Context
The ownership structure of the media in Mexico is a complex puzzle. To solve it, one must consider not only the real owners or the conglomerates behind them, but also the political, economic and social context of Mexico, as well as its history.
One of the most important pieces of the puzzle is the relationship between the media and the political power. Throughout the history, several media enterprises were founded out of the necessity of certain groups to influence and intervene in political processes. The first newspapers with a significant circulation appeared after the Mexican Revolution to support the warring factions. Radio broadcasting since the 1920s and then television since the 1950s also served different strongmen to gain a position of power and to defend it.
Although very rarely and only for short periods of time there have been attempts to create a critical press in Mexico, especially in a political environment where the dominant political party, Partido Revolucionario Institucional (PRI), maintained its hegemony for 71 years. Today investigative journalism is inhibited by very limited resources and visibility, restricted mostly to a few independent digital media sites.
With the 2018 elections, the ailing economic modernization of the country is one of the many pending tasks. Despite its potential, in the last three decades the annual growth rate of the Mexican economy stagnates around 2%. Adding up to it come the many social problems that the Mexican society has been facing historically and which remain to limit prospects of development: inequality, insecurity and corruption.
With a populace of almost 130 million people, Mexico is the country with the largest Spanish speaking population in the world. Most of them use the television as a source of information, although the consumption through technologies with Internet access is threatening the rule of TV. A market with these characteristics still, turns out to be very attractive and profitable for the media industry. To stimulate competition and limit concentration, laws have been adopted. In practice however, their implementation looks flawed.