In July 2024, Expansión reported that Claudia Sheinbaum would bring eight people from her time as head of government of Mexico City into her federal cabinet.
Among them were Rosa Icela Rodríguez, her first secretary of government in the capital, and Omar García Harfuch, whom she named the city’s security secretary in 2019. Ernestina Godoy had led the city’s prosecutor’s office. Jesús Esteva had run its public works ministry since the start of her administration in December 2018.
In 2022, the polling firm Ipsos asked adults in 30 countries whether most people can be trusted. In Mexico, 23 percent said yes.
INEGI’s National Survey of Civic Culture of 2020 measured trust on a scale from zero to ten, “como en la escuela” (as in school). It asked about three groups separately: “la mayoría de las personas” (most people), “la mayoría de las personas que conoce personalmente” (most of the people one knows personally) and the people who live in one’s neighborhood.
In February 2022, El Financiero reported that family businesses make up 90 percent of the business units in Mexico. The newspaper attributed the figure to INEGI data and to specialists, without citing a table.
Sobremesa is the time spent talking at the table after a meal is over. Mexico News Daily calls it “a cultural tradition ingrained in Mexican culture.” A guest who gets up and leaves as soon as the food is finished will seem rude.
At a business meal, the article notes, “the sobremesa can be the weightiest part.”
On September 25, 2023, the business columnist Mauricio Candiani asked in El Financiero: “¿Invitarías a tu jefe a cenar a tu casa?” (Would you invite your boss to dinner at your home?). His answer was yes, “pero nunca forzada o conveniencieramente” (but never forced or for convenience). “Soy partidario de la socialización en casa” (I am in favor of socializing at home).
At work, he argued, it pays “construir puentes de armonía, confianza y entendimiento” (to build bridges of harmony, trust and understanding). He also drew a line: “Una cosa es gozar de un jefe cercano y otra es confundir cercanía con amistad” (It is one thing to enjoy a close boss and another to confuse closeness with friendship).
Confianza means trust. It also means familiarity between people.
De confianza, a person one can rely on, or a close and intimate one.
En confianza, in private, between people who trust each other.
Agarrar confianza, to grow at ease with someone over time.
Pásale, con confianza, “come in, make yourself at home,” said to a guest.
Tomarse confianzas, to take liberties, to act with more familiarity than the relationship allows.
Más vale malo por conocido que bueno por conocer. “Better the bad one you know than the good one you have yet to know.”
In February 2015, a telephone poll of 600 adults by the firm GCE asked Mexicans to match popular sayings with the political parties. 51 percent matched this one to the PRI.
In an article in the Revista Mexicana de Sociología, the sociologist Héctor Castillo Berthier described the traders of La Merced, the Mexico City market that preceded the Central de Abasto. The traders followed customary norms rather than formal law. They kept “un riguroso código de honor,” a strict code of honor, and their deals were not made in writing, with notes and receipts.
The large wholesalers extended credit to the smaller traders, and the credit bound the smaller traders to them.