U.S. Officials Undaunted by Mexico Vote

WASHINGTON —  For more than half a century, U.S. policymakers have had a relatively easy time dealing with Mexico: One political party dominated its governments like a towering eagle. Americans could bicker and bargain with a single font of power.

That dominance has dissipated in the aftermath of Sunday’s elections. Two other political parties have emerged as rival powerhouses, and Washington will now have to take their views into account when formulating policy.

“The voices are going to be more complex,” said Kenneth Maxwell of the Council on Foreign Relations in New York. “It’s going to be a learning experience.”

Yet American officials are not bemoaning that learning experience; they supported the democratic reforms that led to the widespread rejection of the long-omnipotent Institutional Revolutionary Party, or PRI, in the elections. Analysts outside government, who tend to be just as supportive of the reforms, betray little or no worry as well.

State Department spokesman Nicholas Burns reflected that positive mood Tuesday, telling reporters that the United States is “very pleased” with the elections. “It was a great day for democracy in Mexico,” he said.

Burns pooh-poohed concerns about dealing with a Mexican executive branch controlled by one party while the legislature finds itself in the hands of the opposition.

“We have a lot of experience” with divided governments, he said. “Let’s start with our own government, the United States. That’s what we have. That’s what the French government has. Governments all around the world have it. This is nothing unusual.”

Still, “there’s a difference between anticipating it and actually having to live it,” Maxwell said.

One question is whether Washington will have to deal with a new wave of anti-Americanism generated by competitive politicians hunting for votes. This has not happened so far, and many analysts believe it will not in the future.

“I think the day of the anti-American card in Mexico has passed,” said Mark Falcoff of the American Enterprise Institute, a Washington think tank. “Clinton doesn’t make a good villain. . . . After all, everyone knows he bailed out Mexico.”

Falcoff was referring to the $12.5-billion loan package that President Clinton put together in 1995 to help Mexico out of its financial crisis.

While agreeing with Falcoff, Riordan Roett of the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies said the United States supported democratic reforms even though “one of the aspects that we knew would happen would be a far more pugnacious Mexican Congress.”

Roett, who was in Mexico observing the elections, quickly added, however, that this Congress will be “no more pugnacious than our own.”

But analysts do expect some Mexican politicians to fill the air soon with slashing attacks on the North American Free Trade Agreement. Although that debate will focus on whether NAFTA helps or hurts Mexico, the opposition routinely incorporates anti-Americanism into its attacks, insisting that Mexico must free itself from dependence on the U.S. economy.

This rhetoric is expected to come from members of the leftist Democratic Revolution Party, or PRD, led by Cuauhtemoc Cardenas, who won a stunning victory in the first election for the powerful post of mayor of Mexico City. Although Cardenas has muted his criticism of the treaty, several members of his party still berate it.

But the PRD appears to have won only 26% of the vote for congressional deputies, and the Senate, the only body with the power to abrogate a treaty, is still under the firm control of the PRI.

“The attack on NAFTA for the time being can only be an attack in words,” said Nora Lustig of the Brookings Institution in Washington.

Although analysts hail the elections as historic, they warn U.S. policymakers not to read too much into the returns, many of which are not yet official.

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Falcoff of the American Enterprise Institute observed that in Mexico City, Cardenas won “an election to punish the PRI. Cardenas was the candidate who said, ‘If you want to send them a message, elect me.’ ”

In fact, final congressional returns are expected to presage a spirited three-way battle for the presidency in 2000. Though it lost its majority, the PRI still won 39% of the vote. The conservative National Action Party, or PAN, came in second with 27%, a percentage point ahead of the PRD.

“The next three years will tell us a lot more than we know now,” said Peter Hakim of the Inter-American Dialogue, a Washington-based public policy research group. “The real structure of Mexican politics changes only when the presidency changes hands. We don’t quite know how things are going to work out. This only points the way.”

Hakim pointed out that, although the PRI seems to have lost its popularity, President Ernesto Zedillo has not. So the PRI could reassert itself. “These elections could imply a major tectonic shift in Mexico,” Hakim said. “But we will have to wait and see.”