| | |  News Around the Republic of Mexico 
Mexican NGOs, Hard Up and Under Threat
 Emilio Godoy - Inter Press Service
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August 14, 2010
 |  | Among civil society, organisations working for human rights have been hit hardest by drug-related violence, but other NGOs have been affected as well. |  | | |
Mexico City - Public safety is the top concern of Mexico's civil society organisations, but shortage of money is hampering their work, according to a study released this week in the capital.
"Modern societies need a strong, well-organised and participative civil society," Jorge Villalobos, one of the authors of the study and the executive head of the Centro Mexicano para la Filantropía (CEMEFI), a non-governmental organisation (NGO) devoted to fostering social commitment and responsibility, told IPS.
Three hundred and fifty Mexican NGOs participated in the study on the state of Mexican civil society, presented Thursday, which reported an overall score of 40 on a scale ranging from zero, representing no civil society at all, to 100, representing a highly developed civil society.
The score indicates that the present state of Mexican civil society is far from ideal.
The scoring system, an amalgam of several indicators, has been used in more than 55 countries since 2000, and is part of a project by CIVICUS: World Alliance for Citizen Participation - an international network of trade unions, NGOs, professional associations, and philanthropic and donor foundations.
The CIVICUS Civil Society Index for Mexico, developed by CEMEFI and the non-governmental Citizen Initiative for the Promotion of a Culture of Dialogue (ICPCD), assessed civic commitment, organisational level, democratic values and social and political impact of the non-governmental sector by means of surveys of NGOs, civil society actors and stakeholders and the general population.
The work was financed by the U.S. Kellogg Foundation and the British embassy in Mexico.
One of the main findings was that 70 percent of respondents said NGOs make a great difference to the approach to public insecurity.
"Security has become an issue for NGOs across the board, because it affects the entire population, so regardless of their work focus, they have to deal with it," José Piña, the head of Fundación Nuevo Milenio, which disseminates civic culture and observes elections, told IPS.
Along with the survey, eight workshops were held in different regions of the country, and five case studies were presented, one of which analysed the working environment of NGOs in the northern state of Chihuahua, one of the areas most affected by drug-related violence.
NGOs expressed their fears about the high levels of violence in the state, which is the site of turf wars among drug cartels because of its proximity to the United States, the world's largest market for drugs.
After taking office in December 2006, conservative President Felipe Calderón ordered thousands of troops on to the streets to combat drug traffickers, and drug-related violence has spiralled.
Among civil society, organisations working for human rights have been hit hardest by the violence, but other NGOs have been affected as well.
On Jul. 19 the bodies of Antonio Hernández and Arturo Lavín, who worked with Habitat for Humanity Mexico, a housing action organisation, were found in Hidalgo state, about 100 kilometres northeast of the Mexican capital.
The double murder was discussed at the Technical Consultative Council on the Federal Law to Foment the Activities of Civil Society Organisations, in force since 1994, which regulates access by NGOs to government funding. The Council asked the authorities for information about the crime as a basis for analysis.
"The government and NGOs can work together for causes that are in the public interest," Elio Villaseñor, head of ICPCD, told IPS.
Close to 43 percent of the NGOs interviewed for the CIVICUS index reported loss of income, while 23 percent said their incomes had increased.
Twenty-two percent of NGOs said they received funding from the government, and 23 percent obtained funds from private donations.
Public funding represents less than nine percent of the total incomes of NGOs, María Verduzco of the NGO Alternativas y Capacidades, the author of a study on public financing of civil society organisations, told IPS.
This study focused on the National Social Development Institute's (INDESOL) social co-investment programme, overseen by the Social Development Ministry, which received applications from more than 3,000 projects in 2009 and supported 1,589 projects with an average subsidy of 15,700 dollars, for a total of over 236 million dollars.
The national budget allocation for NGOs has varied over the last few years. In 2007 it was about 173 million dollars, rising in 2008 to nearly 380 million dollars before falling last year.
"Civil society organisations are still fragile in terms of their composition, because most of the people who work in them are unpaid volunteers, or people who have precarious jobs," says the CIVICUS Index report, which also found diversity and plurality among the NGOs.
There are about 30,000 NGOs in Mexico, most of them faith-based, but only 9,000 are registered with INDESOL (registration is voluntary). They work in a wide range of areas, from care for the elderly and fighting poverty to promoting education, health and human rights.
"One of the challenges is to mobilise more public and private resources. We must find a way of professionalising what civil society does, and making it more visible," said Villalobos.
Some 15 private foundations in Mexico handle assets worth billions of dollars, and donate the returns for the public good, according to CEFEMI. Among them are foundations financed by Mexican magnate Carlos Slim, who according to the U.S. magazine Forbes is the richest man in the world.
"Although INDESOL's social co-investment programme is in many ways an improvement, it still has flaws, which mean that the results do not strengthen the sector. NGOs are not being encouraged to be self-supporting," Verduzco concluded.
"Instead of a single policy to promote civil society, there are several uncoordinated patchwork policies," Piña complained.
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