  Every year, Mexican cartels lose many members due to conflict with other
cartels and arrests. Yet, despite their losses, cartels have managed to
increase violence for years. We address this puzzle by leveraging data on the
number of homicides, missing persons and arrests in Mexico for the past ten
years, along with information on the interactions among cartels aiming to
estimate the size of cartels' population. We model recruitment, incapacitation
by the state, conflict and saturation as the reasons why cartels vary in size.
Results show that by 2022 cartels have between 160,000 and 185,000 units,
becoming one of the top employers in the country. Recruiting at least 350
people per week is essential to avoid their collapse due to the aggregate
effect of incapacitation, conflict and saturation. Furthermore, we test the
effects of two policy scenarios aimed at decreasing cartel violence. We show
that given the state of violence, increasing current levels of incapacitation
leads to a rise in homicides and cartel members. Conversely, reducing
recruitment provides substantial benefits in terms of violence reduction and
decreasing cartel population, calling for structural investments in a proactive
strategy that targets individuals at risk rather than a traditional reactive
approach centred around incapacitation.
