Mexico Government: Who's Flying the Plane If the Pilot Doesn't Want to? Jorge Zepeda Patterson - Sinembargo.mx
go to original April 22, 2015

It’s not easy for a country to change when its elite are uninterested in change. Perhaps that’s the great tragedy of living in Mexico. The structural problems this country suffers from (security issues, inequality, rampant impunity and corruption, among other things) demand radical solutions that go beyond, say, popping an aspirin, but those who govern us are little interested in the things of change. And for lots of reasons.

By ensuring its survival, the Party of the Institutional Revolution (PRI) ended up tossing out any revolutionary element of its make-up in order to give way to its institutional gene. The engine that drives the ruling party is essentially replicating the conditions that are keeping it in power.

This in itself is not a condemnable act. There are occasions when a country needs stability and absolute certainty to promote the possibilities of expansion afforded by being in a favorable situation. A little like a person’s own trajectory: There are moments for change and times to sit tight. Times when a professional or personal challenge requires an individual to persevere and grow when life presents an opportunity. But there are other moments when stagnation and crisis necessitate change.

Mexico finds itself in the position of this last case. The absence of a rule of law, public insecurity and violence have ended up affecting possibilities for growth; chronic inequality is narrowing the market and preventing economic expansion; the presence of monopolies and privileges is impeding real competition; the lack of opportunities is boosting the informal economy; and corruption’s ubiquity is contaminating all aspects of national life.

Read the rest at Mexico Voices

Translated by Danielle M. Antonetti

Mexico Voices is a blogging endeavor aimed at raising the awareness of U.S. citizens regarding the destructive impact of the U.S. economic policy and the War on Drugs on Mexico — on its people, their economic and physical security and their human rights, on the nation’s dysfunctional justice system, and on the rule of law and Mexico’s fragile democracy. Visit the website at MexicoVoices.blogspot.mx

We invite you to add your charity or supporting organizations' news stories and coming events to PVAngels so we can share them with the world. Do it now!