The Future of Government May Already Be Happening in Mexico

What a secret army of 30,000 social workers reveal about how democracies can get closer to their citizens.

Imagine a single public-facing corps that combines FEMA’s speed, AmeriCorps’ community presence, and a campaign field team’s discipline —and reports directly to the presidency.

Mexico already has it.

They are called "Servidores de la Nación " (Servants of the Nation) and they number roughly 30,000. Servidores don’t sit in cubicles. They wear tenis, knock on doors, and introduce themselves by first name.

To outsiders, they look like campaign volunteers, even wearing the maroon vests of Morena, the ruling party. To critics, they are loyalists disguised as social workers.

Both are true, but incomplete. In reality, this is the most radical experiment in Mexican statecraft in decades: a parallel bureaucracy designed to not regulate from above, but to live inside communities.