The assassination of a journalist in Mexico is no longer extraordinary news. It has been normalised and accepted by citizens, authorities and even news workers. After 134 killings since the beginning of the twenty-first century, five of them during the first three months of 2022 (see Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), ‘Journalists and Media Workers Killed in Mexico between 2000 and 2022 − Motive Confirmed or Unconfirmed’), Mexico has become one of the most dangerous places in the world for journalists. However, these murders are just the tip of the iceberg, because anti-press violence is a much more complex and multifaceted phenomenon that involves different aggressors and aggressions.
Celeste González de Bustamante and Jeannine E. Relly have spent more than a decade studying this problem and have published Surviving Mexico: Resistance and Resilience among Journalists in the Twenty-First Century as much more than a mere account of attacks and victims. On the contrary, it is about journalists’ experiences of vulnerability and precariousness and also of resistance and resilience. Drawing on a set of more than 160 interviews with media staff, academics and activists, the aim is to explain the working conditions of news workers who live in – and report from – the most perilous areas of the nation.
Mexico is a large country and cannot be regarded as a homogeneous whole, because there are diverse regions with different levels of development. González de Bustamante and Relly focus on those areas that are distant from the most populous political, economic, cultural and social centres. That is, they pay attention to the peripheries, and even to the ‘double peripheries’, which are extremely marginalised places within the already underdeveloped zones.
It is precisely in those contexts where journalists face the more blatant risks when doing their jobs. This is due to the strong presence of drug cartels, the weak rule of law and the overt collusion between criminals and authorities, to mention just a few conditions. Under these circumstances, news workers have developed a wide array of strategies to cope with the adverse contexts that hinder the adequate performance of their activities. In doing so, they can continue to produce journalistic content despite the unfavourable climate.
The authors define this stance as a process of resistance and resilience. Whereas the first concept involves the challenge and rejection of the actors who constantly try to impede reporters’ work, the second entails the latter's ability to determine several means to promote the free practice of journalism, such as constant training and collaborative reporting. Thus the central argument of the study is that resistance leads to resilience. In other words, rather than simple acquiescence to de facto powers that try to control the information that the public receives, many Mexican journalists confront them with a more professional stance.
The book also delves into the origins of anti-press violence in this country. The authors explain that the so-called transition to democracy that accelerated during the late 1990s − and fostered the arrival of the first president from a different political party to the then-hegemonic Partido Revolucionario Institucional (Institutional Revolutionary Party, PRI) in 2000 − brought about a reconfiguration of power at the regional level. That is, whilst the new federal governments have struggled to exert influence over the country as a whole, state and local authorities have increasingly gained control of their territories. However, more often than not, the rise of these particular strongholds would have not been possible without the help of organised crime.
In many places where cartels and corrupt public servants work in tandem, corruption, impunity and lack of accountability have become the norm. Hence reporters who work for local news outlets and cover stories on authorities’ wrongdoings and/or drug lords’ activities are the most vulnerable. This is because of the ‘bribe or bullet’ logic that determines much of the information that is diffused by media across the Mexican peripheries. That is, news workers are forced to either accept money in exchange for silence or face a serious potential risk of violent retribution if they publish critical reporting. Notwithstanding, it is precisely in those places where the authors also found the seeds of the aforementioned resistance and resilience strategies implemented by journalists.
Besides the comprehensive and thorough research, González de Bustamante and Relly also make a contribution by suggesting a set of specific actions aimed to ameliorate the current levels of anti-press violence in Mexico. They recommend several feasible actions that could be carried out by journalists, such as the integration of networks and communities that foster security and professionalisation. For their part, scholars can improve visibility of their studies on the harsh conditions that news workers face by sharing them with media and non-governmental organisations (NGOs), both domestic and international. Civil society could also be more involved with the defence of press freedom, because it does affect not only reporters, but citizens as well. One key actor that needs to have a more decisive role is government, since it is the power responsible for guaranteeing the rule of law.
In sum, Surviving Mexico: Resistance and Resilience among Journalists in the Twenty-First Century is a much-needed book that offers a wide scope for understanding the endemic violence against Mexican journalists. It will be useful for scholars and journalists interested in understanding the harsh conditions that news workers have to constantly face when doing their jobs. The book's central arguments and discussions are consistent with broader debates on media in the Global South, where emergent democracies struggle with post-authoritarianisms and populisms.
