Luis Rubio
When Alexander Pope, the great English poet of the XVIII Century, was on his deathbed, his physician ensured him that his breathing, pulse and other vital signs were improving. “Here I am,” Pope said to a friend, “dying of a hundred good symptoms”. The government runs a similar risk. When a country is small and lives next to a large and powerful one, it has no alternative other than to adjust when the larger one changes the game. The Mexican Government cannot afford the luxury of ignoring what is happening in the North. The issue of immigration is already on the table and the government can either help or be in the way but cannot sit with its hands in its pockets.
The U.S. is a nation constructed of successive waves of immigrants. For nearly a century and a half, immigration was formally welcome and promoted. However, from the beginning of the XX Century, the view changed and in 1924 a quota system was adopted that gave rise to bitter and interminable debate with respect to its migration policy.
That debate changed the manner, actors and characteristics, but the content remained the same: those who see immigration as a threat as opposed to those who view it as an opportunity. The “bad guys” tend to change over time: during one of those times it was the Italians, during another the Jews, then the Cubans, now the Mexicans. There’s always someone, in every era, who rationalizes his opposition with arguments relative to the specific origin of the migrants, but if one observes nearly one century of debate, what’s left is that basic confrontation: threat vs. opportunity.
The recent presidential election, in which Obama gained overwhelming support from the Hispanic community, reintroduced the theme to the legislative agenda. Although both views prevail, legislators of both parties are well aware that they cannot evade it, thus the debate promises to be rich and transcending. The question is what, in the face of this reality, are the options left to the Mexican Government.
Similar to the internal debate of the U.S., in the government as well as in Mexican society there are two very clearly differentiated positions: that of those who consider the migratory theme to be an internal matter of the U.S. and those who consider it to be a matter of national interest for Mexico. The former would prefer to put on blinders; the latter would embark upon a crusade. The problem is that both are right in their position, therefore the government can do no more than act, albeit with an intelligent, appropriate, active and discrete strategy.
On the one hand, it is evident that the migratory issue is of an internal character because it involves what is most essential to any nation: the composition of its society. In addition, what is at play is the authority of a sovereign government to decide on the legal treatment of a population that violated its laws at the very instant of entering the country or when it remained within its territory beyond the time permitted by its entry stamp. The Mexican Government has nothing to offer in these fields nor can it run the risk of putting its presidency at play in a decision where it can wield little or no influence. Also, previous experiences of undue dependence on decisions made in Washington have taught the current administration to be cautious and remain distant and aloof.
On the hand, we are speaking of over 10% of the country’s population, of a constituency directly linked with over 50% of the population (siblings, parents, children) and that, in some states, represents more than one half of the total number of its inhabitants. It is impossible to ignore the internal political transcendence of the decision eventually adopted by the U.S. Government. Nor is the impressive impact of remittances on an enormous number of Mexcian families. Finally, although improbable, a scenario in which prodigious numbers of persons who now live there would end up forced to return is not inconceivable. As much as the government might wish to lie low, in this debate there are vital matters that cannot be skirted.
The Mexican Government must develop a strategy that is suitable to the circumstances. The conditioning factors are very clear: a) this is an internal affair, thus the strategy must be discrete; b) Mexico would be enormously benefitted by the legalization of those already living there today; c) these Mexicans are not now nor will they ever be a political “instrument” for the Mexican Government: they are persons of Mexican origin who aspire to live in the U.S. as citizens with their legal status in order; d) there are powerful sources of opposition to any migratory liberalization and their arguments are both legitimate and respectable; e) the U.S. society is highly decentralized and the ideas as well as sources of support and rejection – and fears- in this matter derive from below; and f) the immigration debate itself provides opportunities for a reencounter between the Mexican Government and Mexicans who opted to migrate, but also between the two societies and their governments.
These conditioning factors establish the parameters within which it is imperative to act. There are two key elements: one, to define, in private, a formal position before the U.S. Government and to develop and maintain all of the channels of communication open and fluid with its Executive branch and Congress. The Mexican Government should present itself as an actor respectful of but interested in the results and willing to assume its part for these results to be favorable. The remaining element is that of acting discretely but deliberately in order to attend to, undermine or eliminate opposition sources at the root.
The latter is crucial. When the NAFTA negotiation was launched, the Mexican Government, directly and through diverse actors across the society, devoted itself to catering and paying attention to the oppositional sources, above all in the states most vulnerable to the trade agreement, particularly those related to the manufacture of textiles, automobiles and other similar products. The objective was to explain, seek options and to join together to neutralize the opposition to the extent possible.
The migratory affair is similar to NAFTA except for being monumental in size. The government must develop a strategy to look after the complainers, the Right, the aggrieved, the employers and to the communities of Mexicans. The objective: explain, join forces and show the benign effects of migrants already there illegally, to calm Americans’ fears. A grand effort that, paradoxically, does not need to be very public (meaning in the national media), but broad and everywhere. A great low-profile political operation: with the proper budget allocation and with the appropriate redefinition of the role of the consulates. Above all, going beyond the formal structures and involving the society and the diverse actors, here as well as there. Not, by its nature, too PRIist a strategy, but indispensable nonetheless.
@lrubiof