Mexico is set to elect its first female president today, possibly a climate scientist and former mayor of Mexico City Claudia Shinbaum Pardo.
But as incumbent President Andrés Manuel López Obrador has promised, he has failed to distinguish himself significantly from popular leaders, especially in regions where AMLO, dubbed the current president, has failed to deliver on Mexico’s astronomical murder rate, crime — including drug trafficking, and Because of government corruption. The question now is how much progress Scheinbaum will be able to make This concern While working in the shadow of his mentor.
Scheinbaum’s early career was as an environmental engineer and climate scientist; He was part of a back to back Nobel Prize winning team Report for the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change In 2007. He began his political career in the early 2000s as mayor of Mexico City as AMLO’s environment minister and later served as mayor of the capital himself. But during AMLO’s tenure, he has been overshadowed by his mentor on policy, particularly with the current administration’s investment in fossil fuels at odds with the urgent need to shift to renewable energy — and draining the administration’s coffers.
Scheinbaum beat her nearest challenger, businessman and former senator Xóchitl Gálvez, by about 20 points, ahead of Sunday’s election. Gálvez is backed by a three-party coalition that includes El Partido Revolucionario Institutional (PRI) and El Partido Accion Nacional (PAN), which controlled Mexico for seven decades before AMLO was elected in 2018.
If the vote goes through, Sheinbaum will have plenty to deal with once in office. He sometimes promised a follow-up A more market-friendly approach than AMLOand to carry his principles to others.”second floor” The question will be: Time to ride on AMLO’s popularity and prospects Juggling his ongoing influenceHow will he lead Mexico and when he, not his mentor, becomes president?
Shinbaum campaigned on AMLO’s popularity
Shinbaum is not the first hand-picked successor in Mexican politics; Joy Kathryn Langston, a political science professor at the College of Mexico’s Center for International Studies, told Vox that it’s a common trait for presidents at the national level who serve one term.
Mexico’s economy is performing well by some metrics, and AMLO has expanded the welfare state, which has helped Sheinbaum and the Morena party he represents — also curbing his ability or desire to step out of AMLO’s shadow, at least on the campaign trail.
Juan David Rojas writes in the Journal, AMLO’s policies have focused significantly on the economy American Affairs In 2022. Investment in domestic oil production, government spending cuts and a crackdown on petrochemical theft have helped boost foreign investment. In the form of national bonds. The peso is at a 20-year high, the best-performing major currency so far this year According to Bloombergdue to High interest ratesExtremely high remittances from the US, and the possibility that companies may build factories in Mexico to be closer to their US consumer base.
None of that is likely to change much under Shinbaum. “It’s a foregone conclusion that Shinbaum will be a continuation of the status quo,” said Christian Lawrence, a strategist at Rabobank. told Bloomberg in March.
Although it is important on the world stage, AMLO’s social welfare policies have a more direct impact on the daily lives of Mexicans.
Social welfare spending tripled in AMLO’s first five years in office, reached $24 billion last year. This increased his popularity among the working class, especially when combined with his hostility toward Mexico’s political and corporate classes. Shinbaum Especially the high vote Among voters who receive welfare benefits or have family members, they beat Galvez by nearly 40 points. April vote Found in the newspaper El Financiero.
The implications of social welfare spending are significant, at least politically speaking. Not as though The past is as far-reaching as welfare programsThe Pensions for the elderly in Mexico The population — indigenous people over 65 and non-indigenous people over 68 — is hugely popular, even winning over people in states like Oaxaca, long the domain of the PRI. AMLO raised the minimum wage and proposed a Universal Pension Programwhich will be the first in the world to pay equal to their full salary upon retirement.
AMLO also increased infrastructure spending, including a new airport in Oaxaca, a state-run airline, a tourist train Illusory tendenciesand many other civilians and Military infrastructure projects. In some ways, this has been a boon, providing better jobs, especially for people in Mexico’s poorer southern states. But there are also complaints that the projects are rushed, incomplete, over-budget, environmentally destructive, and overuse of military and security resources. That prevents them from fighting violent crime. his policy Pouring money into PEMEXMexico’s state-run petroleum agency, may be a large debt burden for Sheinbaum to deal with.
Still, many aspects of the spending push have been politically popular — so much so that if Mexico’s constitution allows him to run again, AMLO will likely win. Sheinbaum would be the next best thing, many voters seem to have decided. but Populist charisma without AMLO’s signatureHe needs to focus on delivering real results, especially in areas like crime and corruption where AMLO has failed.
“Whether [Sheinbaum] It’s impossible to say for sure what will change,” Langston said. “You can only base your predictions or my predictions on what he’s said publicly, which is that he won’t radically change the major money-grubbing budget-busting policies of the past six years.” But ultimately, it will hamper the state’s ability to continue AMLO’s calling card social welfare spending.
Scheinbaum may have to introduce some unpopular policies, such as raising taxes, to keep those popular programs afloat.
But Shinbaum faces much bigger obstacles
Sheinbaum – or whoever wins today – will face major challenges once he takes office, including environmental problems exacerbated by climate change, high homicide rates and, ultimately, the economic burden of AMLO’s welfare spending.
And some of these challenges will be difficult to address from a policy perspective, thanks to his predecessor. “[AMLO] He set the political agenda for the next two years even before he left office,” Langston said. “He did this roughly between January and March, putting in place all these incredibly complex policies and reforms, Many of which can damage democracyputting them under a new legislative bill.” That fact, combined with the possibility that Morena won’t win a majority in Congress after today’s election, could also make it harder for Sheinbaum to enact his own policy priorities.
Mexico is the second largest emitter of greenhouse gases in Latin America and the Caribbean and is vulnerable to extreme weather events. coastal flooding, which affects the coastal tourism industry. The overall tourism industry accounted for 8 percent of Mexico’s GDP before the Covid-19 pandemic, and about 6 percent of the labor force was employed in the tourism industry, Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development.
A primary question outside observers have about Shinbaum is whether he will pursue his scientific training in climate change policy. He remained fairly silent on the matter throughout the campaign, and His record on climate change policy As mayor of Mexico City is somewhat mixed. During his reign, the capital city’s buses went electric and he started work on the world’s largest urban solar panel factory. But he also rushed construction of a highway bridge through Mexico City’s protected wetlands before the environmental impact report was finished.
As president, Sheinbaum has pledged to invest in other green energy initiatives and Electrification of bus services across the country. And supporters say science will lead his climate change initiatives — not his mentor’s construction projects or petrochemical development.
As the Associated Press reports, the cartel crisis has continued under AMLO and in some ways intensified Megan Janetsky told Vox’s Sean Rameswaram.
“Under AMLO, cartels and other criminal groups have expanded in power,” Janetsky said. “Donations have expanded. These groups have become more complex where they are often compared to giant illegal companies that are constantly ahead of the authorities in this cat-and-mouse game, as they are at war with each other.”
Although AMLO ended Mexico’s drug war, which began under former President Felipe Calderon and Arguably enhanced Violence linked to cartels, His “hugs, not bullets” policy (to target systemic factors that fueled violence) did not result in a significant drop in homicide rates; Mexico is still watching About 30,000 crime-related deaths occur each year. An average of one journalist is killed every week, and in the troubled southern state of Chiapas, 14 political candidates killed by cartels This election season.
Sheinbaum said he would Coordinate closely with the United States to reduce drug trafficking, human trafficking, arms flow, and money laundering. But there is a lack of clarity on how he plans to stem the rampant violence, which includes enforced disappearances and extortion. Like AMLO, he has promised to tackle systemic problems like poverty and lack of education and job opportunities that make criminal enterprises attractive. “We are going to rescue the youth from the clutches of criminal gangs, and we are going to support them,” he said in a May 19 debate. He also promised to strengthen the National Guard, giving it more officers and surveillance powers. But it could also increase the militarization of policing and the fight against crime, a significant human rights concern.
For Shinbaum, actually running the country will be much more difficult than winning the election, as AMLO leaves behind a complicated governance legacy. And without AMLO’s personal appeal, he would probably have to pay — and sacrifice — in ways he couldn’t or wouldn’t.
