The Journalist and the Mexican “War on Drugs” between Chronicle and Fiction: Edgar Piñon Balderrama, Don Winslow, and Luis Humberto Crosthwaite

Qualitative ethnographic study of the human rights violations committed in the course of the militarized combat against drug trafficking organizations in rural Michoacán unmasks state practices of coercive inclusion. The violation of human rights and the subsequent processing of human rights claims paradoxically bind the marginalized population to the formal state and foster its subordination. The practical configuration of the current arena of human rights is not the lever for a democratic, inclusive Mexico but a curtain that conceals the repressive practices that it makes possible. In the processing of human rights complaints, the legal rights of physical integrity and private property become moral rights with no effect of legal justice. Un estudio etnográfico cualitativo sobre las violaciones a los derechos humanos cometidas durante la lucha militarizada contra las organizaciones de tráfico de drogas en el Michoacán rural sirve para desenmascarar las prácticas de inclusión coercitiva del Estado. Las violaciones y el posterior procesamiento de las denuncias paradójicamente vinculan a la población marginada con el Estado oficial, fomentando su subordinación. La configuración práctica del actual contexto de los derechos humanos no funge como la palanca de un México democrático e inclusivo, sino como una cortina que oculta las prácticas represivas que el Estado hace posibles. En la tramitación de las denuncias sobre violación de derechos humanos, los derechos legales de la integridad física y la propiedad privada se convierten en derechos morales sin ningún efecto de justicia legal.

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“Only Versace”: Knock-Offs, Ostentation, and Desire amid the Mexican War on Drugs.

Revista de Antropologia Visual ◽

10.47725/rav.029.07 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 2 (29) ◽

pp. 1-17

Author(s):

Isaac Vargas

Keyword(s):

Drug Trafficking ◽

War On Drugs ◽

Organised Crime ◽

Multiple Forms ◽

Mexican War ◽

Mass Graves ◽

Complex Landscape ◽

Underground Economies

ince the war on drugs began in 2007, Mexico has accumulated more than 250,000 murders and 70,000 disappearances. A complex landscape of criminal organisations has been shaping the violent conditions in the country, accompanied by an imaginary that projects their presence in multiple forms. We can identify a dire example with the bodies found in mass graves that are still wearing their clothes, often designer knock-offs inspired by the wardrobes of drug lords. In this scenario, I argue that an overlap exists between two underground economies: drug trafficking and counterfeit clothing. To understand this relation and its connection to criminal power, my analysis focuses on one of the basic aspects of organised crime: governance, especially its symbolic vein as well as its interpretation and dissemination through media outlets. The names of my interlocutors have been changed in order to protect their security.

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Impact of Violent Crime on Risk Aversion: Evidence from the Mexican Drug War

Review of Economics and Statistics ◽

10.1162/rest_a_00788 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 101 (5) ◽

pp. 892-904 ◽

Cited By ~ 4

Author(s):

Ryan Brown ◽

Verónica Montalva ◽

Duncan Thomas ◽

Andrea Velásquez

Keyword(s):

Risk Aversion ◽

Violent Crime ◽

Local Population ◽

War On Drugs ◽

Local Area ◽

Longitudinal Survey ◽

Mexican War ◽

Longitudinal Survey Data ◽

Mexican Drug War ◽

The Life Course

Whereas attitudes toward risk play an important role in many decisions over the life course, factors that affect those attitudes are not fully understood. Using longitudinal survey data collected in Mexico before and during the Mexican war on drugs, we investigate how risk attitudes change with variation in insecurity and uncertainty brought on by unprecedented changes in local-area violent crime. Exploiting the fact that the timing, virulence, and spatial distribution of changes in violent crime were unanticipated, we establish there is a rise in risk aversion spread across the entire local population as local-area violent crime increases.

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