By: Anna, Amar, and Will

LINKAGE INSTITUTIONS IN MEXICO

Amar HodzicPOLITICAL PARTIES

The three largest political parties in Mexico today are PRI, PAN, and PRD.

For the most of the 20 th century, Mexico was virtually a one-party state until 2000 all presidents belonged to the PRI, as well as many other government officials.

Over the past 20 years other parties have begun to gain power, and so today competitive elections are a reality in Mexico.

POLITICAL PARTIES

LATEST GENERAL ELECTION (2012)-PARTY DISTRIBUTION

• PRI currently has the greatest number of members in both the Chamber of Deputies and Senate

• The 2012 presidential election winner is a member of the PRI Party

In power continuously from 1920 to 2000

Founded as a coalition of elites who agreed to work out their conflicts through compromise

By forming a political party that encompassed all political elites, they could agree to trade favors and pass power around from one “cacique” to another.

PRI SPECIFIC (PARTIDO REVOLUCIONARIO INSTITUCIONAL)

Corporatist Structure-Interest groups were woven into the structure of the party.

The party has ultimate authority, but voices are “heard” by bringing interest groups under the party. This structure is NOT democratic, but allowed input into the government from party-selected groups whose leaders often held cabinet positions when Mexico was a one party state.

-More recently, peasant and labor organizations have been represented in the party and hold positions of responsibi l ity, but these groups are careful ly selected.

Patron-Client System -The party traditionally gets its support from rural areas

where the patron-client system is sti l l in control. As long as Mexico remained rural based, PRI had a solid, thorough organization that managed to gather overwhelming support.

Supported primarily by: small town/rural, less educated, older, and poorer cit izens

PRI CHARACTERIZATION

Founded in 1939 making it the oldest opposition party in Mexico

Created to represent business interests opposed to centralization and anti-clericism (PRI’s practice of keeping church out of politics).

Began winning elections in the north in 1990s.

PAN SPECIFIC (THE NATIONAL ACTION PARTY)

Regional autonomy Less government intervention

in the economy Clean/Fair elections Good rapport with the Catholic

Church Support for private and

religious education PAN is considered to be PRI’s

opposit ion to the right PAN’s candidates have won

presidency in 2000 and 2006, and in the midterm elections it had more deputies and senators in the legislature than any other party

Supported primarily by: northern, middle-class professionals, urban, better educated, and religious

PAN PLATFORMS/CHARACTERISTICS

PRI’s opposition on the leftGained influence in 1988, where presidential

candidate Cardenas won 31.1% of the official vote and the PRD captured 139 sears in the Chamber of Deputies

Has trouble defining a left of center alternative to the market-centered policies set by PRI

Appeals to younger, politically active, middle class, and small town/urban voters

PRD SPECIFIC (THE DEMOCRATIC REVOLUTIONARY PARTY)

Party has weakened since 1988Their leaders have been divided on issues and have

sometimes publically quarrelledParty criticized for poor organization with beliefs and

leaders Significant gains in the legislative elections of 2006,

but the disarray since has caused the party to lose more than half of its seats in the lower house in 2009

PRD TROUBLES

Will Wagner

ELECTORAL SYSTEM AND RECENT

ELECTIONS

• President: The president is elected by the “first past the post system” with no run off election required. The president may serve one six year term and must be a natural born citizen, over 35 years old, and must have been a resident of Mexico for at least 20 years.

• Congress: Also called the Congress of the Union. A dual election system in which they are elected through “first past the post” and proportional representation. A recent reform in 1986 allowed more proportional representation within congress. Members serve three year terms with no reelection.

The President and Congress

• Mexico’s upper house is the Senate.• Mexico has 31 states and elects three senators from each

state.• Two are elected by majority vote while the third is

determined by which party receives the second highest number of votes.

• Thirty-two Senate seats are also determined nationally by a system of proportional representation that divides the seats according to the number of votes cast for each party.

• Serve 6 year terms that cannot be reelected.

The Upper House

• The lower house is referred to as the Chamber of Deputies.• 300 of the seats within the Chamber of Deputies are

determined by plurality within single-member districts.• 200 other seats are elected through proportional

representation.• Serve three year terms that cannot be reelected.

The Lower House

• Considered to be the most controversial election in Mexican history.• Was mainly between PAN candidate Felipe Calderon and PRD

candidate Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador.• The official votes claimed Calderon had won by 230,000 votes, only

about a half of a percent point difference between himself and Obrador.

• Obrador claimed the votes were not correctly counted and demanded a recount before leaving office. The election tribunal investigated the allegations.

• The election was held in balance for over two months as votes were recounted, yet only about 9% of the precincts had recounted votes.

• After months of rallies and protests by Obrador supporters, the tribunal council announced that the recount had not changed the outcome of the election and that Calderon had won.

The Election of 2006 Controversy

• During the election of 2012 between Enrique Pena supporting the the PRI and Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador supporting PRD, Obrador once again claimed that he had lost due to fraud.

• This time the fraud was more clearly shown as Pena’s PRI party gave out pesos to citizens in return for their ballots which prevented them from casting their votes.

• This occurred in mainly poorer and more rural regions of the country.

• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=as46S1D8V4Q

Corruption in Elections

Anna Honnold

LINKAGE INSTITUTIONS AND

MEDIA

Responds pragmatically to demands of interest groups through accommodation and co-optation

The result has been few serious conflicts, but when they have occurred, solutions are found

Because of this, Mexico’s development of separate civil society has been slow

CORPORATIST STRUCTURE

There is state corporatism in Mexico; it has allowed the business elites to become wealthy

Listen and respond to demands: wage levels for unionized workers grew fairly consistently between 1940 and 1982

The power of union bosses is declining since unions are weaker and union members are more independent

With PAN in control, business interests may exhibit more characteristics of neo-corporatism

POWER OF INTEREST GROUPS

Peasant organizations encouraged by PRI

Ejido system: grants land from the Mexican government to the organizations themselves

Groups are demanding more independence

Have joined with other groups to promote better education, health services, and environmental protections

RURAL ORGANIZATIONS

• These groups have strengthened and become more independent

• They have transformed the political culture and increased the depth of civil society.

URBAN GROUPS

When PRI was in control, the media had little power to criticize the government or to influence public opinion

Government rewarded media that supported them with special favors

Subsidized salaries of those who strongly supported the PRI

Mostly revenue came from government-placed advertisements – couldn’t afford to openly criticize the government

THE MEDIA

Became more independent in 1980’s as PRI lost powerNow there is access to international media (CNN and

BBC)News magazines now offer opinions of government

initiativesFreedom of the press during the Fox administration:

publicized “Toallagate” which was a scandal involving overpriced towels

“Comes y te vas” (eat and leave)- criticized President Fox for these instructions to Fidel Castro

Now have access to a much broader range of political opinions

MEDIA INDEPENDENCE

The End