RoMorena

October 12, 2025

Luis Rubio

A self-assured republic, hegemonic by conventional measures, begins to hurtle toward chaos and civil conflict. Its ruling class has been steadily concentrating the republic’s immense wealth in its own hands, ignoring the growing precariousness of the less well-off. As instability increases, this class—which had also largely monopolized political offices—begins to lose credibility in the eyes of the rest of the population. Demagogues, emerging from that very same ruling class but exploiting popular hatred against it, thrive. At the same time, political corruption grows and public scorn erupts. Yet displays of excess and abuse often turn out to be more a vehicle for entertainment or for settling scores born of vendettas and rivalries among powerful families than mechanisms to enforce justice. Transitions of power become tense, irregular, and marked by violence. The dangerous logic of moral superiority implies that violations of laws and norms by one side almost guarantee even worse violations by their opponents when, inevitably, the political tides turn.

One might think this is a description of national events in recent times, but in fact it is Josiah Osgood’s account of the last decades of the Roman Republic, as presented in his book Lawless Republic.* The central message of the book is that Rome’s decline is a powerful reminder that republican institutions cannot survive if their elites evade their core responsibilities, remain unaccountable for their actions, and stay distant—or detached—from the daily concerns of the population. Even more to the point, Osgood says, “the power of rhetoric and demagoguery in any popular republic should give us reason to doubt that elections will serve as a check on elite misbehavior.” And he concludes: “Prosecuting leaders for crimes they have committed can be dangerously destabilizing. But, as Rome’s case shows, allowing popular leaders to go unpunished for their crimes is far more dangerous in the long run.”

Since Morena came to power—and especially since last September with the so-called “Plan C”—the ruling party has been altering, one by one, the elements that once provided a degree of predictability to the functioning of government and public institutions in general. Countless institutions, mechanisms, and means that had been designed to provide citizens with certainty and stability, and to serve as checks on executive power, have been eliminated, destroyed, or neutralized—creating a climate of potential uncertainty which, while not identical to that of Rome, nevertheless echoes that example. Admittedly, not all these institutions and mechanisms fulfilled their purpose, or did so efficiently and frugally, but the alternative Morena has given us is infinitely worse: the total absence of certainty. The obvious question is what consequences this course of action will bring.

A sensible government would be seeking more effective and less costly ways to meet the need for sources of certainty, but instead, the next step proposed by the administration is to dismantle the one institution all Mexicans universally recognize: the National Electoral Institute (INE).

Morena harbors a deep grievance against the then-IFE over the 2006 election; regardless of the truth of the accusations they level against the electoral institutions of that time, the undeniable fact is that the then-PRD, today’s Morena, lost trust in them. Therefore, their decision (and need) to act is understandable. However, it is one thing to correct the ills, abuses, excesses, and other potential flaws of the current electoral system (as should have been done with the Amparo), and quite another to attempt to impose a monopoly on power by taking advantage of their temporary control of the presidency and congress.

When the electoral reform of 1978 was undertaken, the government of the day sought to reduce tensions and sources of conflict by recognizing and legitimizing the left-wing forces that had been excluded from the legal realm. The significance of that reform did not lie in its numerical scope, since the groups and organizations that benefited were relatively small, albeit politically significant. Morena’s proposal is precisely the opposite: to marginalize nearly half the population that voted for other political options in 2024. Whereas Reyes Heroles’ reform sought to open up the system, Morena’s creates a pressure cooker, with potentially dramatic consequences.

There are many ways to resolve the current electoral tangle, as the countless proposals put forward in opinion columns vividly illustrate. Unfortunately, the worst of all is the one Morena proposes, because its aim is not to solve a problem, but to legitimize impunity and, consequently, to accelerate the breakdown of the political system.

*Lawless Republic: The RIse of Cicero and the Decline of Rome