BOOK REVIEW 11: “Staying at the forefront: The challenge of the consulates of Mexico in the United States” (Chp. 11) of Mexican Consular Diplomacy in Trump´s Era.

“Staying at the forefront: The challenge of the consulates of Mexico in the United States,” written by Rafael Laveaga Rendón, is the last chapter that I will review of the book La Diplomacia Consular Mexicana en Tiempos de Trump.

It has been fascinating to learn about the many aspects of Mexico´s Consular Diplomacy presented by highly regarded Mexican Diplomats. I hope it was useful for you too.

Laveaga Rendón starts his essay by stating that it reflects how Mexican consulates work today and how they should continue to operate in the future. He affirms that the chapter´s main objective is to promote a debate about improving and maintaining a top-of-the-line consular network.[i]

Laveaga Rendón divides his essay into six parts:
1. The evolution of the Mexican consular network in the U.S.
2. Deliberations about updating or keeping the current consular configuration.
3. Establishment of political and economic departments in key consulates.
4. Consular offices´ budget administration.
5. Outreach to the Mexican Diaspora.
6. Final thoughts.[ii]

1. The evolution of the Mexican consular network in the U.S.

In this section, Laveaga Rendón briefly describes the expansion of the Mexican consular network in the U.S., starting with the Consulate in New Orleans in 1823 all the way to the end of the 20th century. From an initial focus on commercial issues, consular offices slowly prioritized assistance to its nationals in the country.[iii]

He explains that in the last century, Mexico had to expand its consular network due to the U.S. growing demand for Mexican workers, the Mexican community’s proliferation, and U.S. immigration policies' evolution.[iv]

The negotiation and approval of the North American Free Trade Agreement was a milestone for Mexico´s consular network. In addition to offering traditional services, the consulates have to reach out to politicians, businesspersons, and the general population to promote the trade agreement so that Congress could approve it.[v]

Other challenges were the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, and the hardening of immigration policies at the national, state, and local levels, in addition to growing xenophobic and discriminatory attitudes.[vi]

Mexico´s consular network response was to expand and improve the resources offered to the Mexican community north of the border. It developed and modernized the Consular ID card program[vii] and established the Programa de Asistencia Jurídica a Personas Mexicanas a través de Asesorías Legales Externas en los Estados Unidos de América (Legal Assistant program or PALE).[viii]

2. Deliberations about updating or keeping the current consular configuration.

In this section, Laveaga Rendón focuses on the need to evaluate with objective criteria the adjustments that the consular network requires. As examples, he offers the closing of the Consulate of Mexico in Anchorage, Alaska (in Nov 2015), and the decision not to open one in Hawaii, after a detailed evaluation.[ix]

He highlights the Mobile Consulate program, a consular best practice, and suggests that it could be expanded to optimize scarce resources as part of the consulate network review.[x]

Laveaga Rendón proposes four principles that could be used to decide opening, closing, or relocating a consulate:
a) Size of the Mexican community in the consular district.
b) Vulnerabilities of Mexican, including their location far from consular offices or in areas with anti-immigrant policies.
c) The region´s political, economic, and cultural relevance for Mexico.
d) The consulate´s territorial coverage, directly or via Mobile Consulates.[xi]

3. Establishment of political and economic departments in key consulates.

Laveaga Rendon complains that very few consulates have officers exclusively dedicated to political issues and economic promotion, which he thinks is a problem. He asserts to be successful, besides providing information, the consuls in charge of political affairs and economic promotion require to build a network of contacts. He offers as an example the border consulates that are now working on infrastructure issues and political engagement due to the reduction in consular protection cases.[xii]

The Mexican diplomat proposes identifying every consulate´s specific relevance to determine personnel’s assignment to cover the political and economic promotion departments. Mexico needs to take advantage of its consular network to generate strategic information[xiii], similar to Ambassador Reyna Torres Mendivil´s suggestion made in her chapter of the book. You can read the review here.

4. Consular offices´ budget administration.
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Laveaga Rendón explains the extraordinary resources assigned to the consular network in 2017 as part of the FAMEU strategy and some of its results. However, he identified a few problems, such as:
-Not being flexible enough so that each consulate could administrate it according to the local circumstances.
-The use of funds for only one year, even though the anti-immigrant policies continued.[xiv]

As a solution, he proposes that Mexico´s Treasury Department issues a budget rules exception that applies to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, considering the particular situation of the consulates in the Unites. States. Additionally, he comes up with a significant number of questions regarding budget issues of the different programs and suggests to review to improve its efficiency and effectiveness.[xv]

5. Outreach to the Mexican Diaspora.

Laveaga Rendón writes that “a constant challenge for Mexico’s consulates is to maintain an open and frank communication with its Diaspora”[xvi]. The Mexican community in the U.S. is heterogeneous; therefore, the consulates have to have a differentiated approach according to the region, the age groups, and gender, for example.
He briefly mentions the Red Global MX, a program of the Institute of Mexicans Abroad for high-skill Mexicans overseas.[xvii]

Additionally, the Mexican diplomat explains that the expansion of the responsibilities of the Institute has led to a dispersion of its goals, thus weakening its performance. He proposes to promote the use of Spanish as a critical community outreach activity.[xviii]

He emphasizes that Mexico needs to develop a comprehensive Public Diplomacy strategy to gain the community’s trust and have a real connection with it.[xix]

6. Final thoughts.

Laveaga Rendón declares that Mexico has a vanguard consular network, unique in the whole world resulting from:
i) Its ample presence across the U.S. with 50 offices,
ii) The high number of services that provide,
iii) Its advanced processes,
iv) Variety of duties that performs.[xx]

He also states that Mexico´s assistance to its national overseas is also in the forefront, with an extensive network of legal services providers, partnerships with different organizations, and financial resources for vulnerable Mexicans. It also has a sophisticated administrative structure.[xxi]

Besides, the consulates perform a significant representation work because they maintain communication with U.S. political and economic authorities at all levels. Our best consuls become local public figures with continuous TV and Radio presence, and they are the specialists of issues related to Mexico.[xxii]

Laveaga Rendón closes the chapter by recognizing Mexico´s Consular Diplomacy successes and strengths. He supports the need to evaluate its programs to improve the country´s foreign policy decision-making process.

Besides, he concludes by reiterating the need to define clear criteria to open a consular office, evaluate its activities, establish political and economic promotion offices at key consulates, grant a budget-program exception, and develop differentiated programs to facilitate its contacts with the Mexican Diaspora.[xxiii]

Why is it relevant to read?

Similar to the chapter of Ambassador José Octavio Tripp, Rafael Laveaga Rendón focuses his essay on the challenges Mexico faces to maintain one of the world´s best Consular Diplomacies.

He highlights one of the more successful programs, the Mobile Consulate, that expanded into four different types, which allows the consular network to reach out to communities far away from the consulate’s office. Seeking to be close to its community is one of the main characteristics of Mexico´s Consular Diplomacy.

I agree with Laveaga Rendón´s proposal of assigning personnel that exclusively focuses on political issues and economic promotion, depending on the consulate´s vocation. Having an in-depth knowledge of the local political situation could benefit Mexico´s foreign policy. It is an untapped resource that needs to be fully exploited. The same should happen in regards to economic promotion activities.

Laveaga Rendón emphasizes that Mexico´s Consular Diplomacy is one of the best. However, to prove that it is, there is a need to do a comparative study. It could be fascinating to identify the similarities and differences of several countries regarding consular affairs.


[i] Laveaga Rendón, Rafael, “Mantenerse a la vanguardia: Desafío para los consulados de México en Estados Unidos” in La Diplomacia Consular Mexicana en Tiempos de Trump, 2018, p. 231.
[ii] Ibid. p. 232.
[iii] Ibid. p. 232–234.
[iv] Ibid. p. 233.
[v] Ibid. p. 233.
[vi] Ibid. p. 233–234.
[vii] This program existed since the early 1870s and is contemplated in the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations. Besides the registration, the consulates issued a card to the person that included the local address. In 2002, Mexico started issuing a new card with enhanced security measures that were useful for local authorities and banks. For more information, see Bruno, Andorra, and Storrs, K. Larry, “Consular Identification Cards: Domestic and Foreign Policy Implications, the Mexican Case, and Related Legislation”, Congressional Research Services, updated May 26, 2005.
[viii] Ibid. p. 234.
[ix] Ibid. p. 234–238.
[x] Ibid. p. 238.
[xi] Ibid. p. 238.
[xii] Ibid. p. 238–240.
[xiii] Ibid. p. 241.
[xiv] Ibid. p. 242.
[xv] Ibid. p. 243.
[xvi] Ibid. p. 245.
[xvii] Ibid. p. 245.
[xviii] Ibid. p. 246–247.
[xix] Ibid. p. 247–248.
[xx] Ibid. p. 248.
[xxi] Ibid. p. 249.
[xxii] Ibid. p. 249.
[xxiii] Ibid. p. 250.
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DISCLAIMER: All views expressed on this blog are that of the author and do not represent the opinions of any other authority, agency, organization, employer or company.

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