Security in Mexico: Implications for U.S. Policy (original) (raw)
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Understanding Mexico’s Security Conundrum
Understanding Mexico’s Security Conundrum, 2020
Unlike other analyses which aim to explain the notion of national security in Mexico and at the same time address the security challenges facing the country, this short text describes the distinction between national, internal and public security in Mexico. It is the first book to provide detailed analysis on Mexico's security policy and its long-term consequences. Mexican scholar and practitioner Augustin Maciel-Padilla contends that the absence of a clear understanding of the complexities and sophistication of the concept of national security has the potential to aggravate security conditions in Mexico. Achieving a proper understanding allows for a better guidance in confronting the grave insecurity facing the country, and for addressing other issues such as human rights, democracy and the country's international exposure. Maciel-Padilla reasons that Mexico is required to formulate a comprehensive, long-term, security strategy, and with this book he proposes a contribution towards that long-term goal. Understanding Mexico's Security Conundrum will be essential for scholars, students and policy makers.
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Politics & Policy, 2019
This article examines Mexico's national security paradoxes and threats in a geopolitical context from a politico-historical perspective into a contemporary setting. It argues that, despite Mexico's nascent democratic transition, none of the various elite groups in power have been able to conceive a broad, democratic security doctrine. On the contrary, realpolitik and regime security form the tradition and true nature of the national security permeating the political system. There are serious doubts that Mexico's next president, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, will change this historical legacy. Despite the widespread desire for change, corruption and impunity are more prevalent than ever, setting the stage for conflict with the United States-the world's biggest drug consumer and the primary vendor of weaponry to Mexico's criminal organizations. This situation is exacerbated by Mexico's interdependence and shared geopolitics with its northern neighbor. The combination of these internal and external factors places Mexico's future in question.
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The article explores the issue of the organized crime and national security in Mexico. The article's author argue that two key factors shaping the current situation of organized crime in Mexico are: 1) the globalization of organized crime, which implies more complex and ample networks in order to operate; 2) transition to a democratic regime that implies governance against the threats to the State and society, by which organized crime has become the main threat to the State. The article consists of analysis of different aspects of the problem of organized crime in Mexico, including: the problem of drug trafficking and its connection to the geographical position of Mexico; bilateral relations between United States and Mexico in the context of the problem of national security (especially after the change in American level of priority of threats after the September 11 th 2001); and a set of combined processes-the endemic weakness of Central American States that lead to the boom in organized crime in the region as well as migration, different kinds of smuggling and human trafficking-all of them linking Mexico with Central America in the context of negative globalization. The author of the article concludes that the problem of organized crime in the Mexican borders have become an issue of national security, but it is also an issue of transnational security. Globalization transforms these phenomena into intermestic issues where separating the external and internal dimensions of these activities becomes impossible.
Mexico's Drug Trafficking Organizations: Source and Scope of the Rising Violence
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Violence has been an inherent feature of the trade in illicit drugs, but the violence generated by Mexico's drug trafficking organizations (DTOs) in recent years has been unprecedented and remarkably brutal. The tactics-including mass killings such as the widely reported massacres of young people and migrants, the use of torture and dismemberment, and the phenomena of car bombs-have led some analysts to speculate whether the violence has been transformed into something new, perhaps requiring a different set of policy responses. According to government and other data, the best estimates are that there have been slightly more than 50,000 homicides related to organized crime from December 2006 through December 2011. It has also been suggested that the targets of the drug trafficking-related violence in Mexico have changed. In 2010, several politicians were murdered, including a leading gubernatorial candidate in Tamaulipas and 15 mayors. While fewer local officials were killed in 2011, there is concern that political violence could spike in 2012 in advance of presidential and congressional elections slated for July. Over the past few years, Mexico has come to be regarded as one of the most dangerous countries for journalists, with 10 reported killings in 2010 and another eight in 2011. In December 2006, Mexico's newly inaugurated President Felipe Calderón launched an aggressive campaign against the DTOs-an initiative that has defined his administration-that has been met with a violent response from the DTOs. Of the seven most significant DTOs operating during the first five years of the Calderón Administration, the government successfully removed key leaders from each of them, through arrests or by death in arrest efforts. However, these efforts add to the dynamic of change-consolidation or fragmentation, succession struggles and new competition-that generate more conflict and violence. The DTOs fragmented and increasingly diversified into other criminal activities, now posing a multi-faceted organized criminal challenge to governance in Mexico. U.S. citizens have also been victims of the security crisis in Mexico. In March 2010, three individuals connected to the U.S. consulate in Ciudad Juárez, two of them U.S. citizens, were killed by a gang working for one of the major DTOs operating in that city. In February 2011, two U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents were shot, one fatally, allegedly by Los Zetas, one of Mexico's most violent DTOs. In the U.S. Congress, these events have raised concerns about the stability of a strategic partner and neighbor. Congress is also concerned about the possibility of "spillover" violence along the U.S. border and further inland. The 112 th Congress has held several hearings on DTO violence, the efforts by the Calderón government to address the situation, and implications of the violence for the United States. Members have maintained close oversight of U.S.-Mexico security cooperation and related bilateral issues. This report provides background on drug trafficking in Mexico: it identifies the major DTOs; how the organized crime "landscape" has been altered by fragmentation; and analyzes the context, scope, and scale of the violence. It examines current trends of the violence, analyzes prospects for curbing violence in the future, and compares it with violence in Colombia. For background on U.S. policy responses to the security crisis in Mexico, see CRS Report R41349, U.S.-Mexican Security Cooperation: The Mérida Initiative and Beyond. For a discussion of the problem of violence "spilling over" into the United States, see CRS Report R41075, Southwest Border Violence: Issues in Identifying and Measuring Spillover Violence. For general background on Mexico, see CRS Report RL32724, Mexico: Issues for Congress.
From independence to interdependency: the evolution of Mexico's strategy against organized crime, violence and social unrest, 2024
Over the last two decades, Mexico has experienced a substantial increase in violence and insecurity, leading to its classification as one of the world's less secure countries. While the origins of this insecurity can be traced back to Mexico's turbulent history, the current surge in violence is a more recent development, primarily stemming from a lack of regional and national coordination among government entities and their respective security agencies. This chapter seeks to delve into the complexities of the Mexican security problem, offering an exploration of its historical context. Additionally, through a comparative analysis with the Italian case, where organized crime posed a significant threat to national security, this chapter aims to propose a set of comprehensive strategies to mitigate the impact of violence and insecurity on both the population and the country's overall development.
Mexico’s Struggle for Public Security
Mexico’s Struggle for Public Security, 2012
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Mexico's Insecurity in North America
hsaj.org
This paper will argue first that Mexico's incapacity to develop a coherent national and regional security framework has paralleled Mexico's inability to undergo a reformation of the Mexican State, and with it, of national security reform. Second, rather than true democratic ...
Is Mexico's Security Policy Backfiring?
Americas Quarterly, 2022
President López Obrador called a recent spate of violent attacks across western and northern Mexico unprecedented and regrettable. But ultimately, he dismissed them as criminal propaganda and accused his opponents of exaggerating the magnitude of the violence. López Obrador’s administration, it seems, wants to make discretionary use of power and resources, and opts for short-term benefits over long-term gains. With the opposition weakened, it is up to citizens to oppose a failed security policy that delivers neither safety, transparency nor human rights protection. Mexicans could demand, for example, that priority be given to civilian police reform—particularly improved training, working conditions and use-of-force oversight mechanisms—and to the creation of a truly autonomous public prosecutor’s office.