How are we connected to Mexico? Travel, immigration, trade & NAFTA, diplomatic relations are some of the ways we are linked. We share are a border and both belong to the continent of North America. As one attorney in Mexico City put it "We are tied at the hip."
How do policy-makers see this relationship?
This overview from the Inter-American Dialogue outlines some of the big issues in US-Mexico relations.
Their Mexico press page sums up what some of the policy experts are saying about this relationship:
If everything was going right Mexico should be growing huge amounts, but that never happened. In the worst of times, Mexico really did get knocked off its perch," Peter Hakim in Reuters on August 4, 2009.
"La novedad más notable sea con México, que ha pasado rápidamente al frente de la agenda política en Washington. Hay mucha más atención a México que antes, y el reconocimiento de que la política antidrogas también ha fracasado fue también muy bien recibido en la región," Michael Shifter in AP on April 27, 2009.
“Obama has had a quick learning curve on Mexico. He understands that this is absolutely crucial,” Michael Shifter in The Houston Chronicle on April 16, 2009.
"Mexico is facing a grave challenge and a threatening level of violence, but we're not talking Afghanistan here. Mexico is a state that has built up its governmental capacities and effectiveness in recent years, but it's also a neighbor that is now under stress and needs reinforcement," Michael Shifter in The Christian Science Monitor on March 25, 2009.
I believe that there is so much potential for the youth of Mexico to become the generation that sets the country on a path of large-scale change, combating corruption and capitalizing on the "information age" to educate its future generations. But, I'm curious to know what young Mexicans perceive regarding the future of their country? So much of the commentary I read/hear comes from middle- to older-aged professionals that have already had considerable experiences (whether positive or negative) working within the professional sectors of the country. What do the young people think? want? aspire to?
ReplyDeleteI actually work in México with a lot of educated, engineers in their 20´s and 30´s, so I asked them what they thought about the future of México. I was not sure what to expect, but I got a wide range of answers.
ReplyDeleteThe general feeling I got was guarded optimism. Some people were pessimistic due to the challenges you mentioned, but the majority of people were optimistic in the long-term, say 20+ years. They think that México can compete globally, but it will be a slow process and they need to overcome these challenges first. One person did mention that as the newer generation matures into power, the overall culture and mentality will change to make México a better place.
One of the big challenges they mentioned, in addition to the common ones, is the national brain drain--those who are truly talented usually leave the country.