Living in Fear: The Dynamics of Extortion in Mexico’s Criminal Insurgency

• In Event: Violence against Civilians and Legitimacy in Latin America

Abstract

This paper provides an account of the strategies of extortion and co-optation used by drug trafficking organizations (DTOs) toward civil society in Mexico. Our theoretical approach focuses on levels of territorial contestation among armed actors to explain variation in co-opting or coercing civil society. Through the use of list experiments in nationally representative surveys, the paper measures extortion and assistance by DTOs in Mexico. Using both original and available measures of contestation and DTOs’ territorial control, we find that drug-traffickers tend to restrict predation when they have monopolistic control over a territory. In these scenarios, "narcos" exert lower levels of extortion and even citizens resort to them for "help when facing a serious problem". Cartel behavior towards society changes in the disputed territories. In those areas, the competition for plazas and drug-trafficking routes is associated with greater levels of extortion and increasingly predatory behavior. These results suggest that territorial contestation is an important determinant of civilian abuse and DTO’s legitimacy among civil society during drug wars.

Authors

• Gustavo Adolfo Robles, Stanford University

• Beatriz Magaloni, Stanford University

• Aila M. Matanock, University of California-Berkeley

• Vidal Romero, ITAM

• Alberto Diaz-Cayeros, Stanford University