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During the government of Felipe Calderón (2006-2012), one of the most important issues on police reform was aimed at the elimination of municipal police or its incorporation into the local police aparatus. The idea that the state police can take over the tasks of the municipal police involves considering the role of both institutions as similar, or that the municipal policing activities could be included in the operation of the state police. In this context, the aim of this paper is to argue that at least some municipal police have quite distinct functions to state and cannot be replaced by the usual functions of the state police without substantial and irreplaceable loss of police service that municipalities offer its inhabitants. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The appearance of the official poverty line in Mexico in 2000 has not been very useful for a more effective antipoverty policy. One of the main reasons has been that the official line does not acknowledge the wider discussion about poverty that has happened in the last four decades in Northern countries. Two different approaches emerge from that literature. One is the "basket of good approach" used in the United States. The other is the "social relative standards approach" to poverty that has been applied in the European Union. To select between them has important implications in terms of poverty conceptualizations and the appropriate policies to deal with it. This paper describes both approaches and draws some lessons for the case of Mexico. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]