Following the Mexican Revolution, the eugenics movement gained prominence in Mexico. Seeking to change the genetic make-up of the country's population, proponents of eugenics in Mexico focused primarily on rebuilding the population, creating healthy citizens, and ameliorating the effects of perceived social ills such as alcoholism, prostitution, and venereal diseases. Mexican eugenics, at its height in the 1930s, influenced the state's health, education, and welfare policies. Global context During the early twentieth century, eugenics became a popular method for population control and nation-building in many countries in Europe and the Americas. Its proponents sought to "improve" the human race through both positive and negative eugenic practices. Positive eugenics encouraged the procreation of the "fit," and negative eugenics advocated for the implementation of more radical actions such as marriage restriction and sterilization of the "unfit." The eugenics movement was not confined to Western European countries and the US. By the 1930s, almost every country in Latin America had been impacted by eugenics. Neo-Lamarckian eugenics Unlike in other countries, the eugenics movements in Latin America were largely founded on the idea of Neo-Lamarckian eugenics. Neo-Lamarckian eugenics stated that the outside effects experienced by an organism throughout its lifetime changed its genetics permanently, allowing the organism to pass acquired traits onto its offspring. In the Neo-Lamarckian genetic framework, activities such as prostitution and alcoholism could result in the degeneration of future generations, amplifying fears about the effects of certain social ills. However, the supposed genetic malleability also offered hope to certain Latin American eugenicists, as social reform would have the ability to transform the population more permanently. Policy According to scholars, eugenics in Mexico was largely preventative and focused on marriage restriction and sexual education. Leaders wanted to encourage the procreation of the "fit." The eugenics movement arrived in Mexico in the context of the widespread devastation and violence of the Mexican Revolution, which had resulted in a pronounced decline in population as well as a growing nationalist sentiment. After almost a decade of brutal fighting, the country was seeking to rebuild not only its population but also its national identity. Prostitution, alcoholism, and venereal disease were all perceived as threats to the fitness of the Mexican population. Many eugenicists sought to eliminate such social ills through control of reproduction, child-rearing, and hygiene. Law of Familial Relations Some of the origins of the eugenics movement can be seen in the 1917 Law of