Friends of Brad Will

Stopping Plan Mexico

Stopping Plan Mexico has been named by the Center for International
Policy as one of the top three challenges (in bold in short piece
below) to protect/defend attempts to build more just and peaceful
societies in Latin America. They write that it is among “[t]hree
challenges [which] come to mind, not because they are the most
transcendent, but because they are viable and reasonable—and we cannot
conceive of a constructive and coherent policy in the hemisphere
without these first steps.”

United Steelworkers came out against it in November and issued a
statement (see our website) demanding public hearings about it after
the police crackdowns on miners in Mexico last week.

Time for Friends of Brad Will, our extensive networks across the
country, and our allies to represent!

Robert

Americas Program Column
2008: Latin America’s Hope and Challenge

Laura Carlsen | January 18, 2008

Americas Program, Center for International Policy (CIP)
americas.irc-online.org

It’s becoming a platitude to refer to Latin America as the region of
hope, and from here in Mexico the perception is tempered by a reality
that looks more ominous than hopeful. Throughout Latin America,
attempts to build more just and peaceful societies have met with a
thousand obstacles, both internal and external.

But what has rightfully captured the attention of the world is that
there are efforts at real change in the hemisphere. And “hope” is not
defined by guaranteed success, but by belief in an animating vision.

In the 21st century Latin America has produced more than its share of
individuals, organizations, and even governments that hold new
animating visions. Many have bucked the system in the most literal
sense to seek different and better ways of living together, living with
the environment, and living in the world.

A few examples from our archives over the past year illustrate the
point.

1. Via Campesina: With its upbeat slogan to “globalize hope,” its broad
international and independent base, and its campaign for food
sovereignty, Via Campesina has been setting a new agenda from the
grassroots that has already changed the terms of debate and will no
doubt gain new ground over the coming year. It may seem strange to
envision an organization of small farmers—a sector squeezed from all
sides by the forces of globalization—as a harbinger of change. But Via
Campesina, with its 149 member organizations in 56 countries, stands on
a long history of innovative community projects and autonomous
organization.

Following a Via forum in Mexico city this summer we noted: “As
globalization erodes community, threatens the quality and accessibility
of our food supply, and destroys ecosystems, small farmers are the ones
defending these values. In doing so, they hold important keys to the
future survival of the planet and rebuilding the kind of society we
want for our children.”

2. Bank of the South: International finance institutions like the World
Bank and the IMF have been discredited in many Latin American countries
due to the ruinous consequences of their neoliberal economic
prescriptions. The Bank of the South is an attempt at regional
cooperation to create a real alternative for development financing. As
it takes shape, the new bank faces its share of conflicts of interests.
Two stand out: the complex negotiations between large and small
countries on vote and contributions, and the debate between orthodox
economic interpretations of its role and social priorities. But as Raúl
Zibechi points out, “The new bank offers the benefits of escaping the
financial controls exercised by developed countries and capital
markets,” as well as “fulfilling the needs of the peoples and those who
have historically been excluded.”

3. The Andean Challenge: Ecuador and Bolivia are undergoing profound
changes that offer hope to nations throughout the world. The current
governments in both countries established Constituent Assemblies to
reform their constitutions to assure greater political equality and
fair redistribution of wealth and resources. They face tremendous
obstacles as they go up against vested interests and begin
institutional reforms. In Bolivia, the reforms seek to break down
structures of oligarchic economic power and racist political power that
have been adapted since colonial times to maintain elite control. The
Assembly concluded amid tense and ongoing conflicts and the
constitution now goes to a popular vote. In Ecuador, the assembly and
its working groups are still at the stage of gathering proposals and
building consensus. As we wrote recently, “The effort to use the state
to retake and redistribute resources ceded to private economic
interests under globalization, to enfranchise indigenous populations,
to narrow the appalling gap between the haves and have-nots of our era
deserves a chance and will no doubt provide lessons for the rest of the
world.”

Other examples of the Andean challenge to top-down globalization come
not from governments but from the day-to-day battles in communities.
Following the example of the Cochabamba “Water War,” Ecuadorians in
Guayaquil have organized to demand the right to water and return to
public control. Although new governments have opened up historic
opportunities for change in the region, it continues to be the
grassroots movements that will drive this process.
The Challenges

Along with the hope, come challenges—particularly for those concerned
with U.S. foreign policy in the region. Three challenges come to mind,
not because they are the most transcendent, but because they are viable
and reasonable—and we cannot conceive of a constructive and coherent
policy in the hemisphere without these first steps.

1. Engagement with Cuba.

After years of failure in Cuba and in the international arena and an
eroding base of domestic support, it’s hard to imagine what it would
take to change the block-headed U.S. policies toward Cuba. In their
article, Center for International Policy analysts Wayne Smith and
Jennifer Schuett point out that in 2008 there may be light at the end
of the tunnel.

A new president willing to seriously assess and reform the current
travel ban and economic embargo, along with a responsible Congress,
could break the stranglehold of Cold War ideology and move toward
constructive engagement. Already signs have appeared to indicate that
current measures to isolate the island and intervene internally could
soon fall from favor. The authors write that “There is hope that the
changing political equation in Miami, pressure from economic interest
groups interested in trade and investment, and support by the majority
of Americans for normalization of relations with Cuba will lead to a
long overdue policy change after the 2008 elections.”

2. Defeat the U.S.-Colombia Free Trade Agreement.

Democrats in Congress have vowed to defeat this agreement due to
concerns about human and labor rights violations in Colombia and the
government’s ties to paramilitary forces. The Bush administration,
however, counts Colombian president Alvaro Uribe as its most important
ally in the region and has vowed to fight for the FTA.

If today Colombian labor leaders organizing in Coca-Cola and other
foreign firms are assassinated to maintain “business as usual,” it’s
likely the situation will get worse when the country is locked into an
FTA-model of development that stakes the national economy on foreign
investment. The militarization of Colombia as a result of U.S. aid
under Plan Colombia has empowered repressive military and paramilitary
forces and distanced Colombia from its Latin American neighbors who
criticize its allegiance to northern interests and fear “spill-over” of
the violence into their territory. The FTA is seen as divisive by other
Andean nations.

In the U.S. Congress there is a growing call for a moratorium on all
Free Trade Agreements until a full assessment of their economic,
political, and social costs has been made. The U.S.-Colombia FTA should
be blocked as part of rethinking trade policy, and as a stand against
the violation of human rights in that country.

3. Reject Funding for Plan Mexico.

Although $500 million appears a paltry sum compared to military
intervention in Iraq and the Middle East, binational relations between
the two neighbors with a fractious border would take an ugly turn if
the so-called “Merida Initiative” were approved. Also known as Plan
Mexico, this program for “regional security cooperation” would provide
money and equipment to the Mexican military, police, and intelligence
services. None of the aid contemplated in this first package of a $1.5
billion-dollar deal goes where it’s most needed, such as addiction
prevention and rehabilitation or development financing—and much of it
is downright dangerous.

Sending equipment to the Mexican police and military in the context of
unprosecuted human rights violations empowers impunity. Increased
intelligence-gathering with expanded powers and insufficient
protections puts the civil liberties of the general population at risk.
The physical presence of U.S. military companies such as Blackwater
doing training and equipment maintenance, and direct U.S. involvement
in Mexican security could lead to a proxy relationship that compromises
national sovereignty and subordinates a traditional Mexican foreign
policy of neutrality to a U.S. interventionist foreign policy. Plan
Mexico, with its emphasis on interdiction in the drug war,
anti-terrorist measures to confront an international threat that does
not demonstrably exist in Mexico, and the reinterpretation of
immigration as organized crime, corresponds to a logic that heightens
violence on all fronts and strains binational relations. Mexico needs
and deserves U.S. support, but not to impose regional militarization.

There are many more sources of hope and challenge. They might seem
novel to those who just recently felt the new winds blowing from the
southern part of the hemisphere, but all are built on years of citizen
involvement and vision. U.S. policies can promote rather than suppress
these efforts at self-determination and social justice. And there are
signs that the United States is ready for that kind of change too.

Laura Carlsen (lcarlsen(a)ciponline.org) is Director of the Americas
Policy Program (www.americaspolicy.org) of the Center for International
Policy.