This Mexican business institution has carried out exemplary work in the expansion of thought and culture throughout the Latin-American world, making a decisive contribution to mutual understanding between nations and providing them with a solid cultural and scientific legacy and a forum free from ideology.

The Economic Culture Fund ("Fondo de Cultura Económica" - FCE) publishers was founded in Mexico on the 13th September 1934 by the Mexican government, with the participation of outstanding intellectuals who were concerned about the diffusion of culture in the country. The intellectuals Daniel Cossío Villegas, Emidgio Martínez Adame, Jesus Silva Herzog, Eduardo Villaseñor and Gonzalo Robles formed part of the first board of management of the institution.

The first works published by the Fund, in 1935, were "The Silver Dollar" by William P. Shea, with an introduction by the Mexican Antonio Espinosa de los Monteros and translation by the poet Salvador Novo, and "Karl Marx", by Harold J. Laski, translated by Antonio Casal Real. The Economic Culture Fund was born with the idea of translating and publishing economic works, but it soon expanded its field of publishing to other sciences such as sociology, psychology, and philosophy, history, politics and law, among other subjects. The works published by the FCE include subjects related to all the sciences, as well as literary anthologies of outstanding authors.

On the occasion of the fiftieth anniversary of its foundation, the Fund published, in 1984, the "Zoológico fantástico" by the Argentine writer, Jorge Luis Borges, in an edition illustrated by the Mexican painter Francisco Toledo.

The publishers has branches in Argentina, Colombia, Chile, Peru, Venezuela and Spain, countries in which all its publications have direct distribution. In the rest of Latin America and in other countries the sales system is the usual one, through the established commercial channels.

The Economic Culture Fund has been an open forum for debate for any ideology, which has gained it recognition form writers and publishers all over the world. The successive directors of the institution have played an outstanding role in obtaining this international prestige. The Mexicans Salvador Azuela, Antonio Carrillo Flores, Francisco Javier Alejo and José Luis Martínez, as well as the aforementioned Cossío, Martínez Adame, Silva Herzog, Villaseñor and Gonzalo Robles, and the Argentinean Arnaldo Orfila, have been those in charge of "governing" the publishers and strengthening its character as a broadcaster of culture within criteria open to the participation of every point of view.

The great Mexican writers have occupied an important place in the Fund´s publications, without this meaning a lack of attention to intellectuals from the rest of the world. In more than half a century of work, the FCE has published more than 3,000 titles and 2,500 reprints, which means a total print run of more than 35 million books.

The Economic Culture Fund has twenty-five collections and undertakes joint editions with institutions such as the College of Mexico or the Autonomous National University of Mexico.