Sustainability in Rural Development Projects in Mexico

This paper aims to scrutinize the concept of sustainability in rural development projects by focusing on two recently established “sustainable rural cities” inChiapas,Mexico. First, it will analyze how the International Development Institutions and the Mexican state authorities have employed the concept of rural sustainability. Second, it will lay a historical background to examine why and how these sustainable rural cities have become a policy priority of the Mexican state since 2010. Finally, the paper will present and discuss the findings of the fieldwork carried out in sustainable rural cities of San Juan Grijalva and Santiago el Pinar. The paper will argue that although these sustainable cities were presented as development projects to concentrate dispersed rural communities for better public service delivery, the outcomes of these projects so far include cultural and social disintegration, proletarianization and enhanced political control