Mexican cartels form a network of alliances and rivalries

Mexican cartels lose many members due to conflict with other cartels and arrests. Yet, despite their losses, cartels managed to increase violence for years. We address this puzzle by leveraging data on homicides, missing persons and arrests in Mexico for the past decade, along with information on cartel interactions. We model recruitment, state incapacitation, conflict and saturation as sources of cartel size variation. Results show that by 2022, cartels counted 160,000–185,000 units, becoming a top employer. Recruiting at least 350 people per week is essential to avoid their collapse due to aggregate losses. Furthermore, we show that increasing incapacitation would increase both homicides and cartel members. Conversely, reducing recruitment could substantially curtail violence and lower cartel size.