Contradictions of diasporic institutionalization in Mexican politics: the 2006 migrant vote and other forms of inclusion and control

Abstract

This paper examines patterns and contradictions involved in the institutionalization of the relationship between Mexico and its diaspora, with special focus on the migrant vote for president from abroad in 2006. While migrants have made increasing, and increasingly successful, demands for political inclusion, and have succeeded in becoming part of Mexico's imagined political community, the institutionalization of their inclusion has been done in ways that control and limit migrant influence. These measures of inclusion include migrant participation in Mexican state entities such as the Institute of Mexicans Abroad, and in state and local politics, and the granting in 2005 of a key citizenship right, the right to vote from abroad for president. However, the implementation of the right to vote made it a largely symbolic right in 2006. Limits on other practices, like running for office, also exist. All this may suggest limits to the extent to which the political class will accommodate migrants’ demands for inclusion. The paper examines specifically diasporic institutionalization during three periods in the history of the movement seeking the migrant vote: before Vicente Fox's 2000 election; during the first five years of his presidency, until the migrant vote law was passed in 2005; and during the 2006 election season. Related methods of diasporic political practice are also analysed.