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MEXICO |
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Political Conflict and Competition
Introduction | Political Regime | Political Conflict and Competition | Society | Political Economy | Case and The World | Current Issues
The Party System
Under the PRI, opposition parties were mostly tolerated; some were even encouraged to exist in order to give legitimacy to the PRI-dominated system. The party skillfully cultivated and selectively co-opted all the opposition parties, which were, in general, weak and divided until the 1980s. The PRI periodically altered the election laws to increase the presence of the opposition in the legislature, while at the same time using electoral fraud to retain control of the presidency and key governorships.
The PRI
The PRI was founded in 1929 as a way of ending Mexico's often-violent struggle for political power. 1 From the start the PRI was viewed as a party representing the interests of the Mexican state. During its long rule, the PRI became increasingly indistinguishable from the state, and the immense power of Mexican presidents resulted from their effective control of both the party and the state.
A key element of the PRI's exercise of power was the use of patron-client relationships, in which powerful government officials delivered state services and access to power in exchange for the delivery of political support. The patron-client relationships operated from top of the hierarchy, dominated by the PRI-controlled presidency, down to the very poorest segments of society (see box). At the elite level, vast informal networks of personal loyalty known as camarillas (political cliques) were far more important than ideology.
PRI: Clientelism from Top to Bottom
During the PRI's long rule millions of Mexicans lived in extreme poverty. During the 1990s over 17,000 people survived as pepenedores, garbage pickers who lived and worked in Mexico City's rat-infested garbage landfills. Journalist Alma Guillermoprieto describes how the PRI web of patron-client relationships extended all the way down to the lowly pepenedores. 2 She argues that garbage dump caciques were able to use patron-client relationships to provide services for the garbage pickers and, most important, to protect their jobs against government officials seeking to move them out of the dumps. One community of pepenedores was awarded a neighborhood of homes across the street from a dump, complete with a school and running water. With this extension of aid, the PRI secured the support of some of Mexico's poorest and most destitute voters.
The PRI also maintained control of the state through its ability to mobilize and control mass organizations. During the presidency of L‡zaro C‡rdenas, worker and peasant organizations were created and then integrated into the PRI structure. By using the state to channel patronage to PRI mass organizations, independent mass organizations were rendered marginal and impotent. Mexico's business elite duly lavished the PRI with campaign donations. One notorious example was the 1993 dinner hosted, by President Carlos Salinas, when two dozen of Mexico's top business leaders were asked to give $25 million each to the PRI.
The PRI has no clear or consistent ideology other than political opportunism. Over the last century, it has it sought mainly to control political power, and PRI governments have varied greatly with each presidency. For example, redistributive and nationalist economic policies implemented during the Cˆrdenas presidency (1934-40) were directly contradicted by future PRI presidents. All PRI leaders claimed to represent the legacy of the Mexican Revolution, but as we have seen, that legacy is ambiguous.
Given that PRI presidents supported very different types of political economic polices, why wasn't there more open dissent within the PRI? In part, the PRI wrote electoral rules that made it virtually impossible for dissident PRI factions to form new parties and win elections.
Beginning in 1982, the PRI slowly but steadily lost support in presidential, congressional, and local elections. Some of the decline was a direct result of Mexico's rapid urbanization: while rural Mexicans were particularly susceptible to local PRI political bosses, urbanites were better educated, wealthier, and more politically independent. The PRI also suffered from a reduction of the state's ability to dispense patronage in tough economic times. The economic austerity policies of the 1990s that were a cornerstone of the government's neo-liberal policies undoubtedly cost the party a number of votes.
Ironically, the erosion of the PRI's political power in the 1990s was also a partial consequence of its attempt at democratic reform. Seeking to enhance its democratic legitimacy, the government in the 1990s spent over $1 billion to implement a high-tech electoral system that greatly reduced electoral fraud.
Even with its historic defeat in the July 2000 presidential elections, the PRI remains Mexico's strongest political party. It holds a majority of seats in the Senate, the largest plurality of seats in the Chamber of Deputies, and controls more than half of Mexico's governorships. It is the only party with a truly national reach, and the only one capable of running candidates for every nationwide political office.
Since losing the presidency in 2000 the PRI has been rudderless. As a party designed to serve sitting presidents, the PRI no longer has a clear leader. The official party leadership, the PRI legislative delegation, and PRI governors have all wielded considerable power and have produced what one observer called "a hydra-headed behemoth." 3 However, recent changes in the PRI structure have led to the direct election of a party president.4 Whether the PRI can transform itself from the perennial party of the state to an effective political opposition force remains to be seen.
The Left
After the Revolution the PRI attempted to occupy the political space traditionally occupied by leftist parties, even though it usually pursued economic policies traditionally identified with the right. Because the Revolution had its leftist phases, especially during the presidency of L‡zaro C‡rdenas (1934-1940), and because Mexico's foreign policy often supported leftist governments and movements in Latin America, there was little real political space to be occupied by leftist parties.
Nevertheless, parties of the left existed in Mexico, though most of them supported the PRI. Although the Communist Party was banned until 1979, the Popular Socialist Party (a moderate socialist party) and a few other leftist parties regularly won a few seats in the legislature. A serious leftist political force only emerged in the 1980s when a leftist faction within the PRI, led by Michoac‡n governor Cu‡uhtŽmoc C‡rdenas, bolted from the party. 5 C‡rdenas, the son of the former president, then led the newly formed PRD (Party of the Democratic Revolution) in a coalition of four opposition parties in the 1988 elections. 6
Bolstered by the high profile leadership of Cˆrdenas, and boosted by the loss of popularity of the PRI, the PRD performed extremely well in the 1988 elections. Many observers believe that without significant electoral fraud the PRD would have won those elections. Despite this auspicious start, the PRD has faltered as a leftist opposition party. It has been plagued by internal infighting and has been unable to capture enough voters outside of its strongholds in Mexico City and the south.
The PRD clearly stands to the left of the PRI. During the 1980s and 1990s it attacked the PRI's neo-liberal reforms and neglect of poor Mexicans. It advocated more nationalist and protectionist policies that had traditionally been pursued by the PRI. PRD candidates at the state and local level have had considerable success and the PRD has controlled Mexico City's government since 1997, but the party's performance in the 2000 presidential elections was certainly a disappointment. C‡rdenas won just over 16 percent of the presidential vote, and the PRD did only slightly better in elections to Congress. The 2000 elections left the PRD as a minor political force whose seats in Congress are not sufficient to build a majority, even if combined with the PAN.
In March 2002 the PRD Congress elected a new leader, Rosario Robles, the first woman to lead a major Mexican party. Robles is a former member of Congress and popular former mayor of Mexico City. A former student activist, she is an outspoken opponent to free-market policies. Robles is likely to face numerous obstacles as she attempts to rebuild and expand the PRD base of support.
The Right
Mexico's conservative opposition has a relatively long history. The National Action Party (PAN), founded in 1939 by defectors from the PRI, became the only opposition party to develop a strong organization presence, especially in its strongholds in northern Mexico and the state of Yucat‡n. 7 The party emerged as a conservative response to the leftist policies of the PRI during the late 1930s and early 1940s. The PAN advocated Christian Democratic ideas, opposing the PRI's anticlericalism and supporting pro-business policies. Since its base of power was state politics, PAN became an early advocate of state rights and opposed the centralization of power that was a feature of Mexican politics under the PRI.
Like many conservative parties, the PAN has historically been divided between Catholic conservatives and more progressive technocrats. The more progressive wing has dominated the PAN since the late 1980s, but the PRI's adoption of neo-liberal economic strategies during that decade threatened to steal the PAN's thunder. The PAN continues to be plagued by internal division, and PAN legislators have been much less willing to follow their own PAN leadership than have the PRI legislators.
In the 1990s the PAN won the governorships of seven states. Its leaders now preside over a third of all Mexicans and are able to offer more honest administration while the PRI fought harder to deny the PAN electoral victories, it unwittingly gave the PAN an issue that garnered more support among Mexicans of all classes: the need to end corruption and guarantee free elections. The PAN, however, still suffers from its geographic concentration of the vote (mostly northern Mexico) and its relative weakness among rural voters who continue to overwhelmingly support the PRI.
Vicente Fox
Vicente Fox was born on a ranch in the central Mexican state of Guanajuato. His mother was born in Spain, making him ineligible for presidency until Article 82 of the Constitution was amended before the 2000 election. He studied business at the Universidad Iberoamericana in Mexico City but left college before earning his degree (he received it in 1999, a year before his election as president). Instead, he found employment at the Mexican subsidiary of Coca Cola, starting as a salesperson and eventually rising to become general manager of national operations. He entered party politics only in 1987 and was nominated by the PAN for a congressional race. From 1988 until 1991 he served in the Chamber of Deputies and then ran for governor of Guanajuato in 1991, narrowly losing an election that is widely believed to have been stolen by the PRI. Fox served as state governor from 1995 to 1999, when he was nominated to be the PAN presidential candidate. He became Mexico's president in 2000.
Vicente Fox is not a prototypical PAN leader and does not appear to share much of the social conservatism of many PAN leaders. His roots are in local government, where he served as governor of his home state after a stint as a congressman. His charisma and his personal support network have allowed him to overcome much opposition within his own party and have helped expand the PAN's appeal to new voters. In the 2000 presidential campaign Fox created his own campaign organization that did not depend on the official PAN hierarchy dominated by Fox's political rivals. 8 Once in office, Fox formed a cabinet that included no members of the PAN's traditionalist wing, and his closest advisors are non-PAN members. He has had stormy relations with the more conservative "traditionalist" wing of the PAN who dominate the legislature and the party hierarchy.
2000 Legislative Election Results
| |
Chamber of Deputies |
Senate |
| Party |
Seats |
Votes (%)* |
Seats |
Votes (%)* |
| PAN |
218 |
38.2 |
46 |
38.1 |
| PRI |
209 |
36.9 |
60 |
36.7 |
| PRD |
53 |
18.7 |
15 |
18.9 |
| Others |
20 |
6.2 |
7 |
6.3 |
| Total |
500 |
100 |
128 |
100 |
*The PAN and PRD ran in electoral coalitions with several minor parties.
The 2000 elections delivered a political earthquake to the Mexican party system, which is now in flux. Recent data demonstrate that only 37 percent of Mexicans identify themselves as PRI partisans, and only 16 percent as strong PRI partisans. The partisan identification with the PAN (22 percent) and PRD (16 percent) is equally weak. About a third of the Mexican electorate claims to have no partisan identification.
The current party system has three major parties but operates as a two-party system in most of the country.9 In Mexico's north and west, the PAN and PRI fight for votes, while in southern Mexico the PRD and PRI are chief rivals. Only in Mexico City and surrounding areas do all three parties really compete on an equal footing. The PRI remains the only party with support in all regions, while the PRD and the PAN have more regionally concentrated bases of support.
Elections and Campaigns
During most of the PRI's long reign, elections were more national celebrations of PRI power than of competitive electoral campaigns. Every six years the country was decked out in the PRI's colors, patronage was dispensed on a massive scale, and the PRI nominees (the presumed winners, for all intents and purposes) toured their constituencies and made speeches.
The 2000 Presidential campaign broke with this tradition. The opposition candidates (CuauhtŽmoc C‡rdenas of the PRD and Vicente Fox of the PAN) had announced their intention to run for the presidency several years before the election, and both candidates were widely assumed to have a lock on their parties' nominations. The PRI candidate, traditionally named quite late into the six-year presidential term, was determined for the first time by a PRI primary vote. As a result, several PRI candidates began campaigning for the nomination early in Zedillo's presidential term, with Francisco Labastida winning the party primary in a hotly contested primary race.
The 2000 campaign was also the first to be governed by new electoral finance rules that not only sharply limited private contributions but also provided public financing for candidates. Access to media by all political parties was far more equitable than ever before. While PRI candidates still enjoyed an advantage, the playing field was more level than in past elections. The first truly fair and competitive election was also the first national campaign in which U.S.-style mudslinging was widespread. The PRI portrayed Fox as a U.S. lackey, while Fox questioned Labastida's "macho" credentials. Some of the most negative campaigning took place between the two PRI contestants for the nomination. The 2000 campaign was also the first truly modern campaign in Mexican history. Television took on a pivotal role, culminating in two televised presidential debates, which the charismatic and engaging Fox won handily over the more wooden Labastida and C‡rdenas.
In the 2000 campaign Mexico's three major political parties presented a fairly wide range of choices for voters. The PRI, under the campaign slogan "Power Will Serve the People," represented the legacy of the Mexican Revolution and nationalism. The PAN shared the PRI's enthusiasm for neo-liberal reforms but offered itself as the party of democratization, as captured by its campaign slogan "Ya!" (Enough Already). Only the leftist PRD criticized neo-liberal economic policies and NAFTA
Civil Society
Under the PRI, Mexican groups and associations were often incorporated into the state in a system known as corporatism. The paternalistic PRI would then mediate among different groups while making sure that no one group challenged government power. The PRI was formally divided into three sectors (labor, peasants, and a middle-class "popular sector), each dominated by PRI-controlled mass organizations. However, it would be a mistake to assume that the Mexican state could control all autonomous groups in society. To cite one example, the private sector Association of Employers (COPARMEX) became an important voice of opposition to the PRI, instead of supporting the governing party.
Business
Although the PRI successfully co-opted Mexico's private sector for decades, it can be argued that business groups later emerged as the most powerful source of opposition to PRI rule. Under the PRI, most private sector interests were channeled into a variety of semi-official organizations, including National Chamber of Industries and the National Chamber of Commerce. Until 1996 private sector membership in these organizations was mandatory. Even though the PRI never gave business organizations formal representation within the governing party, business interests wielded power through more informal organizations and channels. The secretive Businessman's Coordinating Council (CEE), which represents some of Mexico's wealthiest capitalists, currently has close ties with the Fox government.
The relationship between the business sector and the PRI was complex and often contradictory. In general, the policies of the PRI favored the private sector, especially big business. At the same time, business leaders bitterly opposed attempts by some PRI presidents to enact the social agenda of the Mexican Revolution. In the 1970s Presidents Echeverr’a and L—pez Portillo sought to expand the role of the state in the economy, and their polices damaged business-government relations. Although these policies were short-lived, they served to garner opposition to the PRI among northern business interests. The election of a business sector president in 2000 will likely enhance the political power of the private sector.
Labor
The PRI actively supported the unionization of Mexican workers, but unions were thoroughly integrated into the corporatist system. Mexican unions received massive subsidies from the state, which made them politically pliant. They enjoyed privileged treatment under the PRI, in part because unions were never able to incorporate much of the workforce (about 16 percent of the workforce, at its peak) and because a third of union members were government employees. The labor movement was highly centralized. The dominant labor organization, the Mexican Confederation of Labor (CTM), was created by the PRI and became one of the main pillars of the governing party. The CTM was dominated for over fifty years, until his death in 1997, by Fidel Vel‡zquez, a PRI diehard.
Unions independent of the PRI are a relatively new phenomenon in Mexico. In 1997 Mexico's independent unions formed the National Workers Union (UNT) to compete with the CTM. Since the mid-1990s a series of laws and court decisions have weakened the grip of the formerly official unions. The neo-liberal economic policies pursued by the PRI over the last two decades-and the PRI's recent loss of national power-have created new dilemmas for the CTM. Its membership has clearly suffered from the economic reforms, and its leadership no longer benefits from government patronage. Democratic reforms promoted by the PAN are likely to give labor unions more autonomy and greater ability to contest government policy. On the other hand, the PAN is even more committed to neo-liberal economic reform than the PRI is. The PRD, Mexico's leftist political party, has been a weak alternative for Mexican workers.
The Media
The PRI maintained a political lock on the media by cooptation more than by coercion. Rather than imposing censorship, the government courted the favor of Mexico's media by purchasing advertisements in pro-PRI media outlets, giving supportive media voices cheap access to infrastructure, and outright bribing of reporters. Mexico's largest media conglomerate, Televisa, was extremely close to the PRI. By the early 1990s the PRI had loosened its control of the media somewhat. The government stopped bribing reporters, and the wave of privatizations created a more competitive media environment that allowed for criticism of the PRI.
Mexico's Changing Media
Mexico's current state of transition between authoritarianism and democracy can be illustrated by the fate of the daily newspaper Excelsior. The paper was born in 1917, the year of the Mexican Revolution. The PRI ensured the political loyalty of the daily by bribing editors and reporters with money and other payoffs. Like many of Mexico's papers, it was financially dependent on the government, which provided subsidized newsprint, advertising revenue, and a steady stream of gifts to journalists. Shortly after the PRI lost power, and Excelsior lost its government subsidies, the paper announced its bankruptcy. The fate of Excelsior also reveals a great deal about Mexico's recent globalization: the daily was bought in 2002 by a group of Canadian and U.S. investors.
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