In Mexico, Claudia Sheinbaum would govern ‘without verbal violence’

Claudia Sheinbaum (centre in white), candidate for the presidency of Mexico, participates in a campaign event in Mexico City on May 20, 2024. Keystone

Yanina Welp is an expert on populism in Latin America. In an interview with SWI swissinfo.ch, she explains what is likely to change if Mexico elects its first female president.

Mexico will elect its first female president on June 2. Two women are dominating the polls: Claudia Sheinbaum and Xóchitl Gálvez have a large lead over the other candidates in the general election. Sheinbaum of the left-wing populist governing alliance is the favourite to win the race.

Check out our selection of newsletters. Subscribe here.

Political scientist and Latin America expert Yanina Welp is a Research Fellow at the Albert Hirschman Centre on Democracy, Graduate Institute. graduateinstitute.ch

In her book on populism in Latin America, Geneva-based researcher Yanina Welp explores the extent to which populism is a male phenomenon. In an interview, she explains what is at stake in the upcoming election in Mexico and describes a link between the violent rhetoric of outgoing president Andrés Manuel Lopez Obrador and physical violence.

SWI swissinfo.ch: In a recent presidential debate, Claudia Sheinbaum emphasised the importance of free trade. Another candidate, Xóchitl Gálvez of the conservatives, has talked about plans for two million solar-panel roofs. This sounds confusing. What is the starting point for this election?

Yanina Welp: If you look at their last debate, it seems sometimes that they are switching positions. But the European way of understanding politics in terms of left and right doesn’t always apply in Latin America.

It’s a highly polarised election. From the government’s perspective it’s a decision about their welfare-state model. For the opposition this election is about the future of democracy. They claim that institutions are in peril because of the incumbent president, Andrés Manuel Lopez Obrador, and his party, Morena. These are the two strong discourses.

If one wants to take a more neutral, analytical position, it’s clear that Lopez Obrador has weakened the institutions and the checks and balances, and there are risks related to that. But re-elections are not allowed in Mexico and it’s evident that there are new candidates. Claudia Sheinbaum, the candidate of Andrés Manuel Lopez Obrador’s alliance, has a strong profile. And she will probably be the winner.

During the last TV debate, politicians seemed to swap camps. Claudia Sheinbaum, for example, stressed the importance of free trade. Keystone

SWI: Andrés Manuel Lopez Obrador [often referred to as AMLO] is still highly popular, but he won’t be in the new government. Sheinbaum probably will be the first female president of Mexico. In your work, you also explore whether there’s a link between gender and populism. If we consider Lopez Obrador to be a populist, then are his politics masculine?

YW: If you compare him to someone like [El Salvador President Nayib] Bukele, who relies a lot on social media, AMLO is a more traditional populist leader, comparable to leftist leaders like [former French presidential candidate Jean-Luc] Mélenchon in France. AMLO’s discourse is quite aggressive and polarising: each day he singles out his enemies – whether it’s a journalist, a scholar or a politician. With Claudia Sheinbaum, it can be expected that this will change. We will have a reduction in this level of polarisation, but not necessarily because of her gender. We still have few women in these high-level positions, so we lack the data to say that they will govern less aggressively because they are female. In Argentina, Cristina Kirchner used a style very similar to AMLO’s.

SWI: But on a policy level a female president might bring change. Some of AMLO’s policies seemed to go against the interests of women. He lowered the spending to prevent gender-based violence, for example. What did AMLO’s policies mean for women in Mexico?

YW: In this regard, he was like other populist leaders. The leftist Rafael Correa in Ecuador did the same. Correa had personal problems with the leaders of Ecuador’s feminist movement. He was against abortion. AMLO goes more or less in the same direction. But with regard to abortion, both female frontrunners in Mexico have been quite unclear.

Supporters of the Mexican opposition presidential candidate, Xochitl Galvez, participate in a march called ‘Pink Tide’ in Guadalajara, Mexico, May 19, 2024. KEYSTONE

SWI: Do they do this strategically?
YW: I think it’s quite strategic. Cristina Kirchner in Argentina did the same during her campaign – and even [former Brazilian president] Dilma Rousseff did it. It’s a typical strategy. At the same time both Galvez and Sheinbaum pledged that they will invest more in protecting women against violence. Violence in general is a problem in Mexico – and femicide rates are extremely high.

SWI: What is your assessment of Lopez Obrador’s presidency?

YW: I have been discussing this a lot with colleagues from Mexico. Andrés Manuel Lopez Obrador directly attacked academia. He shares an anti-elitism and anti-intellectualism that we experience on the extreme right. Academia is the enemy for him. So many of my colleagues have a very negative evaluation of Andrés Manuel Lopez Obrador. And I see their point. He has attacked the institutions. When it comes to pluralism, his government has been a problem.

In terms of social policy, I think that, despite his high popularity, he could have done much more than what he did. Anyway, his support is also based on the effectiveness of direct payments. But there is something that goes in his favour: popular support for democracy grew.

And this has been good, because Mexican society was in general quite dissatisfied with corruption, elitism and the traditional elites. I do evaluate AMLO negatively, but he managed to make people passionate about democracy.

President Andrés Manuel López Obrador speaks during an election campaign event in 2018. Keystone

We had elites controlling the institutions for a long time. Then AMLO came. He tried to take over the institutions. And now let’s see what happens with Sheinbaum. Maybe it’s a window of opportunity to really change the pattern – or not.

SWI: The upcoming election is not just about choosing the next president. Almost 100 million Mexican voters are electing a new parliament, provincial governments and mayors. Around 20,000 positions will be filled. A lot of commentators stress the importance of splitting the powerExternal link, so that no single party controls the majority of national and local positions.
YW: This is a very good point. It emerged in a recent episode of my podcast, Who is Voting in 2024, devoted to MexicoExternal link. It seems clear that Claudia Sheinbaum will be the president, so the Morena party will form the government. But if they have a unified government and a majority in Congress, then the government will be able to make reforms that could be dangerous for democracy. If you have divisions, the necessity to arrive at an agreement could make room for reinforcing institutional negotiations. That is probably the main question in this election.

SWI: If Sheinbaum gets elected, will she be able to act independently from Andrés Manuel Lopez Obrador?

YW: AMLO keeps his personal popularity and many people feel that he chose the candidate and expect that he will be deciding behind the scenes. But in the Latin American tradition, this almost never happens – that a former president controls a president in power. It’s a wrong depiction.

SWI: The number of women in Mexican politics is already relatively high compared to other Latin American countries. Will the first female president have a symbolic value in empowering more women?

YW: [It’s worked] because of the legal quota. The quota has also worked at increasing the number of women at the local level. It will be a powerful symbol for girls, and for boys as well, to recognise that a woman can arrive in this position and lead the government. But it’s important to stress that it’ll be much more than symbolic. If we go back to the discursive dimension and the aggressive style of Andrés Manuel Lopez Obrador. If you have a leader who is signalling each day that his opponents are the enemy, it’s a form of verbal violence. This has consequences for a society that sees increasing symbolic and physical violence. 

We are seeing this in many countries, for example Argentina – a style of politics that feeds violence and erodes the possibility of arriving at agreements between parties. A very important point is to build trust and agreement between the opposition and the government. We hope many people really want a peaceful environment for the country and for the future and for the welfare of the population. So they have to start with a kind of pacification of these relations and have an agreement that ‘we don’t have the same ideas, but we must recognize that we both want the best for the country’. I trust that Sheinbaum will govern differently, without that verbal violence.

SWI: One could question the role of violent rhetoric in a country like Mexico, where some regionsExternal link are characterised by physical violence. Where do people in Mexico get their confidence in elections, when some of them are in immediate danger?
YW: It is a good point. If many people are killed, these murders become normalised – how can a society get out of that? I think the verbal pacification and trust-building is part of that because crime in Mexico is embedded in politics as well. Of course, verbal violence is not the same as physical violence, but to stop verbal violence is one step to resolving the dominance of physical violence. Criminality is still on the rise – and the trend is still negative.

Agents of the Attorney General of the State of Chihuahua and forensic experts participate in an operation to search for clandestine graves in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico, January, 28, 2021. Keystone

Edited by David Eugster/gw