I study political mobilization and protest politics among Indigenous peoples in Latin America. My current research focuses on how clientelism and local organizing shape protest politics in southern Mexico.

My research explores how Indigenous movements use rights appeals and how Indigenous women's social standing, as well as local ideas about rights, nationalism, and appropriate political tactics influence protest. My research includes work on how the implementation of land reform influenced the rise of Indigenous activism in Mexico. I also study how protest spreads, through research about teachers' union protests in and beyond Oaxaca after 2006.

RESEARCH PROJECTS

Keystone Organizations, Clientelism, and Protest Politics in Indigenous Southern Mexico:

• The Origins and Consequences of Indigenous Organizations

• The Partisan Left and Teachers' Union Protest in Indigenous Regions

• Clientelism and Collective Action

• Indigenous Women and Rights Activism in Southern Mexico

Additional Areas of Research

• Indigenous Movements and Environmental Politics

• Indigenous Autonomy and Comparative Nationalism

• Rural Radicalism? The Origins and Consequences of Leftist and Conservative Rural Politics

BOOK MANUSCRIPT

We Will Not Be Quiet: Clientelism, Keystone Organizations, and the Dynamics of Protest in Indigenous Southern Mexico

My book manuscript builds on my 2015 dissertation and examines protest dynamics in Chiapas, Oaxaca, and Yucatan, Mexico, to understand the causes and consequences of local-level protests in ethnically-diverse developing democracies. It is based on over a year of field research, including interviews with activists from key counties, and on an original dataset of protest events. This dataset, which I coded from local newspapers, covers the period surrounding each Mexican federal election from 2000 through 2012.

I argue that scholars of the developing world need to incorporate clientelism into their studies of protest because clientelism inhibits the growth of protest networks. I also introduce the concept of keystone organizations, or organizations that justify protest and build particularly influential networks, to explain why people from some counties develop extensive capacity to protest. I study how protest networks spread and how the growth of specific keystone organizations influences the type of demands protesters are likely to make.

ARTICLES

Price, Jessica J. “Keystone Organizations Versus Clientelism: Understanding Protest Frequency in Indigenous Southern Mexico.” Comparative Politics, Vol. 51, No. 3, April 2019: 407-435.

WORKING PAPERS

Price, Jessica J. “The Left and the Union: The Spread and Persistence of Teachers’ Union Protest in Southern Mexico.” In progress

Price, Jessica J. “Implementation in the Street: Identity, Women's Social Standing, and Protest for Indigenous Rights in Southern Mexico.” In manuscript

Price, Jessica J. “Transferring Activism: How the Difficult Implementation of Land Reform Laws Developed Indigenous Rights Networks in Mexico.” In manuscript

Price, Jessica J. “Indigenous Movements, Nationalism, and State Legacies in Mexico and Chile.” In manuscript