Rule of Law in Mexico
Here's a third installment of a series about the rule of law.Fred Rosen wrote on Monday in The Herald (Mexico) about the lack of rule of law in Mexico. If you read the complete article, you'll find examples to support his contentions.
In this case, the absence of rule of law has less to do with judicial power (as in the Chinese and Nigerian examples described earlier) and more to do with effective legal and administrative authority -- another important aspect of this topic.
Citizenship in Occupied Territory
"As Felipe Calderón continues to send troops and federal police to combat narco-traffickers in the states of Michoacán and Baja California, we are reminded that there are large swaths of Mexico that exist essentially as 'occupied territory,' under the de-facto control of criminal organizations...
"Citizens of Michoacán, that is, have greatly reduced recourse to the rule of law and to any sort of transparent social compact...
"Massive police corruption is another problem for democratic rule...
"As Mexico’s democratic activists... continue their struggles to develop a meaningful set of democratic institutions and a genuine sense of citizenship in the country, the question of 'occupied territory' raises some crucial questions about democracy and citizenship.
"Principally, the question is whether we can meaningfully speak of the 'rule of the people' or of any defined set of citizens’ rights and responsibilities in a country in which the state itself is constrained from ruling over its own territory.
"It has typically been the nation-state that mediates the relations among citizens (individuals with a certain set of rights and responsibilities within a defined territory), and relations between those citizens their rulers, democratic or otherwise, within a defined territory.
"When that defined territory is occupied by outside forces, what happens to the rights and responsibilities of citizenship? What happens to democracy? Can citizenship of any sort exist within an occupied territory?...
"Powerful international financial institutions like the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank likewise have a strong say on the limits to which a government can go to expand rights and provide services to its citizens.
"These are all forms (some less malign than others) of 'occupied territory,' i.e. displacing the role and power of the state, democratic or otherwise...
"When the power of that state is occupied, abolished or diminished by outside forces, whether those forces are malign drug dealers, self-interested investors or well-intentioned technocrats, democracy, citizenship and (therefore) general well being are at risk..."
See also: The index for this blog at the CompGovPol del.icio.us page, click on the "RuleOfLaw" tag to see more articles about this topic.
posted by Ken Wedding @ 8:20 AM
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