Salinas presides over an era of modernisation

Carlos Salinas de Gortari, President of Mexico since 1988, created an open economy with the first budget surplus in 1991. Relations with the US are good and the North American Free Trade Agreement (Nafta) is intended to cement the alliance. The Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) has controlled the country in nationalist style since 1929. Responsibility for economic growth now rests with the private sector. The Brady plan debt reduction programme eroded the debt crisis.