Editing Chiapas (section)

===Porfiriato, 1876–1911===
The [[Porfirio Díaz]] era at the end of the 19th century and beginning of the 20th was initially thwarted by regional bosses called [[cacique]]s, bolstered by a wave of Spanish and mestizo farmers who migrated to the state and added to the elite group of wealthy landowning families.<ref name="enchis"/><ref name="hisschmal"/> There was some technological progress such as a highway from San Cristóbal to the Oaxaca border and the first telephone line in the 1880s, but Porfirian era economic reforms would not begin until 1891 with Governor [[Emilio Rabasa]].<ref name="enchis"/><ref name="rincones32"/> This governor took on the local and regional caciques and centralized power into the state capital, which he moved from San Cristóbal de las Casas to Tuxtla in 1892.<ref name="rincones32"/><ref name="higgens98">Higgens, p. 98.</ref> He modernized public administration, transportation and promoted education.<ref name="enchis"/> Rabasa also introduced the [[telegraph]], limited public schooling, sanitation and road construction, including a route from San Cristóbal to Tuxtla then Oaxaca, which signaled the beginning of favoritism of development in the central valley over the highlands.<ref name="higgens99">Higgens, p. 99.</ref> He also changed state policies to favor foreign investment, favored large land mass consolidation for the production of cash crops such as henequen, rubber, guayule, cochineal and coffee.<ref name="enchis"/><ref name="higgens96">Higgens, p. 96.</ref> Agricultural production boomed, especially coffee, which induced the construction of port facilities in [[Tonalá, Chiapas|Tonalá]]. The economic expansion and investment in roads also increased access to tropical commodities such as hardwoods, rubber and [[chicle]].<ref name="higgens99"/>

These still required cheap and steady labor to be provided by the indigenous population.<ref name="higgens99"/> By the end of the 19th century, the four main indigenous groups, Tzeltals, Tzotzils, Tojolabals and Ch’ols were living in "reducciones" or reservations, isolated from one another.<ref name="mhidalgo105"/> Conditions on the farms of the Porfirian era was serfdom, as bad if not worse than for other indigenous and mestizo populations leading to the [[Mexican Revolution]]. While this coming event would affect the state, Chiapas did not follow the uprisings in other areas that would end the Porfirian era.<ref name="rincones3233">Jiménez González, pp. 32–33.</ref>