Mexican Drug Cartels: Threat, Causes, and Policy Solutions

Introduction

Today, Mexico shares one of the world's longest borders with the United States and is one of its largest trading partners (Mexico economy, 2020). Despite some political disagreements over immigration policy, the United States and Mexico have enjoyed a strong relationship over the years, and current indications suggest that this relationship will remain in place well into the foreseeable future. Notwithstanding these trends, however, there are still major challenges facing both countries in the form of violent narco-trafficking organizations known as Mexican drug cartels, which continue to generate billions of dollars in criminal proceeds while simultaneously exacting an enormous toll in human lives.

The purpose of this paper is to provide a systematic review of the relevant literature concerning Mexican drug cartels in order to identify the extent of the problem, its primary antecedent causes, and what steps have been taken in recent years to combat these violent international drug organizations. Finally, in recognition that past efforts have largely been ineffective in stopping Mexican drug cartels, an analysis of potential solutions is followed by a summary of the research and key findings in the paper's conclusion.

Background and Overview of Mexican Drug Cartels

In many ways, criminal elements in Mexico are well situated to take advantage of the market represented by the 300 million citizens of the United States. According to the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), "No other country in the world has a greater impact on the drug situation in the United States than does Mexico: the result of a shared border, Mexico's strategic location between drug-producing and consuming countries, and a long history of criminal enterprises that specialize in cross-border smuggling" (Hoover, 2019, p. 2).

Although precise figures are unavailable, some authorities have estimated that Mexican drug cartels have already claimed the lives of more than 60,000 people in Mexico, one of America's most important trading and strategic partners. To place this alarming figure in context, this estimate indicates that approximately one person dies every hour due to Mexican drug cartel-related violence (Rizer, 2015). Even more troubling, other observers suggest that these estimates are far too low and fail to account for deaths that go unreported each year, meaning that the actual figures may be twice as high or even greater (Rizer, 2015). Moreover, even the most disturbing estimates do not account for the tens of thousands of American lives lost to the illicit drug use fueled by Mexican drug cartels each year (Rizer, 2015).

Some indication of the severity of the illicit drug problems caused by Mexican drug cartels can be discerned from a study by Mega (2019), which found that "across Mexico, drug-related violence has been on the rise for more than 12 years. The country documented 33,341 homicides last year — a record — [and] much of the surge was driven by a rise in increasingly violent drug gangs" (p. 37). Beyond these human costs, Mexican drug cartels are also responsible for an increase in human trafficking across the U.S. border and beyond. There is a growing body of evidence indicating that Mexican drug cartels have forged expansive networks throughout South and Central America that channel thousands of unaccompanied minors across the U.S. border each year, destined primarily for southwestern states (Rizer, 2015).

Taken together, it is clear that Mexican drug cartels represent a significant threat to the well-being of American citizens. The enormous sums of money generated by these criminal organizations make meaningful law enforcement especially difficult, since bribery and corruption are thought to be rampant in the regions where these gangs operate. During a hearing in June 2020, Senator David Perdue advised the Senate International Narcotics Control Caucus that Mexican drug cartels were generating more than half a trillion dollars each year — a sum that makes these organizations more lucrative than Walmart, but without the concomitant tax burden (Rizzo, 2019).

The types of illicit drugs manufactured and distributed by Mexican drug cartels are also far more dangerous than the marijuana that was their primary focus in years past. Today, Mexican drug cartels deal primarily in life-threatening substances such as methamphetamines and cocaine, but there are also indications that these organizations are responsible for fueling the rapid increase in opioid addictions and overdose deaths from the powerful drug fentanyl and similar opioid compounds (Dhillon, 2020).

The DEA does not discount the adverse effects of cannabis smuggling, but the agency acknowledges that times are changing as growing numbers of states legalize marijuana in some capacity, which may account for the shift in focus toward more powerful and potentially deadly drugs that are easier and faster to produce and smuggle across the U.S. border. As the DEA head notes, "Mexico is an opium poppy-cultivating/heroin-producing country and nearly all of the heroin produced in Mexico is destined for the U.S." (Hoover, 2019, p. 2).

In sum, Mexican drug cartels have historically been a formidable force, and recent trends suggest that these problems will continue to intensify well into the foreseeable future as the United States grapples with the psychological toll of combined existential crises and rising illicit drug use. Despite the escalating death toll, there have been significant constraints to implementing effective interventions that partner the United States with the Mexican government, as discussed below.

U.S. and Mexican Cartel Intervention Efforts

To its credit, the Mexican government has long recognized the threat represented by the cartels operating within its borders and has implemented a number of countermeasures in response. A study by Chi and Hayatdavoudi (2014) with the U.S. Department of Justice notes that "Mexico's previous policies for addressing the violence focused on military assaults on all violent drug trafficking organizations, reduction of illegal drug flows, and decapitation of top trafficking kingpins" (p. 4). Under previous administrations, the U.S. and Mexican national governments cooperated closely in implementing targeted interventions against Mexican cartels with mixed results, while the Mexican government also remained committed to deploying its own security forces.

The ambitious five-year plan launched in 2014 by then-Mexican President Calderón was intended to "weaken the financial and operational capacities of criminal gangs through seizures of drugs, money, and weapons" (as cited in Chi & Hayatdavoudi, 2014, p. 4). President Calderón invested approximately $2.5 billion in new security forces in 2007, $4 billion in 2008, and $9.2 billion in 2010. By the end of 2011, the Mexican government had dispatched almost 50,000 security forces with the mission to stop the cartels' illicit trade — a figure representing a tenfold increase over the number deployed in 2008 (Chi & Hayatdavoudi, 2014).

More recently, the international effort to combat the illicit trade in drugs, weapons, and humans by Mexican cartels has been stymied due in large part to tensions between the leaders of Mexico and the United States over the best approach going forward. In late 2019, Mexican President López Obrador rejected an offer from the U.S. government to increase the military response to Mexican cartels, stating that a negotiated settlement would be in everyone's better interests. According to a BBC News report, the Mexican president "opted for a non-confrontational approach to the cartels, instead making tackling inequality central to his efforts under a policy dubbed 'abrazos, no balazos' — hugs not bullets" (Mexico rejects U.S. intervention, 2019, para. 3).

The Mexican government has also strongly rejected the U.S. proposal to designate Mexican cartels as terrorist organizations, fearing that the step would exacerbate the problem and create a situation in which Americans would be perceived by Mexican citizens as an invading military force. According to Ward (2019), "It's a terrible idea in part because it will reduce Mexican cooperation as many in Mexico fear it's a first step toward some kind of military intervention, which Trump keeps mentioning when he talks to Mexican presidents" (para. 3). Shortly after this failed attempt to forge a military-based intervention with Mexico, the United States began experiencing its first cases of COVID-19, and the issue of Mexican cartels received considerably less attention despite the continuing severity of the threat.

Conclusion

Over the past decade, a massive rise in Mexican drug cartel activity has been witnessed. During this period, many of Mexico's most prominent and productive urban regions came to be counted among the most dangerous cities worldwide. These areas became home to many of the over 600,000 drug-trafficking-related fatalities recorded during this era (Seguridad, 2013). This climate of violence has expanded to include public displays of brutality, kidnapping, robbery, and extortion.

Moreover, the victims increasingly include government officials, military personnel, law enforcement officers, journalists, and ordinary citizens. Currently, U.S. enforcement efforts focus primarily on minimizing drug flows through and from Mexico, while violence reduction has been treated as a secondary concern — at best a potential side benefit of drug-flow minimization policies (Langton, 2011). Mexican authorities, meanwhile, have directed their efforts at the upper leadership of major organized crime groups in "decapitation" campaigns intended to reduce drug flows and address public safety threats. The violence associated with these efforts has generated significant public demand — particularly in Mexico — for approaches that will more effectively reduce violence.

Former Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto stated that his administration would shift the focus away from drug flows and toward violence minimization and crime prevention. Given that both the Obama and Bush administrations acknowledged that U.S. demand for illicit drugs is a primary driver of the Mexican drug trade, a strategic opportunity exists for redirecting efforts toward violence prevention alongside drug trafficking interdiction (Langton, 2011). The research reviewed here suggests that a targeted enforcement strategy holds genuine promise for addressing security concerns and minimizing violence in Mexico. By utilizing existing enforcement and administrative infrastructures, the United States could reallocate current resources to focus distinctively on the most violent drug-trafficking organizations in Mexico.

While targeted enforcement is consistent with drug-flow minimization goals, it simultaneously directs U.S. enforcement resources toward reducing Mexican violence. As a deterrence-based approach, it requires authorities in all jurisdictions to publicly identify targets and communicate clearly that violence will not be tolerated as a business practice. The violence-focused policy alternatives outlined here take into account current budgetary constraints at the local, state, and federal levels. Other criteria by which these alternatives can be assessed include community impacts, political and implementation feasibility, intelligence demands, and crime reduction effectiveness. It is evident that adopting targeted enforcement within available frameworks is not only feasible but holds considerable potential for reducing cartel-related violence in Mexico.

To summarize, adopting a targeted violence-minimization approach need not conflict with existing U.S. efforts to minimize drug flows, and there need be no corresponding increase in drug abuse in the United States. While a short-term uptick in violence is possible, targeting the revenue streams of violent drug-trafficking organizations should incentivize them away from using violence to advance their agendas. Law enforcement authorities would need to understand the revenue portfolios of violent drug-trafficking organizations in order to assess how effectively they can attack those revenues and measure the cost-effectiveness of the approach.

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