The United States and democracy in Mexico: 1980--1995. Don't disturb the neighbors

With the end of the Cold war, the United States has placed particular emphasis on support for democracy abroad as a principal objective of its foreign policy. This dissertation examines how such a normative goal works in practice towards Mexico, a country where the United States has compelling economic and security interests that may not always coincide with democracy promotion.; The dissertation provides a comprehensive review of U.S. government statements and actions regarding democracy in Mexico from 1980-1995. It focuses on four case studies where the issue of democracy in Mexico had a greater profile: the 1982-86 period under the Reagan administration; the NAFTA negotiations, 1990-1993; the 1994 Mexican presidential elections; and, the 1994-95 peso crisis.; The dissertation tests two research propositions which explore the up and down nature of U.S. treatment of democracy in Mexico. The first proposition is that U.S. officials, particularly within the executive branch, hold a core belief that the United States should not openly criticize Mexican politics. This core belief was found consistently across administrations, and was based on pragmatic, but unspoken assumptions about how criticism might affect bilateral relations and the domestic status of particular Mexican presidents. The second proposition was that when public criticism did arise, it came from a minority of officials that stood mainly outside of the policy mainstream. These officials raised the issue of democracy only as it intersected and reinforced other U.S. policy goals toward Mexico.; Rather than an active policy process to consider normative goals, the dissertation found a static process driven largely by the core belief against public criticism. This policy of external silence to political infractions in Mexico had a number of unexpected internal U.S. policy implications. Striking was the rarity with which internal political developments in Mexico were debated or planned for. U.S. officials tended to downplay linkages between democracy and emerging U.S. interests, impeding their resolution. The dissertation concludes that there is a need to reexamine the assumptions underlying U.S. policy in the light of maturing U.S. - Mexican relations and the growing political dimension of key U.S. interests such as: drugs, corruption, financial management and, law enforcement.