The 2012 Elections in Mexico: The Birth of a Consolidated Federal Democracy?

This art icle was downloaded by: [ Cent ro Est udios Polit icos Y] , [ Helder do Vale] On: 04 Decem ber 2013, At : 06: 49 Publisher: Rout ledge I nform a Lt d Regist ered in England and Wales Regist ered Num ber: 1072954 Regist ered office: Mort im er House, 37- 41 Mort im er St reet , London W1T 3JH, UK Regional & Federal Studies Publicat ion det ails, including inst ruct ions f or aut hors and subscript ion inf ormat ion: ht t p: / / www. t andf online. com/ loi/ f rf s20 The 2012 Elections in Mexico: The Birth of a Consolidated Federal Democracy? a a Helder do Vale & Isabel Wences a Cent er f or Polit ical and Const it ut ional St udies (CEPC), Madrid, 28013 Spain Published online: 25 Nov 2013. To cite this article: Helder do Vale & Isabel Wences , Regional & Federal St udies (2013): The 2012 Elect ions in Mexico: The Birt h of a Consolidat ed Federal Democracy?, Regional & Federal St udies, DOI: 10. 1080/ 13597566. 2013. 852539 To link to this article: ht t p: / / dx. doi. org/ 10. 1080/ 13597566. 2013. 852539 PLEASE SCROLL DOWN FOR ARTI CLE Taylor & Francis m akes every effort t o ensure t he accuracy of all t he inform at ion ( t he “ Cont ent ” ) cont ained in t he publicat ions on our plat form . However, Taylor & Francis, our agent s, and our licensors m ake no represent at ions or warrant ies what soever as t o t he accuracy, com plet eness, or suit abilit y for any purpose of t he Cont ent . Any opinions and views expressed in t his publicat ion are t he opinions and views of t he aut hors, and are not t he views of or endorsed by Taylor & Francis. 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Term s & Condit ions of access and use can be found at ht t p: / / www.t andfonline.com / page/ t erm s- and- condit ions Regional and Federal Studies, 2013 http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13597566.2013.852539 Downloaded by [Centro Estudios Politicos Y], [Helder do Vale] at 06:49 04 December 2013 ELECTION REPORT The 2012 Elections in Mexico: The Birth of a Consolidated Federal Democracy? HELDER DO VALE & ISABEL WENCES Center for Political and Constitutional Studies (CEPC), Madrid, 28013 Spain ABSTRACT In 2012, the simultaneous elections at the federal, state and municipal levels in Mexico reopened the debate about the path of democratic consolidation in the country. With the return of the Revolutionary Institutional Party to the presidency in 2013, there are renewed signs that Mexican democratic consolidation is underway. Particularly important in this process is that the 2012 gubernatorial and mayoral elections have been more competitive, resulting in higher political alternation in power between political parties. Under a changing subnational political context, there are indications that subnational politicians are no longer under the shadow of a dominant party system. As a more consolidated federal democracy, the political landscape in Mexico has become more complex. KEY WORDS: Mexico, federalism, democratic consolidation, intergovernmental relations Introduction: Mexico’s Changing Political Landscape On 1 July 2012, more than 50 million Mexicans cast their vote to elect over 2000 candidates to political office at the federal, state and municipal levels of government. Among these candidates were included the president of the republic, 628 members of the National Congress, seven state governors, 875 mayors and several members of local and state legislatures. There were three main political parties that contested the elections, namely the Revolutionary Institutional Party (PRI), the Party of National Action (PAN) and the Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD).1 The election results highlight power alternation in the national executive and the establishment of a complex political landscape at the regional and municipal levels of government. The unequivocal winner of the 2012 presidential election was the PRI, electing Enrique Peña Nieto for a six-year presidential term. By regaining the Correspondence Address: Helder do Vale, Center for Political and Constitutional Studies (CEPC), Plaza de la Marina Española 9, Madrid, 28013 Spain. Email: helder.dovale@cepc.es # 2013 Taylor & Francis Downloaded by [Centro Estudios Politicos Y], [Helder do Vale] at 06:49 04 December 2013 2 H. do Vale & I. Wences presidential office after 12 years in opposition, the PRI, which had governed Mexico uninterrupted from 1929 to 2000, returned to power under the past shadow of oneparty dominance. However, the prospects of Mexico returning to a dominant party system seem remote. In the 2012 elections, the performance of the PRI in both chambers of the national congress was disappointing, as it failed to hold the majority of the seats. Furthermore, the PRI at the state level elected three state governors out of the seven states holding elections. The electoral results of 2012 can be interpreted as an important sign that Mexico is moving towards a consolidated democracy. With the 2012 elections, Mexico has witnessed an alternation of power in the presidency between main political parties, which is a critical feature for democratic consolidation (Przeworski, 1991: 10). Mexican democratization has been advancing since the 1990s with piecemeal electoral reforms, which have slowly opened the possibility for the opposition to win the presidential elections against the PRI in 2000. From 2000 until 2012, power alternation between parties in the presidency did not occur. The return of the PRI to the presidency suggests that democratic consolidation in Mexico might be underway. In addition, the reduction of post-electoral conflict shows that the main contenders in the elections accept the democratic means as the only ‘rule of the game’, which is an essential criterion for consolidation of democracy (Linz and Stepan, 1996). The task of this report is to explain some effects of the 2012 multi-level elections on Mexican democratic politics. Its structure is as follows: the first section builds on the relationship between changes in Mexican federalism and the consolidation of Mexican democracy; the subsequent section explains the main patterns of electoral campaign and voting behaviour; and the final sections discuss the electoral results at the different levels of government. The conclusion is that after approximately ten years away from the Mexican presidency, the PRI has returned to power under a new political context mainly characterized by a multiparty system and more autonomous subnational politicians. The Consolidation of a Federal Democracy Important institutional changes on the federal front played an important role in the process of Mexican democratic consolidation. Central to this consolidation were subnational electoral politics, which enhanced the advancement of opposition to counter the powers of the presidency. Through slow changes produced by electoral reforms, the subnational level in Mexico became, in the 1980s and 1990s, a site of effective opposition to presidential power (Beer, 2002; Hernandez-Rodriguez, 2003). Under these gradual changes, the PAN started to challenge the local and regional dominance of the PRI through elected mayors and governors (Klesner, 2005). Although several observers pointed out that subnational politics have been a catalyst of changes in the national political landscape (Hiskey and Bowler, 2005; Klesner, 2005, 2012), little has been said on how competitive elections have affected the current power relations between the central and subnational governments in Mexico. By taking a closer look at the subnational democratization process in Mexico, it is possible to notice that it is following a different pace of transformation provided that the electoral dominance of the PRI has remained strong at the state and municipal Downloaded by [Centro Estudios Politicos Y], [Helder do Vale] at 06:49 04 December 2013 The 2012 Elections in Mexico 3 levels. In 2000, when the PAN won the presidential election, the PRI controlled 56% of the Mexican states, and approximately 70% of the municipalities in Mexico. It is often claimed that PRI dominance at the subnational level has been maintained through clientelism, which in Mexico has meant political favour (e.g. fund distribution) in exchange for vote allegiance (Fox, 1994; Hiskey and Bowler, 2005; Hilgers, 2008). The persistence of political bias based on clientelistic relationships in a democratizing system has led some to identify traces of ‘subnational authoritarianism’ in Mexico (Gibson, 2005; Durazo Herrmann, 2010). This partially explains why the PRI’s dominance goes unchallenged in some states, and why the PRD has created electoral strongholds in a few states. However, a closer look at the 2012 subnational electoral results teaches us that electoral competition has become rife, as incumbency is playing less of a role in determining winners, and coalition between parties has become an effective strategy to win subnational elections. These changes, in turn, signal transformation in Mexican federalism, which is critical to understanding Mexico in its post-dominant party systems phase. In Mexico, federalism has often been interpreted as a façade for a centralized territorial system that used to be controlled by the Mexican president (Hernandez-Rodriguez, 2003; Camp, 2007). Under this centralized federalism, the president used to handpick future governors in consultation with incumbent governors, a practice known as ‘the tap of the finger’ (el dedazo). As an illustration of this type of protracted dominance of the central government under the PRI hegemony, for approximately 60 years the PRI has governed simultaneously all states in Mexico. This centralism has been further enhanced by the lack of competitive elections at the subnational level of government. Power alternation at the state level as a result of the 2012 elections is an uncontroversial indication that the subnational political landscape has been transformed in Mexico. Against this background of transformation, Mexican federalism has adapted to the altered political context, creating new territorial dynamics. While it is clear that Mexico has undergone important institutional changes during the past two decades, these changes have not prevented some institutional legacies of the past to persist. The juxtaposition of old (e.g. lack of political co-operation between parties, contestation of electoral results) and new (e.g. decentralized parties, strengthened electoral oversight institutions) institutions under a more democratic dynamics has created some paradoxes and mismatches in Mexico (Valdés Ugalde, 2010). For example, several traits of the one-party system persist and, as such, as Selee and Peschard (2010: 2 – 3) suggest, Mexico’s democracy functions through informal rules, and institutions are created to govern the country without being able to secure rule of law and good governance. Despite all this, and as the 2012 elections suggest, electoral competition is increasing as incumbent parties are being replaced by opposition parties, and electoral coalitions are being formed in order to win elections. The 2012 Election Campaigns, Voting Behaviour and Political Gridlock Just like in every election in Mexico over the past decade, the 2012 elections brought to the fore the obstacles of Mexican democratic deepening. Noteworthy among these obstacles are the persistence of political polarization, lack of co-operation between Downloaded by [Centro Estudios Politicos Y], [Helder do Vale] at 06:49 04 December 2013 4 H. do Vale & I. Wences the executive and legislative branches of government, and legal disputes over electoral results. For more than a decade, elections in Mexico have produced important changes in the Mexican political landscape. The 2012 elections followed suit and, for the first time since its 2000 electoral loss, the PRI has been restored to presidential office under a high voter turn-out, approximately 62%. The comeback of the old rulers has shed light on the effective transition in Mexico from a dominant party system to a multiparty system. While these changes seem to have directed Mexico towards democratic consolidation, they have also been accompanied by a certain degree of social and political instability. The 2012 elections have been a source of some controversy, as they have created a new balance of power between different political parties, and their results once again have been contested before courts, sparking social protests. The Presidential Election Campaign The three-month presidential election campaign was disputed, but, during this period, all opinion polls predicted the victory of the PRI’s president-elect, Peña Nieto. He dominated the presidential race from the very beginning of the campaign, maintaining an advantage in electoral preference of more than 10% over the second contender. However, the mediagenic Peña Nieto fell short in maintaining this advantage and won with a slimmer vote margin of 6.6%. In the final weeks of the campaign, the PRI candidate faced strong opposition from the student movement #YoSoy132, which denounced his flamboyance, his obscure connection with the media, and his deep-seated past in the old PRI leadership. Despite the increasing accusations, Peña Nieto managed to create an image of an efficient, responsive and moderated politician. The main opposition to Peña Nieto, the leftist PRD candidate, López Obrador, ended the presidential campaign in second place, repeating his performance in the 2006 presidential election. He campaigned often, affirming that the pollsters were hiding his alleged lead in the opinion polls. López Obrador’s campaign lost its messianic tone of 2006.2 In contrast with his past campaign strategy, in 2012 he became more pragmatic under the campaign motto “Real change is in your hands”. Yet he did not lose his combative anti-system rhetoric. PAN’s candidate Vázquez Mota ended the election in third place. This major defeat from the outgoing PAN candidate was already presaged in many opinion polls as she started to slip from a 30% voter preference in early April to 24% in early May. Her disappointing performance can be explained by her low support among PAN loyalists, who thought she was a weak standard-bearer for the party.3 Moreover, Vázquez Mota’s strategy to run a campaign attempting to represent a candidate who would bring important changes to Mexico was not convincing, although she rightly emphasized that she would be the first women in Mexican history to reach the presidency. The political divide among politicians during the presidential campaign was particularly deep on issues such as the liberalization of the energy sector, reorganization of the educational system, and flexibilization of the labour market. Throughout the campaign, it was possible to observe a consensus of all the candidates around four important issues: improvement of public security, intensification of the fight against The 2012 Elections in Mexico 5 corruption, betterment of educational standards under an improvement national system of monitoring and evaluation, and the increase of the fiscal revenue base of the state. This consensus might be a sign that Mexico is overcoming the deep-seated polarization between its politicians (Bruhn and Greene, 2007). Downloaded by [Centro Estudios Politicos Y], [Helder do Vale] at 06:49 04 December 2013 The Gubernatorial and Mayoral Election Campaigns As far as the gubernatorial and mayoral election campaigns are concerned, the common pattern of electoral campaign in Mexico is characterized by manipulation of opinion polls, allegations of vote buying, and accusations among the contenders. These practices led to impugnation of candidates for municipal posts, some episodes of political violence, and destruction of public property. Yet this conflictive electoral scenario applies more to the municipal than to the state electoral campaigns. However, in the states where the incumbent party faced a likely defeat, the electoral campaigns were more conflictive. In Jalisco, one of the most economically developed states in Mexico, from the very beginning, the PRI candidate appeared as a front-runner in most opinion polls; however, over time the candidate from the Citizen’s Movement (MC) grew in the preference of the voters. This surge led to what is known in Mexico as a ‘dirty war’ (guerra sucia) between candidates, which is best characterized by the use of intimidation. As part of this tactic, even opinion polls were manipulated to mislead voters. The newspaper Milenio Jalisco showed a strong lead for the PRI, with an alleged 44% against only 5.9% for the MC. At the end, the governor of the PRI was elected with only a 4.7% advantage over the MC runner-up. In Morelos, which is considered one of the most violent states in Mexico, from the very beginning of the electoral campaign, it became evident that the PAN would lose the governorship after 12 years in power. The real dispute occurred between the PRD and PRI candidates. After the first month of campaigning, the opinion polls showed that the PRD candidate was ahead by around 7 – 10% of voters’ intentions from the PRI candidate, a difference that was confirmed in the final electoral results. Contrasting with the rather peaceful gubernatorial elections, at the municipal level, some candidates received death threats in some municipalities in Morelos. In Chiapas, home of a currently active leftist revolutionary movement, four political parties disputed the state governorship. Even before the start of the campaign, polls had already pointed to a comfortable victory for the PRI, as the incumbent PRD was involved in many corruption scandals. Under a fragmented coalition of parties, the PRD lacked a clear strategy to win the favouritism of the PRI-led coalition throughout the campaign. However, the campaign was marked by confrontation between the militants of different parties. At the municipal elections, for example, in one municipality, Villaflores, a PAN candidate for the municipal assembly post was allegedly murdered by a candidate of the PRI for the mayoral office. In Tabasco, known as an important oil-producing state, several opinion polls indicated that the PRI candidate would win by a large vote margin oscillating between 6% and 10% from the alleged second-place contender, a PRD candidate. At the end, the PRD candidate won the gubernatorial elections by a small vote margin of less than 1% under a coalition of parties. In some municipalities there were accusations of Downloaded by [Centro Estudios Politicos Y], [Helder do Vale] at 06:49 04 December 2013 6 H. do Vale & I. Wences PRI militants being engaged in vote buying. On the day before the elections, four out of seventeen municipalities reported politically related violence. In the rest of the states running gubernatorial elections—the Federal District, Guanajuato and Yucatán—the campaigns were very disputed but predictable, as the opinions polls predicted the victory of the leading candidates in the opinion polls from the very beginning. In the other states running municipal elections, the same cannot be said, as electoral conflict leading to contestation of results was commonplace. It is possible to understand the persistence of a conflictive scenario during campaigns, which inevitably leads to post-electoral conflict, through the end of post-election informal negotiations between the PRI and the PAN, a practice called concertacesiones. These negotiations were used in the 1980s and 1990s in order to strike deals and ease the tensions in often fraudulent elections. As the old days of concertacesión bargains have been supplanted by a more institutionalized and transparent process (Eisenstadt, 2007), new tactics have been sought under a more competitive electoral environment. Voting Behaviour Political campaigns are disputed in Mexico, as there is strong evidence that partisan voters can easily migrate to other parties, and there is a growing number of independent voters (Moreno, 2012). The profiling of voters in the presidential election is a telling evidence of the latter case. Most of the voters who supported the PRI’s Peña Nieto were women across all age ranges with limited access to education and ideologically inclined to the right. Yet it is not possible to sketch a stereotypical profile of the PRI voter in 2012, provided that the newly elected Mexican president was most preferred by all social classes cutting across all genders and levels of education. This observation corroborates previous analyses suggesting that, in Mexico, the electoral choices of voters are not based on class, gender or education segments (Lawson, 2007). Instead, in Mexico, spatial and territorial traits explain voters’ choices. In terms of spatial traits, the divide between rural and urban areas is relevant. Similarly to past elections, most of the votes from the rural areas were for the PRI, while the urban poor have a tendency to vote for the PAN (Dı́az-Cayeros et al., 2012). As far as territorial aspects are concerned, the local political landscape became heterogeneous, as the PRI maintained local strongholds with the advancement of democratization in Mexico (Hiskey and Bowler, 2005). In Mexico, there is important variation in party strength across the Mexican states (Harbers, 2012). This can be observed in the 2012 presidential election. Voters from the Northern states are most likely to vote for the PRI, while voters from some districts of the centre-west of the country are more inclined to vote for the PAN, and voters from the centre and southern states are increasingly prone to vote for the PRD. There are indications that the rise of narcotraffic-related violence has determined voting behaviour. Taking into account votes by district, it is possible to say that in localities where violence is high, voter turn-out was smaller, and the voters punished the PRI and voted for the PRD (Dı́az-Cayeros et al., 2012). Another determinant of voter choice in 2012 was the use of the Internet, given the growing influence during the campaign of the Internet-based student movement #YoSoy132. In areas of higher Downloaded by [Centro Estudios Politicos Y], [Helder do Vale] at 06:49 04 December 2013 The 2012 Elections in Mexico 7 Internet penetration, there was higher support for the PAN (Dı́az-Cayeros et al., 2012). Generally speaking, in spite of some polarization, the main winner of the 2012 elections, the PRI, managed to attract votes from all social segments. In a more fragmented party system in Mexico, the more reduced vote polarization, and the decrease in post-electoral conflict in the 2012 elections at the national and state level, indicate that democratic rules are being increasingly accepted by most political parties. The 2012 Presidential and Congressional Electoral Results Mexican presidential elections are important precisely because of the concentration of power that the Mexican president has possessed historically. But pundits and scholars are increasingly agreeing that since the 1997 presidential election, the power of the Mexican president has been decreasing. Over the years, in the Mexican system of qualified majority, the front-runner of the presidential election has been winning by a small margin from the second contender. It is interesting to note, however, that the 2012 election breaks this trend, as in 2012 the PRI won by a 6.6% margin, while in 2006 the victory of the PAN was by a hairline margin of 0.56%. None the less, on the whole the difference between votes received by the front-runner and the runner-up has been systematically narrowed over the years.4 Evidence shows that Mexican presidents have been elected with lower electoral support than in previous decades in progressively more competitive elections, while having to face an opposition with increasingly stronger electoral support. It is clear that whilst the de jure power of the Mexican president remains the same, de facto power is being reduced (Negretto, 2006). Co-operation is one of the recent mechanisms to be used in the new political landscape. The qualified majority and the shorter term of the members of parliament (three years’ congressional term against six years’ presidential term) make it difficult for the president’s party to control congress (Negretto, 2006). Attempting to reach out to the opposition through possible coalition formation seems to be an alternative. Based on recent analysis on the stability of multiparty presidentialism (Pereira and Melo, 2012), it is possible to speculate that a stable co-operation between the Mexican national executive with the national legislative rests on the ability of the PRI in strategically engaging with the PAN and PRD in key issues. The outcome of the 2012 congressional elections confirms that Mexico is turning into a fragmented multiparty system, with three political forces competing for influence in the legislative process. Although the PRI won a plurality of seats in the Senate and the Chamber of Deputies, the party fell short of achieving a simple majority in both chambers. The projections that the PRI in coalition with the Green Ecologist Party of Mexico (PVEM) would control one of the chambers failed to materialize. Even though the PRI–PVEM coalition held the greater number of seats in both chambers—48% of the Chamber of Deputies’ seats and 47% of the Senate’s seats—this coalition will have to engage in forging political alliances with other parties in order to legislate. In the Senate, the second most influential force after the PRI– PVEM coalition, which controls 61 seats, is the PAN with its 38 seats. The PRD coalition with the Workers’ Party (PT) and the Citizens’ Movement (MC), which together gained 38 Downloaded by [Centro Estudios Politicos Y], [Helder do Vale] at 06:49 04 December 2013 8 H. do Vale & I. Wences seats, is an important opposition force that the PRI will contend with. In the Chamber of Deputies, with 240 seats the PRI– PVEM will face opposition from the PRD –PT – MC, which jointly gained 135 seats, becoming the second most important political force in this chamber. The PAN, which in the 2009 elections obtained 149 seats, became a less influential party in the Chamber of Deputies with its 114 seats. Three party-related factors help us understand the visibility of building party alliances in the years to come. First, political parties in Mexico have become less ideological and more pragmatic over the years. In effect, this has led analysts to conclude that under competitive elections, Mexican parties have become ‘catch-all’ parties (Klesner, 2005). This means, in turn, that in principle there are no ideological orientations preventing parties from co-operation among themselves. Second, there are important issues at stake in Mexico—education, energy, fiscal and political reforms—that are seen as pressing for Mexico. The urgency of these reforms might call for a broad coalition of parties to be approved. And, lastly, the possibility of the two main opposition parties, the PAN and the PRD, to come together to make a strong opposition to the PRI government is unlikely. In effect, Mexico historically had a fragmented opposition (Klesner, 2005; Lawson, 2007: 47). The 2012 presidential election reveals that in a more consolidated multiparty system, the newly elected Mexican president will have to confront a divided congress in order to carry out long-awaited political and economic reforms in Mexico. The 2012 Gubernatorial Electoral Results With the 2012 elections, the number of PRI governors increased from 17 to 20 (Figure 1). Furthermore, the gubernatorial elections produced far-reaching changes in the subnational political landscape. Figure 1. Party map of post-2012 election by state. Source: Author’s elaboration based on IFE data. Downloaded by [Centro Estudios Politicos Y], [Helder do Vale] at 06:49 04 December 2013 The 2012 Elections in Mexico 9 As an outcome of the 2012 elections, there was a change of power in four states— Chiapas, Jalisco, Morelos and Tabasco. In Guanajuato, Yucatán and the Federal District, the incumbent party won, indicating continuity (Table 1). The PRD’s performance in the state elections deserves special attention. The PRDled coalition was victorious in Morelos and Tabasco, ending the hegemony of the PAN and the PRI, respectively. In Morelos, from the very beginning of the campaign, the PRD found ample opportunity to challenge the PRI’s favouritism in the PAN-dominated state. After being tied with the PRI for first place throughout the electoral campaign, the PRD came out as winner. The PRD’s victory in Tabasco marks the end of more than 80 years of PRI governorship in the state.5 The PRI made electoral inroads in two states, Chiapas and Jalisco, where the opponents of the PRI had strong electoral support. In Chiapas, the PRI – PVEM coalition elected the PVEM candidate with more than 50% of the votes, replacing the PRD in the state government. In Jalisco, where the second most populated Mexican city is located, Guadalajara, the PRI won, and the PAN finished the elections in third place after having governed the state for 17 years, Continuity of incumbents was observed in Guajanuato, Yucatán and in the Federal District. Guajanuato has been a bastion of the PAN for several years, and its power has gone unchallenged in this state. Similarly, in Yucatán, the comfortable victory of the PRI makes the state a political stronghold of the party. In the Federal District, the PRD came out of the elections strengthened after receiving two-thirds of the votes. Since this elected post was created in 1997, the PRD has won all the elections in the capital city. The 2012 gubernatorial election indicates that incumbency at the state level has been weakened, especially in those states that have been long governed by the PAN and PRD. Under this scenario of more competitive elections, the governors of the Table 1. The results of the 2012 gubernatorial elections Incumbent Chiapas PRD Federal District Guanajuato PRD PAN Jalisco PAN Morelos PAN Yucatán PRI Tabasco PRI Front-runner (% vote) Runner-up (% vote) 67.19 (PRIled coalition) 63.56 (PRDled coalition) 48.31 (PAN) 17.54 (PRDled coalition) 19.75 (PRIled coalition) 40.93 (PRIled coalition) 34.1 (MC) 38.8 (PRI-led coalition) 43.3 (PRD-led coalition) 50,5 (PRI-led coalition) 51.4 (PRD-led coalition) Source: Instituto Federal Electoral (IFE) 34.7 (PRI-led coalition) 41.5 (PAN) 43.79 (PRIled coalition) Second runner-up (% vote) 9.08 (PAN) 13.62 (PAN) 5.0 (PRD) 19.87 (PAN) 15.1 (PAN) 5.3 (PRD-led coalition) 4.82 (PAN) Elected governor Manuel Velasco (PVEM) Miguel Ángel Mancera (PRD) Miguel Márquez (PAN) Aristóleles Sandoval (PRI) Graco Ramı́rez (PRD) Rolando Zapata Bello (PRI) Arturo Nuñez (PRD) Downloaded by [Centro Estudios Politicos Y], [Helder do Vale] at 06:49 04 December 2013 10 H. do Vale & I. Wences PRI will have to convince voters that they can deliver on their campaign promises. This also means that the PRI state governors might have to challenge federal-level policies. Nowadays, subnational politicians can systematically exercise constraint on national politicians (Barracca, 2007). This restraint on the president’s power has been noticed in the implementation of centrally designed public policies and in the partition of fiscal revenues from the centre. As a consequence, Peña Nieto will face opposition from most PRI governors, indicating that party-based political alliance might be outdated in the newly restored Mexican federalism. The 2012 gubernatorial elections show that the electoral strongholds built at the state level have been weakened. This is an indication that elections are becoming more competitive, which in itself implies that democracy in Mexico is being consolidated at the state level. The 2012 Municipal Elections The PRI has historically governed the majority of Mexican municipalities, and the 2012 municipal elections have confirmed this trend. However, the PRI has resorted to the strategy of building coalitions with other parties, which can be interpreted as a sign that municipal elections are becoming more competitive. In 2012, there were 875 municipalities holding municipal elections in 14 states. In these elections, the PRI won 489 of the mayoral offices, while the PAN came second, occupying 183 of the mayoral positions available. The PRD elected 58 mayors alone and was part of coalitions that elected 101 mayors. Similarly, the PVEM elected 56 mayors, but under a coalition with the PRI, it elected more mayors (Table 2). The clear winner of the 2012 municipal elections was the PRI, which not only elected most of the mayors, but also won in 10 out of the 14 state capitals holding elections. The PRI also won in municipalities that the PAN and the PRD have governed for many years, such as León and Querétaro, which have been capital cities ruled by the PAN for 24 and 15 years, respectively. An interesting pattern observed in the 2012 municipal elections is the strategy of relying on coalition building to win elections. In 2012, there were 411 municipalities where the winner of the elections was a coalition of parties. The PRI was part of the winning coalition in 309 municipalities, the PAN in 52, and the PRD in 39 (Table 2). The PRI has embraced this strategy successfully in the 2012 election. The PAN has used electoral coalition less frequently, being limited to only two states—Sonora and Chiapas. In four states—Chiapas, Morelos, Tabasco and Yucatán—the gubernatorial elections coincided with municipal elections. Whereas in Chiapas and Tabasco the party that won the governor’s seat did not perform so well in the mayoral elections, in Morelos and Yucatán, the parties that won the gubernatorial race also won the majority of the municipal elections in the state. This suggests that in some subnational contexts municipal and gubernatorial results are not necessarily congruent. Mexico is known for important variation in terms of party electoral performance from one municipality to the next within the same state (McCann, 2012). In addition to the lack of congruence between municipal and state elections, another pattern is confirmed in 2012, namely strong incumbency at the local level, which has been pointed out as a tendency in The 2012 Elections in Mexico 11 Table 2. Total number of mayors elected by single parties and coalitions in the 2012 municipal elections Downloaded by [Centro Estudios Politicos Y], [Helder do Vale] at 06:49 04 December 2013 Single party Elected mayors Revolutionary Institutional Party (PRI) Party of National Action (PAN) 180 131 Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD) Green Ecologist Party of Mexico (PVEM) Citizen’s Movement (MC) Worker’s Party (PT) New Alliance Party (PANAL) People’s Socialist Party (PCP) Social Democratic Party (PSD) 4 2 FOR CHIAPAS 1 Total Party coalitions Elected mayors 154 95 58 PRI-PVEM PRI-PVEMPANAL PAN-PANAL 56 PRI-PVM 41 12 12 8 PRD-PT-MC PRI-PANAL PAN-FOR CHIAPAS PRD-PT PRI-POR CHIAPAS MC-PT MC-PT-PRD PRD-MC PRD-MC-PT PRD-PC-MC RPI-PVEMPANAL Total 38 14 7 464 45 6 4 2 1 1 1 1 1 411 Source: Centro de Investigación para el Desarrollo (electoral data), www.cidac.org Mexico (Klesner, 2012). This is especially so in the case of the PRI, which confirmed its favouritism in municipalities where the party already governed. All in all, municipal elections in 2012 have shown that the strategy of building electoral coalitions between parties to win elections was successful. These party coalitions have weakened the incumbency of parties that have governed cities for more than a decade. The politics of electoral coalition might create an opportunity for municipalities in Mexico to form a local power base and to promote their interests vis-à-vis other levels of government. The Road Ahead The results of the 2012 Mexican national, state and municipal elections expose new patterns of electoral competition (e.g. more competitive elections in a multiparty system, and coalition formation at the subnational election campaigns), revealing both change and continuity in Mexico’s democratic system. Following the textbook prescription to fulfil a consolidated democracy where parties lose elections and alternate in power, the results of the presidential elections show that with the victory of Peña Nieto, alternation of power might become a reality in Mexico. This, in turn, indicates that democratic consolidation is well underway in Mexico. Downloaded by [Centro Estudios Politicos Y], [Helder do Vale] at 06:49 04 December 2013 12 H. do Vale & I. Wences Equally, the gubernatorial elections show that electoral competition in states are a fertile ground for subnational power alternation since in four out of the seven states that held elections, the incumbent party lost the election. At the municipal level, more competitive elections have weakened the power of incumbent parties to win elections, and have encouraged most parties to form coalitions with other parties. These are important signs that democratic consolidation might be underway beyond the federal level. Under a changing subnational political context, Mexican federalism also shows signs of transformation with more autonomous subnational politicians. In the face of these changes, the once-powerful Mexican president will have to adapt to a more adverse political context. Even if the return to power of the once-hegemonic party that governed Mexico uninterruptedly for 71 years might cast doubts on the true nature of the alternation of power, Peña Nieto is giving unprecedented signs of political conciliation three months after being elected. As evidence of his negotiation and reconciliation after the elections and before he has been invested as president, he has brokered a deal between the major parties to pass a labour-reform law. The most relevant indication of political change in Mexico came a day after Peña Nieto’s inauguration, when he, against all expectation, cobbled a coalition among the main parties behind a political pact—the Pact for Mexico (Pacto por México). This unparalleled agreement between the main political parties is a strong signal that the PRI’s return to power will strengthen democratic consolidation in Mexico. Acknowledgement The authors wish to thank Francisco Paoli Bolio, Valentina Romanova, Luz Marina Arias, and Guadalupe Paz for their valuable suggestions and comments. The usual disclaimer applies. Notes 1 The fourth presidential candidate was Gabriel Quadri of the New Alliance Party (PANAL), who obtained 2.29% of the votes. 2 López Obrador campaigned in the 2006 presidential race under the slogan “For the Good of All, Above All the Poor”, calling himself “the Little Ray of Hope”. 3 As an illustration of Vázquez Mota’s lack of internal party support, former Mexican president (2000– 2006) and member of the PAN, Vicente Fox, declared during the campaign his preference for the PRI candidate. 4 The runner-up has been grabbing a higher percentage of the votes since 1988. 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