Oct. 15 — ASU Latin American Studies to present via Zoom ‘Surviving Mexico — Resistance and Resilience Among Journalists in the Twenty-First Century

Since 2000, more than 150 journalists have been killed in Mexico. Today the country is one of the most dangerous in the world in which to be a reporter. In Surviving Mexico, Celeste González de Bustamante and Jeannine E. Relly examine the networks of political power, business interests, and organized crime that threaten and attack Mexican journalists, who forge ahead despite the risks. Amid the crackdown on drug cartels, overall violence in Mexico has increased, and journalists covering the conflict have grown more vulnerable. Both criminal groups and government forces want reporters out of the way. Journalists are targeted in order to shield corrupt authorities and the very criminals they are supposed to be fighting. Journalists have now turned to one another and to their communities to resist pressures and create their own networks of resilience. Drawing on a decade of rigorous research in Mexico, González de Bustamante and Relly explain how journalists have become their own activists and how they hold those in power accountable.