The Romance of Democracy gives a unique insider perspective on contemporary Mexico by examining the meaning of democracy in the lives of working-class residents in Mexico City today. A highly absorbing and vividly detailed ethnographic study of popular politics and official subjugation, the book provides a detailed, bottom-up exploration of what men and women think about national and neighborhood democracy, what their dreams are for a better society, and how these dreams play out in their daily lives. Based on extensive fieldwork in the same neighborhood he discussed in his acclaimed book The Meanings of Macho, Matthew C. Gutmann now explores the possibilities for political and social change in the world's most populous city. In the process he provides a new perspective on many issues affecting Mexicans countrywide.

"A new book by Matt Gutmann is a gift. He writes of Oscar Lewis and agency resistance and politics, and tacos and beer, with the same fervor and understanding. This is ethnography as a poetry of life. I am delighted to see Gutmann return to Santo Domingo and explore what democracy means in the colonia. I just hope I get to go with him next time."-Miguel Centeno, author of Blood and Debt: War and the Nation-State in Latin America "The appearance of this insightful and penetrating book could not have been better timed. Just when Mexico struggles to create an authentic democracy, Gutmann analyzes with great skill the fabric of Mexican social life that is being transformed."-Thomas Skidmore, co-author of Modern Latin America

Matthew C. Gutmann is the Stanley J. Bernstein Associate Professor of the Social Sciences-International Affairs at Brown University, where he teaches cultural anthropology, ethnic studies, and Latin American studies. His first book, The Meanings of Macho: Being a Man in Mexico City, was published by California in 1996.