The president and the chiefs
Diego Martin Velázquez Caballero
Every day in Mexico the gray zone gains influence, that is, the informal mechanisms that are imposed on the institutions to establish a hybrid of social control. The gray zone (Wil Pansters) is the intermediary offered by certain political actors and operators to solve problems where they are protagonists -cause and effect-; Although they solve little, they manage to stop the demands or, at least, darken the environment to confuse everything. This is how governance has been during the neoliberal era and the democratization that began in the nineties of the last century.
The Mexican State has made use of this gray area to address the problems of drug trafficking, social movements and neo-extractivism, the problem is that the State loses more and more. The federal government has capitulated many spaces and is unable, even, to manage its own engineering.
This situation is representative, says for example Moisés Naim, of the change with respect to the paradigm of power. However, the situation represents the actors of all times: locals versus foreigners, nationalists versus globalists. Depending on the country, the correlation between the elements changes, although in recent times it seems that nations are in permanent defeat.
In the Mexican case, the caciques are representatives of that strange power that is alien to the institutionality. Attached to the motherland, or distant homelands, these characters always question the State and manipulate it, they are advantageous in their particular or local interests and do not contribute to the well-being of the country. They lie when they say that they control the gray area, but their presence in it is real.
Upon the triumph of Vicente Fox, Lorenzo Meyer developed a reflection on the measurement of strength between the Executive and the factual powers of the country. The political scientist warned of the need for control over these actors and the ways in which they manipulated the public administration and the states. Meyer was right, Fox could not control the powers that be and opted for a discreet mutation with them. The country has paid the cost.
In each society, those with the greatest local membership and those from the neighborhood are always going to confront each other. The conflict between globalists and nationalists now takes preponderance in the configuration of the world order.
The porfiriato and priato constituted models of caciquil collaborative factionalism where agreements were respected and common projects were formulated. When cohesion and cooperation waned, the national chief had to exercise intelligent violence to reestablish control. Only in this way was governance established every six years and it became necessary to renew it.
As the transition progressed, the governors and other caciques began to break order. Roberto Madrazo Pintado was perhaps the first governor who confronted the central power and emerged victorious. Henceforth, governance became a disaster and not even with the army collaborative factionalism has been reestablished. Upon the arrival of Ali Baba and his 32 thieves (Andrew Paxman), there was fraud, but no governance.
The transition returned to Mexico at the beginning of the 20th century, it was already happening and, therefore, Carlos Salinas de Gortari ruled like Generals Cárdenas y Calles, and he could not subdue them, he almost ended up ruling as if he had been Carranza.
The iron control of the regional powers is fundamental for the presidential project. Now the governors, mayors and groups allied to them, promote ungovernability and contempt. There can be no better scenario for imperialism that takes advantage of any internal division.
The white, brown, university, religious, rural, urban chiefs, workers, peasants, students, feminists, street workers, etc .; they are being damaged by the attack on corruption. They react because they have never respected the State, they have agreed with it to remain advantageous operators and intermediaries.
The president still has a large base of support, but he has to lead the strikes like Cárdenas did. AMLO, in the course of his project, has forgotten to generate governance and his allies act as enemies not only because of the inconsistency with the 4T but because of the same particular interests that are being formed. The idea that the president is insufficient to generate governance is well known; the party has always been necessary as an extension, binomial and appendix. Lopez Obradorism turns into a church without faithful, before the end of the six-year term! Believers exist because the miracles are many, especially in the pandemic, but without a party the Messiah will end up crucified.