Corruption in Mexico
[7] Civil society developed around economic interest aggregation that was organized by the clientelistic government; the PRI allowed citizens to collectively bargain under the condition that they would continue to provide political loyalty to the party.
As a result of a pervasive, tainted electoral culture, vote buying is common among major political parties that they sometimes reference the phenomenon in their slogans, "Toma lo que los demás dan, ¡pero vota Partido Acción Nacional!"
[14] Trafficking has been accompanied by other forms of illegal activity – such as extortion, kidnappings, and political corruption – as disparate factions compete for control over the same, lucrative areas.
[13] Many of Mexico’s institutions – including those for law, policy, justice, and finance – function under a patron-client system in which officials receive money, political support, or other bribes from TCOs in exchange for minimal interference in, or impunity for, those criminal groups’ affairs.
[9] In these scenarios of narco-corruption, Mexico's power structure is defined by leaders who guide TCOs’ behaviors, receive payoffs, manipulate government resources, and align public policies with legislation that will further their personal and political objectives.
[13] These relationships have served as an impetus for new and problematic sources of violent, drug-related deaths, ineffective governance and policy implementation, terror-based TCO tactics, and a deepening drug market.
[8] The traditional power structure, which had enabled patronage networks to flourish and TCOs to operate, became challenged by government forces that attempted to curb violence and illegal activity.
New conflicts emerged among cartels, as different groups competed to further develop their criminal networks and to work against a political regime that struggled to fight corruption, establish legitimacy, and foster legislative effectiveness.
[19] Citizens claimed that armed soldiers, connected to TCOs through their patronage networks, initiated abuses against the population, including illegal searches, unwarranted arrests, beatings, theft, rape, and torture.
[20] Anthony Kruszewski, Tony Payan, and Kathleen Staudt examine,[9] “The Calderón administration[‘s]…use of armed forces…exposed the weaknesses [and corruption] of state and municipal authorities who had virtually abandoned certain territories to criminal groups.
Surrendering public spaces to organized crime had already become a serious threat to national security and had overtaken the capabilities of local governments to do anything about it.”The arrival of the military corresponded with institutional disintegration as the corruption of elected officials, soldiers, and police demonstrated the entrenched culture of dishonesty and illegality of Mexico's systems.
[18] To redact the negative products of militia employment, Calderón changed his policy strategy to one of reconstruction – rebuilding the Federal Police to have an increase in technical and operational activities, to have more comprehensive offices and departments, and to have a more selective personnel recruitment process.
In the most prominent and controversial case, Peña Nieto, his wife Angélica Rivera, and his Finance Minister Luis Videgaray were criticized for purchasing multimillion-dollar houses from government contractors.
Their dismissal prompted protests and criticism, alongside a new dialogue of the Peña Nieto administration's use of “soft censorship”:[25] "“The government [has] routinely used financial incentives and doled out penalties to punish unflattering reporting and reward favorable stories.
[23] Following Enrique Peña Nieto’s administration, Mexico underwent a political shift with the election of Andrés Manuel López Obrador (commonly known as AMLO), a leftist leader from the MORENA party, who took office in December 2018.
Segalmex (*Seguridad Alimentaria Mexicana*), an agency created under López Obrador to improve food security for rural and low-income communities, became the center of allegations involving the mismanagement and embezzlement of billions of pesos.
The Segalmex scandal, however, highlighted persistent structural problems in Mexican governance, raising questions about the effectiveness of López Obrador’s promised transformation and the durability of systemic corruption within the country.
[25] The international human rights group Article 19 found that in 2014 alone, more than 325 journalists experienced aggressive action by government officials and organized crime, and five reporters were killed due to their line of work.
