Mexicans have seen governments of different partisan colors pass in the last 18 years that have not been able to significantly solve what they consider to be the country’s main problem: insecurity.
Starting in 2007, a large increase in deaths as a result of violence began to be recorded: so far there have been more than 450,000 deaths, an alarming figure that had not been reached since the civil war of the Mexican Revolution.
Throughout this period, Mexico City, the capital, went from having problems associated with common crime, such as assaults or robberies, to also suffering the scourge of criminal gangs associated with drug trafficking, which is the main factor that has contributed to the hundreds of thousands of violent deaths across the country.
During the government of Mayor Claudia Sheinbaum (2018-2023), a notable decrease in the number of intentional homicides began to be recorded, which is considered the most serious crime. Other “high impact” crimes also showed a decrease due to their prevalence.
Sheinbaum, now the country’s elected president, assured that this reduction is the result of her comprehensive security strategy and promised to implement it throughout the country if she won the presidential election.
In addition to several specific proposals, Sheinbaum has proposed four pillars of his Mexico City security strategy to sustain the slight downward trend in intentional homicides that has been seen in the last three years at the national level:
- supporting young people to avoid becoming involved in crime;
- improve police working conditions. their training and evaluation;
- implement intelligence strategies focused on high-impact crimes and specific regions
- establish effective coordination between the police and the prosecutor’s office.
For security analysts, however, it is doubtful that a strategy designed for the particularities of Mexico City, with its resources and local crime, can work in a country where large paramilitary organizations have the capacity to control – and fight – large territories.
“The complexity of the national territory is enormous. And if we talk about criminal paramilitarism, we are talking about another world,” Guadalupe Correa, an expert in security analysis at George Mason University (USA), tells BBC Mundo.
Céline González, senior analyst at the public policy analysis center México Evalúa, points out that “Mexico City is an atypical case and has levels of resources that do not exist in the rest of the country,” so such a strategy would not be enough to achieve significant change at the national level, he believes.
Sheinbaum’s results
Sheinbaum headed the Mexico City government from December 2018 until June 2023, when he retired from the position to campaign for the presidency.
As a candidate, she assured that intentional homicides in the capital were reduced by 51% thanks to the strategy implemented together with her Secretary of Citizen Security, Omar García Harfuch, as well as the coordination with the Attorney General, Ernestina Godoy.
In that period, official records available from two sources (SESNSP, Executive Secretariat of the National Public Security System, and Inegi, National Institute of Statistics and Geography) show that the Mexican capital saw a decrease in intentional homicides starting in 2019.
However, the reduction would be less than that promoted by Sheinbaum, who in some of his campaign documents detailed that he was referring to the average number of intentional homicides per day, not to the total number of violent deaths that occurred during his government.
If the SESNSP figures are compared between 2019 and 2023, the reduction was 44%. The Inegi data show a similar decrease (42%), but between 2019 and 2022, which is its last data available with a full year.
González, who carried out a detailed analysis of the figures in a study by México Evalúa, points out that, in effect, “a decrease in intentional homicides is observed in Mexico City.”
But a striking point is that since before the Sheinbaum government there was an increase in the registration of “deaths of undetermined intent.”
And the city had records of up to 37% of these types of deaths – which include suicides, accidents and homicides – where the authority did not establish the intention of those deaths, which can influence the homicide figures, whether intentional (intentional), negligent (unintentional) or other type.
Sheinbaum’s opponents have pointed out that this could be part of a manipulation of numbers. But González affirms that a makeup of these numbers is something very difficult to do because it would require the involvement of many authorities, of various institutions, in various powers.
With their team they also detected that this type of deaths in the records was reduced. “If we compare the period of Miguel Ángel Mancera [2012-2018] and Sheinbaum, it seems that during Sheinbaum’s period these deaths due to undetermined intention decreased. And this seems to be consistent with the decrease in intentional homicides,” explains the expert.
Other “high impact” crimes also showed a decrease, although not in the overall figure of 58% that Sheinbaum advertised in his campaign. Robberies and assaults, for example, decreased by 31% from 2019 to 2023. Extortion decreased by 42% in the same period.
However, femicides throughout his government period increased 17%, which contrasts with the claims of the presidential campaign that claimed that they had been reduced 42%, but only taking the 2021-2023 period.
What is the strategy?
The plan, the then candidate assured, is based on “4 pillars”: the attention of young people, the improvement of the police, intelligence work and the coordination of authorities.
One of the most radical changes compared to other governments was providing the Mexico City police with investigative capacity. Unlike the model that predominates in the rest of the country, of preventive police, in the Mexican capital police officers can now do work similar to that of “detective.”
In addition, crime victims in the capital now do not need to file a complaint first for the prosecutor’s office to determine whether the police can collect elements to pursue criminals. This had made justice very slow in the past.
“Before, the police had to coincide with the criminal in time, place and time, in flagrante delicto, to arrest him… We went from being a reactive police force to one that also prevented crimes through investigation,” said García Harfuch, Secretary of Security. Ciudadana, in a presentation of the strategy in August 2023.
The former official – today a senator-elect – also pointed out that eliminating barriers to jurisdiction over federal and local crimes allowed them to be more effective. “Here in the city, it didn’t matter if it was a federal or local crime, the instruction was: ‘Solve it.’”
“At the end of the day, people don’t care if it’s a federal or local crime, they just want it solved.”
In intelligence work, Sheinbaum and his team also highlight that Mexico City went from having 15,000 video surveillance cameras to almost 75,000, which allows its control center to offer a prompt response to complaints.
Added to this is a 54% salary increase for police officers and greater training.
And as a strategy to address the causes of violence, Sheinbaum highlights the creation of high schools, universities, sports and cultural spaces, as well as scholarship programs that offer direct money transfers to young people.
“This is the approach to security that will deliver results across Mexico: one that emphasizes peacebuilding, addresses the root causes of violence, social neglect and vulnerability, and eradicates impunity.”
“This is a total change with respect to the scourge of the failed ‘war’ against drug trafficking declared by the federal government in 2006,” said Sheinbaum in the campaign, who defends the security strategy of the current president and political ally, Andrés Manuel López Obrador. .
Can it work nationwide?
In his national security proposal, Sheinbaum says that social programs will continue to prevent young people – who represent the majority of those killed by intentional homicides – from reaching the ranks of criminal gangs.
He also wants to strengthen the National Guard so that it also has tools similar to those of the Mexico City police, but under military command, although the latter has been criticized during the current López Obrador government.
In addition, it would create the National Intelligence System to provide prosecutors and security forces with anti-crime information. And it would strengthen the coordination of the different justice administration institutions.
Although the analysts consulted consider that there are successes in the strategy designed and implemented for Mexico City during the Sheinbaum government, they warn that it is doubtful that a similar model can be applied in the rest of the country and obtain the same results.
Regarding actions for young people, Correa and González warn that it has not yet been proven that they have an effect on public safety. These require an application of a medium period of time to verify their effectiveness.
And the transfers of resources are much lower than the offer with which the gangs recruit their members.
On the other hand, Correa particularly highlights the “focused attention to crimes, that is, focusing on certain crimes, in certain areas, which seems to have given important results.”
“But unlike other parts of the Republic, Mexico City has always had a different behavior of organized crime, more segmented, and with other crimes.”
“We are not talking about drug trafficking, paramilitary groups, or criminal gangs that come into conflict over a dispute over a region,” explains Correa.
For his part, González notes that in Mexico City there are up to 3.9 police officers per 1,000 inhabitants, while in the rest of the country the rate is only 0.9. “I find it very difficult to transfer the Mexico City model to other states,” he says.
And he considers it very worrying that the National Guard has a military command, as has happened under the López Obrador government.
“There we do have evidence that, with greater militarization, a lot of violence is generated. The confrontation between armed forces and organized crime increased this violence. Very little has been able to resolve this militarization of the country, very little,” he warns.
Meanwhile, the country is approaching the closure of a government with a slightly downward trend in intentional homicides, but an unprecedented accumulation of victims (more than 170,000 at the end of 2023), so security will once again be the great challenge for the president-elect.
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