Mexican professor to speak on drug cartels


Arturo Santamaría, a distinguished political scientist and sociologist and professor of social sciences of the University of Sinaloa, Mazatlan, will give a free lecture on the economic and political consequences of the U.S.-Mexico drug market at 5 p.m., April 16, in the Education Lecture Hall (room 117), on ASU’s Tempe campus.

The 2010 Wells Fargo Distinguished Transborder Lecture is titled “The Transnationalization of the Sinaloa Cartel: The Emergence of a Political Power.”

Santamaría has conducted fieldwork in Texas, California and Arizona among Mexican migrants from Sinaloa and received the coveted Instituto Interamericano de Fronteras prize in 2003 for his work on Mexican migrants in the United States.

He is a member of the national system of researchers, which is the highest level of academic researchers in Mexico, and received a Fulbright fellowship to study at UCLA.

Santamaría has published 10 books including “Mexicanos en Estados Unidos: La Nación, la Política y el Voto sin Fronteras” (Mexicans in the United States: Country, Politics and the Vote Without Borders); “Nací de Aquí Muy Lejos: Actores Locales y Turistas en el Centro Histórico, (I Was Born Very Far From Here: Local Actors and Tourists in the Historical Center); “Emigrantes Mexicanos: Movimientos y Elecciones Transterritoriales” (Mexican Immigrants: Transterritorial Movements and Elections); and “Morir en Sinaloa: Narco, Violencia y Cultura” (To Die in Sinaloa: Drug Dealers, Violence and Culture).

Santamaría also writes a weekly newspaper column in which he analyzes “the most salient political and social processes in Mexico, the transborder region, the United States and the state of Sinaloa.

The lecture will be preceded by a reception from 4 p.m. to 5 p.m., in Coor Hall, room 6607. The lecture is sponsored by the Department of Transborder Chicana/o and Latina/o Studies. For more information, contact Carlos G. Vélez-Ibáñez, Motorola Presidential Professor of Neighborhood Revitalization, (480) 965-4908 or Carlos.Velez-Ibanez@asu.edu.