Mexico Legal System

Mexico’s official name is the United Mexican states. Mexico’s current political system derives from the Constitution of 1917, which arose from the Mexican Revolution. The Constitution captures the ideals of the Revolution and reflects three centuries of Spanish colonial rule. The Constitution protects the rights of workers, peasants, and organizations. It guarantees the right to have an eight-hour workday, rights for women and children workers, and rights for minimum wage being sufficient enough to satisfy the necessities of life. In order to make a change to the constitution requires there needs to be the approval of both houses of the federal legislature and the approval of at least 17 of the 32 state legislatures. Mexico’s political system

Civil law is the dominant legal system in over 150 countries worldwide, including Spain and Mexico. Civil law begins with a body of abstractly written principles that constitute rules of law. The role of judges, attorney, and Notarios Público is to assure that all documents, deeds, wills, contacts, etc.—conform to the rules of law laid down in the applicable legal code. The Constitution of 1917 is the apex of Mexico’s legal system. After the devastating violence of the Mexican Revolution, this Constitution was created in response to nationalistic demands. The Mexican Constitution is based on seven basic principles: human rights, sovereignty, division of powers, the representative system, a federal structure, constitutional remedy and the supremacy of the state over the Church. It is as an instrument to be used to bring about social change. The government is very active in the national economy and promotes change through ownership, regulations and legislation. Mexico, belonging to the civil legal tradition, has five basic codes sustained in their legal system. The Civil Code, which is present every step in the lives of Mexicans. It is also present in the lives of foreigners when they engage in certain acts or transactions inside Mexico; namely, those pertaining to family law, personal and real property, and a variety of major contracts, trusts and estates. The Penal Code is an orderly set of legislation on criminal

This means that Mexico is development a competitive field in trade and investment with internationally accepted rules. When moving to Mexico any company many run into legal issues and risks. To begin with, free-trade agreements and other international agreements don’t solve all issues. With or without NAFTA, Mexico will still be suffering from corruption, broken roads/highways, environmental messes, and history with deep state involvement in the economy. Companies already in Mexico’s market will face, the competitive forces of preexisting large and successful corporations. Even though there are lower tariffs, which can open up sales and investment opportunities, companies will still battle to compete with organizations from the United Sates (U.S., Asia, etc.). Low wages found in Mexico are usually in maquiladoras, factories near the U.S. border that employ Mexican workers to assemble products to export. As for Sustainable Living we are only allowed to sell a small portion of what we produce in Mexico. With low wages and hidden costs the maquilas serve the Mexican market and in a country with high unemployment corporations have noted that the quality of work by the Mexican workers is produced with higher quality than that of US workers.