Mexico Out of World Cup: Back to Politics Mexican Style

Mas sabe el diablo por viejo que por Diablo: The Devil That You Know is Better Than the Evil That You Don’t Know

After Mexico's loss to Portugal in the World Cup Wednesday morning - which sets them up for a disqualifying loss to Argentina in the second round this Saturday - Mexicans are beginning to turn their attention back to the Presidential Elections on July 2. Less than two weeks away from an election that will determine the next six years of political rule, Mexico is being ripped open and its political, social, and economic anatomy is being examined by journalists, politicians, and Mexican voters.

In the course of this poking and prodding, Mexico´s “guts” of democratic instability, corruption, and extreme poverty are spilling out for all to see, reminding everyone that Mexico has a long way to go to achieve the kind of social justice and efficiency required of a developed country competing in today’s global economy. Mexico’s most recent internal rumblings – violent clashes between teachers and the Priista Oaxacan state government and strikes and corruption in the mining industry – highlight the failure of all of Mexico’s federal and state governments to protect the basic rights of its people.

Since all political parties are implicated in corruption of the state, a majority of the population that has lost hope in the government will not exercise their right to vote after years of lies and broken political promises (6 million of them live in the U.S.) However, for those Mexicans who will vote on July 2, there is a growing division between those who believe that economic privatization and the ascension of the current ruling PAN party will continue to lead Mexico out of stagnancy, and those who believe that it is time for another revolution in leadership that will focus on the poor and reevaluate the economic and social benefits of NAFTA.

Although the polls change slightly day-to-day, left-leaning populist Andres Manuel Lopez Obrádor (AMLO) is in the lead, right-centrist Felipe Calderón, who hails from current President Vicente Fox’s PAN party, trails by four points, and the candidate from the conservative PRI party, Roberto Madrazo, is close behind in third place. Most believe that Madrazo, whose notoriously corrupt PRI party ran the country since the Mexican Revolution of 1910 until Vicente Fox won in 2000, is out of the race. Despite AMLO’s four point lead, polls show that more than 15% of potential voters are still undecided, and as U.S. history can attest, you never really know until all votes are (or are not) counted on election day.

As a result, Mexico is inundated with outrageous TV and radio campaign ads, political posters, balloons and T-shirts with campaign slogans, and more outrageous campaign giveaways – such as bicycles, milk, and beans. The candidates are racing through the states and running their mouths – “dreaming of a stronger Mexico that will provide education, health care, and decent jobs for its people (from a Calderon campaign rally).” The question that so many Mexicans have already answered in the negative is “Does it matter who wins?”

Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO) PRD Party
Left-leaning AMLO´s platform offers an alternative – perhaps revolutionary – approach to the current business-focused and anti-corruption platform of Calderon’s PAN party. AMLO promises to make adjustments to NAFTA so that there are more protections and opportunities for the small farmers who have been pushed off their land (and unlike in the U.S.) denied subsidies over the last 15 years. These small farmers make up the vast majority of people that are migrating north to the U.S. or to Mexico City’s streets to peddle gum, cigarettes, and whatever other crap they can get their hands on. AMLO’s platform includes overhauling federal social services by increasing health insurance available to the elderly, improving educational opportunities, and drastically cutting the salaries of politicians and their appointees.

As a populist who plays on the heartstrings of the people who are most desperate, AMLO inspires renewed hope in the masses, and many in the middle class. On the other hand, some Mexicans fear his populist style might turn into another Hugo Chavez – who creates his own sense of justice without respecting laws or the interests of the wealthy. Given Mexico’s past of financial devaluations and great abuses of power, their fears may be legitimate.

Felipe Calderon – PAN Party
The right/center candidate Felipe Calderon has basically proposed to stay the course of Vicente Fox’s efforts to curtail corruption and increase large-scale investment and international trade. Yet ironically, the “anti-corruption candidate” has had some political scandal to contend with in the last two weeks. During the final presidential debate, AMLO accused Calderon of giving federal contracts to his brother-in-law (cuñado incómodo) while he was Secretary of Energy in 2001-2, contracts for which his brother in law supposedly did not fully pay taxes on.

In addition, Calderon inherits the anger that many of Mexico's poor feel towards Fox and his PAN political party. The poor feel - and the numbers also support their assertions - that the Fox government has not improved their lives, and that in some instances, it has become more difficult to find low-skilled jobs, access social services, and improve infrastructure in rural towns. As a result of the liberalization of the Mexican economy and the cutting of government spending, which has been occurring since the early 90's but has sped up under NAFTA and Fox, there are less social services available for the poor, and few new jobs have been created to replace those lost to big agriculture companies, machine-driven factories, or to offshoring to Asia. To put it clearly, one Mexican writer wrote, "Fox created 10,000,000 sources of work…unfortunately, all of them in the United States."

On the other hand, the Spanish proverb, Mas sabe el diablo por viejo que por Diablo (the devil that you know is better than the evil that you don’t know) characterizes the voting choice of many Mexicans, who fear the instability that AMLO might create. On the other hand, these Mexicans hope that Calderon will improve upon the stability created under Fox.

For Those Who Believe It Matters
The Mexicans who plan to exercise their right to vote on July 2 are voting on two issues: corruption and economic opportunity and stability. Most big business people that believe in the benefits of globalization and fear the caprices of AMLO will vote for Calderon. Most of the working poor and deeply impoverished will vote for the hope that AMLO will bring them out of generations of poverty.

As a result, the middle class will likely decide the vote on July 2. Some in the middle class will vote for Calderon out of fear that the more left wing AMLO will upset the stability that Fox's PAN party has created over the last 6 years. For these middle class Mexicans, while their lives may not have improved in the past 6 years, they have not gotten worse. They appreciate the stability, lack of inflation, and slight growth in the economy. They will vote for stability out of a fear for the evil that they do not know.

Others in the middle class are frustrated by the lack of improvement in their own lives under Fox, and they are concerned over the apparent decrease in the standard of living of many of Mexico's poor. These Mexicans are also the ones that are beginning to grow doubtful that NAFTA has been a good thing for Mexico; they have a tendency to view the U.S. as the big brother taking advantage of little brother's blind admiration and desperation. As a result, they will vote for AMLO with the hope that he might present new solutions. They are the idealists who have nothing to lose and are willing to take the risk in the “evil” they don’t know.

As the U.S. knows well from its own Presidential campaigns, from now until July 2, it is a fight for the 15% of undecided voters and the others who traditionally do not exercise their rights to vote. Political platforms aside, those undecided, decisive Mexican voters will likely vote from their “gut.” Are they hopeful and willing to take new risks or are they tired and fearful of instability? Mexico has a long history of extreme instability and great human suffering at the hands of lawless leaders. But, it also has a history of great hopefulness, which is the engine that sustains the tireless striving of its poor and middle classes. Whether the vote for stability reigns or the vote of hopefulness reigns on July 2, the actual direction that Mexico will take in the next 6 years is still anybody’s guess.