Mexican astropolitics and scientific diplomacy, 1958–1977

This article examines astropolitics beyond the realm of Big Science, focusing on three interconnected Mexican space initiatives from 1958 to 1977: the Mexican Delegation at the UN Commission on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space; the Empalme-Guaymas tracking station for Project Mercury; and the National Outer Space Commission. Employing a multi-archival and multi-linguistic approach, it explores how the Mexican state navigated the Cold War’s demands for technoscientific and legal expertise in the field of outer space. The analysis unfolds on three scales: Mexico’s assertion in international space governance; its collaborative yet uneven relationship with the U.S.; and the internal political dynamics that highlighted the need for specialized institutions. While these projects aimed to promote the Revolutionary principle of social justice through economic development, limited resources and a lack of technical expertise hindered their success. By focusing on how material conditions shape the grounds of possibility for technoscientific projects, this article offers a critical reappraisal of the category of astropolitics. It demonstrates that the absence of large-scale space projects does not indicate the absence of astropolitics, but rather the form astropolitics takes in under-resourced countries.