Obama and Latin America

Will the “change” reach all the way to the South? In “Obama and Latin America,” Álvaro Vargas Llosa reflects about the possible policies of the United States regarding Latin America after the November elections.

Not long ago, Barack Obama delivered an important speech about Latin America intending to emphasize his distance from the policies of President Bush regarding the region, which he characterized as “negligent.” Adding that Washington “has clung to worn-out plans in the matters of drugs and trade, democracy and development,” he proposed to talk with the opponents, increase foreign aid, be more cautious concerning trade agreements, promote the Peace Corps and establish joint efforts to reduce dependence on oil.

Throughout the 20th century, United States policy towards Latin America oscillated between interventionism, military or political, and condescension, for example the Good Neighbor Policy and the Alliance for Progress. Afterwards, a type of abandonment won out, except on the war against drugs. Occasionally, this abandonment was interrupted by efforts to avoid some financial or political crisis, or by the signing of a trade agreement.

A pinch of abandonment isn’t bad as far as foreign policy is concerned with respect to neighbors, which in certain cases hold on to old resentment or believe that prosperity is the daughter of international altruism. In any case, the influence of the United States on the region’s governments is no longer enormous. Chile and Mexico, two of its closest allies, resisted pressure to support the invasion of Iraq in the United Nations Security Council, and Washington’s candidate to lead the Organization of American States was defeated by a socialist. The International Monetary Fund, through which Washington used to exert pressure on Latin American governments, is concentrated today in Africa owing to the fact that Brazil and Argentina have settled their debts with that organization and the growth in exports has inflated the incomes of the majority of the governments in the area.

But the United States can encourage or slow down the current tendencies to the south of the border. Obama rightly asserts that Latin Americans are the ones mainly responsible for their own difficulties, but he is mistaken in believing that an increase of foreign aid will make the economy of the region better and will avoid the appearance of populists like Chavez. That was the philosophy of the Good Neighbor Policy, thought to undermine the influence of the Axis powers in the 1930s, and of the Alliance for Progress, directed to slow down the penetration of communism in the 1960s. In reality, populism was lord and savior of the region from the ends of the 1920s through the beginnings of the 90s. Its current resurgence confirms that the foreign aid will do little to avoid populism: with George W. Bush, the welfare assistance to Latin America has duplicated, up to 1.6 billion dollars: the largest increase since World War II.

Obama, numerous Democrats and some Republicans have distanced themselves from the free trade agreements supported by Bill Clinton and George W. Bush. Despite that bureaucratic pacts are less effective than unilateral elimination of commercial barriers, as Estonia demonstrated in its day, they are better than protectionism. Increasing the flow of goods and services through the region isn’t a “Bush policy”, but rather an ideal whose origins go back to the Pan-American Conference celebrated in 1889, that failed in trying to win the customs union of the whole continent. Even F.D. Roosevelt and J.F. Kennedy, whose idealist policies inspire Obama, stressed trade almost as much as foreign aid.

The likely candidate for the Democratic Party supported the trade agreement with Peru but he opposed the agreement with Central America and has condemned the agreement with Colombia. Regarding Cuba, Obama has promised to raise the restrictions that complicate trips to Cuba and the shipment of money to the island. In trade matters, the candidate ought to be consistent in his position about Cuba, that he looks to encourage the exchange between both countries.

The trade between the United States and Latin America represents almost 6 billion dollars and the sales to the south of the border give support to two and a half million families in the United States (and indirectly to many more). If it weren’t for the growth of trade, which in the case of Mexico has grown 400% in 15 years, the migration towards the north would be greater.

And speaking of immigration: the policies of Obama differ little from what George W. Bush and McCain have proposed, which have in this respect a better instinct than those of his own party. A sensible immigration policy that tries to legalize millions of undocumented immigrants that work hard will better the perception of the United States on the other side of the border.

The ideal could be that the policies of the United States regarding Latin America were an atmospheric exercise: many pictures and sweet words, and few detailed policies. Detailed policies inevitably bring interventionism or condescension, and what Latin Americans need is to advance towards a sense of responsibility.