Violence increases throughout Mexico as illegals pour across U.S. border - 25-Aug-05 - Generational Dynamics

Generational Dynamics Web Log for 25-Aug-05

Violence increases throughout Mexico as illegals pour across U.S. border

It's been 85 years since the end of the Mexican Revolution, and from the point of view of Generational Dynamics, a new Mexican Revolution is overdue. There are signs that it's building now:

The rate of illegal immigrants being caught is almost five times as great as it was in 2000. (This increase is partially explained by an increase in the number of Border Patrol agents.)

Some 40% of the population is below the poverty line.
One in eight adults born in Mexico now lives in the US, and they remit $16 billion back to their relatives in Mexico. According to surveys conducted by the Pew Hispanic Center

"Meanwhile, separate PHC surveys conducted in Mexico show that about four of every ten adults in the Mexican population say they would migrate to the United States if they had the means and opportunity and that two of every ten are inclined to live and work here without legal authorization. The willingness to migrate, even illegally, is evident in all sectors of Mexican society including the middle class and the well-educated as well as those who are poor and who only completed low-levels of schooling."

Drug lords are taking greater and greater control of Mexico, running a $142 billion a year business in cocaine, heroin, marijuana, and other drugs. Drug war violence along the US border can no longer be controlled by the Mexican police or armed forces. 228 killings, including 21 police officers and 2 police chiefs, have occurred so far this year around the city of Nuevo Laredo, across the Rio Grande from Laredo, Texas.

Violence is also increasing in the southern state of Chiapas, thanks to paramilitaries of a rebel group claiming to represent the indigenous peasants of Chiapas. The group is the Zapatista Army of National Liberation, named after Emiliano Zapata, who, along with Pancho Villa, led the rebel insurgent army in the Mexican Revolution civil war of the 1910s.

All of these are trends that point to a problem that is getting worse with time, with every expectation that those trends will continue.

From the point of view of Generational Dynamics, Mexico is well into a generational crisis period. Mexico's last crisis war was the Mexican Revolution of 1910-20. Historically, 87% of all crisis wars begin less than 85 years after the previous crisis war, and so Mexico is more than ready for a new crisis war, quite possibly led by the Zapatistas.

Whatever happens, the US is certain to be involved, because of the number of Mexican immigrants in America, especially in California. Some 10 million of California's 35 million people -- almost 1/3 -- are Mexican immigrants, 70% of them illegal. Mexicans in California make far less than native Californians, and use far more in public services, including welfare programs. This is precisely the kind of racial division that precipitates a civil war, and it seems likely that the new Mexican civil war will extend into America's southwest. (25-Aug-05) Permanent Link
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Generational Dynamics Web Log for 25-Aug-05 Violence increases throughout Mexico as illegals pour across U.S. border

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Generational Dynamics Web Log for 25-Aug-05
Violence increases throughout Mexico as illegals pour across U.S. border