Labour and migration policies under Vicente Fox: subordination to U.S. economic and geopolitical interests

Abstract

The treatment of migration issues clearly represents one of the most important changes to have taken place in Mexican foreign policy during President Vicente Fox’s first year in office (Castañeda 2001: 89). Above and beyond the anecdotal and symbolic fact that the first official ceremony he held at the president’s official residence, Los Pinos, involved representatives of the migrant community, the National Development Plan for 2001 to 2006 identifies migration as a ‘priority issue for Mexico,’ one that must be addressed under ‘a new long-term approach’ within the framework of ‘comprehensive negotiations [with the United States] that address the structural roots of the phenomenon, its manifestations, and its consequences, and that sees dealing with migration as a shared responsibility’. (Castañeda 2001: 61). In line with this position, in the Annual Report he presented on 3 December 2001, Foreign Minister Jorge G. Castañeda noted that for the first time in the history of the bilateral agenda, the question of migration was taken on board on the basis of joint responsibility and with a long-term outlook aimed at ‘making good use of the synergies that exist between the two countries’. After the parenthesis caused by the attacks on the United States of America on 11 September 2001, he added, negotiations had recommenced in full, and the two governments had recognized the need for the migration question to incorporate security concerns and for a wide-ranging agreement to be struck at the earliest possible juncture.