The End of AMLO’s Six-Year Term and His Legacy: Debates on Progressivism and Socialism

On September 1, Andrés Manuel López Obrador gave a long speech to mark the end of his government. His extensive address was intended to make clear what he considers his legacy in Mexico and to look forward to constructing a progressive tradition in the country. Inevitably, this was interspersed with bitter criticism of the opposition and a defense of his controversial judicial reform, which allows judges to be voted on democratically instead of appointed. He also criticized the U.S. government, which he nevertheless considers a “good friend and neighbor,” and he repeatedly mentioned the family and its importance to Mexican culture and society, in phrasing with strong traditionalist and nationalist overtones. This was perhaps the final speech given by the strongman to his followers at the Zócalo, Mexico City’s massive central plaza. In 2006 he spoke as the leader of an opposition that denounced former Mexican president Felipe Calderón’s electoral fraud. Since 2018 he has led an administration that came to preserve political stability and restore the relationship between rulers and ruled. In this speech he made a lot of goodbyes, but it is open to speculation what place AMLO will occupy for his party.

AMLO ends his term with a more than 60 percent approval rating. This allowed Sheinbaum to win the presidency with more votes than he won six years ago. It also gave him the opportunity to hold his lavish and propagandistic farewell speech on September 1, something unprecedented in the last decades. It is also true, however, that other Latin American progressive governments ended their first terms with high approval ratings, and that the decline came later, as was the case in Argentina and Brazil. Perhaps because of that specter of decline, Obrador dedicated much of his speech to praising Sheinbaum’s character, seeking to pass on his popularity to her. At the same time, he intends to take advantage of her strength in order to implement and fast-track his reforms, such as in the judicial system. All this is causing a real national polarization, which includes student mobilizations both for and against the reforms, as well as strikes by workers, all encouraged and stoked by the right-wing opposition.

On Hegemonies, Idleness, and the Integral State

Behind the festivities lies a persistent hegemony, cultivated by the public policies deployed by AMLO’s administration. In particular, AMLO’s social programs, labor reforms, and wage increases culminated the rising expectations that his arrival generated among the masses, the working class in particular. These marked a tendency in AMLO’s administration to incorporate elements of what Gramsci called the “integral state.” Although this hegemony has important limits that contribute to its legitimacy—which we will return to later—what is certain is that AMLO’s popularity and charisma were based on representing, for the popular imagination, something seen by millions as different from the decades of previous neoliberal governments and their legacy of plundering and obscene corruption.

In the ideological field, Obradorism sought to support its progressive profile by presenting a critical and emancipatory perspective on the educational and cultural fields (which could not hide the greater precariousness in education and the budget decrease) and a decolonization framework incorporated into Mexico’s history. In addition, it embraced, as if they were part of Morena’s own lineage, the workers’ and social mobilizations of the previous decades. All these elements were fundamental to pacifying the class struggle, although it did not head off important resistance movements, before, during, and after the pandemic.

This hegemony rested on the weakness of the conservative opposition, which still shows no signs of recovery. This weakness resulted from the organic crisis that began in 2014, which ended up pulverizing the institutional and electoral weight of the three member parties of the Pact for Mexico, as it was called: the PRI, the PAN, and the PRD, all conservative, neoliberal parties that ruled over Mexico for decades. This allowed AMLO’s party, Morena, to win a majority in the Chamber of Deputies and a near majority in the Senate. Thus, Morena is at the center of a true reconfiguration of the party regime that, although it began in 2018, resoundingly defeated the opposition coalition a few months ago. Obradorism has taken advantage of this hegemonic construction to concentrate its power and impose its legislative agenda, heightening the president’s Bonapartist tendencies and those of the armed forces, while reforms such as the judicial reform combine the popular election of judges with the reactionary proposal to establish “faceless judges,” or anonymous judges who rule on gang-related cases. On paper, this seems fair, since the fear of retribution is high in cases involving the cartels. But when this was implemented, famously in Italy in its efforts against the Mafia, it paved the way for corrupt sentences and closed-door deals, eliminating accountability from the judicial process.

Obradorism and the Marginalization of the Workers’ Movement

Obradorism constitutes a watershed in recent political history, particularly since it conquered and co-opted the labor movement and mass movements for the oppressed.

The narrative around AMLO and the discourse he weaponizes revolves around the “people” and the commoner. A grassroots movement was formed through AMLO and his party, one that brought together the expectations and illusions of extensive and broad social sectors. AMLO seeks to maintain a “direct” relationship with this movement, which breaks with the traditional patterns of Mexican politics. Although this went beyond the frontiers of Morena’s party structure, these movements are now subject to a leadership with a bourgeois political and programmatic perspective, which has not questioned the social and economic order of capitalism. Far from it. Although AMLO’s government had massive social and electoral support, many of its gestures and some of its policies—from the social programs to the energy and judicial reforms—generated discomfort in business sectors and U.S. imperialism itself. Yet Obradorism has preserved the profits of the big businessmen and expanded opportunities for transnational corporations, even in state-run industries.

These two points are crucial to explain the new hegemony, without simplifying AMLO’s regime by focusing only on the results of his welfare policy. To recognize the true contours (and limits) of his government’s progressive character, we must uphold the importance of a class-independent strategy as an alternative to building political power, based on the autonomous action of the working class and its alliance with other oppressed sectors. It is important to consider other experiences that arose in the region in previous historical moments, allowing for all circumstances and considering the very different conditions, from the national-popular movements of the 1930s and 1940s—particularly Argentinean Peronism and Cardenism—to the first wave of progressivism that emerged in the political spotlight after 2000.

In the case of Peronism, the subordination of workers’ organizations and the search for autonomy (class independence) were a fundamental political problem that revolutionary socialists faced. From the hegemonic viewpoint of the revolutionary actors, the working class and the oppressed did not aim to overthrow the capitalist regime but instead looked to reform it. As for Cardenism in Mexico’s 1930s, in this era we can find great lessons for the present. For example, the Mexican Communist Party tried to develop a popular front under the leadership of the Party of the Mexican Revolution, headed by Cárdenas, and in doing so they subordinated themselves to it instead of making space for their distinctly Marxist policies. On the other hand, the position proposed by Leon Trotsky and the small nucleus of Marxists organized around his ideas raised the importance of maintaining political and organizational independence from bourgeois parties, with a strategic focus on polemicizing against the latter instead of folding into them.

Nevertheless, there were profound differences between the experience of the workers’ movement under Cárdenas against the imperialist powers, particularly the United States. Cárdenas relied on the workers’ movement and the masses to carry out measures such as the oil and railroad expropriations, creating strong frictions with the imperialist powers. AMLO was far from that. Beyond some diplomatic gestures that sought to establish a sovereign image of the country, he deepened Mexico’s economic integration with the United States and went so far as to claim that the xenophobic and racist Trump was his “friend.”

On the Limits of the Obradorist Hegemony

Every hegemony has limits, even more so when the regional context is one of economic and social instability and developing class struggle. Furthermore, the main imperialist power—which undergirds Mexico’s new investment boom, thirsty for the advantages of “nearshoring”—is in hegemonic decline and is subject to the fluctuations of the international economy, geopolitical upheavals, and its disputes with the looming power of China. A few weeks ago, Mexican financial markets shook at the pace of the Japanese stock market and the widespread fall of international markets, and the peso is no longer at its strongest.

AMLO’s moderate stances during his term—even those seen as progressive—were limited by Mexico’s dependent capitalism and by its increasing integration with the United States. AMLO’s government, contrary to its progressive face, sustained conservative policies that were continuous with neoliberalism; they thus constantly attacked the interests of workers, women, and youth.

One example of this was the precarization of labor, an issue that was not questioned by Obradorism, even the outsourcing reforms, and was redoubled by the administration in the public sector. The same can be said of extractivism and the development of megaprojects, including those proposed for the industrialization of the Southeast, which constitute a process of accumulation by dispossession and is consistent with the big capital’s need to seek out new spaces for capitalist accumulation. Examples include the Mayan Train project, which violates the wishes of the peoples and communities in the Yucatán Peninsula, and the invasions of Canadian and U.S. companies into Mexico’s natural reserves. Those who opposed these policies—as is the case of the EZLN and the indigenous movement of the CNI—were persecuted and repressed, from the assassination of Samir Flores onward.

Issues as elementary, but as necessary and fundamental, as the historical demands of the women’s movement, such as the legalization of abortion, went unaddressed by the government. Meanwhile, femicidal violence continues to rise.

On the other hand, there have been the recent disputes between AMLO and the U.S. embassy, which once again showed the latter’s interventionism. These disputes do not hide the fact that, together with nearshoring, which promises a new whirlpool of investment opportunities for imperialist capital, the demands of the White House around immigration and security policies have been accepted and implemented by AMLO’s administration.

In this sense, militarization is a fundamental aspect of the U.S. relationship, and it clearly corresponds with the subordination of progressivism to the Yankee mandate. Under AMLO, the dominant role of the armed forces expanded, offering great economic benefits and broadening military influence. At the same time, an ideological operation was deployed that presented the armed forces as an armed people, allowing a rehabilitation of their image that neither Peña Nieto nor Calderón had achieved, and that could only be achieved by a “progressive” government.

Throughout this article, we’ve laid out several different aspects of Obradorism’s legacy, on the part of the Left and the critical intelligentsia, aspects that should be part of a real and deep discussion. At a time when many who come from the Left support the 4T project, or avoid criticizing it while participating in its “training schools,” a truly critical position should enter this debate and avoid the ideological justification of an economic, political, and social project that does not bet on breaking the reality of dependence, exploitation, and oppression, which has characterized Mexico for centuries.

The Struggle for a Revolutionary Socialism from Below

In other articles, we have written about the possible perspectives of the incoming government. Bourgeois hegemony can be preserved only if it is based on the passivization and numbness of the masses. Therefore, if this hegemony is broken, it will depend on sectors of workers, youth, and the women’s movement retaking the path of struggle and advancing with a perspective that questions the government, regaining confidence in their forces and in their autonomous and independent action, breaking with their subordination to the bureaucratic leaderships.

The AMLO government had to face demonstrators who put their claims and demands on the streets—education workers (from elementary school to university), state workers, and health workers, among others. Others included the industrial workers in Matamoros, who carried out a great workers’ struggle in 2019, and all who fought for their rights during the pandemic.

Following this path, we are preparing ourselves for new struggles and to progress in organizing ourselves. It is fundamental to open, from the socialist Left, an active debate that does not limit itself to discussing what exists today, but rather places at its center the project of building a socialist future.

AMLO’s progressivism has shown its limits; it is capitalism with a “human face.” It does not pretend to combat the results of this capitalist system of exploitation—such as precariousness, environmental devastation, structural violence against women, or militarization—nor to attack its deep roots, nor to break the deep dependence that subordinates Mexico to the United States. Furthermore, at any hint of economic crisis or danger to the profits of the bankers and industrialists, the working and living conditions of the masses will once again be pushed down by the same progressive government that gave so few benefits in a time of plenty.

In view of this, it is essential to update the socialist perspective. We must wage the struggle for a new social order, based on expropriating large corporations and transnationals and breaking the pacts and agreements that subordinate us (economically, but also politically, militarily, and diplomatically) to the United States or any other imperialist power. Both previous government’s and AMLO’s have led Mexico to become a source of cheap and precarious labor for transnationals, with hundreds of thousands of deaths and disappearances as a result of militarization and femicides.

Our perspective demands a true and radical social transformation that puts the whole economy in the hands of the workers, those who move the levers of production, transportation, communications, and commerce. In this perspective, technology and technological advances are not at the service of rendering us even more precarious, but at the service of living better, working fewer hours, and having the possibility of dedicating more time to leisure, culture, and recreation. We must take up the historical demands of the indigenous peoples, demands that can be met only through the revolutionary alliance of the workers of the cities and the countryside.

This is a socialist perspective from below, based on the democratic organization of the real producers of society, the workers. Together with the peasants and indigenous peoples, we will take all decisions into our hands. We will begin by democratically planning the economy according to the needs of the majority, seeking a balance with nature, and guaranteeing housing, health, education, and culture for all. Other key aspects of this perspective, such as ending repression and respecting the autonomy of indigenous peoples, will also be guaranteed. This will be infinitely superior to the current bourgeois democracy, in which the great majorities can vote only once every three or six years, but without the right to determine any of the fundamental aspects of the economy and society.

To build this material force, we need a political organization anchored in the working class, the youth, and the women’s movement, one that can achieve this goal. It is fundamental to maintain political and organizational independence in the face of Sheinbaum’s new government, as well as in the face of the bourgeois opposition. Likewise, we must bet on the victory of working-class demands, as well as the demands of the peasants, the indigenous peoples, and all the popular sectors, continuing to promote every struggle against the capitalists. We do this in hopes of overcoming the obstacles and truces that the bureaucratic leaderships want to impose.

A socialist perspective can be achieved only on the basis of a social revolution led by the working class together with its allies in the countryside and the city. That alliance will win a government by and for the exploited and oppressed of Mexico, thus retaking the revolutionary struggle begun more than 110 years ago by the insurrectionary peasants of Morelos led by Zapata with the cry of tierra y libertad (land and liberty). This is the essential debate that must be taken up among workers, poor peasants, indigenous peoples, women, and youth: what kind of society we want, and how to fight for it.

This article was originally published in Ideas de Izquierda Mexico on September 8.

Translated by Kimberly Ann.