“Moises Naim, the editor of Foreign Policy magazine, recently wrote that what is said about Brazil today — that the country’s potential has finally been unlocked — was said of Mexico in the 1990s, a nation that now finds itself in the economic doldrums. Naim had also brought this up at a panel we shared at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. I agree that the issue bears much discussion: Mexico’s reversal of fortunes contains lessons for other countries, if not for Mexico itself. Mexico’s reforms stalled in part because of the dead weight of the long-ruling Institutional Revolutionary Party, or PRI, and of the antediluvian left, but also because the now-governing National Action Party, or PAN, has not shown the imagination and relentless zeal that other reformers have had in spearheading their country’s drive toward modernity. The consequence? Between 2000 and 2007, Brazil’s economy grew by 150 percent while Mexico’s expanded by three times less.” (10/28/09)