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The article reexamines financial market opening in Mexico. This article will show how change in Mexico's financial sector created a powerful private sector ally for reform-oriented politicians and helped make financial opening possible. It will also show how financial opening reflected the support coalition that the government relied upon by rewarding the financial sector with protection from foreign direct investment in financial institutions while liberalising portfolio capital flows. Finally, this article will illustrate the importance including an analysis of local financial sector interests in explanations of financial opening.

In this article, we examine how attitudes toward the United States shape trade & investment policy preferences in Mexico. To the extent that rising anti-Americanism changes public opinion on the desirability of free trade & open markets, increased economic globalization may be at risk from publics & governments who seek to break its advance in multilateral trade negotiations or force its retreat through domestic protectionist policies. We measure Mexican attitudes with public opinion data drawn from the recent Mexico y el Mundo 2004 survey. We find that, in Mexico, rational sociotropic & retrospective evaluations, as well as non-rational political & social values, tend to drive attitudes toward trade & investment, but rational expectations about average economic prospects do not. Our results suggest that the well-documented rise in anti-Americanism & opposition to American foreign policy may indeed put economic globalization at risk. Adapted from the source document.