Violencia y estado en México hoy

Abstract

Mexico experiences overwhelming and irrepressible violence. All therecords indicate that it is a particularly bleak period in Mexican history: disappearances, kidnappings and murders have reached record numbers in recent years. Consequently, violence is one of the main social problems to be solved in the country and as the center of the concerns of social scientists. First, the article presents an overview of violence in Mexico during the period 2006-2016, using official statistics. Secondly, with the support of various human rights reports, it analyzes a specific type of violence: the one carried out by the State to the detriment of journalists, defenders and social activists during this same period of time. Third, it records the incubation of the current tragedy in the extraordinary accumulation of means of violence by the State during the years that run from 1994 to 2006. Fourth, it refers to the disappearance of the 43 Ayotzinapa normalistas as the station end of this social dynamic and analyzes its meaning in relation to the nature of the Mexican State. Finally, the article makes a series of reflections on interpretations that focus on the unconstitutional and undemocratic nature of the use of armed forces in internal security tasks, neglecting a more fundamental critique of the nature of the state of emergency.