No tranza, no avanza
A look at public morality in Mexico
April 2023
We clear passport control at Guadalajara International Airport but still have to go through the final step: bag inspection. This is where you are randomly selected for a secondary screening after sending your bags through an x-ray machine.
There appears to be four or five endless lines. We walk around for a couple minutes attempting to find the end of line. We look at each other and I say, “I have no idea where this starts.”
The lines themselves have no one directing people to lines. There are no ropes to delineate the lines. These ropes, present in every airport I have visited, give a coherence and end point to the different lines. Without the ropes, the four or five endless lines lack coherence and it is hard to know how one line actually leads to the bag x-ray machines.
I see people walking through x-ray machines but it is not clear from which line people are advancing. I make a split second decision. We enter the x-ray machines. There are hoards of officials – it is customs, after all, yet no one official tells us to stop. Thirty seconds later, we are through the last step of customs and in the Guadalajara arrivals hall.
Days later, entering the national anthropology museum in Mexico City, there is a long line outside the door. Fortunately it is moving quickly. We must pass through a metal detector and have our bags checked.
The guard looks in my bag and says I must drink my water. I tell her it is empty. Without looking into the water non-transparent bottle to verify, she waves us through.
After buying tickets, the person collecting the tickets at the museum entrance brusquely says I must check my bag. I forcefully say that I was just allowed in at the entrance with the bag. The guard relents but tells me to wear my backpack face forward. I comply but, once out of his sight wandering through the museum, I put the backpack on my back again. Many guards wander by and none correct my backpack’s position.
The agents of the state, clearly marked in their neat uniforms, make one believe they have a clearly defined function and all is orderly. Their uniformity in looks, however, does not match their uniformity of action. Any one agent – who is a state bureaucrat with power – will choose to wield their power in a different manner based upon different rules.
And some choose not to wield their power at all. At a busy intersection in Mexico City I pull out of a gas station and attempt to enter traffic in front of the traffic light. Being Mexico City, no one will allow me to enter unless I force myself in. My friend in the passenger seat tells me when the light is two seconds away from turning green so I can speed into the crosswalk and out in front of the cars just as the last pedestrians are leaving. I successfully get ahead of the first car and am on the way just as the light turns green.
My friend points out the traffic cops on the corners. “The cop should have done something to allow you to get into the lane safely. It is dangerous you had to do what you did but if they aren’t going to control traffic to allow cars to enter traffic what else can you do?”
At every future intersection I begin to eye the traffic police. Most do stand on the corners playing an ill-defined role. Some encourage pedestrians to cross when the light is green, moving their arms and blowing their whistles from the edge of the sidewalk. Their presence does not stop motorcycles from swerving dangerously through traffic nor does it make cars stay in their lanes. At some intersections, there are police standing in the middle of traffic, blowing whistles and directing traffic. These police, however, simply follow the traffic lights and direct cars to move quickly.
The traffic police’s ineffectiveness reminds me of a previous trip to Mexico City in April 2021 when pandemic restrictions were still in effect and well before the majority of Mexicans were eligible to receive a vaccination. Large groups of police watched mass gatherings of maskless people in markets, bars and restaurants despite official mask ordinances. On the subway, a significant number of people went maskless despite a strong police presence in many stations.
The contrast between the official-looking nature of Mexico’s bureaucracy and its inefficiency and ineffectiveness is evident when reading through government documents. I have translated Mexican legal documents for asylum cases involving refugees fleeing a combination of gang violence and police corruption. The documents present the case very matter of factly. For one case there may be ten or twenty pages describing the case, the officers on the case, and other details. It gives the appearance of professionalism and effectiveness.
The reality of many of the cases is they involved significant police corruption that led to the murder in the first place. In one case, a woman called the police on drug dealers. No action was taken against the drug dealers. Within a day, the woman was killed and the rest of her family fled in fear of their lives. Cases of police corruption are common, with half of Mexicans who have interactions with police reporting corruption by the police.
In Mexican author Juan Villoro’s book about Mexico City, El vértigo horizontal, he discusses the labyrinthine Mexican bureaucracy. He says he will die Mexican but he feels that he will die of being Mexican because Mexicans have to make so many tramites, or document processing. Indeed, according to the Mexican publication El Economista, to close a business in Mexico it can cost around 2,000 U.S. dollars (a handsome sum in Mexico) and take up to two years.
The labyrinthine bureaucracy encourages corruption. If one does not want to wait forever or wants to skip a tramite, a quick bribe is faster. Villoro says that with a bribe, you will get what you need after a very long time rather than an interminable amount of time. Indeed, in Mexican Spanish a common phrase is no tranza, no avanza which means if you do not cheat you will not advance.
If you have armies of bureaucrats who should work for the common good but do not, why should the common man? Why observe rules if those in power do not enforce them or themselves break them? Why would anyone tell another citizen to follow a mask mandate or respect traffic rules if the police are disinclined?
The ineffectiveness of the Mexican government is in contrast to the hard working nature of most Mexicans. Mexico is one of the countries that works the longest hours in the world. If the government worked as hard as the average Mexican to create a system for the common good, imagine what could happen.
South Korea is another country whose citizens work some of the world’s longest hours yet have an efficient, accountable bureaucracy. During Covid, citizens who walked outside without masks were frequently fined by the government. Social gatherings were restricted to low numbers with violations frequently resulting in fines. In addition to government enforcement, multiple Koreans recounted that the social pressure to mask was high. People would glare at anyone who did not mask in public. Citizens were also given power to report other citizens who did not comply with mask mandates.
And so public morality plays a major role. But what creates public morality? How does Mexico get to Korea? Should Mexico get to Korea, and do Mexicans want to get to Korea? This will be the topic of a subsequent article on public morality in Mexico.
