Oswaldo Zavala Argues That Drug Cartels Are a Constructed Fiction

These narratives have spawned countless television series, popular narcocorridos, and a deeply entrenched public belief in monolithic cartels capable of subverting entire governments. Yet, a provocative intellectual and literary counter-offensive is challenging this foundational premise.

Oswaldo Zavala and the Core Argument That Drug Cartels Do Not Exist

The central thesis, advanced by Mexican author, researcher, and City University of New York professor Oswaldo Zavala, routinely provokes shock and disbelief among the general public. In his book Los carteles no existen, released in 2026, Zavala argues that the traditional conception of the cartel is a constructed fiction rather than an objective sociological reality.

Zavala does not deny that drug trafficking exists, nor does he suggest that violent criminals are absent from the streets. Instead, he trains his critique on the political and security language used to describe the phenomenon, pointing directly to Washington and its foreign policy apparatus as the primary architects of the prevailing narrative.

According to this perspective, labeling criminal groups as all-powerful cartels serves a specific political function: it justifies continuous military intervention and legitimizes state-sponsored violence across Latin America under the banner of national security. Zavala maintains that high-profile figures such as Joaquín El Chapo Guzmán have been artificially inflated into legendary figures by this overarching state narrative.

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U.S. Enforcement Escalation and the Judicial Fall of Ismael Zambada

While academics debate the semantics of the drug trade, Washington continues to pursue an aggressive enforcement strategy targeting top-tier leadership and government corruption. These efforts were punctuated by high-stakes judicial proceedings in a Brooklyn federal courtroom, where federal judge Brian Cogan sentenced Ismael El Mayo Zambada to spend the remainder of his 76 years behind bars. The ruling also mandated the forfeiture of 15.000 millones de dólares to compensate victims of decades of cocaine, heroin, and fentanyl trafficking.

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Zambada had previously pleaded guilty in August of the prior year to evade the death penalty, delivering a Spanish-language letter of apology that ultimately carried little weight with the bench. Judge Cogan cited the astronomical volume of narcotics attributed to the defendant and the extensive documented murders as justification for mandatory life imprisonment.

Following the sentencing, Terrance Cole, director of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, signaled that Washington’s cross-border campaign is far from complete, warning that U.S. agencies will continue pursuing both international traffickers and compromised government officials.

Terrance Cole, Director of the DEA, stated that if individuals traffic in lethal drugs, profit from the suffering of others, and threaten communities, the DEA will come after them, noting that whether they are drug traffickers or corrupt government officials, the DEA will come after them.

Cross-Border Sovereignty Debates Under Claudia Sheinbaum

The DEA’s aggressive posture has further strained diplomatic relations between Washington and Mexico City. Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum has consistently defended national sovereignty, demanding mutual cooperation without political subordination and emphasizing that both nations must confront the narcotics crisis collaboratively by addressing American consumer demand and domestic distribution networks.

Compounding these legal complexities, the U.S. intelligence apparatus identified Juan Carlos Valencia—born in Santa Ana, California—as the leader of the Jalisco New Generation Cartel. Valencia, who is the 41-year-old stepson of the late Nemesio Oseguera and was indicted in Washington, DC in October 2020 with a lingering five million dollar bounty for his capture, presents a thorny jurisdictional challenge regarding foreign operations involving an American citizen.