Mexico Today –  April  15 , 2021
Luis Rubio

 Inequality is a structural feature of Mexico: social background, geographical location, and the environment have built an uneven playing field since ancestral times. Mexico is not unique in having inherited a social structure and an orography that create unequal sociopolitical and economic conditions. Where Mexico does stand out (among countries with similar GDP per capita levels) is in having failed, or not even tried, to create conditions to improve the entire population’s odds of success, without distinction. In fact, the problem lies elsewhere: many Mexican politicians have gigantic, maximalist visions that turn into impossible dreams. Other politicians simply prefer for poverty to continue prevailing in Mexico.

The political discourse on inequality is generous in rhetoric, but lacking in solutions. Of course, there is no shortage of proposals to level down wealth via a radical redistribution of income. However, this would involve having many more poor, when what Mexican society demands is having many more rich. Other proposals focus on easing the symptoms of poverty or of those who lack access to social benefits. Usually, this involves subsidies in the form of conditional cash transfers to poor families while requiring them to fulfill specific commitments (like taking children to school and to health centers). This was the basis of social programs in Mexico such as Progresa (1997) Oportunidades (2002), and the like. Then, there are those who propose generalizing this principle through approaches like universal basic income which have the effect of erasing incentives for individual progress. Still, others seek magical solutions through more public spending (and its corresponding taxes) without changing either government expenditure goals or execution.

As German-born physicist Albert Einstein said, there is no reason to expect different results when doing the same thing over and over again.

On the other side of the Pacific Ocean, China has demonstrated that reducing inequality in a couple of generations is possible. What is required is a roaring economy that develops an education process focus in generating human capital in the form of capable individuals able to join the labor force. China’s success is so obvious that we should be ashamed because it is not the only country having achieved it. The Asian behemoth created incentives for private companies (national and foreign) to open and thrive, and devoted enormous resources to turn education into a means through which everyone, regardless of background, could join the 21st century labor market. With this strategy (pioneered by South Korea, Taiwan and others back in the 20th century), China managed to get more than 300 million citizens to join the job market, raise their living standards, and become taxpayers. A social mobility virtuous circle.

The challenge for Mexico is social inclusion: how to create conditions so that all Mexicans, without distinction, have equal access to the opportunities that the world offers. It involves changing the logic of Mexican public spending, the education system, and the development strategy overall. When the concept of social inclusion is embraced, the only thing that matters is that the economy grows rapidly and that the population is capable of joining it. That, in turn, sheds new light on the role of the mafia-like groups at the helm of Mexico’s teachers’ unions, other political bosses, and elected officials who have no greater goal than political control. They all know that a poor population is always easier to manipulate, which doesn’t prevent them from playing up inequality rather than taking action to eliminate it.

In the very different context of the 20th century, Mexico achieved accelerated social mobility thanks to the combination of political stability and public and private investment. In the 21st century of technology and knowledge, this is not enough. Success hinges on the ability of individuals’ to add value. Education, infrastructure and healthcare become critical assets in achieving that goal. Mexico’s progress requires creative social inclusion strategies, but the current government officially stuck in the 20th century.

The obvious question is why Mexico’s productivity grows so little -and, consequently, income levels- despite the success of economic sectors linked to the export markets. Again, when one looks at South Korea or China, the answer is obvious. Both countries have wagered on adding value, which is what has risen living standards in this century. You don’t have to be a genius to see that Mexican president Andrés Manuel López Obrador’s daily press conferences are a mere spectacle that distracts from the more relevant goal of implementing a proven economic development strategy.

Increasing social mobility is the only formula to reduce and eventually end inequality. Greater social mobility is the result of a government’s concerted action to create conditions for accelerated economic growth and for equalized opportunities -through human capital creation via education and healthcare- for the most disadvantaged members of society. Everything is based on leaders having economic development and social inclusion as their main goals, rather than political control and impoverishment.

* Luis Rubio is chairman of México Evalúa-CIDAC and former chairman of the Mexican Council on Foreign Relations (COMEXI).  A Spanish version of this Op-Ed appeared first in Reforma’s newspaper print edition. 

Twitter: @lrubio

https://mexicotoday.com/2021/04/15/opinion-mexicos-challenge-inclusion/

www.mexicoevalua.org
@lrubiof

Mexico Today –  April  7 , 2021
Luis Rubio

China has become a topic of endless debate: Will China replace the United States as the next superpower? Is China’s trademark authoritarianism superior to democracy? Is China’s seemingly unstoppable economic pace sustainable? These are all relevant questions. The attempts to answer them and define future scenarios abound. The outcome carries huge implications for Mexico.

Countless authors of all stripes have tried to answer these questions. I relay two views here, interesting in that they offer contrasting answers.

In his most recent book (You Will Be Assimilated: China’s Plan to Sino-form the World, 2020) financial analyst David Goldman outlines the enormous transformation that the Asian giant has undergone and what drives it. His argument is sometimes counterintuitive. For example, Goldman says that China is a nation characterized by a relentless meritocracy that contrasts with Western benevolence: its educational system is so brutal and deterministic that children compete to the death because their future is determined by university entrance exams. The result is a society of few friends, where competition begins at birth, and to which two additional elements must be factored in: first, that in China most are only-child households, and second, because of the complexity of the language (and the extraordinary diversity of languages), Chinese households are practically silent. The social structure is pyramidal and the bureaucracy, since ancient times, and now commanded by the Communist Party, dominates all aspects of life and the economy.

The Chinese government, says Goldman, has succeeded in legitimizing its position vis-à-vis the population, overcoming a structural insecurity stemming from centuries of floods, invasions and other catastrophes. Chinese authoritarianism is not new, but has now become a banner because, from its perspective, it has proven to be more functional and successful than the Western capitalist model. Its bureaucracy develops long-term plans and acts rationally, surmising that the same is taking place in the rest of the world (a source of tremendous misunderstandings).

The ambition displayed by the Asian nation is unlimited and evident in all fields, but particularly in technology, where it aspires to dominate artificial intelligence, 5G broadband connectivity, and quantum cryptography, all with both civil and military applications. China has a comprehensive transformation plan where economic cost takes a back seat to political and geopolitical goals. Although Goldman’s argument isn’t infallible, it has the enormous virtue of explaining the consistency and coherence of the Chinese economic and political model.

In a more recent book (The Return of Great Power Rivalry. Democracy versus Autocracy from the Ancient World to the U.S. and China, 2021), political scientist Matthew Kroenig focuses on the geopolitical competition between the United States and China. Kroenig analyzes the contrast between the feasibility and permanence of the democratic development model versus the authoritarian one, which he calls autocratic. Analyzing history and literature, from the feud between Athens and Sparta to the present, the book is a fascinating study. It shows that, in each era, there was always a power that achieved enormous functionality and efficiency in its dealings, but at the same time always found limits to its development by the absence of checks and balances. Kroenig concludes that the virtue of democracy lies in the fact that citizen participation, while complicating and making decision-making less effective, has the effect of reducing or limiting bad decisions that usually take place in autocratic regimes. In other words, the approach is essentially institutional and its conclusion is that the Chinese system will inexorably lead it to make mistakes that will limit its progress.

Time will tell if China achieves its ambitious goals, much of which will depend on how the United States responds and acts in the future, especially on the technology front. However, what is interesting about the contrast between the determinism of each of these two readings of reality is that both are uncompromising.

Unfortunately, Mexico is doing nothing to improve its tech position or to attract investment located in China today. What is absolutely certain is that the competition between the United States and China can only increase. The opportunity for Mexico is obvious, but it will not come about by itself. It will depend on concrete actions on the educational front, infrastructure, and investment promotion, none of which are a priority for the current Mexican administration.

* Luis Rubio is chairman of México Evalúa-CIDAC and former chairman of the Mexican Council on Foreign Relations (COMEXI).  A Spanish version of this Op-Ed appeared first in Reforma’s newspaper print edition.

 Twitter: @lrubio

https://mexicotoday.com/2021/04/06/opinion-china-where-to-go-from-here-and-mexicos-opportunity/

www.mexicoevalua.org
@lrubiof

Mexico Today –  March 30 , 2021
Luis Rubio

 When divorce is out of the question, the two parties have to find a way to compromise. That’s been the logic that Mexico and the United States have followed regarding their shared border. A mere glance around the world proves there are much worse alternatives. Nevertheless, everything now suggests that President Andrés Manuel López Obrador’s administration would not mind giving “no compromise” a try, without fathoming the Pandora’s box lying in wait.

 The fact that the border between the Mexico and the U.S. is extremely complex is nothing new. Not only due to the multiple issues on the table but also because of inextricable perceptions. Mexican poet Octavio Paz once wrote that “the border between Mexico and the United States is political and historical, not geographical”. Paz later added as an additional factor the gaping cultural contrasts between the two countries. In fact, the main feature of 20th-century Mexico was the systematic attempt to maintain the colo

ssus of the north at arm’s length. Even during Mexico’s most successful economic era -the 1960s- some politicians harbored fears of a possible U.S. invasion.

In the 1980s, Mexico decided to pivot to a different kind of relationship with the U.S.. This pivoting occurred in the context of a seemingly endless Mexican economic crisis that had been magnified and deepened by political decisions like the nationalization of the banks in 1982. The logic of this change in Mexico’s attitude vis-à-vis the U.S. was twofold.

First, it was an acknowledgment of the new realities in global production that had done away with the notion that it was possible to prosper with an economy isolated from the world. The Mexican economy was already showing worrying trends since the 1960s that were obscured, but not solved, by the discovery of vast oil resources in the Gulf of Mexico. In reality, this turn of events allowed Mexico to postpone the inevitable review of the 1960s stabilizing development strategy more than a decade.

The second reason that led Mexico to draw closer to the U.S. during the 1980s was the search for anchors of stability. In the 1980s, Mexico underwent an economic contraction and was a poorer country due to bad decisions taken in the 1970s. These decisions had sown distrust. Mexican administrations sought in the U.S. a source of economic certainty that would attracting savings and investment in the 1980s. By that time,  the twoe economies growing closer, the export assembly plants (“maquiladoras”) were prospering, the bilateral security agenda was increasingly contentious and Mexican migration to the U.S. was growing. That is, the sources of potential conflict between the U.S. and Mexico had multiplied in a mere decade.

Negotiations between Mexico and the U.S. eventually led to NAFTA trade dealt to be enacted in 1994. But it was the initial agreement between both countries, and which preceded the trade negotiations, that was key for the bilateral relationship to prosper in the following decades. In 1988, the Mexican and the U.S. governments adopted two principles that were conducive to solve the existing problems and decompress the bilateral relationship. This opened up previously inconceivable opportunities for interaction between both countries.

The first principle was a shared vision regarding the future of the relationship among the two neighbors. This included greater economic integration, an agreement not to let historical grievances to be used to distance the U.S. and Mexico, and the opening of greater student exchange between the two countries.

The second principle was agreeing to solve the bilateral issues that afflicted the U.S.-Mexico relationship without them contaminating each other. The countries adopted the principle of compartmentalization, which allowed managing this complex relationship without too much fuss, until Donald Trump’s arrival to the White House in 2017.

Those two principles have been weakened, if not demolished, over the last four years. First, Trump and López Obrador did not share the existing vision regarding the future of the bilateral relationship and, in fact, both would have preferred to return to the pre-1980s distancing. Second, by linking migration to a tariff threat against Mexican exports, Trump decimated the concept of compartmentalization of issues in the U.S.-Mexico relationship. It is possible that Biden would want to return to those two principles, but everything on the Mexican side suggests otherwise.

In his eagerness to recreate his idyllic world of the 1970s, president López Obrador seeks to reproduce the relationship of “respect and sovereignty” that, in his mind, was at the core of the relationship that Mexico had with the U.S. back then. The logic with which López Obrador has conducted himself since Biden won the election last November is indicative of his goal to diminish, move away from, and diversify the relationship, courting China and Russia to that end. It seems clear to me that the López Obrador administration is not pursuing a divorce, but a redefinition of Mexico’s relationship with the U.S. The question is at what cost.

The current U.S.-Mexico relationship is not only extraordinarily complex and demands painstaking management. It is also extremely deep and indispensable for both countries. Mutual economic dependency is enormous. Even when Trump and López Obrador would have clearly preferred to do away with NAFTA, centripetal forces demanded the treaty to be renegotiated and ratified.

The big question in U.S.-Mexico relations will be how to manage the relationship lacking a shared vision of its future and dynamics, and without the critical tool of compartmentalization of issues to avoid frequent bilateral clashes. It’s easy to dream of putting some distance, but in real life it is nonexistent.

https://mexicotoday.com/2021/03/30/opinion-mexico-the-united-states-zero-options/

* Luis Rubio is chairman of México Evalúa-CIDAC and former chairman of the Mexican Council on Foreign Relations (COMEXI).  A Spanish version of this Op-Ed appeared first in Reforma’s newspaper print edition.
Twitter: @lrubio

www.mexicoevalua.org
@lrubiof

Mexico Today –  March  24, 2021

Luis Rubio
*In solidarity with José Ramón Cossio

An old joke goes like this: a candidate offers constituents a choice of heaven or hell. The voter first visits heaven, finding everything calm and in order. Then he goes to hell, where he finds manicured gardens, tables full of mouthwatering dishes, delightful music, and an array of leisure activities which its inhabitants reveled in. Back with the candidate he says: “I can’t believe what I’m saying, but I’ll vote for hell.” As soon as he says that, the landscape changes radically. Hell becomes, well, hell: agony, pain, heaviness, suffering. What was once joy now turns out to be torment. “I don’t understand,” says the voter, “this is not what you showed me before.” “Well,” the politician responds, “that was the campaign; now you’ve already cast your vote.” Thus the evolution of Mexican president Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO).

 Fifteen years ago, AMLO gave a memorable speech explaining his philosophy of how Mexican presidents should conduct themselves. He said this while criticizing then-president Vicente Fox: “a president cannot be a factional leader. Mexico’s president must act as a statesman, a head of state. He must not behave as head of a party, faction or group. The president must represent all Mexicans. The president must be an element of harmony and national unity. The president cannot use institutions in a factional way or to aid his friends or to destroy his adversaries.”

I wonder what happened to candidate AMLO who promised Nirvana, but delivered hell. In the vein of another old joke, the one that states that being a drunk is not the same as being a bartender, the Mexican president has gone in the opposite direction. When on campaign, AMLO promised respect for Mexican institutions. However once in office, he has thrown himself into dividing, polarizing, attacking, and even questioning Mexico’s relationship with the US, its neighbor to the north and the world’s most powerful country. Instead of evolving towards becoming responsible for owning the establishment -as the bartender in the joke would do- AMLO behaves like the archetype of the drunkard who has no qualms about disturbing the peace and wreaking destruction, as if he had no responsibility whatsoever.

AMLO’s defining phrases speak for themselves. In contrast with the notion he spoused years earlier (that Mexico’s president ¨must act as a statesman, a head of state”) he said at the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic that “this crisis fits us like a glove to reinforce the purpose of our transformation.” While promising not to be a factious Mexican leader, AMLO wrote to the Supreme Court saying that “it would be regrettable…if we continue to allow abuse and arrogance, under the excuse of the rule of law.”

“It’s not only his interference with the judiciary,” says Verónica Ortiz. “but (AMLO’s) express intention that the country’s judges decide cases not based on the merits of an injunction but on who is filing them. Is AMLO’s behavior that of a statesman or a factious Mexican leader?

In the heat of political rallies -and his daily morning press conferences- inevitably led to gaffes and discursive excesses. But for AMLO these are not gaffes: his rhetoric is a strategy of confrontation and permanent disqualification. AMLO, who previously criticized his predecessor Enrique Peña Nieto as a factious leader now uses the same tactic to divide. Manichaeism as a strategy and ripping into others as a system of government. The question to be asked is whether this method allows AMLO to move forward politicalluy or if he’s merely, at best, running in place.

If the pandemic has us taught anything, it is that the successful performance of a political leader in a health crisis is not at odds with his or her own popularity. Rather, it works in the opposite direction: those leaders who devoted themselves body and soul to fighting the health crisis without conflict of agendas are being highly rated. Those world leaders who ignored or politicized the health crisis are increasingly discredited. The president may boast of his high popularity numbers, but they’re nowhere near those that characterize German Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany, New Zealand’s Prime Minister Jacinta Ardern or ttaiwanese Prime Minister Tsai Ing-wen.

The German Chancellor enters the last stage of her term in office with both the left and the right recognizing her successfully steering the country through turbulent times since 2005. This period of time has included challenges as complex as the wars in the Middle East, migration from Syria, Trump, and the pandemic. Instead of flinging insults, Merkel got to work and the results speak for themselves. How does AMLO measure up to that paragon?

Mexico is sliding in all indicators. Although it would be handy to blame the Covid-19 pandemic for the economic downturn, the reality is that the Mexican economy was already in a tailspin in 2019. The corruption of past administrations continues as unpunished as ever. Even more: today there are countless examples of corruption in the current AMLO administration that enjoy, and will surely end up in, the same impunity. The relationship with the US, key to the functioning of the Mexican economy, is on tenterhooks and the prospects for the next few years are anything but encouraging.

This is the Supreme Court’s time. Mexicans’ future and freedoms literally depend on the Court’s justices. As well as them demanding that president AMLO behave as befits a head of state.

* Luis Rubio is chairman of México Evalúa-CIDAC and former chairman of the Mexican Council on Foreign Relations (COMEXI).  A Spanish version of this Op-Ed appeared first in Reforma’s newspaper print edition
Twitter: @lrubio

www.mexicoevalua.org
@lrubiof

Mexico Today – March 17, 2021

 The current moment in Mexico’s can be summed up in a tweet published last week: “President (Andrés Manuel López Obrador) prepared himself more thoroughly for (confronting the March 8) women’s march than for the (Covid-19) vaccine rollout”. López Obrador’s decision to build a formidable protective wall around Mexico’s National Palace ahead of the Mexican women’s protest revealed the true perceptions within, it revealed the fear that dwells there. For an administration 100-percent focused on winning Mexico’s upcoming midterm election, its reaction to the women’s protests was tantamount to a confession: the president’s popularity is high, but success is not guaranteed.

 President López Obrador stated that Mexican women “have every right to protest, but there are many infiltrated rabble-rousers”. His attempt to justify the construction of a wall around the National Palace was a colossal testament to his fear. Once again, the president proved that he doesn’t understand the gist of Mexico’s feminist movement nor is he willing to learn from it. The women’s protests showed that López Obrador reacts to things that are not under his control like a caged lion. He opted not to make the Mexican feminist movement his own and avoided adding it to the calls for change that characterized his coming to power in 2018. His reaction showed that the president feels threatened. The episode also showed a López Obrador reacting with fear, disdain, and an endless spouting off that exhibits his total disregard for feminist demands. His position offends and alienates even his very own party followers. Dogma first, Mexico’s problems later.

It’s not only that López Obrador shows a lack of empathy towards the feminist grievance in the abstract. Politicians around the world often over pride themselves on leading such effort however falsely. What surprises of the Mexican president is his obstinacy in denying the existence of rape, sexual abuse, and unequal opportunity. Enough already! Rather than seeing it as a legitimate grievance, López Obrador sees feminist protests as a personal affront, leading him to claim it as a provocation.

Is the Mexican president right to be so fearful of the upcoming midterm election?

The polls show two things: on the one hand, a high approval of president López Obrador among Mexicans; on the other, a very low rating for his administration and its policies. Although López Obrador’s high approval is real, it doesn’t differ much from that of most of his predecessors at this stage of the game, but two things stand out. First, on the negative side, the divide between the president’s persona and his administration is unusual. Historically, both generally run parallel, one explaining the other. The results of the 2020 local elections in the states of Coahuila and Hidalgo -where the opposition PRI party won handily- would suggest that López Obrador’s popularity does not translate into electoral support at the local level. This would justify his anxiety.

In another sense, however, the nature of this president’s popularity among Mexicans differs from that of his predecessors. These were commended for what they had achieved so far in their six-year term. López Obrador has forged a personal bond that transcends his administration and that resembles communication based more on faith than on earthly achievement. This connection, the result of an almost religious-tinged belief in López Obrador, makes pollsters’ work very difficult as it incorporates a variable impossible to measure. It’s not surprising that, in this context, the current polls predict an almost absolute victory for the governing MORENA party and its affiliate parties in June.

The pathetic performance of Mexico’s opposition parties in fielding candidates further strengthens the perception that the López Obrador administration doesn’t face a significant challenge in the upcoming midterm election. It would seem to be that the opposition has not only nominated poorly regarded candidates, but that it has alienated those who would have a greater chance of winning a Mexican congressional seat, mayorship or governorship.

In light of all this, it is not an idle question to wonder why so much restlessness on the part of president López Obrador’s team. Do they know something that the rest of us simple mortals do not? Perhaps the explanation lies in something as simple and straightforward as that the veneration that his supporters have for the president does not translate into electoral support. This would be even more true at the local level, where voters’ concerns are far removed from national issues. Moreover, López Obrador is showing the same kind of contempt for Mexican voters that he has shown to Mexican women by assuming that their vote for his MORENA party is guaranteed.

I haven’t the faintest idea who will win or by what margin the Mexican midterm election of June 6. However, I have no doubt that president López Obrador has reason to be concerned. As much as many Mexican people have unshakable faith in him, it is impossible that his administration’s terrible performance regarding the economy, the pandemic, the vaccine rollout, employment, the political environment, and now women, will not impact Mexican citizens’ votes.

More importantly, president López Obrador faces two potentially irrepressible forces. On one hand, weak opposition parties that have lost their bearings and may not satisfy Mexican voters. Mexicans would in turn adopt a much more pragmatic position during the upcoming midterm election favoring any option that penalizes the president and his MORENA party. The other force is the one that president López Obrador himself has unleashed with his very own reaction to the feminist protests. Mexico’s feminism could become the great unifier of grievances, anger, and unfulfilled expectations, among Mexican voters. However, the translation of the feminist movement into something that can alter the electoral scene it is not obvious.

López Obrador’s very own lack of understanding, disregarding, and attempt to belittle Mexican feminist protests is turning into a great rallying cry for many Mexican citizens. Perhaps, this could be president López Obrador’s costlier mistakes and governing dogmas.

* Luis Rubio is chairman of México Evalúa-CIDAC and former chairman of the Mexican Council on Foreign Relations (COMEXI).  A Spanish version of this Op-Ed appeared first in Reforma’s newspaper print edition. Twitter: @lrubio

https://mexicotoday.com/2021/03/17/opinion-three-strikes-against-mexicos-president/

www.mexicoevalua.org
@lrubiof

Mexico Today –  March  10, 2021

Observers and scholars of Mexican transition to democracy hold two views. One maintains that the transition ended the day when fair and contested elections were held in the late 1990s, allowing a peaceful transfer of power in the year 2000. The other argues that the Mexican political system has not changed in nature despite the alternation of political parties in power. Beyond the details, perhaps the pertinent question is what should have been done differently to reach a better harbor? The answer would allow a more insightful diagnosis of Mexico’s current state and, perhaps, in an idyllic exercise of statesmanship, to start over.

My perception is that Mexico’s 1996 electoral reform was a great exercise in high politics. Then-president Ernesto Zedillo, the leaders of the Mexican political parties along with several task forces (especially those from academia) pushed to bring about the deal that enabled Mexico to hold free, fair, competitive, and professional elections at the federal level in 1997. Given Mexico’s past authoritarian history, no one can sell that achievement short.

Twenty-five years later, it seems to me that that there was more hope and joy than foresight and depth among those who made possible Mexico’s 1996 electoral reform. I say this with the perspective and arrogance afforded by the rear-view mirror. The 2000 presidential election was hailed inside and outside Mexico because it achieved a peaceful alternation of parties for the first time in 70 years. But the reality is that this applause was due more to the fact that the PRI, the long-ruling party, lost than to an actual transformation of the Mexican state. The key thing to understand is that the “politically correct candidate”, Vicente Fox of the PAN party, won the election. This allowed all those involved to congratulate themselves for the milestone of alternation in power. However, the events of the presidential contest in 2006 would prove that Mexico was far from democracy.

The hard and simple truth is that the real powers of Mexico’s old political system (not all within the PRI) wanted changes that would assist their own victory. However, these same powers balked at true openness or a comprehensive transformation of actual government structures. Certainly, Mexico’s electoral system was radically transformed becoming unusually structured by international standards. It was also an expensive electoral system because, as top elections chief José Woldenberg said, this was the price to pay for citizen mistrust. In the 1990s, we Mexicans ended up with an exceptionally powerful tool to ensure that the vote decided who would governs us. But as the current moment shows, what we did not achieve was a better result in the way we govern ourselves.

We Mexicans can be proud of having solved the problem of access to power thanks to the creation of what is now called the National Electoral Institute (INE). The current criticism leveled at INE is not only unfair but absurd because the problem that the 1996 reform sought to solve, along with ensuing electoral reforms, was fully achieved. What was not solved was the way in which we Mexicans should govern themselves, which involves addressing both the way the government works and the rights of the Mexican people.

The key players in Mexico’s landmark 1996 electoral reform were convinced that the issue hindering the transformation of country’s political system was the electoral system. Their expectations were that once the alternation of parties in the Mexican presidency had been achieved, the pieces would automatically fall into place, opening up new opportunities for political engagement. Nobody foresaw that the old Mexican political system had such powerful moorings and inertia that have managed to remain practically untouched even a quarter of a century later. One should add to all this the tragic fact Vicente Fox, the winner of the 2000 presidential election, had no idea of the responsibility deposited on his shoulders on that crucial year or the golden opportunity handed to him. In the end, Mexico’s powers that be and the system’s institutional inertia claimed victory. The combination of unfinished work along with ignorance and apathy allowed this to happen.

Truth be told, no one should have been surprised by the outcome, as it is very much part of Mexico’s DNA. When NAFTA trade deal was negotiated in the early 1990s, Mexico requested a 17 year phase-out period before opening three agricultural markets to imports: corn, beans, and powdered milk. Sixteen years later and with the opening of those three markets knocking at the door, Mexican agricultural producers began to say that such phase-out was no enough time. In the end, these producers were saved by the bell because agricultural prices rose just then, allowing for a smooth phase-out. But the example illustrates Mexican behavior: instead of anticipating and acting in a timely manner, Mexicans are always in haste when something has already gone awry. Mexico’s great unfinished business in politics is the comprehensive reform of the government. The Mexican government is opaque, inherently corrupt, unaccountable, and does not abide by any legal framework. The way in which the current Mexican president has been able to dismantle the institutional framework shows that it did not possess the strength and legitimacy that many assumed.

* Luis Rubio is chairman of México Evalúa-CIDAC and former chairman of the Mexican Council on Foreign Relations (COMEXI).  A Spanish version of this Op-Ed appeared first in Reforma’s newspaper print edition.

 Twitter: @lrubio

https://mexicotoday.com/2021/03/10/opinion-starting-over/

www.mexicoevalua.org
@lrubiof

Luis Rubio
Mexico Today –  March 02 , 2021

 The U.S. establishment managed to turn the Covid-19 pandemic into yet another point of contention and polarization. The issue joins a myriad of divisive factors that over the last decade and a half produced three polar opposite administrations: Obama’s, Trump’s, and now Biden’s.

Where there is practically no disagreement, however, is regarding the United States’ relationship with China. There’s almost absolute unity on that issue, reaching obsessive levels. It is a rare issue indeed on which Americans are not divided. Donald Trump and Barack Obama remain controversial figures and Joe Biden is yet to be defined. There is division over everything: from life’s most intimate issues -like abortion and marriage- to geopolitical issues, such as Russia and Europe, to trade and migration. Even the most trivial matters end up being a matter of dispute, all of which explain the delay in acting against the coronavirus. It is an issue that impacted the appointment the new head of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the flagship U.S. institution in health matters. Today’s American society cannot agree on practically anything. Except China.

The dispute with China has many levels and facets, beginning with the trade war started by Trump but stemming from the loss of industrial jobs. Unlike Mexico, China used the plants that were installed on its soil to trigger an industrial transformation. From there all kinds of grievances, both real and imaginary, arise: the mandatory transfer of technology, the subsidies to state-owned enterprises, and the anti-foreign bias. Second, the U.S. blames the Chinese government for stealing technology, data, and secrets by hacking the internet. Third, and perhaps central to the perceived wrong, Americans feel betrayed –and worse, cheated- that China has not evolved in line with their expectations of it becoming a democracy. While China’s rulers surely never promised an evolution toward democracy in sync with its economic development, it was the West’s expectation when China became a member of the World Trade Organization in 2001.

China’s impressive growth in recent decades unleashed all matter of fervor among fans and critics alike. Some see China as the harbinger of the future and extol its authoritarian government as the solution to the problems both of countries and the world: if instead of debating and discussing in a democratic context, dreams The New York Times’ columnist Thomas Friedman, the U.S. had a government like China’s, it could tackle its problems (and those of the world, like climate change) with alacrity and determination.

Others, like Minxin Pei, view the Chinese system as unsustainable, while George Magnus sees a very difficult future, particularly due to Xi Jinping’s unwillingness to face the nation’s quandaries head-on, now compounded by the repercussions of the coronavirus and domestic anger left in its wake. Obviously, no one knows what will happen, and bets are all over the place.

The sum of all these differences, misunderstandings, and clashes of expectations has led to a virtual consensus in the U.S. of China as a geopolitical threat. Countless publications debate the implications of the new reality, which essentially come down to two: those who anticipate a growing confrontation vs. those who consider appeasement possible.

Leading the former is Graham Allison, who put on the table the notion that the U.S. and China face what he calls a “Thucydides trap”, a confrontation generated when a declining power tries to prevent an emerging one from displacing it. The other side, forever led by Henry Kissinger, raises not only the possibility, but the need for cooperation. This side argues that the relationship with China has nothing to do with the former USSR due to the multiple interactions that exist, and therefore advances that it is perfectly compatible to work where there are common interests and compete where there are differences, categorically denying the Thucydides trap’s validity. Kishore Mahbubani, a Singaporean diplomat, sets forth the details of what the concrete content of such an arrangement might be. Mahbubani’s text is arrogant and not very analytical, but is a clear example of how a compromise could be reached.

Americans, Kissinger wrote years ago, play chess, where the goal is to kill the king as quickly as possible; the Chinese play weiqi, the nature of which is to patiently build positions to overwhelm the enemy, without ever directly confronting him. It is not obvious to me who will win this game, but two things are clear: first, the result will affect us and second, Americans have not been very strategic and deliberate in this fight.

It’s a pity that we Mexicans are so lost that we lack the ability to see the enormous opportunity that the U.S.-China war represents for us. Another one that is going to get away.

* Luis Rubio is chairman of México Evalúa-CIDAC and former chairman of the Mexican Council on Foreign Relations (COMEXI).  A Spanish version of this Op-Ed appeared first in Reforma’s newspaper print edition. 

Twitter: @lrubio

https://mexicotoday.com/2021/03/02/opinion-by-the-book/

www.mexicoevalua.org
@lrubiof

Mexico Today – March 01,  2021

 Undoubtedly, each government forges its own history, some due to their achievements, others because of their dogmatism. If something characterizes the current Mexican government, it’s its absolute lack of ability (or willingness) to learn. Since it arrived in power in December 2018, the López Obrador administration’s script has been absolute and set in stone. Nothing can alter it even if conditions changes radically, as it ensued with the Covid-19 pandemic. The results of the government’s first year in office clearly displayed the price of the López Obrador administration’s stubbornness. While a good part of López Obrador’s presidential campaign in 2019 hinged on criticizing Mexico’s low growth rates (on average) and intolerable corruption, the first year achieved the milestone of decreasing the country’s growth rate to negative territory. And it also did nothing more than elevate and legitimize the corruption of its own cadres. The second year was full of pandemic-fueled setbacks, without the administration’s dogmas changing in any way.

 After a year of near-total paralysis, catastrophe looms in Mexico. You don’t have to be an expert to realize that, instead of strategy, the López Obrador administration harbored a hope: that the pandemic would resolve itself. Now, 12 months later, the Mexican government doesn’t even have a vaccination strategy. From the beginning of this unusual crisis, the López Obrador administrations’ only goal has been to help its political base for electoral purposes. Most Mexicans can go resort to their own devices (a more appropriate expression for the feeling exists). In a word, there never was, nor is there now, a health strategy. It took president López Obrador a year to learn precisely nothing.

Experts state that the risk of not advancing at a brisk rate with vaccination is twofold: on the one hand, Mexico could end up isolated from the world, a leper colony-type with whom nobody wants to interact, which could even affect exports, our main source of growth. On the other hand, as professor Ian Goldin of Oxford University says, “the longer this takes, the greater the risk of mutations which could render the vaccines impotent, as is already apparently happening in South Africa”. In other words, continuing to do nothing involves risking an unimaginable crisis both on the health and the economic fronts. A catastrophe.

Of course, not everything is the Mexican government’s fault. The entire world is dealing with the problem of vaccine shortages, compounded by detrimental responses toward defeating a virus whose core characteristic is its ubiquity, in that it strikes everyone and crosses borders no matter what walls some nations want to erect. The European Union recently imposed controls on vaccine exports, when some of the main laboratories (starting with Pfizer in Belgium) that manufacture them for the whole world are located in its territory.

All of this, however, does not excuse the Mexican government’s lack of foresight. Its disregard has been such that the only really existing plan is the one developed and financed by Carlos Slim for the AstraZeneca vaccine. Everything else has been casuistic, leaving the country helpless and dependent and at the mercy of what is, at least for now, a sellers’ market. While many governments in the world have suffered from the same inability to foresee and anticipate next steps, what sets ours apart is its absolute unwillingness to learn. Successful models are not a state secret: they are visible and many nations have tweaked their strategy when it has not proven effective. All except Mexico: the only important thing here is not to lose June’s midterm elections.

The Mexican government erred in the diagnosis, clung to an unsuccessful strategy, miscommunicated (or better deceived), did not foresee vaccine purchase, and still has the gall to state that “we are doing fine.”

The contradictions of the anti-Covid-19 “strategy” are ample. The López Obrador administration has made it clear that it has unspeakable goals, which are no less real, starting with the fact that its goal isn’t to solve the issue of the pandemic, but to preserve its majority in the Mexican Lower House of Congress intact. Other contradictions have stemmed from this prodigious unwillingness to learn: for example, the evidence to date does not confirm that this virus produces permanent immunity. That has not led to modifying what appears to be Mexico’s actual strategy from the beginning: achieve “herd immunity” without the vaccine, regardless of how much it denies it or might be a delusion. This would imply that the loss of life would continue to grow endlessly.

Then, when reality- in the form of 513,000 Covid-19 deaths- overtook López Obrador’s, the government embarked on a new adventure: “stick it to Uncle Sam”. The Chinese or Russian vaccines may end up being just as effective as the others, but circumstances suggest that the Mexican government decided to play geopolitics by mischievously buying vaccines from those who are challenging “our” power in the big leagues. Of course, there is nothing wrong with acting with sovereignty in mind, but this course of action stinks more of 1960s student radicalism than a well thought out plan for duly steering the country’s development going forward.

Waterloo marked Napoleon’s defeat and it changed the history of Europe. If we continue down the current government’s path, only the clumsiness of the opposition could prevent a similar outcome.

* Luis Rubio is chairman of México Evalúa-CIDAC and former chairman of the Mexican Council on Foreign Relations (COMEXI).  A Spanish version of this Op-Ed appeared first in Reforma’s newspaper print edition.
Twitter: @lrubio

https://mexicotoday.com/2021/03/01/opinion-waterloo/

www.mexicoevalua.org
@lrubiof

Luis Rubio
Mexico Today – February 21,  2021 

 It has become commonplace to state, with deep conviction, that everything in Mexico’s recent past was bad and that the current López Obrador administration is therefore the country’s salvation. Although some Mexicans see this as mere political rhetoric, many others believe this is an absolute truth beyond question. However, the argument that everything in Mexico’s recent past was bad is rather peculiar. It was precisely during the now-decried recent past that Mexicans won the hardly-fought freedom of expression that they are now exercising. This idea is even more absurd when we know that the goal of the President Andrés Manuel López Obrador administration is actually to rebuild the authoritarian Mexico of yesteryear.

The idea that everything in Mexico’s past was bad is heard everywhere. It is repeated in legislators’ speeches, in presidential aides’ statements, in president López Obrador’s daily press conferences and as a mantra in social networks. For that group of believers in the president, the authoritarian Mexico that resulted from the Mexican Revolution in the early 20th century never took place. Nor the multiple financial crises Mexico experienced. There was never a growing Mexican middle class. There were never any currency restrictions for the normal functioning of the Mexican economy. There were no competent Mexican administrations or successful companies. Mexico never had award-winning scientists, or Nobel Prizes. The world was born in 2018 with López Obrador’s victory in the presidential election of that year. Prior to that, chaos, like in the Bible.

If the world was born yesterday and everything in the past was chaos, Mexico’s future will inevitably be better. If Mexican citizens manage to believe this fact as an act of faith, they become mere pawns at the service of a manipulative leader. Therein must lie the origin of the so-called “fake news” phenomenon. A phenomenon where beliefs –not facts- matter, particularly so if the former become the new and indisputable dogma. The problem for Mexico is that many, too many, believe it and beliefs are not subject to debate or learning. This explains a lot of what transpires in Mexico’s public sphere, beginning with López Obrador’s morning press conferences and in the Mexican legislative arena. The issue here is about revealed truths, not matters subject to legitimate debate. Isn’t this a new Mexican authoritarianism?

The belief that there is nothing good or salvageable from Mexico’s recent past is objectively false. Not only because the opposite can be proven, but because most of those Mexicans who hold these views exhibit, in their own lives, enormous advancements and family progress. Of course, objectivity is irrelevant when dealing with beliefs. It is even worse when such beliefs ar so deeply ingrained.

Around 10 years ago, when Luis de la Calle and I published the book “Clasemediero” (that in Spanish means “A Member of the Middle Class”) we invited several Mexican political leaders to comment on it. One of them, a prominent member of the leftist PRD party at the time, began his remarks by saying (I quote from memory): “When I was invited to comment on this book I felt very uncomfortable. For me, in my college days, the term middle class was used in a derogatory manner to belittle someone who did not act as an underprivileged individual. However, when I began reading the book I realized that it was describing me.” The PRD politician then went on to say that he was born in a rural town, the son of peasants, but that thanks to a scholarship he had been able to study, attend college, and then live in a city apartment the likes of which his parents could never have imagined. The commentator discovered that that social mobility existed in Mexico and that he himself had experience it. He also discovered that Mexico had made such political headway that he could express himself freely thanks to changes that had taken place over the last 40 years.

As Aristotle wrote in his Rhetoric facts are only about the past and the present. The future is only about aspirations and interests –politics’ fundamental concern. The past is a matter of legitimate debate because there are concrete facts. Regarding the specific issue of whether a country has made progress, pinpointing if this has taken place or not is a simple task. For example, nobody can deny that there are some Mexican states (like Aguascalientes) that have 40 years recording annual rates of growth above 7 percent, a milestone by any measure. It is also objectively true that other Mexican states like Chiapas and Oaxaca have not changed much during the same period of time. These are two indisputable truths. To deny them would imply that Mexico should follow, or recreate, the great achievement of Mexico’s southern states instead of learning from the success of states lie Aguascalientes or Querétaro.

It’s easy to get lost in president López Obrador’s rhetoric that pursues two obvious goals. One, to preserve poverty because a country of poor people is a country of dependents and, therefore, of manipulable people. The recipe is not a new one and is always an effective tool for those leaders who want to remain in power. Two, the goal goes beyond simply creating a dependence on a leader, it pursues obtaining blind loyalty. President López Obrador’s great success is that he has a large number of followers who believe in these falsehoods. Reasoning is to no avail.

Mexico’s tragedy is that progress is not possible when the population treads blindly in the footsteps of a commander-in-chief whose objective is to perpetuate poverty. For this goal he requires believers and not citizens. He needs to focus on political clienteles and not in increasing the country’s productivity. The victims of this scheme -whether they recognize it or not- are those who believe instead of reason. Those Mexicans who are the “beneficiaries” of the dependency relationship that the López Obrador regime instigates.

* Luis Rubio is chairman of México Evalúa-CIDAC and former chairman of the Mexican Council on Foreign Relations (COMEXI).  A Spanish version of this Op-Ed appeared first in Reforma’s newspaper print edition.
Twitter: @lrubiof

https://mexicotoday.com/2021/02/21/opinion-wicked-past/

www.mexicoevalua.org
@lrubiof

Luis Rubio
Mexico Today – February 21, 2021

  When I first visited Beijing in 1980 did not have the feel of a city, rather a big town. A few large and empty avenues led to the Forbidden City and Tiananmen Square, the city’s political hub. Now and then, bicycles –that ubiquitous means of transporting people, moving, and distributing all kinds of goods- would whizz by. Around these ceremonial centers rose an endless collection of tenements in varying degrees of disrepair. When I returned in 1999, the sight left me speechless: a modern city, with skyscrapers, expressways, luxury stores, and traffic like any international megacity. While in Mexico we debated ourselves about what economic model to follow, the debt crisis and the role of government in development, China transformed itself. Here’s to an effective government.

In Mexico, politics has been confused with governing. While it is clear that politics determines each country’s priorities, executing them is a different matter. In serious countries, government is an element of continuity and stability. Public officials are permanent, mostly career civil servants, and abide by codes of conduct and transparency. Politicians for their part, who are elected b the people, determine which projects go ahead and which don’t. They establish the criteria that will guide decision-making during their terms. Cities in serious countries have a professional manager who reports to the mayor as departments or ministries do. Only Third World countries reinvent government every time a new administration moves in.

This is the subject of an exceptional new book, The Wake-Up Call, which seeks explain the differences between the countries that successfully dealt with the Covid-19 crisis and those that still to this day can’t grasp what is happening. The book’s premise is that Western countries have very effective systems of government that know how to function under normal circumstances and how to respond to critical situations. However, it argues that these systems of government became timeworn, became too big, and ended up beholden to countless private interests, both internal (like political groups and unions), and external (construction firms, service operators, environmentalists).

In contrast, Singapore become the prime example of an efficient, technically proficient, and effective government which has attained the highest level of per capita income in the world. Many countries, particularly in Asia, have opted to follow this governing model and have successfully built meritocratic bureaucracies. Singapur and other Asian countries have exceptionally well-trained personnel that is duly compensated. Hence the indisputable successes of South Korea, Taiwan and, of course China. To be sure, there are effective and competent governments in other regions as well like Germany and some Scandinavian nations. This group of countries is notable for the seriousness, competence, and technical expertise of its bureaucracies, which are never distracted by politics.

Most of these countries are full, working democracies. Some are hybrids, and others are autocracies.One thing makes them similar is the quality of their government staff. Nothing like Covid-19 to separate those countries that know what they’re doing from the rest. This virus is an unbeatable opportunity to understand the difference among countries because it affects all exactly in the same way. Each nation, however, responds in keeping with its socio-political characteristics.

Infrastructure is another similar example. Countries with competent governments have ultra-modern highways, high-speed trains and airports. Frankfurt, Beijing, Singapore, and Incheon are obvious examples. None of these states gets bogged down with the issue of education, like Mexico. In this group countries, bureaucracies continually learn and do not sallow themselves to be manipulated by incompetent politicians, although they strictly adhere to the priorities they set. The key point is that the effectiveness of a Mexican administration isn’t about its quality of democracy or autocracy, but about its own structures and means of organization and compensation.

Unlike Singapore, the Mexican government was not built to be effective. Rather it was seen as a means to advance the interests of the political class, which inlaid corruption as one of its missions. Despite this, the López Obrador government managed to confer on Mexico stability and conditions for its development for several decades after the revolution. All of this was lost in the populism of the 1970s and the incomplete (and sometimes ineffectual) reforms of the ensuing decades.

Instead of rectifying those errors, presidente López Obrador has devoted itself to replicating the 1970s. López Obrador’s governing style is based in searching for a single person making decisions, ideologically driven and with purely political objectives. The Covid-19 crisis could not have come at a more revealing moment: it exposed Mexico’s accumulated flaws and shortcomings. The Mexican government that on paper would have push the notion of regime change This is the time for major reforms to produce a professional and technically proficient government.

* Luis Rubio is chairman of México Evalúa-CIDAC and former chairman of the Mexican Council on Foreign Relations (COMEXI).  A Spanish version of this Op-Ed appeared first in Reforma’s newspaper print edition.

Twitter: @lrubiof

https://mexicotoday.com/2021/02/21/opinion-the-key-point/

www.mexicoevalua.org
@lrubiof