Divided Government

Ezra Shabot's vision (like that of many of his colleagues) of Mexico over the next few years inspires little confidence:

Since 2000, when the panistas arrived to the presidency, the PRI and PRD have maintained a position of minimal collaboration with the executive. For their part, neither Fox nor Calderón managed to dismantle the old priísta machinery that still functions in the labor union structure, and impedes the implementation of a deep labor reform. Furthermore, the PAN administrations significantly increased state participation, with the governors then plumping up the money [from the federal government] whose destination they were not obligated to report.

In this way political change gave way to a weak executive overrun by a corporatist bureaucracy, by governors who run their states like a local viceroy without any counterweight, and finally by a Congress committed in the best of scenarios to minimal and incomplete reforms that don't modify in any way the form in which politics is conducted, nor the financial structure of the government as a whole. It is this paralysis that has left the country in the same place that it was years ago. Dependent on oil, tied irreversibly to the American economy for better or worse, and with very limited room for maneuver in resolving the principal national problems like poverty, marginalization, and educative, technological, and infrastructure gaps.

The result of the election on July 5 reinforced this tendency in a very deep way.

[Break]

The reality demonstrates that, for the balance of powers in a democracy to work, there has to exist a political class willing to commit itself to the idea that basic task is the creation of parliamentary majorities capable of arriving at agreements beyond the dispute for power. Without this condition, the paralyzing equilibriums lead only to paralysis, citizen disenchantment, and, worst of all, the deterioration of the quality of life in all sectors of society. Governing in a minority in Mexico is to be condemned to failure regardless of the party that holds the presidency.

I think this is a little pessimistic, in that it implies that Mexico's structure permanently prevents the parties from cooperating, rather than just acts as a disincentive. The thing is, the disincentive is not so overwhelming as to be insurmountable. While the reforms passed in the last three years were almost universally timid, they do mark a major improvement from the first nine years of divided government. As the prevailing political dynamic continues to evolve, as Mexico's political class continues to stumble forward, the conditions will (intermittently, at the very least) become more favorable toward intra-party cooperation.

Nonetheless, a thorough analysis. It's interesting how much recent commentary has focused on the dysfunction and irresponsibility of state and local governments.