrada del Cóndor, a shantytown in Mexico City, in the journal Demografía y Economía. Of about 180 households, “solamente diez unidades residenciales estaban desligadas de sus vecinos” (only ten households were cut off from their neighbors). The others formed 45 networks of reciprocal exchange, averaging four or five families.

“Las redes están formadas en su mayoría por parientes cercanos, pero también incluyen a vecinos no emparentados” (The networks are formed mostly of close relatives, but they also include unrelated neighbors). When a man loses his work, “su familia recibe alojamiento y es mantenida mientras se le encuentra empleo” (his family receives lodging and is supported while a job is found for him).

Through Friends and Relatives

In August 2019, Mexico’s Labor Secretary, Luisa María Alcalde Luján, spoke at the ExpoEmpleo OCC job fair. According to Excélsior, she said that 56 percent of employed people in Mexico had found their job through personal contacts, friends or relatives. Only 25 percent of job seekers used private agencies or job boards.

Guelaguetza

In the Zapotec communities of the Valley of Oaxaca, guelaguetza names a system of mutual help among friends and relatives. According to an article in a journal of the National Institute of Anthropology and History (INAH), help received “es devuelta en una ocasión similar y en una misma cantidad,” is returned on a similar occasion and in the same amount.

In Cuilapan, according to a study the article cites, the guelaguetza takes the form of loans of goods such as bread, maize, fowl or mezcal for the fiestas of the mayordomía, for baptisms and for weddings. Looser help, such as a hand with the preparations, is not returned as strictly.

Today for You, Tomorrow for Me

Hoy por ti, mañana por mí. “Today for you, tomorrow for me.” The saying goes with a favor that is given now and may be returned later.

Una mano lava la otra, y las dos lavan la cara. “One hand washes the other, and both wash the face.”

The Lever

In Mexico, a person who tiene palanca, “has a lever,” has a connection who can open a door. In a 2021 article, the researchers Arellano-Gault and Trejo Alonso describe the palanca as a mechanism for exchanging favors among acquaintances and “acquaintances of acquaintances.” It forms a network “that rests on relationships of trust.”

One participant in their focus groups said: “En México, la vida se compone de una serie de palancas” (In Mexico, life is made up of a series of levers).

Compadres

Compadrazgo is the bond between a child’s parents and the child’s godparents, who become each other’s compadres. A study in the Revista Mexicana de Sociología on communities of the Huasteca describes it as “a true bond of friendship” that ties the whole community together.

The godfather may take the father’s place in providing for the home if the father dies. The study observes that “a well-chosen godfather is worth more than a modern life insurance policy.”