Religion and Politics in MexicoSee also Latin America, Argentina, Brazil, Chile. 1. Brief Introduction 1. Brief Introduction to Religion and Politics in Mexico Mexico has a population of over 113 million, with a population growth rate of 1.1% (July 2011 est). It had a 2010 HDI ranking of #56 and a 2010 CPI ranking of 3.1. The 2000 census listed the country as 76.5% Roman Catholic, 6.3% Protestant, and over 13% unspecified [probably mostly "culturally Catholic"]. Unlike Brazil and Chile, however, the Mexican Catholic Church has been comparatively weak during the twentieth century. The Conservatives, who supported the Church, lost the political and cultural struggle to the secularizing Liberals in the mid-nineteenth century. The following porfiriato (Porfirio Diáz, 1875-1910) saw its bureaucratic and cultural model in the French Enlightenment. The caudillo leaders of the Mexican Revolution further emphasized the anticlericalism of both sources, resulting in the Catholic Cristero Rebellion of the late 1920s. When Calles formed what became the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) in 1929, he sought to include all national centers of power except the Catholic Church. Eventually, the military, peasants, and laborers became less important in this Mexican establishment as business increased its influence. Backed by the PRI, successive presidents solidified power in single six-year “dictatorships.” The PRI did not lose the presidency until 2000. By the mid-1990s, however, the country had three significant political parties, each with a unique relationship to the Catholic Church. The PRI tried to moderate its anticlerical heritage for a “modern and correct” one, reaching a new concordat with the Vatican in December 1991. Anticlericalism remained engrained in the PRD (Party of Revolutionary Democracy), formerly the left section of the PRI. Leftist heroes remain in the nineteenth-century liberal Benito Juárez, early-twentieth-century revolutionary Emiliano Zapata, and PRI president (1934-40) Lázaro Cárdenas, all at least somewhat anticlerical. PRD partisans, however, have natural issue alliances with Catholics on social justice questions like the treatment of indigenous people, for example, reaction to the January 1994 Zapatista Rebellion. The third party, the National Action Party (PAN), founded in 1939 as a culturally Catholic and middle-class business party, began with strength in modernizing states like Jalisco and Nuevo Leon. The PRI still maintains the largest countrywide political network along with an unenviable reputation for corruption. The PAN’s Vicente Fox won the Mexican presidency in 2000, but had a much more difficult time producing the promised change (Cambio!) in office than in winning it. Presidents now have to deal with a pluralistic Chamber of Deputies and Senate. Legislators, limited to single terms and without large staffs, are not yet used to their expanded role in national policy. The July 2006 presidential race was extraordinarily close. The Federal Election Institute and the Federal Election Tribunal declared the PAN’s Felipe Calderón the winner over the PRD’s Andrés López Obrador by 243,000 out of 41 million votes cast. The vote showed a “red state-blue state” division among voters. The north and the middle class voted for Calderón, and the south and the poor voted for López Obrador. The results for the 500-seat Chamber of Deputies were: 206 PAN; 160 PRD (and allies); 121 PRI (and Greens); 13 others. The results for the 128-seat Senate were: 52 PAN; 38 PRI (and Greens); 36 PRD (and allies); 2 others. López Obrador called for a “parallel government” against the “illegitimate” one headed by Calderón, but this strategy proved unsuccessful in promoting his influence. The new PAN president proved more effective than his successor, but the PRI victory in the 2009 Chamber of Deputies election (241 of 500 seats) has made it more difficult. Calderon has taken on the Mexican drug cartels and their political connections, resulting in significant tension throughout the country and along the American border. Hanson, pp. 275-77, discusses “Contemporary Mexico: A New Paradigm for Religion and Politics.” 2. Short Introductory Course to Religion and Politics in Mexico Camp lays out the basic relationships of religion and politics. Krause's article gives the reader a fine sense of the strengths and weaknesses of the three major parties and the fact that Mexico's future depends on their cooperation. That the election was not yet decided makes the article even more valuable. Edmonds-Poli and Shirk are strongest on the contemporary relations of politics and economics. Chapter Nine is especially valuable for the four different types of political economies during Mexican history. Camp, Roderic Ai. Crossing Swords: Politics and Religion in Mexico (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1997). Krause, Enrique, "Furthering Democracy in Mexico," Foreign Affairs (January/February 2006): 54-65. Edmonds-Poli, Emily, and Shirk, David A. Contemporary Mexican Politics (Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2009). 3. Other Key Resource Materials for Religion and Politics in Mexico Bowen, Kurt D., Evangelism and Apostasy: The Evolution and Impact of Evangelicals in Modern Mexico. Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 1996. Centeno, Miguel Angel. Democracy Within Reason: Technocratic Revolution in Mexico. University Park, Pa.: The Pennsylvania State University Press, 1994. Centeno explains the workings of the Mexican bureaucracy in support of the nearly dictatorial president during the long reign of the PRI. Chesnut, R. Andrew, “A Preferential Option for the Spirit: The Catholic Charismatic Renewal in Latin America’s New Religious Economy,” Latin American Politics and Society 45, no. 1 (spring 2003): 55-85. Crahan, Margaret, “Church and State in Latin America: Assassinating Some Old and New Stereotypes,” in Daedalus (1991). Elizondo, Virgil. Guadalupe: Mother of the New Creation (Maryknoll, New York: Orbis Books, 1998). Gill, Anthony. Rendering Unto Caesar: The Catholic Church and the State in Latin America (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1998). Klaiber, Jeffrey, S.J. The Church, Dictatorships, and Democracy in Latin America (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 1998). Levine, Daniel H., and Stoll, David, “Bridging the Gap Between Empowerment and Power in Latin America,” Rudolph, Susanne Hoeber, and Piscatori, James, Transnational Religion and Fading States (Boulder, Co.: Westview Press, 1997), 63-103. Schell, Patience A. Church and State Education in Revolutionary Mexico City (Tucson, AR: University of Arizona Press, 2003). Smith, Brian H. Religious Politics in Latin America: Pentecostal vs. Catholic (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 1998). 4. Recent News Articles on Mexico “Report on Mexican ‘Dirty War’ Details Abuse by Military, New York Times, February 27, 2006. Special prosecutor’s report on kidnapping, torturing and killing of hundreds of suspected subversives in Guerrero from the late 1960s to the early 1980s. “Prodded by the Left, Mexico’s Richest Man Talks Equity,” New York Times, June 3, 2006. World’s third richest man, Carlos Slim, 66, announces $4 billion in scholarships and other philanthropy. Telecommunications companies are the base of his diversified fortune. “Mexico Charges Ex-President in ’68 Massacre of Students,” New York Times, July 1, 2006. President Luis Echeverría charged by Fox government. “Conservative Wins in Mexico In Final Tally,” New York Times, July 7, 2006. Federal Election Institute declares Calderón the winner by 243,000 out of 41 million cast on July 2. Challenges then go to Federal Election Tribunal. “Would the Left Be Better for Mexico?” Mark Weisbrot op-ed in San Jose Mercury News, July 9, 2006. Weisbrot supports López Obrador (see Krauze above). “Leftist’s Backers End Blockade in Mexico City,” New York Times, September 15, 2006. López Obrador calls off blockade in the center of Mexico City. Action losing middle-class liberals and influential leftist politicians and intellectuals. Criticism by Cuauhtémoc Cárdenas and Carlos Fuentes. PRD has second largest faction in Chamber of Deputies. Problems of working both within and without the system. “With Beheadings and Attacks, Drug Gangs Terrorize Mexico,” New York Times, October 26, 2006. Battle between Sinaloa and Gulf Cartels, assassinations of judges and police. "Abortion Plan in Mexico City Shakes a Heavily Catholic Land," New York Times, March 31, 2007. The debate around a Mexico City bill that would make it legal to have an abortion during the first trimester for any reason. Cardinal Norberto Rivera led a protest march to the Basilica of the Virgin of Guadalupe. PRD, in power in Mexico City, has majority support in Legislative Assembly. PAN proposing streamlining adoption laws, improving sex education, and providing subsidies to unwed mothers as alternative. "Mexican Farmers Protest End of Corn-Import Taxes," New York Times, February 1, 2008. 50-100,000 farmers, led by the National Union of Workers and many farmer organizations, protest elimination of barriers against U.S. corn exports, claiming the small producer cannot compete with U.S. agribusiness and that Mexican subsidies have gone to Mexican agribusiness in the north. President Calderon replied that NAFTA has been generally good for Mexico, increasing exports four fold, even without oil. "Mexico City Struggles With Law On Abortion," New York Times, August 25, 2008. Summary of Mexico City's passage and Supreme Court arguments over abortion. On August 28, by an 8-3 decision, court upheld constitutionality. But doctors have right to declare themselves conscientious objectors and most gynecologists have. "In Mexico, Sorting Out Good Guys From Bad," New York Times, November 2, 2008. Drug connections to all parts of Mexican society. "In Drug War, Mexico Fights the Cartels and Itself," New York Times, March 30, 2009. Update on war between government and cartels. "Bishops Urge New Strategy In War Against Cartels," America, March 1, 2010. The Mexican bishops issued a February 15 pastoral calling on the government to reconsider its force-reliant strategy which had seen 18,000 deaths in the previous three years. It opposed returning to the old "let live" policies of the past, called for legal improvement, better cooperation among law enforcement agencies, and structural economic reforms. "Inequality, social exclusion, poverty, unemployment, low salaries, discrimination, forced migration and the inhumane levels of living expose many people to violence," the letter said. "Candidate's killing chills Mexican politics," San Jose Mercury News, June 30, 2010. Assassination of leading PRI governor candidate Rodolfo Torre in the northern state of Tamaulipas. "In Mexico, Unlikely Allies Hope to Defeat Party Machine," New York Times, July 3, 2010. PAN and PRD join in right-left coalition to run against PRI, governorship winner in Oaxaca for last 80 years. Such coalition candidates won in Oaxaca, Puebla, and Sinaloa. The PRI won the rest of the twelve contests, including Tlaxcala and Aguascalientes from the PAN and Zacatecas from the PRD. "Mexico City mayor files lawsuit against cardinal," AP, August 18, 2010. Mayor Marcelo Ebrard filed a lawsuit against Cardinal Juan Sandoval Iniguez for suggesting that the mayor had been bribed to allow adoptions by same-sex couples. The Supreme Court has denied and condemned the accusation, while the Mexican bishops have supported the cardinal. This event is part of the ongoing struggle over social policy in Mexico City. "Bishops Call for Reconciliation On National Bicentennial," America, September 13-20, 2010. On bicentennial Catholic bishops call for national reconciliation of centuries-old divisions of ethniciy, historical memory, and church-state relations. "Mexican Church Looks Closer at Its Benefactors," New York Times, March 7, 2011. Investigation of Pachuca church built with Zeta money. "Ex-Mayor of Tijuana Investigated In Killing," New York Times, June 15, 2011. Investigation of Hank Rhon, gambling king of Baja. "A Departing Governor Looks Ahead to a Bigger Prize in Mexico," New York Times, July 3, 2011. PRI Enrique Pena Nieto's candidate wins in Mexico State, boosting his 2012 chances for president. "Electoral Tribunal Sanctions Mexico City Archdiocese," America, July 18-25, 2011. Tribunal objects to church calling on Catholics not to vote for parties that support liberalized abortion laws and same-sex marriage. "Rights Groups Contend Mexican Military Has Heavy Hand in Drug Cases," New York Times, August 3, 2011. Criticism by the United States, international organizations, human rights adocates. For example, Sister Consuelo Morales Elizondo, director of Citizens in Support of Human Rights in Monterrey, points to difficulty of knowing whether mistakes were made "because nobody claims to have answers." Military claims they are "clones" from drug dealers.
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