Mexico

Mexico City — one of the world's largest metropolitan areas, with over 21 million residents — was built on the ruins of Tenochtitlán, the capital of the Aztec Empire that Hernán Cortés conquered in 1521. The country's pre-Columbian heritage is extraordinary in depth and variety: the Maya cities of the Yucatán, the pyramids of Teotihuacán, the Zapotec site of Monte Albán, and hundreds of other archaeological zones testify to thousands of years of complex civilization before European arrival.

Mexico's economy is the 15th largest in the world and deeply integrated with those of the United States and Canada through the USMCA free trade agreement. Manufacturing — particularly automotive, electronics, and aerospace — has grown dramatically since the 1990s, concentrated in northern industrial cities like Monterrey, Tijuana, and Ciudad Juárez. Mexico is also a major oil producer, agricultural exporter, and tourism destination. However, the country faces persistent challenges: high income inequality, the influence of organized crime and drug trafficking organizations, institutional corruption, and significant rural poverty. The US-Mexico border is one of the busiest and most consequential in the world.