Mexico, Conflict, Authority as Arbiter

Conciliation and Arbitration Boards

Article 123 of the Constitution of 1917, fraction XX: “Las diferencias o los conflictos entre el capital y el trabajo se sujetarán a la decisión de una Junta de Conciliación y Arbitraje” (Differences or conflicts between capital and labor shall be submitted to the decision of a Conciliation and Arbitration Board). The board was formed by an equal number of representatives of workers and of employers, and one of the government.

Workers and employers have the same number of seats. The one remaining seat belongs to the government.

The Arbiter of Social Life

In February 1936, a conflict between employers and workers broke out in Monterrey. President Lázaro Cárdenas traveled to the city. In front of the industrialists, he set out fourteen points on his government’s labor policy.

One point defined the role of the state. Sources give it in slightly different words, among them “el gobierno es el único árbitro y regulador de la vida social” (the government is the only arbiter and regulator of social life). The last point told employers who felt “fatigados por la lucha social” (tired of the social struggle) that they could hand their industries to the workers or to the government.

No Waiting Rooms

In January 1935, President Lázaro Cárdenas visited Morelos. The newspaper El Nacional wrote that people there had found “un medio todavía más eficaz y más rápido que el telégrafo para la formulación de sus quejas” (a means even more effective and faster than the telegraph for making their complaints). “Ni antesalas, ni trámites, ni oficinas” (No waiting rooms, no paperwork, no offices).

At the end of the month, the paper printed a box titled “¡Cómo ver al Presidente!” (How to see the President!) for the thousands who wanted to bring him their complaints. The historian Jacqueline Covo concludes that the box showed “que más vale pasar por los intermediarios” (that it is better to go through the intermediaries).

Envelopes, Notes and Posters

On his tours, President Andrés Manuel López Obrador received requests directly from citizens. In March 2019, the newspaper Eje Central reported: “Las peticiones a López Obrador a veces llegan a gritos, en cartas” (Petitions to López Obrador sometimes arrive shouted, or in letters). “Estos voluntarios van recibiendo sobres, recados y cartulinas” (These volunteers collect envelopes, notes and posters).

Before he took office, his transition team had already received “29,499 documentos con peticiones de la ciudadanía” (29,499 documents with citizens’ petitions), Expansión reported in December 2018.

A Night Meeting at the Palace

In December 2024, Ricardo Monreal and Adán Augusto López, Morena’s leaders in the Chamber of Deputies and in the Senate, were in an open dispute. Adán Augusto was angered by a cut to the Senate’s budget. He had also pointed to possibly irregular contracts from the time when Monreal led the Senate’s governing board.

On the night of December 16, both men went to the National Palace and met President Claudia Sheinbaum. The next morning she said: “Son nuestros adversarios los que hacen grande todo esto pero hay mucha unidad en nuestro movimiento” (It is our opponents who make all this big, but there is a lot of unity in our movement).

Up the Chain of Command

Article 42 of the Law of Discipline of the Army, Air Force and National Guard covers complaints. “El militar que tenga alguna queja en relación con las disposiciones superiores” (The member of the military who has a complaint about orders from above) “podrá acudir ante el superior inmediato” (may go to the immediate superior).

If the superior does not deal with it, the complaint can go higher, step by step, “hasta el Presidente de la República, si es necesario” (up to the President of the Republic, if necessary). The article was added in 2004.