Per the linked article I had no idea that Latin America was so leftist/socialist these days. Is socialism a threat to the US politically & economically as communism was said to be, or is it relatively benign and will peacefully coexist with our capitalist ethos and economy?
Wrong Agenda?
What Bush should really be talking about at the Latin American summit.
I’m kind of surprised anyone can be surprised by this. Latin America has long been socialist leaning and that was pretty well-known during the Cold War. It’s not like the entire region changed their political ideologies just because the USSR collapsed.
As it is, I think socialist Latin American countries pose no threat to the United States. However, aggressive dictators that masquerade as socialists certainly do.
The biggest threat that I can see is the increased “blame America” mentality. There has been a lot of talk today about how Latin America tried capitalism* and failed, and now the poor are taught to blame America. Soon they are going to try what they think is socialism, and that too will fail, and who will they blame? Certainly not Chavez (possibly the richest guy in Venezuela), they’ll blame the US. And unfortunately, when you have that many people completely disenfranchized and told its all the fault of the US, nothing good can result.
*Its important to note that what they called capitalism had nothing to do with a free market and is better described as cronyism in that the rich helped the rich get richer.
That’s a pretty broad brush. Chile certainly doesn’t fit that description, and Argentina has had periods that could reasonably be called capitalist.
As to the OP, a threat to the US? I’m not particularly worried about economic competition from socialist countries, and I think the US has largely made its peace with Latin America. We once feared Soviet influence in that region, but if they want to go it alone, it shouldn’t cause much concern. It’s a whole different ball game now that the USSR is defunct.
Imaging what the Chinese must be thinking about Latin America’s tilt. 
When you get a handle on what’s really happening in Latin America, it really doesn’t look like a threat at all. The media loves labeling pwerful leaders as dictators. But Hugo Chavez is a democratically elected President, not a dictator. The people of Venezuela can remove him by voting him out, if they so wish. The events in Ecuador earlier this year are examples of genuine democratic people. The people of the country gathered in large numbers to eject President Gutierrez, who was corrupt and was trying to manipulate the Supreme Court of Justice. Democracy is spreading. And while democracy is not always perfect in the immediate sense, true democratic governments are inherently superior to non-democratic governments in the long term. They allow the people the remove corrupt and criminal regimes, and to hold leaders accountable for important political decisions.
I should add that I take no pleasure in seeing many Latin American countries persue what I consider to be bad economic policies. The US benefits more from having neighboring countries that aren’t mired in poverty. But as long as things are done in a democratic environment, who am I to tell them how to run their affairs? It does, however, make me less willing to bail them out when the inevitable crash comes.
I don’t see them as a threat to the US unless and until their economies completely come unglued (in which case I suppose there COULD be a more intense backlash against the US, maybe even some terrorist type attacks). There is a lot of resentment towards the US in just about ever country south of the border (including Mexico). A lot of folks (rightly or wrong…mostly wrongly IMO) blame the US for all their troubles, and think the US is trying to keep them down. They don’t realize that in many cases its their own elite that ARE keeping them down…deliberately. Its much easier to blame everything on the US, and to be honest the US isn’t exactly blameless either.
As John Mace said, its their decision…in most cases they DO have democracy (even if its more heavily influenced by the elite than folks in the US realize…even in countries like Mexico), so ultimately its their call. Personally I think free trade agreements and closer economic ties to the US would benifit the region a hell of a lot…but again, its their call. And as this last week shows, there are a lot of pissed off folks down there, and leaders like Chavez who are more than willing to make as much political hay as they can out of it.
-XT
To be fair, in the past, the US hasn’t exactly hesitated to take control of things in the South. They can’t blame us for everything, naturally, but their fears aren’t exactly unfounded, perhaps just a kneejerk.
The crony capitalism call made earlier in the thread is a good one … I don’t think there’s been a lot of actual free market capitalism is Latin America, more like something between kleptocracy and crony oligarchic capitalism, with various attempts at socialism. I was once very interested in the region, but the more I found out about it, the less interesting it became. I think most of the people on top of the heap in Central and South America don’t understand voluntary transfers of money, much less power.
Let’s bear in ind that it was a kleptocracy run by American Agribusiness companies, like UFCO. Most Caribbean countries have been invaded by the Untied States in order to prop up those kleptocratic dictatorships, and leftist governments have traditionally been toppled quickly.
For example, in the early 1950s, UFCO demanded from the Guatemalan government, and received, the ability to appraise its own land holdings for tax purposes. In 1954, the left-wing Arbenz government used eminent domain to seize the huge plantations, to break them up into small farms. UFCO received the appraised value on their land. Since they did the appraisals to determine their taxation, they received a pittance, which they found to be unacceptable. It was this situation that the Dulles brothers cited when they recommended overthrowing Arbenz. Since the CIA overthrew that government, there has been a permanent state of civil war.
Incidentally, this is recounted in The Fifties by David Halberstam. The Endnotes contain the primary source materials, from which he drew the account.
I have done a lot of reading about the United Fruit Company and its heavy involvement with the CIA in the 1940’s and lasting for decades thereafter. Their hijinx all over the region could be made into a movie called The CIA Gone Wild. There is some responsibility there.
Isn’t there some currently politically connected family who had a forebear who was a director fo the UFCO during those times?
Anybody? Anybody? Beuhler? … Beuhler?
Hmmm…Correct me if you think I am wrong in my interpretation, but I had the general impression that Argentina had its crash when it was closely following the recommended policies of the U.S. and the IMF.
Even when they are legally elected in democratic elections?
Oh, especially then!
Costa Rican citizen chiming in:
Being the last country to sign a FTA with the U.S. (it’s in the hands of Congress right now) puts us somewhere in the spotlight of this ordeal. I can tell you that most people here have a poor opinion of the U.S. government and its citizens. I don’t get it. I’d rather deal with facts than accept our public schools’ indoctrination with open arms, no questions asked. As I see it, my country has been screwed less by U.S. actions than any other Latin American nation (not having a military counts for something, I guess) and it was in fact saved back in the 80s when you guys made capitalism look a lot cheaper for us than communism, mostly out of fear and control. The current FTA debacle centers around three things: social security, communications, and agriculture.
While we’re not equipped with the latest in high-end technology and our facilities are infected with extreme bureaucratization, ideally, not one of our citizens should pay a dime for medication or sophisticated medical procedures when they’re in need. At times when transplants have been delayed patients and patients’ families have sued the government and won. In direct contrast to the U.S., our hospitals are obliged to operate first, ask questions later (and that’s valid even for immigrants, legal or not). It supports itself by giving away generic drugs and it can only do that some 20 years after pharmaceutical houses have, I don’t know, given the go-ahead. With this new FTA, an added 5 years of waiting are introduced. That’s 5 years of people dying because we’re forced to buy your drugs instead of making them ourselves. In a way, we’re importing what makes your social security crap over here, making it just as crappy.
As for what concerns communications we currently have one government-owned company that enjoys a monopoly over this. What’s good about this, though, is they’re willing to put phones in regions of about a hundred people, most of them living in extreme poverty. If international companies all of a sudden make business over here they’re bound to weaken the government’s role and they sure as hell won’t care for poor people who really need a pay phone in their neighborhood. There’s some debate on wether our electricity institute can cope with this or how well it can actually adapt, not to mention the absurdity in having “a great number” of companies competing in a market of about 4 million.
Agriculturists won’t be able to compete with the enormous tax breaks that were negotiated on behalf of American products. This will lead to us buying your rice and most everything else you toss in our way. At this point, making our industries broke is not very enlightening.
While I’m baffled by those who ban any kind of American presence and yet they’re favorite show remains The O.C., I favor intelligent debates on realistic approaches to the many points contained in the Agreement. Unfortunately, these are few and receive little to no attention from “concerned citizens”. Grab your average college student during a strike and you’ll see he’s just lost as many of (here comes the shocking bit of news) the Congressmen currently reviewing the FTA. However, the sentiments over these kinds of things go something like this: An increase in privatization policies also increases our dependency on foreign economies and markets and most of our historical autonomy will vanish as the years go by. As we all know, corporations don’t give any four-letter words about people and their rapid growth in our territories turns out detrimental to the poor (who will only get poorer) and beneficial to those in power. Indeed, most people suspect their elected officials act based on their own needs and not those of the people (well, duh) so, to them, one Menem is the exact same thing as a Clinton or a Dubya. It is also my belief that our society is technically unprepared for the call center invasion that is to come (that one Indian guy without an accent that took care of your computer needs? Yeah, well, you weren’t talking to India), and whose fault lies entirely on past leadership. Remarkably, nothing is being done about it now. Our educational system is based on the naive hope that all students will some day become doctors and lawyers, even though colleges can’t handle that kind of volume and the teaching in public schools is underwhelming at best (I’m not making this up: half of math teachers today don’t have a degree). What we need is more trade schools, more English (and other languages) being taught at schools, and a realistic approach to shattering dreams and placing citizens in useful jobs for the nation’s well-being. Because we’re not prepared for any of the things to come, America could potentially quit cold turkey on us at any time and that’s not going to be good for any of us.
So, that’s one Latin American’s perspective on things. What some of you see as beneficial to us most people here consider it the latest thing in control techniques. I can’t blame them. My country, because it hasn’t had many major problems as opposed to the rest of the world, has had a kind of voyeuristic experience in the history of Latin America and we’ve seen what’s happened in Argentina, Guatemala, Chile, etc., not just economically but politically. Is it a threat to the U.S.? While most see it the other way around, it could be if your ultimate goal is to milk us for all we have then having to end up paying for what we don’t have. I believe that for the most part the U.S. is imposing its will on a bunch of ill-adjusted nations that are barely making it in the world and only a firm restraint on the greed of both sides can make all this somewhat work. You won’t see me picketing for stating the obvious, though.