[longknife]

Somethings we won't see or read in USA media. An interesting look at Mexico from a German source.

Enrique Peña Nieto took over as Mexico's president in December. In a SPIEGEL interview, he discusses his plans to fight poverty and drug violence and why Europe should take advantage of his country's economic boom.

Read more @ http://www.spiegel.de/international/wor ... 81752.html

As my wife is from Mexico and we just spent two weeks there, I am more than interested in news from there. We saw no violence and the people seemed no different than from other visits. It appears the major violence is taking place in the northeast part of the country. One can only hope that the new president will be successful in his efforts.

[Figlio di Moros]

One must take his statement, as with nearly all politicians, with a grain of salt.

[Rancid]

Indeed. In fact, he probably is in the pocket of the mafia more than anyone before him.

[Figlio di Moros]

I see you're keeping a good eye on your home politics, Rancid...

[Rancid]

God damn it, I'm not Mexican!

[WilrickV]

So, basically, the Mexican government will implement social programs, improve the police, crack down on money laundering, etc. Whenever the Mexican government says it will redouble its efforts to fight crime, corruption, inefficiency, abuse, and incompetence, the standard reaction is a well-deserved "I'll believe it when I see it." No doubt I'll join many in making that refrain here.

I believe Peña Nieto is mostly sincere in his desire to do these things, but will be foiled by the same traditions of Mexican governance that have frustrated such efforts in the past. The line between legitimacy and illegitimacy in Mexico, be it among transactions, institutions, or organizations, is blurred to a much greater extent than it is in the US. To use a Foucauldian explanation (God forgive me), Mexicans have not been as thoroughly disciplined as Americans. Internal mental adherence to socially ordained constraints on their actions is not as strongly ingrained. Among the outward manifestations of this is what we may refer to as a lack of respect for the rule of law or the social contract.

Thus, when a Mexican bribes a police officer, we see it as an immoral and antisocial crime, when it may actually represent a traditional social arrangement that works underneath and outside the judiciary. Of course, Mexico has been in contact with the disciplined cultures of the US and others for long enough to have ascertained some semblance of a stigma for corruption. One most easily observes this trend with the more educated and cosmopolitan Mexicans, from which Peña Nieto comes and most of the anti-corruption rhetoric is produced.

[Decky]

I see you're keeping a good eye on your home politics, Rancid...

Damn you are quick on the draw, that's what I was going to say.

[Sithsaber]

The PRI is an extremely corrupt center left party that will likely just renew their deal with the Gulf cartel. (Social_Critic please back me up on this. You seem to know all their is to know on the corrupt dealings of parties with the sound "revolution" in it and i don't like to source my common sense and vague knowledge with wikipedia)

[longknife]

Well, things got worse under the PAN so Mexicans gave the PRI a larger bloc than its opponents.

Perhaps, this time the PRI will actually live up to its promises.

[Rei Murasame]

Great thread. Let's say they are telling the truth, do the people who finance the PRI have any incentive to make sure that these actions are carried out?

[Quantum]

Are you going to crush yourself, Presidente Peña Nieto? Thought so because the Mexican government is basically a drug kingpin and has an interest in maintaining the war to secure revenues for their drug kingpin buddies.

[KlassWar]

I believe Peña Nieto is mostly sincere in his desire to do these things, but will be foiled by the same traditions of Mexican governance that have frustrated such efforts in the past. The line between legitimacy and illegitimacy in Mexico, be it among transactions, institutions, or organizations, is blurred to a much greater extent than it is in the US. To use a Foucauldian explanation (God forgive me), Mexicans have not been as thoroughly disciplined as Americans. Internal mental adherence to socially ordained constraints on their actions is not as strongly ingrained. Among the outward manifestations of this is what we may refer to as a lack of respect for the rule of law or the social contract.

Considering that laws are imposed on the masses by their class enemies, a cultural disdain for the law might be a positive trait overall.

[Smertios]

Interesting interview. It's a shame I couldn't believe a single word of what he said. The problem with politicians is precisely that: they say a lot of things, but rarely do what they promise.

I think people almost always fail to see that the main issue in this case is political corruption, not lack of action by the government. It doesn't matter how much the president tries to fight the cartels, as long as the system keeps giving them money, they will continue fighting. Some of the things proposed in that interview might actually help. For example, legalizing marijuana will take away part of the cartel's market. But nothing I read there sounded like a good policy to destroy the cartels for good.

The bit about working with regional governments is probably the most worrying part. Federalism works great when there is no political corruption involved. But the game of interests is too strong to be ignored like that. State governments and politicians have their own interests, which aren't always the same as the federal government's ones. And when you add the municipal governments to the equation, things get even uglier. You have hundreds of politicians and institutions, each defending their own interests. It's obvious a lot of money will be involved. And also a lot of promises, electoral support, etc. It's the perfect environment for corruption to appear. And when the issue is dealing with corruption, such an environment is the worst possible.

For some things, federalism or decentralization works great. Education, for example. It is much better when schools are administered locally than having a government 1,000 km away in charge. But for things like fighting crime and political corruption, it is better when a centralized authority is responsible.

Mexicans have this notion that they will be able to fight the cartels the same way the Colombians did, by murdering all druglords, but that sounds less likely each year. I really doubt that having the military fight the cartels will work much better for the PRI than it did for the PAN.

As my wife is from Mexico and we just spent two weeks there, I am more than interested in news from there. We saw no violence and the people seemed no different than from other visits. It appears the major violence is taking place in the northeast part of the country. One can only hope that the new president will be successful in his efforts.

Well, I don't know where you went, but Latin American countries usually offer better protection for touristic areas. It's not good for the country when a lot of tourists get robbed. So violent areas are usually off the touristic route. And eventually, one tourist get mugged or murdered, but the great majority comes and goes without a problem. Maybe that's why you didn't see any violence.

The PRI is an extremely corrupt center left party that will likely just renew their deal with the Gulf cartel. (Social_Critic please back me up on this. You seem to know all their is to know on the corrupt dealings of parties with the sound "revolution" in it and i don't like to source my common sense and vague knowledge with wikipedia)

It's not only the PRI, really. Corruption is common in Mexican politics, as it is the only way to make things work. The PRI is simply the representative of the most recent dictatorship Mexico has had. But it has always been that way. The PRI got in power in the 1920s, after they brought the previous dictatorship down. Before that, the country had been a dictatorship since 1876, with Porfirio Diaz as president. During both the Porfiriato and the PRI rule (as well as during the reign of the few dictators that ruled mexico between the fall of Porfirio Diaz and the rise of the PRI, like Huerta), corruption and fraud were the way to make sure they stayed in power. Porfirio Diaz got elected promising to end reelections, for example. Then he decided he wanted to continue being reelected forever. The Mexican Revolution came to end that practice of infinite reelections. The PRI, as the party of the revolution, enforced that strictly. Now there is no reelection in Mexico at all. Even members of Congress have to step down for the next legislature. But they continued controlling the system o their own benefits. And before all that, it was not like the leaders were not corrupt, either.

And it is not like the PAN is a great party, either. Many people were worried that the PAN was creating a new dictatorship in Mexico, after Felipe Calderón succeeded Vincent Fox in the presidency. They are basically the successors of the people that lost the Mexican Revolution, after all. They were formed as a counter to the anti-Catholic policies of the PRI, in the 1930s.

As for the PRD, it branched out of the PRI, so it is hard to think they are immune to corruption. The 2006 election was basically about which side managed to commit more fraud. One side did not accept the other's victory, and each declared their own candidate president.

I suggest this Al Jazeera show on the matter:
[youtube]oUOZiOBKRsA[/youtube]

One guy there mentions Vargas Llosa's (the guy in my avatar) famous quote about Mexico. In 1990, after being invited to go to Mexico, he said in national television that "Mexico was the perfect dictatorship" under the PRI rule. The guy in that video says that Mexico was the perfect dictatorship, but has become a very imperfect democracy now. Which, unfortunately, is true.

Maybe the next step for Mexicans will be to forbid one party to succeed itself in the presidency. If that manages to create actual competition in Mexican politics, then maybe the institutional problems the country has will stop existing.

Well, things got worse under the PAN so Mexicans gave the PRI a larger bloc than its opponents.

Perhaps, this time the PRI will actually live up to its promises.

I find that unlikely, really. It was not like things got worse with the PAN because they failed to act. It got worse because their plans did not work. They preferred sending the military to fight the cartels, probably hoping to achieve the same success that Colombia had destroying the Cali and Medellín cartels years before. That didn't work. They tried to remedy the situation by fighting the effects of the drug trade, but failed to combat the actual cause of the problem.

From what Peña Nieto is saying, I really doubt the PRI will have a different approach on the matter, here.

Great thread. Let's say they are telling the truth, do the people who finance the PRI have any incentive to make sure that these actions are carried out?

Lobbying exists in any country. People need the government's support to start their own business etc. It's not like that's going to change anytime soon. So yeah, as long as the government keeps benefitting their electoral supporters and financers, they will keep financing their actions, no matter what they do.

The real problem, which many people tend to ignore, is the fact that the drug cartels probably finance politicians from all three main parties.

[longknife]

Many thanks to Smertious for a well-thought-out and educational post!!!

I went to Mazatlan with two side trips to rural Nayarit.

One of the things I noticed was a lack of serious news on the local Mexican television stations. It was most surprising. Newspapers are on sale everywhere but other media is somewhat lacking.