What Mexico's Election Means for the Drug War

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Mexico is winning its death match against the drug cartels and rebuilding once-corrupt institutions in the process. But an election is approaching, and the candidates are calling for a truce. Mexico can take its place in the sun, but only if it wipes out the cartels for good.

A police officer on patrol in Guadalupe. (Courtesy Reuters)

U.S.-Mexico security cooperation has been strikingly close and effective during the tenure of Mexican President Felipe Calder?n. A country that had traditionally seen the United States as the principal threat to its national security has come to accept its northern neighbor as a partner in the battle against organized crime. Mexican intelligence agencies and naval units now collaborate closely with U.S. security personnel despite the historic reluctance of Mexico?s highly nationalistic military establishment to do so. At the same time, the United States, a country that had traditionally seen Mexico as a weak and unreliable counterpart, has learned to see its southern neighbor as an increasingly trusted associate. The United States now willingly shares sensitive intelligence with Mexican officials, playing a critical role in improving the effectiveness of Mexican counternarcotics operations. Just a generation ago, this would have been unthinkable.

Yet this could change after the Mexican presidential election, set to take place on July 1. The recent era of cooperation relies on an unusual coincidence of national interests and close personal relationships, rather than on a permanent, codified set of formal agreements. Relying on personal chemistry and common interests, which are liable to be interpreted differently by different governments, makes bilateral cooperation vulnerable to the policy and personnel changes that will come with a new administration in Mexico, regardless of who wins the election. (Enrique Pe?a Nieto of the Institutional Revolutionary Party, or PRI, has enjoyed a substantial lead in the final polls and is favored to win.) Moreover, because each of the main candidates has promised to redefine Mexican security priorities, focusing more on fighting organized crime than on cutting off the flow of drugs to the United States, the transition to a new administration will likely damage trust between the two countries, which will in turn threaten to weaken security cooperation. Policymakers on both sides of the border must prepare for this thorny transition in order to mitigate its impact on their shared struggle against organized crime.

Policymakers on both sides of the border must prepare for a thorny transition.

According to a March 2012 poll by Consulta Mitofsky and M?xico Unido, the vast majority of Mexicans believe that the government must bring organized crime under control and support the use of the military in this fight until effective police forces are available. But their central concern is reducing violence and crime, not drug trafficking, and less than a quarter of the public says that the government?s current strategy is working. That is understandable: Since Calder?n took office in late 2006 and declared war on the country?s drug-trafficking organizations, Mexico has seen a dramatic increase in the brutality and frequency of organized crime?related murders (over 50,000 and counting) and an explosion of kidnapping, bribery, extortion, and robbery.

Despite stump speeches devoid of detail, all three leading contenders -- Pe?a Nieto; Josefina V?zquez Mota of the ruling National Action Party (PAN); and Andr?s Manuel L?pez Obrador, who represents a coalition of left-leaning parties -- have signaled their intention to implement three core policy changes, albeit somewhat differently, in deference to these public demands and informed by the successes and failures of the Calder?n strategy.

First, the next president will likely build up Mexico?s weak state and local law enforcement, prosecutors, and penal systems, without which the battle against organized crime cannot be won, and will welcome U.S. collaboration in the process. This will be coupled with a greater emphasis on rebuilding communities and creating job and educational opportunities for at-risk youth.

Second, Mexico?s next president will continue the current strategy of countering violent organized crime organizations with force. (This is true even of L?pez Obrador, whose pragmatic streak should override his campaign promise to return the military immediately to the barracks.) But this method will be more targeted than in the past. The Calder?n years demonstrated the government?s inability to combat all of Mexico?s crime syndicates on multiple fronts. The new administration will instead concentrate its limited resources on the country?s most violent regions and activities, such as mass killings in public places. Drawing on lessons from outside of Mexico, the government will seek to bring together community members, law enforcement officials, and prosecutors in particular neighborhoods and target specific criminal groups. Since several U.S. municipal police forces have had great success with such an approach, this strategy offers another opportunity for bilateral security cooperation.

The third anticipated policy shift, however, could present a challenge to the U.S.-Mexico relationship. All three leading candidates have promised to shift the country?s crime-fighting priorities away from arresting drug traffickers and seizing drugs and toward stopping the violence associated with organized crime. This is what the Mexican population demands, and it also turns out to be what the country needs. But this modified perception of Mexico?s national interest could produce tension with Washington, where stopping the flow of drugs into the United States continues to be the top priority.

Source: http://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/137757/pamela-k-starr/what-mexicos-election-means-for-the-drug-war?cid=rss-rss_xml-what_mexicos_election_means_fo-000000

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