I am intellectually indebted to Cirila Quintero Ramírez and Bob Whitney for this book. My discussions with Cirila, my friend and colleague from El Colegio de la Frontera Norte campus Matamoros, helped me to explore the continuities and changes of physical and economic violence in Mexico, particularly in the northeastern region. My conversations with Bob Whitney from the University of New Brunswick were central to my analysis of neoliberalism in its relationship to state formation as a historical, contingent and agent-driven process. I want to thank Yolanda Moran Isais as well as relatives of the disappeared in Mexico that allowed me to do accompaniment work in their struggle to find their missing ones between 2012 and 2016. This experience forced me to explore alternative ways of understanding violence as a process that connects the quotidian and the personal to larger structures of economic and political power. I am grateful to Shana Yael Shubs for her remarkable copy-editing work which allowed me to convey complex information into comprehensive and accessible language for diverse audiences. Thanks to David Fasenfest for his support and interest in the manuscript.
I also acknowledge the assistance provided by El Colegio de la Frontera Norte and El Colegio de San Luis in the research and preparation of different phases of the manuscript. I want to recognize the work of Maricruz, Ambar, Irma and Paty on issues of social reproduction. Without their support, I would not have been able to write the first draft of the manuscript.
Thanks to my parents and brother for their help in the elaboration of the manuscript, particularly their insights into the everyday experiences of violence in Tamaulipas. Lastly, I also want to thank Niko for his continuous words of encouragement and constant support of my academic endeavors.