The start of my research

When asked to think of where the most dangerous place for a journalist to work now is, Iraq always comes to mind. It should. Nearly 112 journalists have been killed in the line of duty since the war began in March 2003, the reasons are obvious, they were killed four doing their job in a war zone.

But the second most dangerous place for journalists isn’t in a war-torn country on the other side of the world. It’s our neighbor to the south, Mexico, where more than 30 journalists have been killed since 2001, according to the Washington Post. But why is there such a large number of journalists dying in a country not at war? The answer could be because they are trying to establish something the country is not familiar with, freedom of the press.

Growing up in a border town, I heard stories about how dangerous being a journalist in Mexico was, many getting killed for asking too many questions, knowing too much of the story. But I heard that being a journalist can be dangerous anywhere you are. Journalists are the ones who would put their lives at risk for a story. But everytime I heard about another Mexican journalist killed, I would ask myself one thing: Why?

As I grew into a journalist and learned about the freedom of the press in the United States, I came to realize that the danger Mexican journalists faced was the lack of that freedom.

Through my research, I hope to find what advances the Mexican government has made to give journalists more freedom in their jobs. I also hope to find out what information found caused some of these reporters to be killed. What did they uncover that they weren’t meant to? And most importantly, what kind of impact has journalism had on Mexican politics?

KEYWORDS I’ll USE: Mexico; politics; government; journalist; freedom of press; impact WEB SITES: Reporting across the border: The challenges of U.S.-Mexico Journalismhttp://www.wilsoncenter.org/index.cfm?topic_id=5949&categoryid=357B7E40-65BF-E7DC-44E3EC31B219E598&fuseaction=topics.events_item_topics&event_id=161802Conference on how to be a better journalist working on the U.S./Mexican borderMexico’s Most Wanted Journalist http://www.motherjones.com/interview/2007/05/cacho.html Interview with Lydia Cacho, who made some powerful enemies by exposing Cancun’s sex tourism industry. Now she’s taking a historic civil rights case to Mexico’s highest court.Talli Nauman: Killing Journalists in Mexico http://www.counterpunch.org/nauman01102005.html Details on Mexican journalists being killed Mexico’s press: ready for freedom?
http://www.cs.uwaterloo.ca/~alopez-o/politics/presm.html The first steps Mexico has taken to allow a free press, including setting up conference for the National Association of Hispanic Journalists.Mexico’s Journalists Feel Heavy Hand of Violencehttp://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/05/29/AR2007052902132.html Post story about Mexico being the second deadliest country for journalists after Iraq.