(August 2018) On July the 1st 2018 Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO), on his third attempt, won the presidency of Mexico while his party, Morena, made serious gains taking control of both houses of the legislator and a host of state and local positions. In doing so they broke the hold on power held by the two main parties, the Partido Revolucionario Institucional (PRI) and the Partido Acción Nacional (PAN), since the democratic opening in 2000. AMLO took the presidency on a record turnout and margin of victory that saw him win 53% of the vote. But while a great deal of hope has been placed in AMLO by the Mexican people his actions since his victory are sending mixed messages to an electorate activated by his rhetoric of tackling corruption, impunity and poverty.
Part I: More neoliberalism?
The Washington Consensus continues.
While the populist campaign rhetoric continues AMLO and his transition team have also announced numerous economic proposals that seem to perpetuate the last 36 years of neoliberal economic policy. Otherwise known as the Washington Consensus, this policy has biased the Mexican economy towards foreign capital and a new group of Mexican elites: the transnational capitalist class (TCC). A group that has directed the Mexican economy, since 1983, towards free markets, privatisation and reduced state welfare spending, but in the process also sustained high levels of poverty and inequality. AMLO’s team assert that their economic strategy is designed to reverse the country’s broken economy, but a new line of credit from the International Monetary Fund (IMF), and continued national bank independence implies the continuation of structural adjustment policies that embedded the Washington Consensus in Mexico.
Some of the IMF money will probably also be used for the continuation and possible expansion of the special economic zones (SEZs) in the southeast of Mexico. AMLO´s nominated chief of staff Alfonso Romo favors this strategy as much as the current PRI government. That is problematic enough after current President Enrique Peña Nieto´s (EPN) six year neoliberal reform package, but a closer look at the history of the SEZs reveals them to be a tool of the United States (U.S.) foreign policy. One that integrates spaces into the global economy for exploitation by capital. Borne out of the US’ desire to reconfigure the economy of post-World War II Puerto Rico towards free markets; SEZs soon moved further afield, including Mexico in the late 1960s as the Maquiladora industry, and today number over 14,000 worldwide. While some national economies have benefited greatly, such as China, a lot more have not, and they often break a host of laws in areas such as labor, the environment, and finance to name a few.
In Mexico the SEZs should been seen as a renewal of Plan Puebla Panama: an attempt to integrate Central American and southeast Mexico into the global economy through mega-projects and infrastructure building. Enabling multi-national corporations (MNCs) to extract the abundant natural resources from the southeast of Mexico while taking advantage of numerous fiscal benefits, and cheap plentiful labor.
The SEZs are also intrinsically linked to the continued opening of the Mexican energy sector. The former´s promoted economic benefits justifying the construction of new infrastructure that connect indigenous lands to global markets. Which is a long-term goal of U.S. foreign policy in Mexico, as it increases energy integration of Latin American markets, in the region. Hilary Clinton advocated this to the Mexican government while she was Obama’s secretary of state.
In addition, AMLO’s campaign policy of reforming oil privatisation appears, for now, to be off the table according to Romo. While the expected slowing down of oil privatisation looks set to be offset by the promised investment in other areas of the energy sector. Which will include increasing electricity production, and new financing for the national oil company’s, Pemex, dilapidated infrastructure. Financial markets, a critical indicator of the TCC´s views, appear pleased so far as demonstrated by the Mexican peso making gains on the U.S. dollar in the week after AMLO’s triumph; further reinforced by the approval of the IMF.
Can AMLO contain the streets from rising?
Mexican political scientist Carlos Fazio summarized AMLO’s platform the day after his victory as a: “…turn towards the center and a redesigning of its program of reformist transition -capitalist democratic, and national, with large concessions to the dominant power bloc…”. It is an opinion reinforced by AMLO’s anti-corruption strategy which while resonating with the public is in reality a tired and trusted right-wing tactic. One that protects elite power by pointing at a “few bad apples” rather than the actual structural problems with capitalism.
Fazio also believes that AMLO´s position is constrained by the TCC´s counter-revolution strategy; more widely known as the war on drugs. The real purpose of the war on drugs though is that of low-level counter-insurgency against the poor and anti-neoliberal elements. And as the strategy has progressed in Mexico, especially since 2007, we have seen the continuing integration of Mexico´s security architecture into that of the U.S global policing governance.
This is a bigger issue in Mexico for two reasons. First, Mexico´s links to the U.S. through NAFTA; with the latter nation defining any danger to the trade agreement as a threat to its national security. Second, the passing of the Internal Security Law earlier in the year that removed the constitutional bar on the Mexican military from internal affairs. With a vaguely defined role to protect “internal security” the door has been left open for a military, operating under U.S. goals, to justify AMLO´s removal from office if his leadership is deemed a threat. This is not a possibility AMLO can afford to take lightly: over the last decade numerous democratic leftist regimes in the Americas have been destabilized or deposed.
These regimes were victims of a U.S. promoted and funded TCC strategy of regime change. Primarily, soft coups in place of the more violent variety we saw in the region from the 1979s in Chile and Argentina. Today Brazil and Honduras are the most instructive examples where the legal system was manipulated to remove leftist presidents: usurping the democratic electoral system. Meanwhile in Venezuela, and more recently Nicaragua, we see a more sustained approach consisting of creating and funding opposition groups that promote anti-government dissent assisted by para-criminal gangs, combined with economic war and psychological operations designed to reduce the democratic mandate a leftist leader possesses.
The Mexican element of this strategy that has already begun with within the pages of TCC owned media. In the days after AMLO´s victory in the opinion sections of the New York Times, owned by the man who has benefited the most from Mexico’s neoliberal turn: Carlos Slim, and the Mexican financial daily El Financiero voiced fears off an expectant public disappointed and enraged if AMLO’s promises remain unfilled. While AMLO has yet to fully articulate what his security strategy will be his appointment of Manuel Mondragón y Kalb, who sent in police to crush protestors on the first day in office of EPN in 2012, as his security assessor; his opposition to reform of the attorney general office; and Romo’s promise to the business community to respect the rule of law while fighting insecurity, preventing protestors from shutting down commerce, points to the transitions team’s awareness of elite fears in Mexico.
While his meeting with U.S. secretaries for State, Mike Pompeo, Treasury, Steve Mnuchin, and Homeland Security, Kristjen Nielsen, the week after his victory demonstrates the impoirtance of Mexico to the U.S and TCC. It is a importance that reaches beyond Mexican borders because despite the the pro-neoliberal victories in the region they are aware that many of them have limited legitimacy, particularly in Brazil and Argentina, and that the battle for Latin America’s political future is still undecided.
The reactions from the US and the TCC demonstrate that what AMLO awoke in the Mexican public with his historic election victory could have a profound effect on region wide anti-capitalist struggles. AMLO could be the initial shoots of the real radical change needed to end poverty and corruption not just in Mexico, but in the wider region if he can harness his democratic mandate and make policy progress domestically in Mexico and globally.
Stories of Resistance: México, neoliberalism & the war on drugs. 