The 2000-mile border between the United States and Mexico separates two inseparable countries. Through periods of rocky diplomatic relations, U.S. economic presence in Mexico has remained steady. On January 1, 1994, the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) introduced another factor in the already complex relationship between the U.S. and Mexico. The tri-national agreement between the U.S., Mexico and Canada was promoted in Mexico as an essential step in the path toward "sustainable development." Yet while trade between the US and Mexico more than doubled in just the first four years of NAFTA, the agreement has done little to create better living conditions for the majority of Mexicans. More than a decade later, many of NAFTA's environmental and social promises have yet to be realized.

In 1992, in preparation for NAFTA, President Salinas threw salt into a deep Mexican wound by repealing existing agrarian reform legislation, and allowing communal ejido lands to be sold off, rented, or dissolved entirely. Salinas’s reforms corresponded with a broader economic liberalization package, continued now under President Fox, to attract foreign investors and integrate Mexico into the global economy. Land distribution programs were discontinued and small farmers lost access to credit and state price supports, all while Mexico became flooded with cheap corn, beans and sugar from the United States. Mexico today is a net importer of basic grains. This “crisis in the countryside,” as it is known in Mexico, has sparked a new wave of urban migration.

Today, American companies control 90% of Mexican maquiladora (an export-oriented assembly factory) ‘mother’ or ‘hub’ corporations. The maquila sector has grown significantly since NAFTA, with factory jobs that had previously been concentrated along the northern border expanding to other parts of the country. However, the less industrialized states of southern Mexico (also some of the most acutely hit by the agricultural crisis) have seen little of this maquila development. Campesinos from these poor Mexican states continue migrating in search of employment to factories of northern Mexico and across the border into the United States. Meanwhile, plans continue on an initiative to develop industry in the areas of the country with the greatest outward migration. This development project, known as the “Plan Puebla-Panama” would expand maquilas, and the infrastructure necessary to support them, to the southern part of Mexico.

The neo-liberal policies briefly outlined above have had tremendous effects on the economic livelihood and human rights of Mexicans. On January 1,1994, the day NAFTA went into effect, the Zapatista Army for National Liberation (EZLN), comprised almost entirely of indigenous people from Chiapas, rose up against the government. Other organizations like the faith-based Las Abejas, or The Bees, dedicated to non-violence, arose to demand their right as indigenous peoples to self-determination, social justice and peace – rights they feel they’ve been denied for 500 years. Mestizo campesino organizations have also continued to fight for land rights, such as the OCEZ, the Organización de Campesinos Emiliano Zapata (Emiliano Zapata Organization of Campesinos).

Perhaps the most irrefutable effect NAFTA has had on North America is the way it has brought the continent together toward a common, but irregularly defined, goal of bettering our economies, land, and quality of life. In a sense, NAFTA (along with the proposed Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA) and Plan Puebla Panama) has united many policy makers, economists, scholars, and activists as a regional focus for debates and development dialogues. As Witness for Peace delegates to Mexico, we were in a unique position to better understand free-trade development models and to serve as an informed advocate for international solidarity.

We were in Mexico during the 2006 presidential elections, a very excited and turbulent time for Mexico. The main presidential candidates were Roberto Madrazo (from the PRI, the Institutional Revolutionary Party), Felipe Calderón (representing the PAN, Fox´s National Action Party), and Andrés Manuel López Obrador (from the PRD, the Democratic Revolutionary Party). In 2000, then PAN presidential candidate Vicente Fox was elected to the presidency, breaking a 71 year long presidential rule by the PRI. Current polls show Felipe Calderón, from the pro-business PAN party, with a slight lead over Andrés Manuel López Obrador, who is thought to be a more left-leaning candidate. It was sure to be a tough fight right down to Election Day, July 2, 2006. The Zapatistas (EZLN) were also underway with la Otra Campaña (the Other Campaign), a grassroots caravan visiting the entire Mexican republic, in which Subcomandante Marcos, as Delegado Zero (Delegate Zero) held conferences with civil society members to hear their concerns and struggles, all in an effort to create a movement from the bottom up and from the left to make radical change. The Otra Campaña says that all of the political parties are the same, and real change will only come from a grassroots movement from the people.