Mexico

[© tweed]

Four questions.

Is Mexico making vital economic reforms that are aiding the economy?
Will the PAN win the next election?
Has globalization aided the people of Mexico?
Will relations between Mexico and USA improve over the next few years?

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

Is Mexico making vital economic reforms that are aiding the economy?
Not as many as they should.

Will the PAN win the next election?
Hard to say.

Has globalization aided the people of Mexico?
It's been largely a wash.  Like most developing countries, Mexico suffers from the fact that globalization has been handled in a manner that benefits the developed nations more than it does the developing nations, tho NAFTA has moderated that problem to some degree.

Will relations between Mexico and USA improve over the next few years?
Depends on wins the 2006 and 2008 Presidential races.  Mexico without a doubt was the biggest loser from 9/11 as Bush would have otherwise made the Americas his major foreign policy concern, and Mexico is the nation in the Americas that deserves our most intense efforts.

[ag]

1. The most that can be said about the recent years is that Mexico has avoided making major errors that would dramatically set it back. With the Congress split and gridlocked few important measures requiring legislative approval have passed. The tax base and tax revenue remain low, the energy sector remains constitutionally public, and, consequently, weak, underdeveloped and inefficient, the legal system is, still, crancky and slow.  In addition (and this could have been dealt with even without the legislative approval) the economy remains highly monopolized in many sectors and the educational system is still a horrid mess. On the positive side, the last two administrations have a decent record of sane public finance and macro stability (last year the budget deficit was just 0.09% of GDP and is likely to turn into surplus this year, the public debt is under 22% of GDP, 3/4 of it domestic, the foreign exchange reserves are healthy, last year's inflation was smaller than that in the US and interest rates are dropping, etc.) and a number of important and well-designed social programs have been successfully introduced. The economy is recovering from the post-1994 credit crunch. Having concluded more free-trade agreements than any country in the world, Mexico has become one of the world's biggest trading nations.  Reforms are still needed for growth, but, at least, the country is stable.

2. PAN's Calderon has, I would say, a 30% chance of being elected president (I would put PRD's Lopez Obrador's chances at 60%; PRI's Madrazo is increasingly unlikely to win). PAN has a reasonable chance of emerging with the largest single faction in the Congress, though no party is at all likely to get a majority.

3. Mexico has exploited world trade well, if that is what you mean by globalization. On the whole the impact has been very positive.  Of course, NAFTA has done a lot to transform the country (in addition to giving jobs to millions of Mexicans across the economy, it forced many important reforms, crucial to the country's modernization). Mexico is, by no means, a passive player: it has been extremely proactive in negotiating free-trade agreements (it is the only country to have negotiated one with Japan!) and its companies have been aggressive internationally (thus, the Monterrey-based Cemex is now  the world's leading mulitnational in the cement business, while Carlos Slim's telephone holdings across Latin America make him the most important player in the industry in the region).  Overall, Mexico is an enthusiastic participant in the world economy (hey, this is the country with the highest per-capita consumption of Coca Cola products - and before you scream, consider how many lives are saved by drinking coke instead of either poluted water or liquor).

On the downside, the restructuing has not been painless, with many traditional import-substitution industries going bust. The latest casualties are in agriculture, where the subisdized U.S. competition is hurting producers of many traditional cultures, including, of all things, the maize! To compensate, though (and many like to conveniently forget it) Mexico's climatic advantages make some of its vegetable producers  super-competitive internationally.

4. Hard to say. The relations are not really bad, though they have soured recently. Mexico has been strongly supportive of the US trade and democracy policies in the region, and has extremely strained (not to say hostile) relations with both Venezuela and Cuba. PAN is, generally, a pro-American force in Mexican politics (or, at least, it is not at all anti-American), and the current government once expected a warm relationship. Unfortunately, it was so consistently ignored and/or rebuffed by the Bush administration, it was left hanging, exposed to abuse as being "servile" to the Northern neighbor, without anything to show for it. Clearly, this is not a tenable position, so the government has been forced to repeatedly assert its independence, even if that would make the US upset. If the anti-immigrant hysteria continues in the US, the relationship is likely to sour further. As far as Mexico is concerned, the migration agreement is THE objective of any current diplomacy, and unless US is willing to give something in that direction, it is hard to see a significant improvement on anything else. If the left comes to power there might be a further downturn (the left is anti-American and pro-Castro - I don't want to say "pro-Cuba"). 

[WMS]

2. PAN's Calderon has, I would say, a 30% chance of being elected president (I would put PRD's Lopez Obrador's chances at 60%; PRI's Madrazo is increasingly unlikely to win). PAN has a reasonable chance of emerging with the largest single faction in the Congress, though no party is at all likely to get a majority.
...
If the left comes to power there might be a further downturn (the left is anti-American and pro-Castro - I don't want to say "pro-Cuba").

I was afraid of that. Oh joy, another rabid anti-American leftist nutter in Latin America...I'm sure Pym and BRTD will be thrilled

[Cubby]

2. PAN's Calderon has, I would say, a 30% chance of being elected president (I would put PRD's Lopez Obrador's chances at 60%; PRI's Madrazo is increasingly unlikely to win). PAN has a reasonable chance of emerging with the largest single faction in the Congress, though no party is at all likely to get a majority.
...
If the left comes to power there might be a further downturn (the left is anti-American and pro-Castro - I don't want to say "pro-Cuba").

I was afraid of that. Oh joy, another rabid anti-American leftist nutter in Latin America...I'm sure Pym and BRTD will be thrilled

Well Ag told me a while back that Obrador is just a PRI guy with a new name. Still, I like the PRD party.

Why yes, I would be thrilled if Obrador won its not like Fox has accomplished all that much in 6 years, or if he has it hasn't been mentioned north of the Rio Grande.

I wonder how the stand-off in Chiapas is going. I saw a documentary on it recently, but it was from 1998 and was all about Zedillo, NAFTA and Clinton. Sub Commander Marcos is a groovy freedom fighter, although there was this one scene where a French Fashion magazine was taking pictures of his outfit and I was like WTF??

My biggest problem was it said that the US (and Canada?) forced Mexico to change its Constitution before NAFTA was signed, removing a clause that gave land to the peasants. This is why I'm not a fan of free trade. How dare American companies tell a soverign state like Mexico to change its Constitution so that their assets will be safe!

[ag]

1. Well Ag told me a while back that Obrador is just a PRI guy with a new name. Still, I like the PRD party.

2. My biggest problem was it said that the US (and Canada?) forced Mexico to change its Constitution before

1. There is no contradiction. The mainstream of PRI and PRD are indistinguishable on US and Castro. Under PRI Mexico was always very friendly with the Cuban regime, and a current of anti-americanism is always alive in Mexican politics (your average Jose still hasn't forgiven or forgotten the war of 1848). While the last two or three PRI presidents were able to resist this sentiment, at present both PRI and PRD are in the same boat on these issues. Doesn't really mean that they will act on these in more than symbolic ways, though - even Lopez Obrador avoids outright anti-American statements (except for his call to "renegotiate" NAFTA, which, frankly, is more anti-Mexican than anti-American ). The anti-Americanism is an outgrowth of nationalism, and is nothing new. In Mexico it is the left - both PRD and the bulk of PRI - that is nationalist  (should I say, national sociallist ? I wouldn't, really, be that wrong!), while the right is more internationalist.

2. Mexico's constitution gets changed quite frequently. In fact, it gets changed almost every time a major international agreement gets signed. Why aren't you upset that the "vile Europeans and anti-Americans" have "forced" - just this year - a change in Mexican constitution (allowing extradition of Mexican citizens abroad) that was necessary to ratify the International Criminal Courth treaty (something that Mexico did against strong opposition of the US - and it was pushed through by the "pro-US" PAN government against the opposition of much of PRI and, to a lesser extent, PRD)? Ah, perhaps, Mexicans did this voluntarily. But then, may be, the same was the case with NAFTA?

[Colin]

Is Mexico making vital economic reforms that are aiding the economy?

Not entirely. They're making reforms but not as many or the type that are needed.

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Probably not. I'm expect Obrador and his populists to win in the next election. Is there a runoff though? I'm not sure.

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Yes and no. Its been hard to tell. Its helped Northern Mexico due to its proximity to the United States so you can see states like Neuvo Leon and Monterrey have a nice growing economy and increasing standards or living while the South, especially agricultural Chiapas, has been especially hard by globalization leading to the emergence of the Zapatistas in that state.

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Doubt it. I'm guessing that it has mostly to do with two things, one is if the PAN gets re-elected and secondly what type of immigration reforms are put in place in the US. However there is unlikely to be any major change in relations even if the most anti-US candidate, in my mind, Obrador wins.

[© tweed]

I posted these questions because my AP comparitive government HW over the break was to form arguments supporting and opposing four concepts.  I reworded the statements so they became questions.

Thanks for everyone's help.  I'll post up my paper when I'm done with it, likely later today.

[© tweed]

Here is the paper.
---------------------------

1. Mexico is making economic reforms vital to the growth of its economy.

Argument supporting: After the upheavals of the revolution, the Institutional Revolutionary Party followed a statist plan of socialism that was known as Import Substitution Industrialization.  Under this plan, the government imposed high tariffs to protect Mexican industry and nationalized industries such as the massive oil industry, as well as banks, railroads, telecommunications, and steel and sugar mills.  These policies aided Mexico for decades, but also deprived the Mexican people and the Mexican government of the ability to compete nationally on the world stage.  Vast oil reserves were discovered, making Mexico one of the greatest oil producers on the globe.  But when oil prices fell drastically in 1982, the Mexican economy was crushed.  Its people had no knowledge of how to compete on the world stage due to years of oppressive socialism.

In 1988, Carlos Salinas became president.  He supported a policy of economic neoliberalism, fighting for free markets, balanced budgets, privatization of industries, and so on.  His policies destroyed the past system of socialism that hindered Mexico for so long, and he got the economy back on track.  The trademark of Salinas’ reign was the creation and signing of the North American Free Trade Agreement, which stuck down many trade borders between the United States, Canada, and Mexico.  Mexico also dropped the tariff rates significantly that hindered the Mexican economy and consumer.  These economic reforms have aided the Mexican economy and continue to do so to this day.

Argument Against: Since the Salinas administration left in 1994, little reforms have been made to further the Mexican economy.  A grid locked congress has led to little legislation being passed, and the country remains stagnant on the economic reform front.

Even the reforms made by Salinas weren’t perfect in their results on Mexico.  As a result of the liberalization of the Mexican economy, Mexico has become much more vulnerable to the whim of international markets.  In particular, the deregulation of financial markets allowed foreign investors to invest heavily in the stock market.  When foreign investors became nervous about the Mexican economy in 1994because of an uprising in Chiapas and a number of political assassinations, they took their money out of the country very quickly by selling their stock.  After this, the value of the peso dropped significantly and the economy stagnated.

Mexico’s economy is also vulnerable to swings in the American economy.  Early in the 2000s, when the United States dipped into recession, Mexico followed.  Mexico’s continued reliance on foreigners to aid their free market economy leads one to believe a larger government with more economic regulations may be the best thing for Mexico.


2. The PAN will most likely retain control of the presidency next election.

Argument supporting: Vicente Fox is not running for re-election.  Felipe Calderon is taking his place as the presumptive PAN candidate.  Calderon is quite a unifying force within the PAN, are he garnered 58% of the vote in the PAN primary, and is also a unifying force within all of Mexico.  Vicente Fox’ legacy is increased liberalization and friendship with the United States, ideas that the Mexican people are unlikely to reject.

The Mexicans have seen what has gone on places like Venezuela, where a socialist candidate is elected (Hugo Chavez) and within a few years starts to take over dictatorial powers and nationalizing most industries, even threatening to socialize basic industries such as coffee.  Mexicans do not want to head down the leftist road and therefore will give the PAN another term.

Argument against: Anti-Americanism has increased in the past few years in Latin America, leading to the election of socialists such as Chavez in Venezuela and Evo Morales in Bolivia.  It’s likely to see Mexico go down the same road and to see PAN defeated, as incumbent president Vicente Fox has fostered a decent relationship with United States president George W. Bush.

Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, the PRD leftist candidate, is currently pacing the field in a new poll.  He leads Calderon of the PAN by 4.6%, and Roberto Madrazo of the Institutional Revolutionary Party by 10%, according to the news service Reuters.  Lopez Obrador has been barnstorming the country as of late in his campaign, saying the free market reforms of the Mexican right have widened the gap between rich and poor.  This message sells well in central and southern Mexico as well as in urban areas, which should allow Senor Lopez Obrador to win the election.

3. Globalization has benefited the people of Mexico.

Argument supporting: Globalization is defined as the process of making global or worldwide in scope or application.  NAFTA is a hallmark agreement in terms of the expansion of globalization to Mexico.  As a result of globalization and NAFTA, many multinational companies have moved factories and thousands of jobs to Mexico, creating dependable, reasonably well-paying jobs to the Mexican people. 

For example, Ford motor company has opened plants in Hermosillo and Cuatitlan, among other locations.  General Motors also has a plant in Mexico City.  These opened factories give stable jobs to otherwise unskilled, uneducated workers who have globalization to thank for their jobs and the security of their families.

Argument opposing: As a result of globalization, the rich in Mexico have become richer and the poor have become poorer.  The jobs that have been created, such as those created by motor companies, are low-paying, hard labor jobs that are created by predator multinational corporations that are unethically exploiting the labor of impoverished and unskilled Mexican workers.
Presidential candidate Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador realizes what has been going on in his country and will take steps to halt the devastation of the economy that has resulted from globalization.

4. Relations between Mexico and the United States will improve over the next few years.

Argument supporting: (partly copied from #2) Vicente Fox is not running for re-election.  Felipe Calderon is taking his place as the presumptive PAN candidate.  Calderon is quite a unifying force within the PAN, are he garnered 58% of the vote in the PAN primary, and is also a unifying force within all of Mexico.  Vicente Fox’ legacy is increased liberalization and friendship with the United States, ideas that the Mexican people are unlikely to reject.

As the PAN is re-elected, Calderon will continue the positive relations with the United States that Fox started and Mexico will soon grow into being one of the strongest allies of America.

Argument Against:  With a 4.6% lead in the last election, the socialist Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador is likely to be the next president of Mexico.  Recent history shows us that elected socialists in Latin America, such as Hugo Chavez and Evo Morales, are at times very antagonistic towards the United States and anti-American, and this is especially true in the case of Chavez.

A large number of the Mexican people view the Americans as skeptical and rich, and hold American corporations responsible for taking advantage of their labor and deepening the division of rich and poor in Mexican society.  The Mexican people will want their socialist leader to stand up for Mexican interests and oppose American interest when they see fit.

Another issue that will hinder American-Mexican relations is that of immigration reform in the United States.  Illegal immigration is a hot topic and major issue today in America, and some fanatics on the issue such as Colorado Congressman Tom Tancredo and former Congressional candidate Jim Gilchrist have formed campaigns on the issue of tightening the United States border around Mexico.  Tancredo may even run for president in 2008 on the strength of this issue.  If, or perhaps when, the United States does begin to guard the Mexican border more tightly, this will frustrate those Mexicans who try to immigrate illegally and lead to greater anti-Americanism in Mexico.

[Beet]

Part of the problem with distinguishing the impact of NAFTA on Mexico is the Mexican peso crisis of late 1994. With the permanently devalued peso, it became much more attractive to export from Mexico to the US. Mexico's trade surplus with the US did not much change in the first year of NAFTA, but it began to surge rapidly after January 1995 when the peso was devalued. So is Mexico's export growth mostly the result of the devalued peso than NAFTA? It's impossible to tell.

One thing is for certain, Mexico's long term economic growth rate post-1994 (which, along with the poverty rate, is really the bottom line, isn't it?) has not improved at all over the pre-neoliberalism years. At current rates of growth Mexico will pretty much make no progress towards closing its income gap with the US, thus leading to a constant illegal immigration problem here.

[Cubby]

1. Well Ag told me a while back that Obrador is just a PRI guy with a new name. Still, I like the PRD party.

2. My biggest problem was it said that the US (and Canada?) forced Mexico to change its Constitution before

1. There is no contradiction. The mainstream of PRI and PRD are indistinguishable on US and Castro. Under PRI Mexico was always very friendly with the Cuban regime, and a current of anti-americanism is always alive in Mexican politics (your average Jose still hasn't forgiven or forgotten the war of 1848). While the last two or three PRI presidents were able to resist this sentiment, at present both PRI and PRD are in the same boat on these issues. Doesn't really mean that they will act on these in more than symbolic ways, though - even Lopez Obrador avoids outright anti-American statements (except for his call to "renegotiate" NAFTA, which, frankly, is more anti-Mexican than anti-American ). The anti-Americanism is an outgrowth of nationalism, and is nothing new. In Mexico it is the left - both PRD and the bulk of PRI - that is nationalist  (should I say, national sociallist ? I wouldn't, really, be that wrong!), while the right is more internationalist.

2. Mexico's constitution gets changed quite frequently. In fact, it gets changed almost every time a major international agreement gets signed. Why aren't you upset that the "vile Europeans and anti-Americans" have "forced" - just this year - a change in Mexican constitution (allowing extradition of Mexican citizens abroad) that was necessary to ratify the International Criminal Courth treaty (something that Mexico did against strong opposition of the US - and it was pushed through by the "pro-US" PAN government against the opposition of much of PRI and, to a lesser extent, PRD)? Ah, perhaps, Mexicans did this voluntarily. But then, may be, the same was the case with NAFTA?

While this may sound too simplistic I don't like PAN because it is socially conservative (compared to the US and Europe all the Mexican parties are I guess) but isn't PAN linked to the Catholic Church somehow? Not that thats completely wrong, I'm Catholic and we all used to be Democrats until this stupid abortion issue became the basis of all politics in America. As far as PRD goes, better to be nationalist and liberal than internationalist and conservative.

And Tweed, Venezuela is an extreme example. Just because a country elects a leftist president doesn't mean they'll take Chavez's confrontational approach to world affairs.

[Undisguised Sockpuppet]

I say simply open legal immigraiton more then militarize the border. also stop letting in refugees from ANY country whatosever. The refugees take up jobs that americans/legal immigrants oculd have.

[MasterJedi]

Seal the boarder and allow much, much more immigration from Mexico.

[Undisguised Sockpuppet]

Seal the boarder and allow much, much more immigration from Mexico.

that's a shortened version of what I said...

[ag]

I say simply open legal immigraiton more then militarize the border. also stop letting in refugees from ANY country whatosever. The refugees take up jobs that americans/legal immigrants oculd have.

Refugees ARE legal.  They are legally in the US; many of them, in fact, receive their refugee status outside of the US, and, quite frequently, even have their ticket paid for by the US government. US government has a - Congressionally authorized -  quota on how many refugees to admit, and, frequently, this quota is not even filled. Thus, in 2003 the quota was 70,000, but only 28,000 refugees actually arrived. To put it in perspective, every year US government grants 55,000 green cards to winners of the "Diversity Lottery", and you, probably, never even heard of it, such a minor part of US migration policy it is.  Overall, US admits some 700 to 900 thousand legal immigrants every year, and refugees are not even 5% of that number. Once in the US, within a year refugees get the green card, and are, in every sense, as legal immigrants as anybody else. In fact, within 6 years of arrival most of them are US citizens.

Furthermore, it is an international obligation of the US goverment (as well as of any other government that has signed the appropriate conventions - that is, nearly every government in the world) to give a legitimate hearing to anybody who, once on the US soil, claims being politically persecuted in his home country. If at the hearing the claims are found credible, US cannot return such a refugee to his home country - this would violate a large number of international agreements and US laws. It should be stressed - refugees do not violate ANY US laws, but sending them away, if they face credible fear of persecution would. Of course, if the claim is not found to be credible, the person can be deported.

Finally, refugees are not a problem in the US. The total number of refugees in any given year is fairly small - and is not really comparable to either the number of legal or illegal immigrants. To the extent there has been misuse of refugee status - i.e., giving the status to people not in danger of anything - most of the time it has been done by the US government deliberately, for a clear political reason. One example was the continued acceptance of certain religious refugees from the former USSR many years after the USSR was no more (for most of the 1990s this was the single largest source of refugees in the US, some years accounting for an outright majority of them). While a clear abuse, the policy was deliberate. Even in this case, the beneficiaries of the policy violated no US laws, since the policy was explicitly authorized by the US Congress that chose to mislable a class of legal immigrats as refugees (the policy has now stopped).

To sum up, banning refugees from the US would have negligible effect on immigration policy, but would require major changes in the US law (as well as US withdrawal from a number of inernational treaties).  Refugees violate no US laws and are no less legally in the US than anybody else, including ancestors of every American on this forum.

PS besides everything else, and given how non-existent is the refugee problem in the US, I can't even fathom why would one suggest something this useless and cruel at the same time.  If you are Christian, you, probably, should believe you are going to hell even for getting such an idea!

[ag]

To add to my previous post: what do you mean by "opening up legal immigration". Because, if it is done properly, doing it obviates the need for srengthening the border: why would anyone whatsoever go through the window if the door is open?