It always times time for the benefits of structural reforms to materialize, which is why few politicians dare attempt them. “That only makes the courage shown by Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto and his partners all the more impressive,” said Tepperman in an essay published today on the Washington Post.
In the essay, How Mexico's President May Have Rescued His Country, Tepperman argues that the effects of the Pact for Mexico have been outstanding, and that in 2012, several factors had the country, apparently, “stuck in a death-cycle of dysfunction that looked even worse than the one gripping Washington today.”
Jonathan Tepperman is Managing Editor of Foreign Affairs y autor de The Fix: How Nations Survive and Thrive in a World in Decline, from which he his essay is adapted.
Tepperman acknowledges many missteps in his admninistration, such as “his unfathomable decision to invite Donald Trump for a visit in August” but the first two years of his tenure were among the most productive in Mexico’s history.
He specifically talks about the 85 major reforms he was able to pass, which have helped “crack open Mexico’s monopolies, reinvigorate its oil sector, take on its powerful teachers’ unions and revamp its ineffective tax laws… To appreciate the scale of these accomplishments, try to imagine the U.S. Congress passing immigration, tax, banking and campaign finance reform at the same time,” he argues.
“By unshackling the Mexican economy, promoting competition, improving education and easing foreign investment, the reforms have set the stage for serious growth, especially once oil prices, so critical to Mexico’s economy, start to recover.”
He closes by saying that “whatever his faults, and they are many, there’s no denying that Mexico’s president is brave.“