AP Comparative government

 Traditionally Mexico has had a state corporatist structure  This means that Mexico has used authoritarian rule which permits input from interest groups outside of government  The Camarilla system, which is based on leaders of important groups, has powerful leaders within high levels of government  In recent years, Mexico has taken on a more open structure of government with corporatism still helping to shape policy

 It is difficult to categorize Mexico’s current economic status for the following reasons:  GNP Per Capita: GNP is calculated based upon a country’s total economic output divided by its total population  This measure is criticized because it does not take into account what goods and services people can actually buy with their local currencies, providing a clouded picture of how well off citizens actually are  PPP (Purchasing Power Parity): This measure looks at the actual cost of living in a particular country. This is done by looking at what it costs to buy the same goods in other countries  Mexico’s cost of living is $15,600 a year.

 HDI (Human Development Index): HDI looks at life expectancy at birth, knowledge, and income  Mexico’s literacy rate is 86.9% for men, 85.3% for women, life expectancy for men is and 79 for women  Economic Dependency: This looks at how dependent one country is dependent on others for their survival  Economic Inequality: Countries generally used the Gini coefficient. The higher the number, the more unequal the rich are from the poor  Mexico is generally in the middle of all countries within all of these measures. Because the indicators are moving up, it is generally considered to be developing

 Mexico is said to be moving from old-fashioned authoritarian rule to modern democratic rule. This can be seen through:  Political accountability: Political leaders are held accountable to the people of the country  Regular, free and fair elections exist  Political competition: Political parties are free to organize, present candidates, and express ideas  The losing party allows the winning party to take office peacefully  Political freedom: Citizens have the right to assemble, organize, and express grievances against the government  Mexico is still in the process of throwing off its authoritarian past and its relatively short time as a democracy puts it in the Transitional category

 For much of the 20 th century the PRI, or Partido Revolucionario Institucional, was in power  This left Mexico as a primarily one-party state  The PRI was founded as a coalition of elites who agreed to work out conflicts through compromise rather than violence  This was largely done through the patron-client system  The PRI also relied heavily on the corporatist structure where favored corporations are allowed to lend their voice to policy measures  In 2000 the PRI was defeated ending their 80 year dominance

 The National Action Party, or PAN, was founded in 1939  IT began to provide a real challenge to the PRI in the 1990’s  PAN is strongest in the north  Their platform includes:  Regional autonomy  Less government intervention in the economy  Clean and fair elections  Good rapport with the Catholic Church  Support for private and religious education  PAN has won presidential elections in 2000 and 2006 and has more elected officials than another party  They are considered to be to the right of the PRI

 The Democratic Revolutionary Party, or PRD, is looked at as a party to the left of the PRI  In 1988 and 1994 Cuauhtemoc Cardenas, the son of Lazaro Cardenas, was the leader of the party  He had been ejected from the PRI for want more social justice and populist ideals  Current party leader Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador barely lost in the 2006 presidential election to PAN candidate Felipe Calderon  He refused to admit defeat in 2006 and his challenge of the election results fractured the PRD lessening their power

 Presidents in Mexico are directly elected as well as Chamber of Deputy representatives, senators, as well as state and local officials  Typical voter profiles include:  PRI- small town or rural, less educated, older, poorer  PAN- from the north, middle-class professional or business, urban, better educated, religious  PRD- younger, politically active, from the central states, some education, small town or urban  Urban areas have the most political participation  Rural participation is starting to increase  Vincente Fox won the presidency in 2006 and PAN captured 208 of 500 deputies in the lower house and 46 out of 128 senators  These numbers were slightly lower than the PRI

 2006  Felipe Calderon won the 2006 election for the PAN over PRD candidate Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador by 230,000 votes  PAN was able to also overtake the PRI in both the Chamber of Deputies and in the senate  2009  The midterm election of 2009 the PRI was able to regain a large amount of seats that had been lost in the election of 2006

 The president is elected in a “first past the post” system with no run-off elections required (they must have a plurality of votes)  Felipe Calderon was elected with only a little more than a third of the total popular vote  Members of congress are elected through a dual “first-past-the-post” and proportional representation system  Each Mexican state elects 3 senators, two by majority vote, and one by whoever comes in second place in voting  In addition to this, 32 senators are determined nationally through a system of proportional representation that divides the seats according to the number of votes cast for each party  In the Chamber of Deputies 300 seats are determined by plurality within single-member districts and 200 seats are chosen by proportional repersentation

 The Mexican’ government’s corporatist structure allows for the government to pragmatically accommodate the needs of interest groups  Because of this serious conflicts between groups are rare and when they do a solution is often sought  Because of this system, civil-society is largely linked to government function  Under state corporatism, business elites have become quite rich  Labor leaders and corporate leaders have largely been accommodated in the policy making process  With PAN in power, Mexico has demonstrated more characteristics of neo-corporatism  PAN does not currently control the legislature and businesses do not currently control government action  In rural areas, where the PRI dominates, the ejido system grants land from the Mexican government to the organizations themselves  These peasant organizations have pushed for better education, health services, and environmental services

 The media began to step out from the shadow of the PRI in the 1980’s  There are now a wide variety of media outlets available to Mexican citizens including international organizations such as CNN and BBC  Citizens and the media are free to criticize the government