José María Vigil’s Republican Humanist Critique of Authoritarian Positivist Liberalism

José María Vigil is one of the most radical and critical Mexican republican liberals of the nineteenth century. Heir of a Mexican republican humanist tradition, he questioned the project of a homogeneous nation, vindicated Mexico’s multicultural identity, criticized positivist philosophies as the foundation of the authoritarian state and defended the republican principles of the Mexican Constitution of 1857, in opposition to the scientific and conservative liberalism promoted mainly by Justo Sierra. His work encompasses epistemology, political philosophy, literary criticism and Mexican history. All his work constitutes a republican humanism that influenced the Mexican Revolution of 1910.