Michel Luna Thesis Draft

The EU’s Normative Power: An Alternative Approach to the Mexican War on Drugs

This thesis will focus on the case study of the Mexican War on Drugs, specifically on the current Mexico-United Statesof America joint hard power strategy towards attempting to solve the conflict. Since December 1st 2006 when the then newly elected President of Mexico, Felipe Calderon Hinojosa, took power hedeclared a War on Drugs. This decision was supported by the USA and ten days later the Calderon Administration launched its first operation in order to “liberate” Michoacán from the drug cartels.
Since thatday until now, the death toll of the War on Drugs has risen to 68,000 people killed, 10,000 people disappeared and over 1.6 million people displaced. (Proceso, 12-2011).
The Mexico-USA strategy wasestablished in 2007 with the creation of the Merida Initiative through which the USA would help finance the War on Drugs in Mexico and also aid in developing what would be the hard power approach thathas led to the complete militarization of Mexico. The current hard power strategy is based on “violently securitizing” Mexico through numerous military operations with the aim at curving drugtrafficking related activities and ultimately decreasing the drug flow towards the USA.
Furthermore, the presence of the Mexican military in every day civilian life has led to a systematic violation ofhuman rights and basic freedoms, something that has infuriated and concerned national and international human rights organizations as well as the European Union for the violation of their 2010 StrategicPartnership Agreement.
This project will therefore look at the role the European Union has with regards to the War on Drugs, more concretely at the Normative Power nature of the EU and how the corenorms and values that comprise the acquis communautaire and the acquis politique of the Union, can be utilized in order to develop a comprehensive strategy with the aim at a long term solution for the...