Police departments across Mexico maintain user-pays police forces that provide protection for a fee. This qualitative study examines the Cuerpos de Seguridad Auxiliares del Estado de México (CUSAEM), one of the largest, most notorious user-pays police forces in the country. While the CUSAEM is a remnant of Mexico’s authoritarian past, I argue that the state has adapted its practices to the contemporary era by maintaining the force’s ambiguous legal status to exploit the growing market for security and shield itself from accountability. Thus, we see how states are not naturally threatened by the rise of the private security market but can instead benefit from it to the detriment of competing private security firms. Moreover, this study highlights the importance of analyzing plural policing cases in the Global South and emphasizes the need to consider authoritarian and colonial legacies when evaluating contemporary public–private security relationships.
AbrahamsenR.WilliamsM. C. (2011). Security beyond the state: Private security in international politics. Cambridge University Press.
2.
AlvaradoA. (2012). El Tamaño del infierno: Un estudio sobre la criminalidad en la zona metropolitana de la Ciudad de México [The size of hell: A study of criminality in the metropolitan area of Mexico City]. El Colegio de México.
3.
ArguetaO. (2012). Private security in Guatemala: Pathway to its proliferation. Bulletin of Latin American Research, 31(3), 320–335.
4.
AylingJ.GraboskyP.ShearingC. (2012). Lengthening the arm of the law: Enhancing police resources in the twenty-first century. Cambridge University Press.
5.
AylingJ.ShearingC. (2008). Taking care of business: Public police as commercial security vendors. Criminology & Criminal Justice, 8(1), 27–50.
BakerB. (2007). Multi-choice policing in Africa. Nordic Africa Institute.
8.
BensonB. (1998). To serve and protect: Privatization and community in criminal justice. New York University Press.
9.
BlackstoneE. A.HakimS. (2013). Competition versus monopoly in the provision of police. Security Journal, 26, 157–179.
10.
BlackstoneE. A.HakimS.MeehanB. (Eds.). (2023). Handbook on public and private security. Springer Nature.
11.
CarrM. (2016). Public-private partnerships in national cyber-security strategies. International Affairs, 92(1), 43–62.
12.
ChakrabortyI.DeshmukhR. (2024). Private security market by service (manned security, electronic security, cash handling services, and others), and end user (residential, commercial, industrial, and government): Global opportunity analysis and industry forecast, 2023-2032. Allied Market Research.
DavisD. (2009). Non-state armed actors, new imagined communities, and shifting patterns of sovereignty and insecurity in the modern world. Contemporary Security Policy, 30(2), 221–245.
15.
DavisD. (2010a). Policing and populism in the Cardenas and Echeverria administrations. KiddleM.MuñozM. L. (Eds.), Populism in twentieth century Mexico: The residencies of Lazaro Cardenas and Luis Echeverria (pp. 135–158). University of Arizona Press.
16.
DavisD. (2010b). The political and economic origins of violence and insecurity in contemporary Latin America: Past trajectories and future prospects. In GoldsteinD.AriasD. (Eds.), Violent democracies in Latin America: Toward an interdisciplinary reconceptualization (pp. 25–62). Duke University Press.
17.
De WaardJ. (1999). The private security industry in international perspective. European Journal on Criminal Policy and Research, 7, 143–174.
18.
DelloraD.BeckL. (2021). Imposing fees for polices services in Australia. Griffith Law Review, 30(2), 313–336.
Flores-MacíasG. (2018). Mexico’s PRI: The resilience of an authoritarian successor party and its consequences for democracy.In LoxtonJ.MainwaringJ. (Eds.), Life after dictatorship: Authoritarian successor parties worldwide (pp. 257–283). Cambridge University Press.
GarlandD. (1996). The limits of the sovereign state: Strategies of crime control in contemporary society. British Journal of Criminology, 36(4), 445–471.
26.
Gobierno del Estado de México [The State of Mexico Government]. (2006). Reglamento Interior de la Agencia de Seguridad Estatal [Internal Regulations of the State Security Agency].
27.
Gobierno del Estado de México [The State of Mexico Government]. (2010). Reglamento Interior de la Agencia de Seguridad Estatal [Internal Regulations of the State Security Agency].
28.
Gobierno del Estado de México [The State of Mexico Government]. (2013). Reglamento Interior de la Agencia de Seguridad Estatal [Internal Regulations of the State Security Agency].
29.
Gobierno del Estado de México [The State of Mexico Government]. (2015). Reglamento Interior de la Agencia de Seguridad Estatal [Internal Regulations of the State Security Agency].
30.
GoethemE. V.EastonM. (2021). Public-private partnerships for information sharing in the security sector: What’s in it for me?Information & Security: An International Journal, 48, 21–35.
HugginsM. K. (2000). Urban violence and police privatization in Brazil: Blended invisibility. Social Justice, 27(2), 113–134.
33.
KinosianS.BosworthJ. (2018). Security for sale: Challenges and good practices in regulating private military and security companies in Latin America. Inter-American Dialogue.
34.
KitchensJ. W. (1967). Some considerations on the Rurales of Porfirian Mexico. Journal of Inter-American Studies, 9(3), 441–455.
35.
LaRoseA. P.MaddanS. A. (2009). Reforming La Policía: Looking to the future of policing in Mexico. Police Practice and Research, 10(4), 333–348.
LippertR. K.WalbyK. (2013). Police moonlighting revisited: The case of “pay duty” in three Canadian police services. Policing: A Journal of Policy and Practice, 7(4), 370–378.
39.
LippertR. K.WalbyK. (2020). A criminology of policing and security frontiers. Bristol University Press.
40.
Los ingresos anuales del CUSAEM pueden ser de 3 mil 500 millones de pesos o más [The annual income of the CUSAEM may be 3.5 billion pesos or more]. (2024, August12). AD Noticias. https://adnoticias.mx/director-cusaem-ingresos/
41.
LozanoR.HijarM.ZuritaB.HernándezP.ÁvilaL.BravoM. L.RamírezT. J.CarilloC.AyalaC.LópezB. E. (2000). Capital lesionada: Violencia en Ciudad de México [Wounded capital: Violence in Mexico City]. In LondoñoJ. LGaviriaA.GuerreroR. (Eds.), Asalto al desarrollo: Violencia en América Latina [Assault on development: Violence in Latin America] (pp. 205–232). Banco Americano de Desarollo.
42.
Luna HernandezJ. G. (2017). Los Cuerpos Auxiliares de Seguridad Pública del Estado de México y las afectaciones al derecho de acceso a la información pública y a la protección de datos personales [The Auxiliary Security Corps of The State of Mexico and the impacts on the right of access to public information and the protection of personal data]. Estudios En Derecho a La Información, 4, 79–91.
43.
McFarlaneA. (1996). Political corruption and reform in Bourbon Spanish America. In LittleW.Posado-CarbóE. (Eds.), Political corruption in Europe and Latin America (pp. 41–63). Nt. Martin’s Press.
44.
MeehanB.BensonB. L. (2017). Does private security affect crime? A test using state regulations as instruments. Applied Economics, 49(48), 4911–4924.
45.
MirandaA. (2011, October12). Ley de seguridad: CUSAEM, regulados por el ejecutivo [Security law: CUSAEM regulated by the executive]. El Universal (Estado de México).
PuckL. (2021). The state in private security: Examining Mexico City’s complementary police. Democracy and Security, 18(1), 1–25.
53.
PuckL. (2023). Incorporating non-state security actors into public security: Mexico’s failed experiment. In BlackstoneE.HakimS.MeehanB. (Eds.), Handbook on public and private security (pp. 175–192). Springer Nature.
SoiferH. D. (2012). Measuring state capacity in contemporary Latin America. Revista de Ciencia Política, 32(3), 585–598.
58.
TheodoreN.MartinN.HollonR. (2006). Securing the city: Emerging markets in the private provision of security services in Chicago. Social Justice, 33(3 (105)), 85–100.
59.
ThorburnM. (2010). Reinventing the nightwatchman state?The University of Toronto Law Journal, 60(2), 425–443.
VillamilJ. (2014). CUSAEM, la “mina de oro” de Peña Nieto [CUSAEM, Peña Nieto’s gold mine]. Unpublished manuscript.
65.
VolinzL. (2018). Crafting and reinforcing the state through security privatisation: Territorialisation as a public–private state project in East Jerusalem. Policing and Society, 29(9), 1077–1090.
66.
WatsonD.AminS. N.WallaceW. C.AkinlabiO.Ruiz-VásquezJ. C. (2023). Continuity and change in policing the Global South. In WatsonD.AminS. N.WallaceW. C.AkinlabiO.Ruiz-VásquezJ. C. (Eds.), Policing the Global South: Colonial legacies, pluralities, partnerships, and reform (pp. 381–386). Routledge.
67.
WhiteA. (2010). The politics of private security regulation, reform and re-legitimation. Palgrave Macmillan.
