Weakening of balancing institutions: Violence hollows out Mexico's checks on power

Mexico’s institutions have been under pressure from various forces. Their weakness has been both caused and enabled by extrajudicial violence, paving the way for executive overreach that has threatened the balance of power — a central feature of democracy.

Civil violence and widespread corruption have plagued Mexican democracy for decades. In many states and localities, organised drug cartels collude with officials and/or establish parallel power structures. Violence is pervasive, taking the form of gang wars, attacks on journalists, political assassinations, and extortion. This has constrained media freedom and civic participation, with the government unable to curtail cartel violence, which in turn undermines the rule of law. Federal efforts to crack down through military action or targeted arrests of “kingpins” have at best been of limited success, and at worst have exacerbated political violence and law enforcement overreach.

The cartel-built parallel structures have replaced or weakened institutions such as law enforcement and public services, and eroded political accountability and the rule of law. Cartels have become the effective government in many localities, reducing the formal institutions of democracy to facades.

This weakening of institutions also occurs at the political level. In 2018, Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO) won the presidency alongside an overwhelming congressional victory for his MORENA party. Mexico’s presidency already carries substantial constitutional powers, and from 2018 to 2024, the dominance of MORENA and its allies in Congress sharply reduced the institutional checks on AMLO’s authority.

MORENA’s control of the legislature increased again in the 2024 elections, with the capture of a two-thirds supermajority in the Chamber of Deputies. The party’s victory opened the way for constitutional amendments that have weakened the independence of the judiciary. The most significant of these were provisions for the election of judges (including to the Supreme Court) and the shortening of their terms in office. Under the new provisions, judicial candidates are to be “pre-selected” by MORENA-dominated committees representing the executive, legislative, and judicial branches, and then directly elected by popular vote. Together with other institutional changes, these amendments have increased the politicisation of the judicial system and weakened the rule of law.

In 2025, AMLO’s successor, President Claudia Scheinbaum, sought to push initiatives that would threaten the autonomy of the National Election Institute (INE) by introducing direct election of its councillors, replacing the current system of selection through detailed screening and approval by legislative supermajorities. This process would reduce the number of local electoral institutes that serve as checks on centralised control of the voting process. Scheinbaum’s agenda of electoral reform also included the elimination of congressional seats elected through proportional representation, reducing opportunities for minority representation. These measures pose threats to the hard-won electoral reforms that opened the way to Mexico’s democratic transition in the late 1990s and early 2000s.