Is Washington Losing Latin America?

Peter Hakim

From Foreign Affairs, January/February 2006

Summary:  For nearly a decade, U.S. policy toward Latin America has been narrowly focused on a handful of issues, such as China's growing influence in the region and the power of Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez. Latin Americans want economic ties with the United States but feel slighted by Washington and uneasy about the U.S. role in the world. The costs of the estrangement will be high for both sides.

PETER HAKIM is President of the Inter-American Dialogue.

Although U.S. relations with Latin America are at a low point and the prospects for improvement in the short term are not good, not all the news is bad. The United States and Latin America share many values and are still cooperating on many issues. Some bilateral relationships are remarkably strong. Washington has maintained an unusually productive relationship with Colombia over the past half-dozen years. U.S. aid programs, initially propelled by domestic concerns about increased drug trafficking, have helped make Colombia more secure and have strengthened the authority of its government. Similarly, Chile continues its exceptional economic and social progress, and its democracy has become more robust. Since 2004, when Chile's free-trade pact with the United States went into force, U.S.-Chilean trade has soared, further reinforcing the two countries' genuinely respectful and valued relationship (all despite Chile's opposition to the war in Iraq). At the United States' request, over the past year Brazil has led some 7,500 peacekeepers (mainly from Latin America) in Haiti, helping reestablish security and order there as the country prepared for elections in December.

Despite their disagreements and dissatisfaction with U.S. policy in the region, most governments in Latin America want to strengthen their relations with Washington. But the Bush administration has demonstrated neither the determination nor the capability to pursue policies in the Americas that would mobilize the support of the other nations of the hemisphere. Latin American countries, divided among themselves, are by no means clamoring for a renewal of hemispheric cooperation. Chávez's antics at the Summit of the Americas in November 2005 obscured the real tragedies of the gathering -- that is, how little the leaders accomplished, how badly the hemispheric agenda has unraveled, and how deeply divided the countries of the Americas are. Despite enthusiasm in the region for economic partnership, Latin Americans' fundamental ambivalence toward the United States' foreign policies has forcefully reemerged.

The costs of this impasse may be high for both the United States and Latin America. Another financial crisis in Argentina or Brazil could have global ramifications. So would a political confrontation in oil-rich Venezuela and or an intensification of the armed conflict in Colombia. Greater regional integration and political cooperation could benefit all the countries of the Western Hemisphere, as they have in Europe. But the United States and Latin America have demonstrated neither the will nor the ability to travel that road together.