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various social conflicts and Union protests shook the national geography during the last six months of 2025. Democratic teachers, students and professors from higher education institutions, university officials, farmers, transporters, defenders of the water territory, opponents of megaprojects and mothers searching for the missing protested by taking to streets, public squares and highways. Many of these movements are still alive and will unfold throughout the first months of next year.
It is not at the center of their struggle to confront the President or the 4T, although in their mobilizations they clash with the president and her project. Much less a right-wing destabilizing dynamic. They do not seek to influence electoral processes or partisan disputes. They take to the streets to have their demands resolved. Whether they say it explicitly or not, they are not willing to join a dynamic of “unity at all costs” or be incorporated into a “class pact.”
They do not stick to an interpretation of our history as a result of the confrontation between liberals and conservatives. They also do not agree that the 4T is the synthesis of all emancipatory causes. They object to the slogan “radicals from both sides come together.” They claim their autonomy and the need to resolve their demands, regardless of who governs.
Although different forces within these movements seek convergence, it has not occurred. Not even in groups related to their problems, such as university students or groups of search girls, is there unity of action. The nature of their leadership, the diversity of their demands, their different forms of struggle, their differentiated times and rhythms of mobilization make this meeting difficult. But that does not mean that they will not seek certain forms of coordination in the future. For now, in the last three months we have seen an unprecedented alliance between farmers and a transport organization.
The National Coordinator of Education Workers (CNTE) demands the repeal of the 2007 Issste Law, repeal an educational reform that keeps them in exceptional labor legislation, and democratize their union. The senator for Morena Alfonso Cepeda, general secretary of the National Union of Education Workers (SNTE), is illegally heading the union. He finished his interim term in February 2024. He asked the national council for an extension of his mandate until November of that year. The date has already passed and, since then, he has served as general secretary irregularly.
In the second half of January, the democratic teachers will begin a day of national brigade promoted, fundamentally, by Oaxaca, Guerrero, Chiapas and Zacatecas. The Coordinator will hold its national assembly in Yucatán, where there is a vigorous movement on the rise. A 72-hour strike is likely to break out around mid-March. Meanwhile, they will maintain a variety of protest actions.
According to the Insurgencia Magisterial collective, this has been a hot fall in universities, normal and technological, practically throughout the country. Between August and September, more than 70 protests led to strikes and seizure of facilities. Many schools and faculties of the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM), the National Polytechnic Institute (IPN) and the University of Guadalajara suspended work. Their requests range from questioning school insecurity to complaints of sexual harassment by teachers; from student cafeterias to demands for the removal of officials.
Many of these conflicts have not been resolved, for example, at the Ajusco National Pedagogical University. The financial situation of many universities is serious and criticism of the opacity and lack of accountability of their governing bodies is a constant.
Farmer protests do not stop. To each government announcement that the problem is resolved, the peasants respond with new mobilizations. According to the Confederation of National Chambers of Commerce (Concanaco), the blockades caused economic losses of up to 6 billion pesos. Industrial branches – such as the automotive industry – suffered hard blows.
Despite some local negotiations, such as the one carried out with the corn growers of Bajío, disagreement arises everywhere. Despite official attempts to exclude the leaders of the National Front for the Rescue of the Mexican Countryside (FNRCM) from the negotiations, this organization played a fundamental role in the dialogues to modify the Water Law and continues to do so in agreements such as the pledge scheme that will enable producers to obtain an advance on their staple crops from the government, using these as collateral.
Expressions of dissatisfaction from relatives of the disappeared arise practically every day. They denounce specific cases of new victims of this crime and criticize government indolence. Organized in a veritable archipelago of collectives or family groups, they carry out searches and have taken on the task of ensuring that the truth is known and there is justice for more than 133,000 missing people, according to data from the National Registry of Missing and Unlocated Persons (RNPDNO), which counts disappearances since 1950. Their prominence and radicalism are increasing, especially in Jalisco.
This social unrest, evident by simply reading the daily press, is not necessarily recorded in published surveys, which seek to measure other types of indicators (such as the acceptance or rejection of public officials and politicians). But that doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist. And, even less so, that it will not continue to emerge next year.
X: @lhan55
