Abstract

After the publication of Reforma energética en México for the Chamber of Deputies in May of 2016, this paper discusses the text 100 años de petróleo en México by Víctor Rodríguez-Padilla within the framework of Hans-Georg Gadamer’s hermeneutics. This implies the discussion on the definition of “oil”, which will become crucial in order to articulate a hermeneutical sense of the Mexican collective consciousness, its links with nationalism and the complex recuperation process that Mexico lived during the twentieth century. By delving into the connections between the interpreter and the author, and by immersing ourselves in the historical gear of oil as a part of morality, this article ends by analysing the experienced axiological basis that occurs in the text.