Why Did Drug Cartels Go to War in Mexico? Subnational Party Alternation, the Breakdown of Criminal Protection, and the Onset of Large-Scale Violence

Abstract

This article explains why Mexican drug cartels went to war in the 1990s, when the federal government was not pursuing a major antidrug campaign. We argue that political alternation and the rotation of parties in state gubernatorial power undermined the informal networks of protection that had facilitated the cartels’ operations under one-party rule. Without protection, cartels created their own private militias to defend themselves from rival groups and from incoming opposition authorities. After securing their turf, they used these militias to conquer rival territory. Drawing on an original database of intercartel murders, 1995 to 2006, we show that the spread of opposition gubernatorial victories was strongly associated with intercartel violence. Based on in-depth interviews with opposition governors, we show that by simply removing top- and midlevel officials from the state attorney’s office and the judicial police—the institutions where protection was forged—incoming governors unwittingly triggered the outbreak of intercartel wars.

Indigenous Resistance to Criminal Governance: Why Regional Ethnic Autonomy Institutions Protect Communities from Narco Rule in Mexico

“…Access to informal government protection networks is key to cartels' success in controlling illicit markets. Various studies of drug trafficking in Mexico have demonstrated that members of the armed forces, state and municipal police forces, and officials of the justice system have played a crucial role in developing these networks (Snyder and Durán-Martínez 2009;Trejo and Ley 2018). In a context of extensive collusion between OCGs and state security agents, it is crucial to develop informal institutions that are autonomous from state interference and that facilitate mechanisms of internal control and external protection in order to deter the collusion of local indigenous authorities with drug lords.…”

“…For much of the 1980s and 1990s drug cultivation and trafficking in Chihuahua was under the control of the Juárez Cartel. But after the PRI (Partido Revolucionario Institucional) lost the state gubernatorial power in 1992, and the Juárez Cartel temporarily lost the informal state protection it had previously enjoyed under one-party rule (Trejo and Ley 2018), rival cartels from neighboring states, particularly the Sinaloa Cartel, seized this opportunity to contest Juárez's hegemony, leading the state into a protracted turf war. To fight this war, the Juárez Cartel created its own private militia, La Línea, and the Sinaloans subcontracted a number of local gangs and armed groups, including Artistas Asesinos, the Mexicles, Nueva Generación, and Los Salazar (Guerrero 2012).…”

Migrant transnationalism in violent democracies

“…Additionally, (un)civil society groups and citizens use violence to signal their demands to leaders, hold them accountable (Von Holdt 2014), and negotiate forcefully (Assies 2004). And, criminal as well as legitimate profit-seeking organisations use violence to secure more favourable political environments and electoral outcomes (Holland and Ríos Contreras 2017;Trejo and Ley 2018).…”

“…130 politicians, including 48 candidates for office, were murdered in Mexico between September 2017 and the July 1, 2018 elections (Nugent 2018). Many of these murders were ordered by organisations seeking to eliminate politicians who, as part of their electoral platforms, threaten to contain crime (Trejo and Ley 2018). This highlights the degree to which the actors using violence to influence elections in Mexico's new political landscape have become more plural, as well as the complex ways in which non-state criminal organisations and actors carry out violence alongside or in cooperation with legitimate institutional actors.…”

Living in Gang-Controlled Neighborhoods: Impacts on Electoral and Nonelectoral Participation in El Salvador

“…As the third wave of democracy swept through the developing world, hopes for peace and security rose. This idyllic expectation was soon met with an unprecedented wave of violence (e.g., Trejo and Ley 2018). High levels of criminal violence have positioned the Latin American region as the most violent in the world (UNODC 2013).…”