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In Mexico, as in other Latin American countries, access to books is in general hampered by socioeconomic problems: the high cost of production, distribution, promotion and advertising.
There are two phenomena specific to psychoanalysis texts, however: first, most books written by renowned Mexican psychoanalysts are published by university presses, and often remain classified as internal publications, which means that they are promoted almost exclusively through the personal efforts of the author or psychoanalytical group responsible, and never reach bookstores. The second phenomenon is that if the book is published by a known publisher it is often not reprinted when the first edition is sold out.
This information was obtained from interviews with individuals who are involved in book purchasing and who directly handle requests from customers in the field of psychoanalysis. It covers an area of four major Mexico City bookstores. The lists of best-selling psychoanalysis books were compiled between January and May 2000. We did not look into sales through the Internet but we are aware of widespread complaints from those who have used this system to buy books from abroad. Three bookstores have branches in numerous parts of the city, with outlets close to university campuses, in the north and south of Mexico City, downtown, and in two cities elsewhere in Mexico.
I researched the background, organization and function of the bookstores, as well as the processes for producing and promoting books, in the context of a profound crisis in the Mexican publishing industry.
The process of waiting while my contacts supplied the necessary information within their own time frames, or being supplied with more data than I requested, of spending long periods opening and perusing books to find the country where they were published, to complete the author's name or to determine whether or not they dealt with psychoanalysis — was a process that gave me a sense o