President Obama has recognized that Mexico should be a high priority for his administration. In the issue of Foreign Affairs that hit the newsstands today I argue that U.S. and Mexican interests will be best met if the United States goes beyond the current focus on border control and support for Mexico’s public safety institutions and pursues a more ambitious goal: supporting Mexico’s democracy. I hope you enjoy reading it and look forward to any comments you may have.
(Photo: Presidents Barack Obama and Felipe Calderon at Los Pinos. Courtesy of El Enigma at Flickr.)
As if Mexico didn’t have enough problems, it is now the epicenter of the swine flu epidemic. Confirmed cases of the influenza top 300, with 12 officially confirmed deaths. Experts, though, estimate the true number of infections in the thousands. Mexico’s economy – already on the rocks – will now definitively plummet in 2009, leading hundreds of thousands, and perhaps even millions, back into poverty. But there is a silver lining. The Mexican government’s handling of the epidemic should banish any notions of a failed state on our southern border.
While its origin and spread are still quite mysterious, cases of A/H1N1 virus, or swine flu, first appeared in Mexico and the U.S. southwestern border region in late March. Initially diagnosed as a regular flu, laboratory testing confirmed in mid-April that a new hybrid of pig, bird, and human flu virus was spreading rapidly and lethally throughout Mexico, the United States, and now the world.
In addition to the human costs, the flu is expected to hit Mexico’s economy hard. Already reeling from the U.S. and global downturn, GDP is expected to fall at least 5 percent – nearing the declines suffered during the 1995 “Tequila crisis.” Hardest hit is the $11 billion a year tourism industry, which had been holding up despite worries of drug violence. Cruise ships are rerouting away from its ports, only flights out of Mexico are full, and hotel phones ring with cancellations.
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I spoke on Charlie Rose last Friday about President Obama’s visits to Mexico and to the Summit of the Americas. You can see the whole program here:
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s heads to Mexico today. The main issue on the agenda with Mexican President Felipe Calderon and Foreign Minister Patricia Espinosa will undoubtedly be security. The rising power and violence of Mexico-based drug trafficking organizations (DTOs) covers the front pages of newspapers throughout both countries, and is a priority for policymakers in both capitals. Yet as these two nations focus on their mutual security, the United States should not forget about other bilateral issues – in particular immigration. This is an important topic in and of itself, and perhaps the most important issue on the bilateral agenda for Mexico. But it is also intrinsically related to security. Immigration reform would boost U.S. and Mexican efforts to lessen the reach of the drugs cartels’ on both sides of the border.
The drug cartels’ operations are fueled by one thing: money. This money buys guns, buys people, and buys power. The vast majority of this money – estimated at some $15-20 billion dollars a year – comes from drug sales in the United States. These profits are then sent back to Mexico, and fuel the insecurity and violence.
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I wrote the following for a CFR “expert brief” which originally appeared here.
Brazen assassinations, kidnappings, and political intimidation by drug lords conjure up images of Colombia in the early 1990s. Yet today, it is Mexico that is being engulfed by escalating violence. In 2007, drug related killings topped 2,250; in 2008 they reached nearly 6,000. Drug cartels are adopting guerrilla-style tactics – sending heavily-armed paramilitary battalions to attack police stations, ambush military brigades, and assassinate high-level security officials, political officials, and journalists. They also are adopting innovative public relations strategies to encourage recruits and intimidate their enemies and the population in general: hanging narcomantas–drug banners–in public places, placing videos on YouTube depicting gruesome murders, and more recently staging street protests against the military’s presence in some of Mexico’s largest cities and most violent regions.
Mexico’s drug business has changed significantly since the 1980s. Previously primarily middlemen, Mexican drug cartels now produce, transport, and distribute drugs. Every year over 500 metric tons of cocaine, 15,500 metric tons of marijuana, 18 metric tons of heroin, and a still unknown amount of methamphetamines make their way through Mexico into the United States. These cartels also supply Mexico’s growing domestic market for illegal substances, and their networks have become increasingly sophisticated. U.S. and Mexican interdiction efforts in the last two decades weeded out mom-and-pop operations, leading drug trafficking organizations to professionalize their operations and add former Mexican military officials, some of them U.S.-trained commandos, to their payrolls. They also diversified their business structures, adding new products (such as meth) and moving into U.S.-based distribution and production.
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With the formation of ALBA, Unasur, IIRSA, and many others, Latin American nations are pushing towards a new era of economic, political, and social integration. But how innovative are these efforts really? Will they differ from the failed attempts of the past? I recently wrote the following article for World Politics Review on the promise and perils of the region’s integration.
The Promise and Perils of South American Integration
Shannon O’Neil
January 12, 2009
World Politics Review
In the 21st century so far, regional integration has been one of the most notable elements of South American foreign relations. Picking up speed in recent years, the continent’s heads of state have enthusiastically met in numerous summits, promising increased political, economic, social, and development cooperation. Across the spectrum, governments are expanding current integration frameworks and entering into new agreements. Expectations are no less grand. As Brazil’s President Luis Inacio “Lula” da Silva recently stated, “South America, united, will move the board game of power in the world, not for its own benefit, but for everyone’s.” Read the entire article here.
Since I published a short article on the drug war in Mexico on Tuesday (and re-published it in a posting below) I’ve received a number of responses and questions related to gun shops on the border and the weapons they sell that end up in the hands of drug cartels in Mexico. I’d like to thank everyone who sent feedback and clarify a few points.
I do incorrectly imply in the article that gun shops on the border sell hand grenades and rocket-propelled grenade launchers. The border gun shops do not legally sell these. However, these type of weapons used by Mexican drug cartels have been seized by customs officlas making their way south through the border. How they are purchased is somewhat unknown, but many of these are making their way to Mexico through the United States.
I received many skeptical emails regarding the number of gunshops along the border. In fact, the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) estimates that there are about 6,650 Federal Firearms Licensees in this area, and the border is 2,000 mile long, meaning that there are 3.3 gun shops per mile (I said 3 per mile in the article). If we include all the shops in border states (not just near the border), the number rises to 9,161 locations.
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I wrote the following piece on the U.S. role in Mexico’s security challenges for foreignpolicy.com.
President Calderón is fighting America’s third war, and America’s backing his enemies.
By Shannon O’Neil
When President-elect Barack Obama is sworn in next week, he’ll become the proud owner of several wars. There is the familiar mayhem in Afghanistan and reluctant optimism in Iraq. And then there is America’s forgotten war: the war on drugs. That battle’s newest front is its southern neighbor Mexico, whose president, Felipe Calderón, Obama met on Monday. If Calderón speaks his mind, he could put it simply to Obama: We are fighting your war, and you are supplying our enemies — with demand for their drugs, money for their cartels, and guns for their violence.
Mexico is fighting for its life, and Calderón has ratcheted up the battle since becoming president in 2006. Still, the picture remains grim.
Please click here to continue reading on foreignpolicy.com.
It’s hard to believe that Calderon is coming up for 2 years in office, one-third of his term. Much has been said of Calderon’s domestic agenda, but in the op-ed below, published in Mexico’s major English-language newspaper, The News, I analyze his foreign policy achievements. I argue that President Calderon has done much to restore Mexico’s bilateral relationships, but that so far his administration has failed to take on a global leadership role. With four more years in office, Calderon should shift Mexico’s foreign policy course to actively shape the international agenda.
It’s time for Mexico to lead
BY Shannon O’Neil
Special to The News
November 28, 2008
As he celebrates his two-year anniversary in office, President Felipe Calderón gets mixed reviews on his domestic and foreign policy. Many point to the numerous successful reforms – pension, tax, justice, and energy – that have passed as evidence he can deftly guide serious issues through a divided Congress. These achievements do stand in stark contrast to the gridlocked Vicente Fox administration. Yet others dismiss these reforms as too little, too late, and lament the wasted potential for real change.
This ambivalence is not limited to national politics. While much lower in profile, Calderón´s foreign policy elicits both praise and dismissals. It shines in comparison to Fox´s, which left Mexico’s relations with Venezuela and Cuba in tatters and U.S. relations weakened by recriminations on both sides. But as in the domestic arena, many worry Calderón is wasting the opportunity to fundamentally transform Mexico’s role on the world stage.
Upon entering Los Pinos, Calderón quickly moved to repair broken bilateral fences. In his first year, he returned Mexican ambassadors to both Venezuela and Cuba, taking the first necessary steps to re-engage with all of Latin America. He followed up with visits to Argentina and Chile, and received Presidents Tabaré Vázquez of Uruguay and Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva of Brazil at home. Through these renewed ties, his government pushed to increase trade and to further energy partnerships – all important for Mexico´s future. This new hemispheric camaraderie permitted Mexico´s successful U.N. Security Council seat bid, providing Calderón a new international platform in 2009.
While at times seeming almost desperate to ignore his northern neighbor – during his first trip there as head of state in April he even bypassed Washington – Calderón’s administration has actually made more concrete headway with the United States than many of his predecessors. The harsh realities of his “get tough” domestic agenda, and the increasing worries of U.S. policy-makers about drug-related violence in Mexico, have facilitated this newfound cooperation.
Negotiations with President George W. Bush culminated in the three-year package known as the Mérida Initiative, which provides $400 million in the first year for the fight against the drug cartels. Just as important, these discussions changed the terms of the drug war debate, getting the United States to at least grudgingly accept some responsibility in the violence and to promise to stem the flow of illegal guns and money into Mexico.
QUIET CONFIDENCE
On other bilateral issues, Calderón has been notably silent. Coming on Fox’s burned heels, he has virtually ignored U.S.-bound migration in his discussions with the U.S. president. Calls for better treatment of Mexico’s citizens abroad, and for economic development and job creation at home to stem the steady human flow outward, have been geared almost exclusively to his domestic audience. On NAFTA, too, the administration has been uncommonly reticent, particularly amid calls by U.S. democrats for its renegotiation.
Two years in, Calderón’s foreign policy has promoted better Latin American relations, and assuaged past rifts with the United States. Not bad – but not visionary. As the 13th-largest economy in the world, and according to The Economist, soon to break into the ranks of the top 10, Mexico has been decidedly quiet on the international front. It is time for Mexico to lead.
The current financial crisis provides an unprecedented opportunity. Given its own tortuous history with financial upheaval (and more than one near-death experience of its banking sector), Mexico has quite a lot of wisdom to share. And since the exclusive G-7 has given way to the G-20 in worldwide negotiations, Mexico now has a seat at the table.
Other countries understand this. Brazil is the most obvious example, and one to be emulated rather than envied. Its steady and confident leadership on the world stage (backed by good macroeconomic policies and solid domestic economic growth), seduces not just international businesses and investors, but also worldwide diplomats. Having the world’s ear, Brazil´s eminence has become a self-fulfilling prophecy. In contrast, Mexico´s more timid foreign policy stance leaves it out of the game.
In the coming months, we will likely see a narrowing of the Mexican government’s domestic policy agenda. The unfortunate combination of escalating criminal violence, the almost certain National Action Party losses in next year´s midterm elections, and the deepening of the global financial crisis will prove too much for an ambitious reform program in the second half of the president´s term. But this unlucky trifecta for the home front opens the opportunity for a more aggressive foreign policy approach. Mexico should turn outward in earnest, building on the solid blocks of support developed so far by Mexico´s diplomats. With now two years of distance from Fox´s unfortunate travails, the arrival of a new administration in Washington provides an opening for the Calderón government to shift Mexico´s foreign policy course. Through the U.N. Security Council seat, its OECD and G-20 membership, and its intricate economic, security, social, and cultural ties with what is still the most powerful world economy and government, Mexico has a chance to shape the international agenda. It is an opportunity Calderón should not waste.
About the writer: Shannon O’Neil is Douglas Dillon Fellow for Latin America Studies at the Council on Foreign Relations in New York.
Since Calderon took office nearly 2 years ago, crime has increased at an alarming rate. Spilling beyond border drug violence, assaults, shootouts and kidnappings frighten citizens across the country. Perceived widespread corruption in the ranks of public security forces heightens the unease. In the wake of a particularly high profile and gruesome kidnapping/killing, Mexico’s civil society marched on mass in August 2008, demanding change. In response, local and national governments signed a pact-the “Acuerdo Nacional por la Seguridad, la Justicia y la Legalidad”-to improve Mexico’s public security.
Based on this agreement on October 22, 2008, President Calderon sent two reforms to Congress to overhaul Mexico’s federal police system, combining existing forces and redrawing responsibilities. Mexico’s federal police is currently composed of two separate federal forces: the Agencia Federal de Investigacion (AFI) and the Policia Federal Preventiva (PFP). Although on the operational side both forces report to the Ministry of Public Security (SSP), on administrative issues the AFI is linked to the Attorney General’s office, the PGR. Reforming two already-existing laws, the Federal Police Law and the Federal Attorney General Office’s (Procuraduria General de la Republica, PGR) Law, the new bills would merge these two police forces into one single branch under the SSP. This should, according to the Calderon administration, clarify the different roles of the SSP and the PGR and as a result strengthen their mandates. The executive argues that the new centralized police force will make the federal police more efficient, more effective, and less corrupt.
If congress approves the reforms, the first one would transform the PFP into an autonomous new Federal Police. The second reform would reorganize the PGR and change the process of selection and training of its officials in the effort to improve its performance. In this process, the AFI would disappear. Its officers could join the new Federal Police police force, but only after they prove- by undergoing an invigorated evaluation and certification process- that they are qualified (i.e. not corrupt among other skills).
It is good to see the Mexican government taking on these serious challenges, but it is not all that clear that the reforms will improve the situation. Given that today’s PFP suffers from corruption, it is unclear how the consolidation of authority and renaming of its force will clean up the system. Mexico’s past two Presidents also revamped the federal police with great fanfare, but with few material results. The infiltration by drug traffickers into the most elite forces combating organized crime, as was revealed last month, is just the most recent reminder that Mexico’s police forces do not have adequate measures in place to stem corruption. The proposed laws don’t look to change this situation.
Furthermore, while the new police force’s greater autonomy could increase efficiency, it will also reduce its interaction with the PGR. Whether the reforms then boost the new police’s ability to investigate and procure evidence on crime is a question.
Lastly, corruption is not exclusive to the federal police forces. State and local police forces, as well as the army and other government agencies (which are now all involved in the battle against organized crime) are all contaminated with corruption. The federal police accounts for less than 5 percent of Mexico’s total police presence. Therefore, although at this point almost any change is welcome, the Mexican government must address the dire situation of local police forces. It also needs to tackle the impunity (due to malfunctioning court systems) that allows corruption to flourish. Though seemingly insurmountable, cleaning up all these links in the “rule of law” chain are necessary to turn back the tide of organized crime, and better the lives of ordinary Mexican citizens.
