ABSTRACT
Mexican drug-trafficking organisations originated in the 1970s, trafficking cocaine from South America and marijuana crops from Mexico to the United States. In 2000, Mexico’s dominant Institutional Revolutionary Party lost national elections for the first time in 70 years. Political turnover at the state and local levels unravelled many unofficial pacts between the cartels and government representatives, leading to an increase in cartel violence. The most significant change in the conflict between the DTOs and the state in 2022 was the renewed collaboration between the US and Mexico and the increased reliance on the Mexican military to provide public security. As the high-level strategic changes are implemented throughout Mexico’s public-security infrastructure, cartels continue to take on the lowest and highest levels of government.
