Dangerous Encounters Along the Mexican Migration Route

A growing number of Central Americans from Honduras, Guatemala, and El Salvador are migrating toward the United States to escape poverty, lack of opportunities, and violence. Migrants pass through Mexico, where the lucrative migration industry and corruption have prevented the implementation of recent laws intended to protect migrants. Along the way, migrants are exposed to a variety of uncivil groups that take advantage of their unprotected position. Humanitarian shelters for migrants work to provide spaces of safety amidst widespread insecurity. Through secondary data analysis, this research explores how and why these different civil and uncivil actors interact with migrants. The study explores the violence from a systems-level analysis and a body politics framework and reveals the strong gendered dimension to personal violence. The strength of uncivil operations creates insecurity for migrants throughout their journeys, and even civil spaces can become implicated in uncivil operations. The lack of a meaningful, humanitarian response from the Mexican state is representative of ongoing cycles of violence and corruption in the country.