This report documents the creation of Narco-Imágenes.com, a multi-media website featuring the fashion, iconography, and stock character images related to the “narco” or “narco-traficante” (drug trafficker) as seen in recent film and television from Colombia, Mexico, and the United States. / text

Thesis (M.S. in Electronic Warfare Systems Engineering and M.A. in Security Studies (Stabilization and Reconstruction))--Naval Postgraduate School, September 2008. / Thesis Advisor(s): Sankar, Pat ; McNab, Robert. "September 2008." Description based on title screen as viewed on November 6, 2008. Includes bibliographical references (p. 151-154). Also available in print.

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Desde os anos 1970, o narcotráfico tem figurado papel de destaque nos principais veículos de comunicação da América Latina, com uma cobertura caracterizada pela superficialidade e, em alguns casos, flertando com o sensacionalismo. Porém, alguns repórteres foram bem-sucedidos ao aproximar o narcotráfico e a reportagem, principalmente, a partir da produção de livros-reportagem. O tema influenciou a literatura do continente (originando termos como narcoliteratura, narconarrativa e narcocultura), bem como o contexto do tráfico de drogas proporcionou a produção editorial de obras de não ficção, a partir dos anos 80, atingindo o ápice nos anos 90 e 2000. Desta forma, esta dissertação, apoiado no referencial teórico da análise crítica da narrativa, proposta por Luiz Gonzaga Motta (2013), buscou analisar a contribuição do livro-reportagem em relação à produção cultural da narcoliteratura, a partir do estudo de duas obras: Abusado: o dono do morro Dona Marta (Record, 2011), de Caco Barcellos e El Cártel de Sinaloa (Randon House, 2009), de Diego Enrique Osorno. De forma geral, debruçando-se sobre características como enredo, personagens, tempo, espaço e narrador, encontrou-se aproximações narrativas entre o que ficou considerado como narconarrativas (MEJÍAS; SANTOS; URGELLES, 2016) e a produção jornalística do livro-reportagem. / Since the 70\'s, the cover of drug trafficking showed superficiality in narratives and, the process almost industrial, does not allow a deep analysis. Despite this fact, some journalists was succeded uniting the drug trafficking and the reportage, mainly, with the production of non-fiction books. This theme had influenced the literature of continent (creating terms like narcoliteratura, narconarrativa and narcocultura), as well, the context of drug trafficking provided a mass editorial production of non-fiction books, starting in final of the 80\'s, and reaching the apex in the 90\'s and 2000. In this way, this dissertation, referenced in the concepts of critic analysis of narrative, developed by Luiz Gonzaga Motta (2013), will analyse the contribution of the non-fiction books in relation to the cultural production of narcoliteratura, from the analysis of two books: Abusado: o dono do morro Dona Marta (Record, 2011), of Caco Barcellos and El Cártel de Sinaloa (Randon House, 2009), of Diego Enrique Osorno. In general, looking at characteristics such as plot, characters, time, space and narrator, we found narrative approximations between that was considered narconarrativas (MEJÍAS; SANTOS; URGELLES, 2016) and the journalistic production of the non-fiction books.

This thesis investigates Nuestra Aparente Rendición, or "Our Apparent Surrender," a literary project launched in response to narco-violence in Mexico. I consider the potential of literature to intervene on violence by elaborating a theory of fiction as a strategy of naturalization. Fiction dissembles artifice and contingency, imposing sense-making frames on the imagination. The role of fiction in politics is to work the very limits of intelligibility. It has long been held that language requires external moorings to anchor discourse to a stable place. This has been conceived, alternatively, as an idealized speech community or an intersubjective commitment to veracity, as objective truths, a privileged experience, external reality or God. In the absence of such moorings, it has been claimed that language would be a sea of unending deferral, and communication would be impossible. A theory of fiction suggests instead that the place where meaning is 'fixed' and stabilized is internal to discourse itself. Fiction works to halt the imagination, limit what is possible, and transform infinite contingency into necessity. Ultimately, I suggest that what is needed is a deepening of the rhetorical turn. It has been argued--and feared--that that the rhetorical turn devolves into relativism and renders scholarship ineffectual. Against such claims, I contend that we have not yet accounted for the effects of necessity, which is caught up with contingency in an inextricable embrace.

"Reading the Narcosphere: A Queer Hemispheric Critique of Narco Cultural Production," analyzes the emergence of contemporary drug politics (drug trade and drug war) as a dominant cultural narrative of the public sphere, producing what I call the narco-sphere. Drawing from theories on sexuality, subjectivity and biopolitics, I examine the intractability and interconnectedness of social relations of race, gender, and class in narco cultural production by building on critical work in social and political theory as well as narco studies. Rather than merely reflecting on the effects of the ongoing drug war, narco cultural texts about Colombia, Mexico, and the U.S.-Mexico border produce relations of power that while intending to critique drug culture and neoliberalism, reify complicit social hierarchies through discourses of difference that promote marginalization and exclusion of vulnerable subjects. Through readings of cultural texts such as Jorge Franco's Rosario Tijeras, Lourdes Portillo’s Señorita Extraviada, Fernando Vallejo's Our Lady of the Assassins, and Luis Estrada’s film El Infierno, I further demonstrate how the social relations portrayed are not simply endemic to the drug trade and the drug war but instead are deployments of power in accordance with neoliberalism and neocolonialism. Through my notion of the narco-sphere and a queer critique, I offer a more incisive way to read difference within western hemispheric cultural politics.

Various groups of Mexican culture have assigned to el narco archetypical characteristics of a heroic figure in the literary, visual, and auditory arts. As a result, today’s narcocultura has expanded its tentacles to a vast array of prominent industries, such as publishing companies, the silver screen, and recording studios. El narco is no longer seen by some sectors as the outlaw that stalks our society but, instead, as a hero who fights against a hegemonic faction to reclaim his sovereignty. This thesis unites interdisciplinary observations of the narco phenomena that Mexican culture has assigned to the iconic figure of el narco. The purpose of this work is to recreate the evolutionary development through a theoretical-literary analysis of this prototype in order to better understand Mexican society’s stance on this phenomenon. Octavio Paz’s theory of the Mexican psyche, Joseph Campbell’s theory of the hero’s journey, and an interdisciplinary focus will be employed to analyze this iconic figure. In this thesis, my aim is to investigate how an ultra-conservative Mexican society evolved into a consortium that upholds the narco’s indistinct behaviors and actions. What roles do first world governments and the Mexican state play to fortify, eradicate, or control the narco phenomenon? Finally, which is the most prudent strategy to coexist in a world alongside the narco?

This study is designed both as a case study and a literature-based policy analysis to assist interested parties in gaining a better understanding of controversial “narco-terrorism” phenomenon. The objectives of this study are to show the existing connection between some terrorist organizations and drug trafficking to provide academic information about and explanations for terrorism and drug trafficking, to critically analyze the biases of many current narco-terrorism doctrines and to offer a comprehensive and neutral typology that elucidates all types of narco-terrorism. This thesis is presented in four parts. The first part includes an introduction to narco-terrorism and provides a historical background of drug dilemma and terrorism. A number of definitional and conceptual arguments constituting the backbone of the study are laid out in the second part of the study. Third part consists of case studies of three different insurgent groups. An analysis of the information uncovered and presented in previous chapters and a typology of narco-terrorism are provided in the last part. Thesis is concluded with recommendations in an attempt to inspire useful policies for individuals or institutions operating on the field.

Neoliberal has bee largely responsible for the creation of a narcoestado. As the Mexican state abandon its previous cultural projects such as education, employment, and social services, economic void increased. Narco-traffickers have increasingly filled this vacuum. Arguably, the weaken pillars of Mexican society allowed narco-trafficking to penetrate the areas once fulfilled by the state. It has led to the recruitment of economically dislocated farmers and citizens to turn to narco-trafficking for financial stability. Although, the state and narco-traffickers at times compete with each other to fulfill some of these functions, they also at times co-exist and merge into what has been referred to as narcoestado. This metamorphosis between the state and narco-traffickers has been responsible for the increasing impunity of violence and crime in México. It is also a factor in the continuous disenfranchisement of the rights Mexican citizens. The ubiquitous violence and fear have altered the ways Mexicans negotiate their rights. It has led to many resistance efforts and organizing across the country with the most notable example of autodefesas.

Although drug trafficking organizations (DTOs) exist and have an effect on health, crime, economies, and politics, little research has explored these entities as political organizations. Legal interest groups and movements have been found to influence domestic and international politics because they operate within legal parameters. Illicit groups, such as DTOs, have rarely been accounted for—especially in the literature on interest groups—though they play a measurable role in affecting domestic and international politics in similar ways. Using an interest group model, this dissertation analyzed DTOs as illicit interest groups (IIGs) to explain their political influence. The analysis included a study of group formation, development, and demise that examined IIG motivation, organization, and policy impact. The data for the study drew from primary and secondary sources, which include interviews with former DTO members and government officials, government documents, journalistic accounts, memoirs, and academic research. To illustrate the interest group model, the study examined Medellin-based DTO leaders, popularly known as the “Medellin Cartel.” In particular, the study focused on the external factors that gave rise to DTOs in Colombia and how Medellin DTOs reacted to the implementation of counternarcotics efforts. The discussion was framed by the implementation of the 1979 Extradition Treaty negotiated between Colombia and the United States. The treaty was significant because as drug trafficking became the principal bilateral issue in the 1980s; extradition became a major method of combating the illicit drug business. The study’s findings suggested that Medellin DTO leaders had a one-issue agenda and used a variety of political strategies to influence public opinion and all three branches of government—the judicial, the legislative, and the executive—in an effort to invalidate the 1979 Extradition Treaty. The changes in the life cycle of the 1979 Extradition Treaty correlated with changes in the political power of Medellin-based DTOs vis-à-vis the Colombian government, and international forces such as the U.S. government’s push for tougher counternarcotics efforts.