A blog written by Étienne von Bertrab, Lecturer (Teaching) at The Development Planning Unit.

Claudia Sheinbaum greeted by supporters at an informative assembly in Acapulco. Source: Wikimedia Commons

The original version of this text was presented at the seminar “Mexico’s 2024 elections and continuation of the Transformation” during the Latin America Conference 2024 on January 27^th in Hamilton House, London. DPU’s Étienne von Bertrab was joined in the panel by William Booth (UCL Institute of the Americas) and by David Raby and María Pérez Ramos from Mexico Solidarity Forum.

On June 2^nd Mexico will elect its first female president in 200 years as independent nation. It won’t be Xóchitl Gálvez, candidate of the opposition considered instrument of the country’s oligarchy, but Claudia Sheinbaum, an environmental scientist and social leader who has accompanied the political movement of Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO) for over two decades. She is one of the founders of the Morena party and has admirably governed Mexico City this sexenio (six-year term) until stepping down last June to pursue the presidency.

Apart from this being a momentous event for Mexican society, the coming elections will be highly significant for the life of Morena after AMLO, as Claudia (for short) will be accompanied by five female gubernatorial candidates including leftist Clara Brugada who aspires to build on Claudia’s legacy in Mexico City. Indeed, as journalist Kurt Hackbarth puts it in his latest piece in Jacobin, “the next chapter in Morena’s history is set to be shaped by leftist women”.

The certainty I start with is founded both on AMLO’s remarkably high approval rates (unprecedented at this point in a presidential term) and on the numerous opinion polls that consistently give Sheinbaum a significant lead (20 to 30%) ahead of the opposition’s strongest candidate (Gálvez). But who is Claudia Sheinbaum and what could be expected from a second moment of Mexico’s Fourth Transformation?

There isn’t much space to elaborate on Claudia’s fascinating background and significant public life, but I would like to highlight some things from her trajectory and ways of thinking and doing.[1]

As a young student in the National University, UNAM, Claudia became an activist, first in movements of solidarity with workers and peasants and then as part of the wider student mobilisations of the 1970s and 1980s.  She took part in the Comité de Lucha of her university campus and became prominent in the Consejo Estudiantil Universitario (CEU), a movement in defence of public education, at a time when neoliberalism started creeping up in Mexico’s education system.

Claudia got her first degree in Physics and did a masters in Energy Engineering. She was the first woman to enter the doctorate in energy engineering at UNAM and to obtain, in this institution, a PhD in the field. As a young mother she moved with her family to Berkeley, California, to undertake her doctoral research, but even there continued her political activism. Together with other activists she bravely gave President Carlos Salinas de Gortari a hard time in a triumphalist visit to sell the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). She worked hard as student while nurturing her political awareness and social commitment towards marginalised communities in her work on energy.

As a climate scientist, Claudia was a contributing author to the IPCC’s Fourth Report. For this work the panel received the Nobel Peace Prize (2007). She is a respected scholar in the energy and climate fields, and academia is a part of her life that she never fully abandons (although her life might become even a bit busier for a while).

Due to her solid trajectory on environmental matters and their clear political affinity Claudia was invited by AMLO to be the environment minister for his government of the capital city, then called Distrito Federal, from 2000 to 2005. As minister, Claudia was entrusted with key projects and led significant initiatives.

She supported the struggle against the desafuero of López Obrador[2] and was fundamental in the documentation of the electoral fraud that stripped AMLO from the presidency in 2006 (his first attempt). We need to remember that, since then, Mexico’s government and the business elites worked closely in well-funded smear campaigns to portray him as “un peligro para México” (a danger for Mexico). After the 2006 fraud Claudia returned to her academic activities at UNAM, but never abandoned her political action alongside AMLO.

Claudia was key in the defence of energy sovereignty —a central component of the proyecto obradorista de nación that took AMLO to the presidency in 2018— and was a great mobiliser of women in defence of such sovereignty.

Once AMLO broke with the then leftist party PRD as it allied with the conservative alliance (PRI-PAN) when Enrique Peña Nieto took power, Morena was founded, first as a civic organisation, and later —after discussions in assemblies— as a political party. Claudia Sheinbaum was part of Morena’s foundational process. The rest is history. Morena competed electorally for the first time in 2015 and only 9 years later governs, together with its allied parties, 23 of the 32 states that form the Mexican federation. It could win a few more states in the coming elections.

As mayor of Mexico City, Claudia Sheinbaum’s government expanded fundamental rights to public education, health, housing, culture, dignified employment at a fair wage, sustainable mobility, and a healthy environment. It also drove significant innovation. For example the integration of a solar power plant (now the world’s largest in an urban area) in the city’s food market, and public and free Internet connectivity throughout the city. The accomplishments of her administration are impressive and long is the list of international recognitions and prices. Mirroring what occurs at the national level, public investment in infrastructure and social protection are unparalleled, achieved through republican austerity (not the neoliberal version) and good governance, including combating corruption, without incurring in additional debt. A recurrent argument of the opposition is that Claudia Sheinbaum is candidate because of being AMLO’s favourite (or its “handpicked successor” as it is often framed in the media).[3] This (also misogynist) trope neglects her outstanding leadership and the extraordinary results of her government, putting, for the benefit of all, the poor first.

Claudia Sheinbaum’s programme is under construction. An anachronic electoral law forbids candidates to spell out specific proposals until campaigns officially start in March. However, political documents and ongoing processes are useful indications:

1. Proyecto de Nación 2024-2030, consulted and written by a special commission of Morena (before the candidacy was determined). It addresses 19 themes considered major challenges of the Fourth Transformation. More than 15 thousand people participated in this process.
2. An initial diagnostic produced by Claudia’s closest team.
3. The ongoing Diálogos por la Transformación, a public, participatory process coordinated thematically by a team of advisors (a transition team of sorts).

The dialogues’ resulting document will be presented in March and will complement both Morena’s project (abovementioned) and the programme registered before the National Electoral Institute, INE, which already indicates a boost in the energy transition, a further impulse for women, and a National Guard of proximity oriented to ending violence in the country.

Challenges are many and Claudia Sheinbaum won’t have it easy, not least before a huge popular movement in mourning with AMLO’s full retirement in October. AMLO has been an extraordinary leader and political mastermind and is impossible to substitute him. Mexico’s oligarchy will continue working hard to try to end the political project in power and lawfare is likely to intensify in the next administration, including attempts to seek US intervention. But Claudia Sheinbaum has many things in her favour, not least the demonstrated success of the Fourth Transformation, the palpable results of her government in Mexico City and, above all, her personal integrity. Undoubtedly, a key goal is to achieve a two-thirds super majority in Congress (dubbed Plan C), as this would allow constitutional reforms needed to expand, extend and deepen Mexico’s transformation.

In sum, barring an unforeseen reversal of circumstances in the country, Claudia Sheinbaum will be Mexico’s next president, taking office on October 1^st, 2024, and this will be very good news for Mexico, for Latin America and for the world.

Footnotes

[1] For those interested in knowing more about her I recommend the recent documentary Claudia, and Arturo Cano’s book Claudia Sheinbaum: Presidenta.

[2]  A political manoeuvre aimed at stopping him from being candidate to the presidency in the 2006 elections.

[3] Claudia Sheinbaum became candidate after winning an internal, transparent process through national polling against five other contestants from Morena and allied parties.

References

Cano, Arturo, 2023, Claudia Sheinbaum: Presidenta, Grijalbo, Ciudad de México.

Hackbarth, Kurt, 2023, “MORENA’s Next Chapter Will Be Written by Leftist Women”, Jacobin, 22 December 2023 https://jacobin.com/2023/12/morena-claudia-sheinbaum-clara-brugada-mexico-women-politics

Raby, David, 2024, “Mexico’s transformation advances”, Morning Star Saturday/Sunday January 27-28 2024. https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/mexicos-transformation-advances

La tierra no se vende, se ama y se defiende. La Parota, Guerrero. Image: Javier Verdin (Agua, Ríos y Pueblos)

This post focuses upon the disconnection between the urban population in Mexico (a large majority) and what happens in the non-urban territory, and reflects on the crucial role and state of journalism. However, events that have come to light in the last 7 days demand a short digression:

Just Another Week On

An on going investigation has revealed that the ‘disappearance rate’ in Mexico is currently a shocking 13 people per day. That is one every 2 hours. These people are usually considered as ‘disappeared by force,’ as reinforced last week by the UN Committee of Forced Disappearances. They are mostly marginalised women and men who predominantly belong to poor rural and indigenous communities.

To add to the tragedy 40% are aged 15 to 29, simply too young to go through such experience without life-long consequences – if they survive. The injustice doesn’t end here: confronting a reign of impunity their own relatives face high risks when choosing to do something about it.

This was the case of Norma Angélica Bruno, aged 26, who had recently joined a group of determined to find ‘the other disappeared’ in Guerrero. So far the group has discovered 48 bodies in clandestine graves across the state. In a sickly ironic turn of fate, Norma was assassinated before the eyes of her three children while walking to the funeral of a murdered colleague.

As if living in a parallel world, the Interior Minister Osorio Chong declared that Mexico has the highest levels of security in ten years and that “very important steps have been taken to give back peace and security to all Mexicans”.

National Autonomous University (UNAM), Mexico City. Image: Étienne von Bertrab

The missing link between society and nature

Despite growing awareness of the crises in Mexico, politicians, analysts, mainstream media and even organised citizens who try to reform or rebuild the State, tend to ignore an underlying issue. The country is highly urbanised and most citizens are, willingly or not, alienated from nature, or more concretely, completely dislocated from what happens ‘elsewhere’.

It turns out, however, that Mexico’s land, water and natural resources are being degraded and extracted at an alarming pace. Mexican institutional framework, created in order to join the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) in the early 1990s, has been largely irrelevant in the rhetorical pursuit of sustainable development.

Take water resources, for instance: after conducting hearings between 2006 and 2012, the Latin American Water Tribunal warned of “possible hydric collapse” and condemned the Mexican State for violation of international treaties and its own legal framework to guarantee the right to water as a fundamental human right.

Indigenous Resistance

Indigenous communities have resisted for centuries. However, as a result of a combination of constitutional reforms and trade deals, resource grabbing has increased significantly over the last two decades; and it often unfolds violently.

For instance, in the mountains of Guerrero communities have been resisting the imposition of the La Parota Dam, which would displace 25,000 and severely affect livelihoods of another 75,000. Their decade-long resistance has been relatively effective, yet at a tragic cost: repression, illegal incarceration and assassination of communal leaders.

But this region is by no means an exception. Another ethical tribunal, the Tribunal Permanente de los Pueblos (TPP), documented over the last few years 220 active socio-environmental conflicts across the country, and observed the normalisation of institutional violence towards those who resist.

TPP’s condemnation of the Mexican State, entitled “The dispossession and degradation of Mexico: Free trade and deviation of power as causes of structural violence, impunity and dirty war against Mexico’s peoples”, can be downloaded here.

For years, active community members have regular meetings where they discuss structural problems and actions. With huge efforts they form regional assemblies and have an annual national assembly. This is the case of the Asamblea Nacional de Afectados Ambientales (ANAA).

In my view, these forms of organisation are poorly supported and understood, and are essential not only in slowing down environmental degradation, but also in addressing a key factor in Mexico’s humanitarian crisis.

Mazahua people confront the dispossession of their water – pumped to Mexico City. Image: Agua, Ríos y Pueblos

The brave world of journalism

Mexico has become one of the most dangerous countries to practice journalism, particularly critical, independent journalism. According to the map Periodistas en Riesgo, a recent initiative by Freedom House and International Center for Journalists (ICFJ), 13 journalists have been killed over the last two years (the most deadly period has been May-October 2014) and four journalists are currently thought abducted.

Without brave journalists we would be incapable of understanding what happens in a country whose State machinery has dominated the art of manipulating our mainstream media. On a positive note, as noted by several political analysts, those in power have been completely unable to understand the world of the Internet – despite attempts to monitor and control. Civil society is way ahead in understanding the power and potential of social media, a space where anyone can join in solidarity.

To explore the role of street art in social movements in Mexico DPU and UCL Americas are hosting a unique conversation with artist-activists part of Oaxaca’s Colectivo Lapiztola, on Monday 23 February. Read more and register to attend.

Étienne von Bertrab is a Teaching Fellow at the DPU and a guest lecturer in universities in Mexico. He also works as a consultant in the UK and in Mexico, where he has been a social activist for ten years. Twitter: @etiennista

Just one week on

To understand the depth of the socio-political crisis in Mexico it might be illustrative to go through events that occurred since Part I was posted a week ago: a mayor in the State of Mexico authorised police to shoot those who protest against the dispossession of their communal water system; a newspaper editor in Matamoros was abducted, beaten and left with a death threat: “no more reporting on violence along the border”; and as if it was a horror film, 61 bodies were found in an abandoned crematory in the outskirts of Acapulco, a famous tourist destination in the State of Guerrero (where the disappearance of the 43 teacher training students took place four months ago).

Much to the disappointment of those in power, what happens in Mexico can no longer be kept within the country’s borders. The prestigious Hay Festival, which would take place later this year in Xalapa, was cancelled after hundreds of Mexican writers and journalists signed a petition in protest. “We recognise that the killing of Moisés Sánchez, the 15^th journalist to have been murdered or disappeared in Veracruz since 2010, has caused unbearable pain and rage” – reads the organisers’ official statement.

In Geneva – in the same week – the UN Committee of Enforced Disappearances (CED) identified ‘prominent discrepancy between words and deeds’ while for Amnesty International the hearings evidenced the failure of the Mexican State in its international responsibilities. Furthermore, The New York Times revealed over the weekend that amongst the secret buyers using shell companies to grab the most expensive real estate in New York is an ex-governor of Oaxaca and father of the current director of INFONAVIT – Mexico’s social housing agency.

Elections: opportunity or distraction?

While it is almost a consensus that the party system is rotten beyond repair, what to do during the elections is always a divisive issue: to back the least worst party or candidates, or to boycott the elections altogether? As a result of a recent political reform it will now be possible – for the first time in Mexican history – for citizens to be elected without affiliation to a political party. For many this is a double-edged sword, but there are glimpses of hope: Wikipolítica, a group of young student-activists, could give Jalisco its first independent legislator – without using any public resources but rather dozens of creative and enthusiastic volunteers.

Beyond these more localised opportunities there is an increasing recognition that our social contract has been broken: the Mexican Constitution of 1917 (often referred to as the most progressive of the early 20^th century) has been subject to almost 500 reforms, mostly to facilitate capital accumulation in detriment of rights and communal and public ownership of natural resources.

A call for the formation of a constitutional assembly with the aim of refunding the State is gaining traction, reinvigorated by the very circumstances and by the vocal support of progressive and highly respectable public figures such as bishop Raúl Vera, the last prominent priest of the Theology of Liberation in Mexico, who since the Zapatista uprising has made his cause the voices of the poor. His mission: “to listen to everyone’s feelings and aspirations, particularly those of the poor and marginalised”. However, it is undoubtedly a long-term social and democratic endeavour that no living Mexican has ever experienced. For many, including myself, it might be the only way to avoid a violent revolution.

In this emotive video, Omar García, survivor of the attack, expresses how the case of Ayotzinapa has awaken millions throughout the country.

Part III on the role of journalism and new media, and on why it’s important to focus on the (non-urban) territory and those who defend it, will be published next week.

All images are courtesy of Colectivo Lapiztola, a street art collective that emerged in the suppressed social movement in Oaxaca in 2006. Part of their work is exhibited in Rich Mix, London, until 28 February.

Étienne von Bertrab is a Teaching Fellow at the DPU and a guest lecturer in universities in Mexico. He also works as a consultant in the UK and in Mexico, where he has been a social activist for ten years. Twitter: @etiennista