1 Mercenary Writers of British Propaganda in Mexico During the Second World War * José Luis Ortiz Garza Universidad Panamericana (Mexico City Campus) * Paper presented at the 5th International Conference for Literary Journalism Studies (IALJS), May, 21, 2009. Roehampton University, London. Abstract Thousands of news articles, editorials and features claiming to be written by Mexican journalists, political commentators or military specialists, were produced by writers in the pay of British propaganda agencies during the Second World War in Mexico. The acknowledgement of this fabrication may prevent historians from using content analysis of news items, cartoons and editorials in Mexican press as a reliable source for the analysis of public opinion during these years. Unchecked or tolerated by the Mexican government, the use of hired writers resulted in rampant editorial distortion towards the Allied cause and imposition of their agenda within the public sphere. Many factors led to extensive manipulation of public opinion in Mexico. Among them were media’s dependence upon foreign newsprint, the lack of national wire services and blackmailing from advertisers. 1 The Press in Mexico in the Early Forties In 1940, Mexico´s population was nearly twenty million, of whom less than 50 per cent were literate. Mexico’s print media were highly concentrated regionally. In the capital, the leading commercial newspapers were six morning dailies: four independent, and two the mouthpieces of the government party and the main labor union. 2 In the provinces there were approximately one hundred and thirty newspapers, very uneven in scope, circulation and resources. American propagandists reckoned eighty-three newspapers as “small” and forty-one “intermediate-sized”. They deemed relevant only the thirty magazines of the capital. 3 1 Denis.McQuail, McQuail's Mass Communication Theory, London; Thousand Oaks: Sage Publications, 2000. p. 495 2 The independent morning papers were El Universal and Excélsior (with daily circulation of around 70,000 and 50,000 respectively), Novedades (daily circulation, around 40,000) and La Prensa (sensationalist tabloid, daily circulation around 32,000). El Nacional and El Popular, were respectively the organs of the Partido de la Revolución Mexicana (PRM, later PRI) and of the Confederación de Trabajadores de México (CTM). El Universal and Excélsior, had also afternoon editions: El Universal Gráfico and Últimas Noticias, respectively. Circulation figures were taken from NAW, RG 229, Entry 1, General Records, Commercial and Financial Development, Advertising, Box 138, “ND CAR-11, ND CAR 35, American Social Surveys, Export Information Bureau # 13”, Letter No. 37, From Harold J. Corson to Hadley Cantril. May 14 th , 1941 3 National Archives and Record Administration, College Park, Maryland, Record Group (hereafter, NARA, RG) RG 59, 811.20212/60. From Herbert Bursley to the Secretary of State, December 14 th , 1942.