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Friday 3 September 2010 19.04 BST

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/sep/03/mexico-war-drugs-violence

Fear as the old troubles remain unsolved while the country reels from the worst wave of violence since the revolution

Ten years ago Mexico completed a velvet transition to democracy after 71 years of one-party rule with the opposition winning an uncontested victory in presidential elections and the economy growing at 6.6%. There were still many problems, not least the poverty affecting half the population, acute degrees of inequality, lingering guerilla conflicts, and a worrying number of kidnappings. But there was a sense and an expectation that things were going to get better.

Today that optimism has transformed into depression and fear as the old troubles remain unsolved while the country reels from the worst wave of violence since the revolution a century ago.

More than 28,000 people have died in Mexico's drug wars since President Felipe Calderón launched a military-led offensive against the cartels upon taking office in December 2006, and there seems no end in sight.

Explanations for the country's decline differ vastly. Calderón says he had no choice but to go after the cartels with all the force of the state because the negligence and collusion of previous governments had allowed them to take silent control of significant parts of the country. The vast majority of the deaths, he insists, are the result of turf wars between the criminals. Although he admits that his offensive has triggered an intensification of the violence, he argues this is a sign that they are self-destructing under the pressure.

"The conflicts weaken these groups even if they generate enormous nervousness and unease in society," he said in his state of the nation address on Thursday. "We must battle on."

Others link the mayhem to the demise of semi-authoritarian one-party rule that, however corrupt, was able to set some limits on organised crime. "In the old days the correlation of forces favoured the state," says drug trafficking historian and sociologist Luis Astorga. "Today the struggle for hegemony among drug traffickers is taking place without a referee."

Some analysts prefer to emphasise that the main change over the past two decades has been the transformation of Mexican drug traffickers from lackeys of Colombian cocaine cartels to the most powerful criminals in the continent.

Their portfolios have diversified, so that they now smuggle the whole range of illegal drugs destined for the US, supply a growing domestic market and have become key players in criminal activities from people smuggling to kidnapping. This has made controlling whole territories more important, and that requires more firepower.

For yet others, the key trigger was a series of high-profile arrests beginning in 2002 that destroyed the underworld equilibrium. The violence will subside, they say, once a new one is established. Scot Stewart, of the global intelligence company Stratfor, believes there are signs that Sinaloa cartel leader Joaquín El Chapo Guzmán, has formed a potentially winning coalition with smaller cartels that could wipe out his main enemies, the Zetas.

Then there are the many critics of Calderón's offensive within Mexico who argue its reliance on military tactics has made things much worse. The failure to pay as much attention to money laundering, political corruption and poverty has, the argument goes, not only triggered more violence but also encouraged the cartels to penetrate ever deeper into society.

Organised crime expert Edgar Buscaglia, a leading critic of Calderón, calls it the "Afghanistanisation of Mexico". In recent months Calderón has tacitly admitted that his strategy has holes and has begun calling for the creation of a broad consensus on the best route out of the horror. It isn't yet clear whether this new focus can turn Mexico's fortunes around. What isn't in doubt is that many more people will die before we find out.