Mexico and asylum

All the stories about Mexican law enforcement, journalists, and even just family of activists seeking asylum in the United States made me wonder about the numbers.  These are from the Department of Justice's Yearbook of Immigration Statistics 2009 (I discovered that the 2010 numbers don't come out until next month).  The following is the number of individuals granted asylum from Mexico from 2000 to 2009.

2000: 42
2001: 52
2002: 36
2003: 35
2004: 53
2005: 85
2006: 84
2007: 103
2008: 176
2009: 192

In other words, in that decade the number rose 457 percent.  It is entirely reasonable to expect the 2010 numbers also to show an increase.  It makes me wonder a) whether the evaluation of asylum requests has evolved over time or not; and b) how much the number of total requests has gone up.

Regardless, this is becoming an increasingly public issue that is uncomfortable for both the U.S. and Mexican governments since it does not reflect well on current strategies for reducing drug-related violence.

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Remittances are back

One sign of an economic recovery in the United States is the increase of remittances to Latin America, which had been down for several years.  Overall, they rose to $58.9 billion, a 0.2% increase.  Guatemala, Honduras, El Salvador and Mexico all increased between 6 and 16%.

We can therefore come to a few conclusions.

First, this once again suggests strongly that there is no exodus of migrants going back home.  They still see the U.S. as an economic engine from which they can draw.

Second, since we know that recent migrants are the most likely to send remittances, and many of them are undocumented, this constitutes anecdotal evidence that enforcement is not serving as a major deterrent.

Third, unfortunately, Latin American economies are still heavily dependent on the export of primary products, and that includes their own people.

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Brazil at the UN

Peter Hakim at the Inter-American Dialogue has a balanced analysis of why the Obama administration should support Brazil's bid for a permanent seat on the UN Security Council, and also includes counter-arguments.  He has one sentence that jumped out at me:

Washington would simply be acknowledging Brazil’s new global prominence and getting out in front of the inevitable.

I think "getting out in front of the inevitable" applies to many different foreign policy areas.  U.S. policy makers, not to mention the general public, all too often believe that sheer might, combined with our deeply embedded sense of exceptionalism, can bend international events to our own will.  You can push for your own policy preferences, but it is important to understand when something is going to happen whether you like it or not, and then adjust accordingly.

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Current immigration reform

Here is where we currently stand on immigration.  Faced with federal inaction and knowing they need to regularize their workforce, state governments like Utah are trying to forge their own guest worker programs.  Whether or not the Utah plan passes constitutional muster, or works in practice, remains to be seen.

Meanwhile, the federal government raids Chipotle restaurants.

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Fidel and Moammar

The Huffington Post has a post from Yoani Sánchez in English comparing Fidel Castro to Moammar Gaddafi.

Both leaders waved before their subjects' eyes the specter of foreign invasion and a return to political dependence, the worst of threats. Anti-colonialism became the big bad wolf of the eccentric Berber leader, while the Caribbean leader scratched around in the mud of anti-imperialism, turning the metaphor of David and Goliath into a perennial reference to Cuba and the United States.

It's a good post.  Short and sweet.

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Drugs and innovation in Latin America

Sylvia Longmire has a very interesting article in Homeland Security Today about how drug traffickers are constantly finding new and innovative ways to transport drugs to the United States.  Although the U.S. government has been responding, it can barely keep up.  She makes the point that the innovation comes because of the squeeze--"record" busts mean it is necessary for traffickers to find new strategies.

This brings me to one of my numerous pet peeves.  I find myself annoyed at triumphant references to "records" regarding drugs, and though she doesn't focus on it I think her article highlights why they are terribly misleading yet media pleasing factoids.  To quote Inigo Montoya, I do not think it means what you think it means, because records don't automatically mean you are "winning" (and now I guess I am quoting Charlie Sheen).  Somehow the record number of busts continues to coincide with the record amount of drug revenue.

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Chile-Japan nexus

From Wikileaks (via CIPER Chile): Alejandro Toledo thought there was a nefarious "Chile-Japan nexus."

The President also complained that he was surprised President Vicente Fox of Mexico did not promptly inform him that Fujimori’s plane had transited via Tijuana. The Ambassador replied that it appeared the Chilean Government had been caught off guard, noting that the flight manifest faxed to Santiago did not have Fujimori’s name on it (though the manifest handed over by the flight crew on arrival did). The Ambassador added that he suspected the Japanese Government also was taken unawares. Toledo indicated that he still suspected collusion between Chile and Japan, while continuing to express bewilderment at “”my friend”" Fox’s failure to provide timely information during their attendance at the Summit of the Americas.

In fact, by 2007 Fujimori was a hot potato for the Bachelet administration, which didn't want him around.    But I guess if you set the record for the lowest approval rating in a democracy, you feel pretty paranoid all the time.

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More on Libya and Latin America

Reading analyses of Latin American leaders' reaction to the Libyan crisis has been entertaining.  A simple matter of ideological unity--however repugnant--is transformed into sweeping arguments about Latin America as a whole.  This normally becomes a mirror of the author's own beliefs.  Take for example this L.A. Times op-ed by Andrés Martinez at the New America Foundation.

The fact that three Latin American leaders (Chávez, Castro, and Ortega) have expressed support for Gaddafi means the following (and I swear I am not making this up):

--All of Latin American civil society is "immature."  So presumably the fact that Hugo Chávez supports Gaddafi reflects Chilean or Mexican "immaturity" as well.

--"Latin leaders have arrogantly considered foreign affairs their exclusive prerogative, divorced from whatever constraints they face at home."  I will explain what this means once I figure it out.  If there were constraints, then presumably they would be constrained.  Otherwise they aren't constraints.

--Lula mocks human rights by his relation with Iran.  What this has to do with Libya or President Rousseff (she is not even mentioned in the article!) is not explained.  The Brazilian government has in fact not ruled any response out, but rather asserts any international solution must have UN backing.  Lula cozied up to Gaddafi plenty of times in the past, but currently Brazil is more or less in the mainstream with regard to a solution.

--In sum, the Latin American left is a big bloc and all of it supports Gaddafi. Except if it doesn't, I guess.

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Latino population in North Carolina

I have not yet had time to dig into the Census data on the Latino population.  Nonetheless, the upward growth of that population is considerable--Latinos now constitute 8.4 percent of North Carolina's population, an increase of 111.1 percent since 2000.  I was quoted in a local paper, the Salisbury Post, about the origins of that migration.

There will be plenty of misunderstanding of the numbers, plus anecdotal accounts that may or may not have empirical backing.  Take this story in the News & Observer, which argues there is an "exodus."  The reporter spoke to one Latino immigrant who, as we learn at the end of the story, doesn't plan to leave despite economic problems!  As I've written many, many times, there is always circular migration and some people will indeed leave for economic reasons (or perhaps enforcement) but there is no exodus.

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Performance vs. ideology

There's a curious juxtaposition between North Carolina politics, where Republicans recently took control of the both legislative houses for the first time in more than a century, to Latin America, where over the past decade or so left-leaning governments are replacing right-leaning ones.  In both cases, the new governments confidently asserted that the voters actively wanted them in particular.  Increasingly, however, it is evident that voters are making their choices based on performance rather than ideology.  Assuming everyone voted based on your ideology can become problematic when performance dips.

From Jack Betts in today's Charlotte Observer:

"The biggest mistake Republicans can make is to believe that voters chose them because of their ideology," he said. "They chose Republicans because they had lost confidence in the Democrats' ability to solve the problems of the day. ... This has not become a Republican state."

And this abstract from Latin American Research Review:

Over the past few years, a burgeoning literature on Latin American politics has developed, focusing on explanations for the renewed success of the left in the region. Building on electoral trends and public opinion analysis, we argue that the region is experiencing the normalization of democratic politics rather than a backlash or a revolution. Furthermore, we believe that electoral support for the left reflects the disenchantment of voters with underperforming right-wing governments. Using a unique data set covering eighteen countries in the region, our statistical analyses demonstrate that retrospective voting provides a powerful explanation of the recent electoral success of the left in Latin America. Thus, the central implication of our argument is that electoral accountability is still the primary mechanism of controlling the executive in the region's young democracies.

María Victoria Murillo, Virginia Oliveros, and Milan Vaishnav, "Electoral Revolution or Democratic Alternation?" Latin American Research Review 45, 3 (2010): 87-114.

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Quote of the day: Chile

"The latest rumor is that Moammar Gadhafi is calling other countries to find a place to live in exile. So far, only Chile has offered to rent out an empty mine."

--Jay Leno

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U.S. policy toward Nicaragua

Thanks to Boz for pointing out this speech from the U.S. Ambassador to Nicaragua, Robert Callahan.  It is an apologia for U.S. policy, and really a doozy.  He goes all the way back to William Walker.

Walker was clearly crazed, a true megalomaniac, and he caused death and destruction wherever he pitched up.  But he was acting on his own and received no support from the American government.

Then it gets worse.  Much worse.

Another renowned Nicaraguan figure to emerge from this period was Anastasio Somoza Garcia.  As history would prove, Americans erred in selecting him to lead the newly created and non-partisan National Guard, which was to replace a politicized army, but it would have been impossible to know Somoza's intentions at the time.  He seemed bright and well intentioned and he spoke English.  He talked of democracy.  He extolled freedom.  He promised elections.  He charmed us, and many others.

Yes, we supported him and his sons for years, tolerating them in the name of national security.  But at the end, admittedly late in the game, we abandoned him.  Many contributed to the defeat of Somoza, but we did play a modest, if belated, role. 

This is just embarrassing.  We thought Somoza was a great guy and he tricked us!  But then, after over 40 years of brutal repression we stopped supporting his son just when he was about to be overthrown anyway.  So we're the good guys.  Why can't you Nicaraguans understand that?

I will just provide one more example.

But there are many other, much less visible, ways that America and Americans contribute to Nicaragua's economic and social development.  Take, for example, remittances.  Although we have no exact figures, we estimate conservatively that Nicaraguans receive at least a half a billion dollars annually from workers and residents in the United States.  The United States has welcomed these workers, many of whom are immigrants, and has never interfered with their desire to send money home.

It is strange that anyone today could say that the U.S. welcomes Latin American workers.  Even setting that aside, it is bizarre that "never interfering" with remittances is equated with actively contributing to Nicaragua's "economic and social development."

There is more, but I won't subject you to it.

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Hugo Chávez on the Middle East

Hugo Chávez on Libya: I want to help mediate.

Hugo Chávez on Egypt: No outside power should be involved and the country should find its own solution.  "El pueblo decidirá."

Hugo Chávez on the U.S government.: It is hypocritical.

Oh, and don't call me Mubarak.

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Latin American drug consumption

A dark side of economic growth is that people have more disposable income to spend on illegal substances.  The UN is concerned about the rise of cocaine use among Latin American youths, led by Uruguay, Chile and Argentina.  Further, it looks like Peru may overtake Colombia as the world's largest exporter of coca.

Latin American governments rightfully criticize the United States for refusing to address the problem of consumption, but with increased Latin American consumption there is a pressing need to work jointly to find solutions that work.  Otherwise organized crime will be moving into places like Chile that have never experienced it before.

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Why Cuba Isn't Likely Next

I think Chris Sabatini has a really interesting take about why Cuba is not likely to be the next in a wave of dictatorial uprootings:

For the last two decades, from Eastern Europe to Egypt, none of the countries that has experienced a people's revolution has been under a U.S. embargo.  Though it is about to be the target of focused sanctions as a result of its bloody response to the protestors (and deservedly so) before the current uprising even Libya saw its sanctions ended in 2004 by the George W. Bush administration.  In the case of Libya --and in the past-- targeted sanctions tied to a specific act by the government can provoke a course correction or even collapse.  Over the long-term, though, sanctions actually seal a country off from the rest of the world and allow a government to dig in.

The inverse relationship between isolation and people's revolution is no coincidence. Contact with the outside world builds capacity and ideas insidious to even the most tyrannical regime.  

Add this to all the other many reasons that the embargo helps to block political change in Cuba.

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Sergio Bitar on Obama

Sergio Bitar (who was a cabinet member in the Allende, Lagos, and Bachelet administrations in Chile) offers a Latin American perspective of the Obama administration's Latin America policy that is worth reading.  It compares Obama's approach to other parts of the world, and sees two core problems.

First, with Latin America, Obama focuses only on the hemisphere and does not acknowledge broader global forces at work.

Second, Obama does not acknowledge legitimate reasons why Latin American leaders (even ones generally supportive of U.S. policy) have been critical of the U.S., particularly how the global economic crisis came about in the first place.

Both are fair criticisms.  Obama inherited the "neighbor" rhetoric from every president before him, but it is increasingly becoming outdated and often had paternalistic overtones.  He also inherited the insistence that problems of drugs, immigration, etc. are primarily Latin American ones without creating new policies aimed at demand rather than just supply.

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Honduran elections

The People's National Resistance Front in Honduras says it will not form a party and participate in the 2013 presidential elections because the country is not democratic enough.

Instead, some 1,500 delegates to the first general assembly of the People's National Resistance Front, known popularly as Resistance, opted to eschew elections and push for the Central American nation's constitution to be rewritten, an effort that was begun by Zelaya and led to his ouster.

"The conditions are not right to go to an electoral process," Zelaya's wife, Xiomara Castro, said in a speech Saturday. "To do that would require that the coup-mongers leave power and are punished."

My immediate thought was that it sounded almost exactly like the opposition to Hugo Chávez in the 2005 legislative elections.  The lesson it learned was that refusing to participate gave Chávez a huge majority in the legislature and in retrospect was a serious tactical mistake.  It also reminds me of the Chilean Communist Party, which had once been very strong, but which rejected any participation in Augusto Pinochet's 1988 referendum.  As a result, the party was not part of the Concertación and ever since has struggled for political relevance.

In short, it is a risky strategy in a situation where there are admittedly no great options given the political violence (on top of the criminal violence) in the country.  However, to require punishment for those involved in the coup as a precondition for formal political participation may unfortunately be setting the bar impossibly high.

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Nicaragua and social media

Tim Rogers at Time has an article on virtual protests in Nicaragua against Daniel Ortega's re-election, which gets to the heart of recent debate about social media and political activism (see, for example, the controversy over Malcolm Gladwell's dismissal of any connection).  Some 16,000 Nicaraguans protested on Facebook.  The protests in the Middle East have famously used social media for coordination, so the parallel is obvious.

The big difference, at least for now, is that social media must translate into real world action.  Here is a problematic part of the story:

Indeed, the fear of reprisal in Nicaragua might have even affected turnout to the cyber protest. More than 2,200 Facebook users invited to attend the march clicked "maybe" — if, one assumes, it didn't conflict with other virtual commitments on their virtual calendars — and 76,800 didn't respond at all.

Afraid?  Maybe so, but we should also ask whether the vast majority are indifferent, apathetic, or otherwise not feeling sufficiently motivated to protest even just online.  The article seems more like wishful thinking than serious appraisal.

But let's see whether protests can jump entire regions with totally different political, economic, and cultural contexts.

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Libya and Latin America 2

I recommend this Al Jazeera rundown on the Latin American response to the Libyan crisis, which is much more detailed than others I've seen.  Everyone talks about Venezuela, but Brazil has been very happy in recent years with Gaddafi as well.

One of the stranger developments is the criticism from both Venezuela and Cuba about media manipulation about events in Libya, which is why Hugo Chávez claims he has remained quiet.  Of course, Al Jazeera has been at the forefront of providing news from the Middle East, so is very often the source for western news agencies.  Back in 2006, Telesur and Al Jazeera signed a deal to share content:

Head of Telesur Andres Izarra said his channel felt inspired by the path which al-Jazeera had taken to become a reference point in the Arab world.

Telesur says it seeks to promote regional integration and offer an alternative to US networks.

In other words, up until now the Venezuelan government saw Al Jazeera as a solution, and now suddenly it is part of the problem.

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Libya and Latin America

Another conservative criticism of the Libya-Latin America link from José Cárdenas at Foreign Policy.  For once I actually agree with most of what he says, until the end when he cannot help make it into a criticism of the Obama administration.

All this crystallizes the situation for the United States in Latin America today: between serious governments with whom we can do business and the irresponsible outliers with whom we share hardly any common interests. It is a distinction the Obama administration doesn't always seem to appreciate. At a House Western Hemisphere subcommittee hearing last week, Rep. David Rivera (R-FL) chided Assistant Secretary of State Arturo Valenzuela on this score, saying that our hemispheric policy seems to be all about trying to make up with our enemies and ignoring our friends. Let's hope the disparate reactions to the carnage in Libya will serve as a wake-up call to realign our priorities in the Western Hemisphere.

If we didn't "do business" with "serious" countries that had ties to Libya and had nice photo-ops with Gaddafi, we wouldn't do business with much of Europe.  Plus, Bolivia is not the same as Venezuela, since the former is actually pursuing unpopular market reforms.  In general, the stubborn inability to see any nuance is tiring, though not surprising.

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Gaddafi and Latin America

Conservative commentators are jumping on the Latin American reaction to the Libyan uprisings, even criticizing the Obama administration for, well, I am not quite sure even what.  Regardless, it is useful to start thinking about what Latin America lessons we can take from Libya, though of course we need to wait until events unfold more before we can make firm conclusions.

Perhaps the most important is that the U.S. was uninvolved in prompting these protests, and they are likely more powerful as a result because accusations of meddling--as from Fidel Castro--come off as hollow echoes of the Cold War.  Strangely enough, for those who support the Cuban embargo, the U.S. (starting with George W. Bush, in fact) had even been liberalizing relations with Libya, which obviously did not have the effect of making him stronger politically.  Whether you believe the liberalization was good or bad is irrelevant--the point is that there is no automatic correlation between such liberalization and the strength of a dictatorship.  If there is one thing Cuba policy teaches us, it is that intervention can create blowback and give you the exact opposite result from what you want.

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Gaddafi and Chávez

Twitter has been loaded with rumors the past two days about Libya, and there was no juicier rumor than Moammar Gaddafi flying to Venezuela.  It also turned out to be completely false, but it underlined the very public and strong bond between him and Hugo Chávez.  Meanwhile, Chávez has been totally silent about events in Libya.  Along these lines, I recommend Nikolas Kozloff's article in the Huffington Post.  He's written fairly favorably of Chávez in the past, but pretty much nails the embarrassment of embracing people like Gadafi:

With revolution now sweeping away the most autocratic rulers across the African continent, Chávez now has a unique opportunity to redraw his political priorities. Will the Venezuelan leader see the error of his ways or continue to embrace phony Third World liberation in the guise of autocratic despotism? Señor Presidente: the silence has become truly deafening.

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Colombia FTA and the Middle East

There is an article in the Miami Herald about Latin America's ties to the Middle East, which is largely interesting but one part grated on me:

Amid mounting frustration with the U.S. Congress’ refusal to pass a free trade agreement with Colombia, Santos has talked of the need to build new trade routes, including with the Middle East. And the country plans to open embassies in the United Arab Emirates and Turkey this year.

This meme is tiresome.  Whether or not an FTA is passed is irrelevant to Colombia's trade with the rest of the world.  An FTA does not mean that you suddenly stop trading with everyone else.  Chile has roughly fifty free trade agreements, and continues to "build new trade routes" all the time.

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Transitions and foreign policy

Like everyone else, I've been following events in the Middle East with no small amount of shock.  As protests in Libya expand, I've been thinking about the ideological angle.  Dictators of all different ideological stripes are under fire.

That ideological mix is throwing the western hemisphere for a loop.  The Obama administration was slow to respond because Mubarak was such a strong ally, yet much more quickly now says it will provide "technical assistance" to Libyan protestors.  Fidel Castro lauded the protestors in Egypt, and then the Cuban government became utterly silent when similar protests hit Libya.  Similarly, Telesur emphasizes the Libyan government's official line that the protests constitute foreign intervention, though interestingly in the Egyptian case Hugo Chávez criticized the U.S. for not supporting Mubarak, which itself is foreign intervention.

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Chile Wikileaks

If you need more evidence from Chile that the left-right dichotomy in Latin America is far more complex than commonly portrayed, we have this Wikileaks revelation.  The center-left Bachelet government, which we would expect to be more sympathetic to Hugo Chávez, was spying on Iranians in Latin America, which was in line with U.S. concerns.  And now, the center-right Piñera government is pro-Palestinian, which is not what the U.S. wants and is much more in line with Venezuela.

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Immigration enforcement welfare

Andres Oppenheimer makes a good case for cutting immigration enforcement spending on programs proven not to work.

At the very least, they should have a serious discussion on whether it makes sense to spend $4.5 billion in deporting people who have not committed serious crimes and do jobs that Americans don’t want to do, while slashing funds for the FBI and other law enforcement agencies whose job is to put serious criminals behind bars.

He also highlights an important and generally neglected issue, namely that immigration enforcement is a huge government giveaway:

There is growing evidence that the arrest and deportation of undocumented migrants along the U.S. border has become a big business for private detention companies, and that in many cases it hasn’t helped reduce the flow of undocumented migrants.

In so many ways, immigration enforcement should be a perfect issue for those claiming a commitment to cut fat from the budget.  Unfortunately that rarely seems to happen, as everyone is happy to throw good money after bad.

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Obama's trip to El Salvador

The media in the U.S. is still not sure why President Obama is going to El Salvador (here is my post about how confused everyone was last month).  The fact that the White House is not really explaining why doesn't help.  From the New York Times' Caucus Blog:

Mr. Obama’s stop in El Salvador is as much about domestic politics as international affairs; one of the larger and fast-growing immigrant populations in the United States hails from this nation.

I don't buy it.  Obama is not courting Salvadoran-American votes in the U.S.  His trip will likely focus on gangs and drug trafficking, which are related to immigration but far more complicated than that.

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Colombian refugees

A new report shows that 280,000 Colombians were displaced in 2010, and one-third of these were in areas the government claimed were "consolidated."  Colombia has a total of 5.2 million displaced people, roughly 1 out of every 9 Colombians, and the most in the world.  Some 389,000 live as refugees abroad, which of course has been a serious problem for Ecuador.

Unfortunate, then, that the House of Representatives wants to slash refugee aid when we're helping to cause the flow of refugees in the first place.

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Economic growth and food riots

It is so ironic.  For about the past year, we were hearing over and over that Latin American economies were on fire, recovering from the global recession faster than the developed world (back in December, for example, both ECLAC and the Wall Street Journal, not exactly bosom buddies, were excited).  The problem, of course, was that economic growth was dependent largely on high commodity prices, which had become something of a pet peeve of mine.

A mere two months later, reality sets in.  High commodity prices are not so good when you are the buyer, and it is even worse when it's food.  In fact, now the UN is concerned about food riots in the poorest Latin American countries because of the rise in prices.  The Bolivian government may even stockpile food.

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The U.S. and Honduras

Arturo Valenzuela's statement to the Subcommittee on the Western Hemisphere of the House Committee on Foreign Affairs is not too remarkable, but one thing jumped out at me:

During 2010, Honduras made significant progress in strengthening governance, promoting national reconciliation, addressing some of the problems of human rights violations, and restoring diplomatic relations with many countries in the hemisphere. As President Lobo has said, he has sought to redirect the country on a path towards democratic normalization following the disruption of the institutional order that took place in June 2009. In our view, he has prepared the groundwork for the restoration of Honduras to the Organization of American States. The U.S. Government is supporting Honduras through robust programs managed by several agencies, including the Departments of the Treasury, Defense, Homeland Security, State, and USAID, and we will seek new ways to support the country’s efforts to achieve its economic development objectives.

This is so over the top and inaccurate that I would wager that he does not believe it either.  Just browse, for example, Amnesty International's Honduras reports, which discuss police intimidation of human rights activists, threats against journalists, and refusal to address human rights violations that occurred after the coup.  Then take a look at Human Rights Watch, which discusses the overall climate of intimidation and failure to deal with human rights abuses.

My hunch is that it is a bone for the key Republican members of the committee, who thought the Honduran coup was the best thing since sliced bread.  The committee chair, Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, even went personally to Honduras to tell Roberto Micheletti how great he was.

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Trading with Colombia

Finally, finally, I see public acknowledgment of a key aspect of U.S. economic policy toward Colombia that is usually obscured.  Back in 2008, I asked the following:

If Colombia benefits now, and the U.S. doesn’t, then how does an FTA benefit both of us? Right now, Colombia has access but also protection of domestic industry, and an FTA gets rid of the latter.

So you can ignore all the arguments you hear ad nauseam about how essential an FTA is for Colombia, as House Republicans are finally discussing the real reason they support an FTA, which is that the status quo benefits Colombia too much.  From the new Chair of the House Ways and Means Committee:

Without a timetable on all three agreements, Mr. Camp said, conservatives weren't likely to back an extension of the Andean trade program, because it reduced tariffs on Colombian exporters without lowering them on U.S exports to Colombia, as a trade agreement would do.

The key benefit of an FTA for Colombia is to avoid the constant stress of renewal deadlines for trade preferences.

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Political transitions in Chile and Egypt

The academic study of political transitions was huge in the 1980s and 1990s, focusing largely on Latin America.  It may well get a new boost because of the Middle East.  In fact, the White House is reaching out to academia to better understand the Egyptian transition.  From the Washington Post:

The White House focus has been on revolutions against U.S.-backed dictatorships, including the 1986 popular revolt against Ferdinand Marcos in the Philippines, the Chilean transition from the dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet to democracy in 1990, and the 1998 uprising in Indonesia that drove out President Suharto. Officials have also looked to Serbia and Poland for lessons.

I assume they will not make the mistake of labeling Chile a "revolution."  It was a pacted transition that got going when Pinochet lost a referendum on whether he should stay in office.  He did leave power, but in a position of strength, even remaining commander in chief of the army.  In that sense, the Chilean transition has little to say to Egypt.

As I mentioned in passing in a previous post, Chile is more relevant for understanding how to deal with a very strong military in a democratic context.  For a 2006 book chapter on Chilean civil-military relations, I used the title "Inching Toward Democracy" and that may be the same for Egypt.

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Who needs a groundhog...

...when you have the day--today--when pitchers and catchers report to spring training.  Plus, Baseball Prospectus 2011 will be out in nine more days.  Baseball is here and spring is on its way.

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Contagions and dominos

"Contagion effect" and "domino effect" are being used interchangeably (I can put in a million links but just do a quick Google search to see what I mean) to describe the current spread of popular revolt in the Middle East, but I would argue it is useful to view them as distinct, albeit clearly similar.  What's occurring in the Middle East is contagion, not domino.

The term "domino effect" was coined by Dwight Eisenhower to describe the drive to spread communist governments around the world, and was central to U.S. policy toward Latin America during the Cold War.  They key here is the aspect of coordination, or at least leadership.  Marxist leaders wanted to spread revolutions to other countries (e.g. Che Guevara's Message to the Tricontinental about multiple Vietnams) and so provided arms, training, doctrine, rhetorical support, etc. to rebel leaders elsewhere.  In Latin America particularly after the 1954 Guatemala invasion, U.S. policy makers tended to view everything as a domino even if there was little or no outside support.  Indeed, it can be even more confusing when movements were both home grown and then also supported from abroad.

"Contagion effect" refers to more spontaneous copying of successful political movements (such as uprisings).  Success in one country provides opposition leaders in others with more confidence that they could do the same.  Currently in the Middle East there is no direct coordination (that I have heard of, anyway) between, say, Tunisia and Egypt, but clearly the former had a huge impact on the latter.  And the example of Egypt is now very influential.

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The military in Egypt and Latin America

Rightly, much attention is now being paid to the Egyptian military.  David Pion-Berlin, Harold Trinkunas, and I among others commented on the issue at The Monkey Cage from the perspective of Latin Americanists.  Although comparisons to Batista's Cuba or Somoza's Nicaragua are compelling for understanding U.S. policy, they are weaker for understanding civilian-military relations, because those governments did not have independent military institutions.  What the Latin American experience demonstrates, however, is that all the current excitement must be tempered by the fact that the outcome in Egypt is by no means preordained to be democratic.

Along those lines, Steven Taylor links to a Foreign Affairs article by Ellis Goldberg, a political scientist at the American University in Cairo.

Today, the army presents itself as a force of order and a neutral arbiter between contending opponents, but it has significant interests of its own to defend, and it is not, in fact, neutral. The basic structure of the Egyptian state as it now exists has benefited the military. The practical demands of the protesters seem fairly simple: end the state of emergency, hold new elections, and grant the freedom to form parties without state interference. But these demands would amount to opening up the political space to everyone across Egypt's social and political structure. That would involve constitutional and statutory changes, such as reforming Egypt as a parliamentary rather than a presidential system, in which a freely elected majority selects the prime minister (who is now appointed by the president). These changes would wipe away the power structure the army created in 1952 and has backed since.

At a minimum. the military will protect its prerogatives, though this can be consistent with democratic elections.  With luck, this will be a case like Bolivia or Ecuador, where the military withdrew support from leaders facing massive protests, then stepped aside to allow elections.  If that happens, then it may well take years to whittle away at the prerogatives, as in Chile.  Let's see how the meetings go between Mubarak's opposition and the armed forces.

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Insurgency and Mexico

There is a flap regarding the U.S. Undersecretary of the Army characterizing the situation in Mexico as a "form of insurgency," even raising the issue of using U.S. troops to fight it.  Key quote:

“This isn’t just about drugs and about illegal immigrants,” he said. “This is about, potentially, a takeover of a government by individuals who are corrupt.”

This isn't entirely new, since Hillary Clinton had made the insurgency comparison last year.

Setting aside the obvious problem of sending U.S. troops, I agree with the Mexican government that it is an inaccurate way of characterizing the conflict.  An insurgency is an illegal armed group seeking to overthrow a government.  That is not happening in Mexico because the drug trafficking organizations do not want to overthrow the government, but rather simply to absorb themselves into it.  Much of that effort has nothing to do with armed insurrection, and instead involves well placed bribery, recruitment of political candidates and other such strategies.  You can't fight those with troops, either U.S. or Mexican.

Further, when there are attacks, they are aimed at forcing the government to leave them alone and not to overthrow it.  The Center for International Policy's Just the Facts correctly made this point last year:

This is a concern, because some poor policy choices can result from viewing criminal gangs and narcotrafficking syndicates – whose only truly political goal is to keep government from disrupting their business – as “insurgents” or revolutionaries.

It's not just a matter of semantics.  If you call this an insurgency, then you click into place a variety of counterinsurgency measures that in the Mexican case will not work.

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Promoting economic growth

Quite a lot to chew on from a speech by Jose Fernandez, the State Department's Assistant Secretary for Economic, Energy, and Business Affairs.  The issue is how the Obama administration views the U.S. role in promoting economic growth.

To be clear, this is not simply a blind faith in the power of the free markets. Instead, this focus is really about identifying every convergence point where commercial and public interests meet.

We see this convergence of profit and purpose with several initiatives and concepts we are promoting in the spirit of partnership and cooperation laid out by the President.

• FIRST, our innovative initiative to harness remittances for development needs,

• SECOND; our emphasis on women’s entrepreneurship in Peru, and

• THIRD, I want to speak to the need to promote anti-corruption and transparency measures as a way to boost domestic revenues for development

The emphasis on remittances is ironic, since the Obama administration is deporting more remittance senders than any administration in the history of the United States.

Women's entrepreneurship sounds good, though the idea is essentially to connect small entrepreneurs with Wal-Mart.  Small businesses do need markets, but government-sponsored ties to massive multinational corporations raise all sorts of questions given the virtually total control the MNCs will immediately exert on those small businesses acting as distributors.

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With friends like these...

An African American state senator in South Carolina managed to use every stereotype imaginable, to advocate paying immigrants virtually nothing and thereby making legal businesses go bankrupt, all the while believing he was helping the cause of undocumented immigrants.

He recalled to senators that four workers in the country illegally showed up on his lawn and finished mowing, edging and other work in 30 minutes that would take others much longer, and only wanted $10 for the job. He went on to say he recommended the workers to his neighbors, and one local lawn care businessman lost work - a story one senator remarked was hurting, not helping, his case.

...

Black guys and white guys are going to get out there and do the hard work? No. I'm for America, and America's a country of immigrants," Ford said later when reached on his cell phone. "Everybody in America finds ways to take a break."

Everyone is lazy, so let's ignore the minimum wage.  He then said he would apologize, but he doesn't know what for.

This is the sort of thing that distorts the immigration debate.  It isn't about "lazy" versus "hard working."  Are there jobs so physically demanding and/or seasonal that many people don't want them?  Absolutely, but that is not related to laziness.*  What the U.S. needs is an immigration policy that encourages hard working people to come legally, which will raise the wages of those physically demanding and lower wage jobs (including lawn care) thus making them more attractive.  That in turn will help both businesses and workers.  The "us versus them" mentality just makes everything worse.

* On this point, once again I recommend Gabriel Thompson's Working in the Shadows, which I reviewed last August.

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Andean trade preferences

In a speech to the Americas Society/Council of the Americas, John McCain said that the Andean Trade Preference Act will not be  renewed by Congress.

The need to ratify our FTA with Colombia will become even more dire in a few days, as it appears all but certain that Congress will fail to reauthorize the Andean Trade Preference Act, which expires on Saturday. This legislation gives Colombia, along with other Andean nations, privileged access to U.S. markets. It has done wonders for Colombian workers and American consumers alike, and as a result, these trade preferences have been renewed by every Congress for the past 20 years, regardless of which party was in power. If these trade preferences expire this weekend, with no FTA in place, it will be a double slap in the face for Colombia.

I was not aware of that, and it turns out there is a bizarre story behind it that can be summed up as follows: Republicans say are blocking trade because they support trade.  From The Hill:

Republicans had planned a vote to extend the Andean Trade Preferences Act (ATPA), which lowers duties on imports from Andean countries, and the Trade Adjustment Assistance (TAA) program, which helps U.S. workers hurt by overseas competition. The TAA program is widely supported by Democrats, and some Republicans were known to be pressing for a White House commitment to move ahead with the Colombia and Panama free trade agreements (FTAs) before allowing a vote on TAA.

So the Andean Trade Preference Act, which everyone supports, will be held hostage for an FTA.  But it gets even more interesting, as voting for trade preferences have also recently been held up because of sleeping bags in Alabama.  You couldn't make that up if you tried.

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Immigration reform

More and more stories about how Chuck Schumer and Lindsey Graham are still working to pass immigration reform, though it is in the "infant stage."  The basic idea, which should be obvious to everyone, is to cobble together all the disparate groups who support it even if they don't necessarily agree on anything else at all.  There isn't much chance of reform happening this year, but if restrictionists are up in arms and refer to bipartisan dialogue as "scheming," then it suggests at least some belief that it could have legs.

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Reagan and Panama

As the Ronald Reagan 100th birthday commemorations really get going, the Charlotte Observer notes the importance of North Carolina to his presidential aspirations, and reminds us how Latin America was the main connection.  What is perhaps most remarkable to remember is that Reagan successfully generated outrage at something that was irrelevant.

He had failed in his early primary challenges against President Gerald Ford. But when he got to North Carolina, his campaign was taken over by Republican Sen. Jesse Helms and his sidekick, Raleigh attorney Tom Ellis. They made the Panama Canal the signature issue, as Reagan pulled off a historic upset, breathing new life into his presidential effort.

"We bought it, we paid for it, it's ours and we're going to keep it," Reagan said of the canal.

The transfer of the Panama Canal was ultimately smooth, untraumatic, and perfectly compatible with U.S. national security to boot.  Even Henry Kissinger supported it, yet Reagan and Helms managed to get people riled up all the same.  Happy 100th!

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Latin America-Arab Summit blues

Last month I mentioned the Latin America-Arab Summit, which is coming right up.  At that point, the big issue was the string of governments recognizing the Palestinian state.  What a difference a month makes.  Now everyone is focused on Egypt, and as result the summit may be postponed.  It does not take too much reading between the lines to figure out why.  From Peruvian President Alan García:

"We understand that there is a severe problem of instability in the zone and some (leaders) are wary of leaving the area," Garcia said.

Put another way, authoritarian Middle Eastern leaders do not want to leave their countries and then suddenly find themselves ousted and not allowed back (or allowed back under arrest).

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Homecoming 5K

This morning was time once again for the UNC Charlotte Homecoming 5K, which circles around campus and is my favorite race of the year.  Since we will have a football program beginning in 2013, I am guessing the university will move Homecoming (and thus this race as well) to the fall.  That will be much nicer, because although I enjoy the run (despite pushing my constantly growing daughters in the jogger stroller) it is less pleasant when 38 degrees and rainy.

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China message

From the Financial Times blog: these days the U.S. government has to try and convince people its economic influence is still greater than China's.  And, apparently, we make that argument essentially by saying that with Wal-Mart we can be just as cheap and anti-labor as China.

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Egypt and Latin America

Silvia Viña at Global Voices Online links to a number of blog posts, including mine, that compare the situation in Egypt with Latin America.  Some, like Boz, ask whether a similar situation could occur in Latin America now.  I see that as unlikely in large part because it already happened.  The past riots in Caracas and the protests in Bolivia and Ecuador, among others, uprooted deeply entrenched and corrupt regimes and installed very different ones that currently enjoy more popular support.  Later in Venezuela, the opposition tried to launch such a movement itself, failed, and then gave up the mass protest strategy.  I think the main current comparison to be made is with Cuba, where like in Egypt you have a long-standing personalistic dictatorship.  However, Cuba is even more repressive than Egypt, so the massive movement of people simply wouldn't be allowed, and it is hard to imagine security forces simply standing around.

So at least in my opinion the historical analogies--while imperfect--are best equipped to shed some light on the different possible directions Egypt might go.  If there is a contagion effect of some sort, I am not sure where we would likely see it.

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Piñera and Bachelet

Sebastián Piñera's approval rating dropped to 41% in January 2011.  Curiously, right about this same time in her presidency Michelle Bachelet started facing a similar crisis of confidence.  In January 2007 she fell to 47%, and then fell into a slide that brought down to 35% in September.  Of course, we need to remember that she ended her presidency at 83%.

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Hegemony and omnipotence

Media commentary on Egypt is echoing past arguments about Somoza's Nicaragua, Batista's Cuba, and the Shah's Iran (among others).  All of them confuse U.S. hegemony with omnipotence, and fail to comprehend the consequences of their policy prescriptions.  I thought of this as I happened to see Cal Thomas' opinion piece as I read today's Charlotte Observer.

The argument, made most prominently in the past by Jeane Kirkpatrick (which is why I have students in my U.S.-Latin American Relations class read her), goes along the following lines:

First, procedural democracy (or Dahl's basic idea of polyarchy) is not possible in these countries.

Second, the United States has the power to keep these authoritarian governments in power.

Third, it is necessary to keep those pro-U.S. authoritarian governments in power, because if they fall, an anti-U.S. totalitarian dictatorship will take its place.

Fourth, as a result the United States should support the authoritarian government's efforts to repress dissent as much as possible.

Fifth, if the U.S. does so, then the status quo will be maintained and the protests will disappear.

This is a vision where the U.S. controls all events, and mass protests are simple manipulations that do not reflect true popular opinion.  As such, they can be crushed without consequence, and neither U.S. national security nor the positive image of the U.S. will suffer.

It is, in short, a mirage.

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More on 287(g)

The Migration Policy Institute just published an extensive study on the 287(g) program.  It has a number of findings, but a key one is that contrary to the government's stated aims, the program does not target criminal offenders, and tends to be oriented toward tossing people in jail.  Obviously, a major concern about 287(g) is that it would give law enforcement carte blanche to stop anyone anywhere for any reason based on a presumption of being in the United States illegally, thus fostering an environment of fear and mistrust of law enforcement.

Overall, the conclusion is that the program can be implemented in a way that targets criminal offenders and builds  bridges to the Latino community.  At present, however, there is too little attention being paid a) to the different ways 287(g) is implemented; and b) the specific pros and cons of all those different ways.

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Private in Cuba

Check out the list of 178 activities that Cubans can now do privately for profit.  Bill collector seems perhaps the most un-socialist.  Meanwhile, people who take care of public places--both bathroom attendants and park caretakers--can now make a profit doing so.

And if you want a sense of the economic situation in Cuba, look at the list of jobs that repair something, including disposable lighters.  Yes, even those need repair in Castro's Cuba.

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Palestinians in Latin America

Here is a new and bizarre twist to the Palestinian-Latin America connection:

The United States proposed giving Palestinian refugees land in South America as a radical solution to a problem that has haunted Middle East peace talks for decades.

Condoleezza Rice, the Bush administration's secretary of state, wanted to settle displaced Palestinians in Argentina and Chile as an alternative to letting them return to former homes in Israel and the occupied territories. Rice made the proposal in a June 2008 meeting with US, Israeli and Palestinian negotiators in Berlin, according to minutes of the encounter seen by the Guardian.

...

The proposal seems based on the fact that Chile has a large Palestinian community dating back a century and, like Argentina, has large tracts of sparsely populated land.

Did anyone ask whether Palestinians would prefer to be shipped out, or whether a very large number of non-Spanish speaking Muslims would automatically be welcomed?  I suppose it is worth at least discussing all sorts of potential solutions, but this one seems particularly outlandish.

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Nicaragua and Egypt

It is impossible not to make analogies between the current situation in Egypt and the implosion of dictatorships in Latin America.  Anastasio Somoza in particular comes to mind.  Broadly speaking, the U.S. had supported a dictatorship for decades because it was a strategic ally, then internal opposition began to boil, hoping to copy the toppling of another repressive regime in the region.

There are, however, also very important differences.  One prominent difference is the attitude of the U.S. government.  In that regard, Somoza would agree 100% with Joe Biden:

"The Admiral came back to the proposal, which was simply that my family and I had to leave the country.  I was becoming wearisome of this contumacious proposal and said: "Look, Admiral, you people may think this government is a dictatorship, but your proposal has been handed down through every channel of government, as well as the leaders of the party, and not one person has accepted the proposal."  Then I told him that we didn't even have a small ripple of support for the proposal.  I told him that in my meetings with all of the leaders in the government, the party, and the Army, there was unanimous opposition to the proposal."

--Anastasio Somoza, Nicaragua Betrayed p. 221

At least for now, the U.S. position is quite different:

Vice President Joe Biden offered his take on the protests in Egypt, saying the current protests should not cause Egyptian Prsident Hosni Mubarak to resign.

Speaking in response to a question from Newshour‘s Jim Lehrer, Mr. Biden stopped short of calling for Mr. Mubarak to resign amidst the protests.

“I think the time has come for President Mubarak to begin to move in the direction that – to be more responsive to some… of the needs of the people out there,” Mr. Biden said.

Mr.  Biden  added that he does not consider the Egyptian president a “dictator.”

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Obama and El Salvador

If there is one thing all media outlets can agree on, it is that they have no idea why President Obama is going to El Salvador.

--The Wall Street Journal just says he's going to South America

--Ditto for Bloomberg, though at least they have a sentence or two on El Salvador

--UPI focuses on the unvisited countries that are ticked off, figuring they are more important

--At least Fox News Latino (yes, such a thing exists) mentions the importance of migrants

--Voice of America disagrees, saying it is about crime

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Copper Law

The infamous Chilean Copper Law has been reformed, though not removed.  To provide more transparency, its management is moving from the Superior Council of National Defense to the Finance Ministry.  This type of reform has been in the works for a while, but accelerated due to a recent controversy over transparency that led to the resignation of Defense Minister Jaime Ravinet and his replacement by Andrés Allamand, an old hand in Renovación Nacional.

This is a win for President Piñera and the center-right, as they show themselves committed to an issue the Concertación had struggled in vain to reform, and can point to it as indicating more transparency.  However, I blogged almost exactly a year ago about how Piñera has indicated he wants to get rid of the Copper Law entirely, but obviously that did not happen.

A real victory for civilian supremacy over the armed forces, however, would be to remove the law entirely.  It may take a Nixon-China moment, where only a president of the right could get it done.  For fiscal conservatives, it does not make sense to throw sums of money quite that large at the military.  I'm not sure, though, whether Piñera's willingness to take a smaller step right now indicates this is off the table again for a while.

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Immigration and the SOTU

I don't tend to get too worked up about State of the Union addresses, the content of which I tend to forget a day or two later.  However, here is the immigration mention, which focuses largely on the DREAM Act though oddly without mentioning it:

One last point about education. Today, there are hundreds of thousands of students excelling in our schools who are not American citizens. Some are the children of undocumented workers, who had nothing to do with the actions of their parents. They grew up as Americans and pledge allegiance to our flag, and yet they live every day with the threat of deportation. Others come here from abroad to study in our colleges and universities. But as soon as they obtain advanced degrees, we send them back home to compete against us. It makes no sense.

Now, I strongly believe that we should take on, once and for all, the issue of illegal immigration. And I am prepared to work with Republicans and Democrats to protect our borders, enforce our laws and address the millions of undocumented workers who are now living in the shadows. (Applause.) I know that debate will be difficult. I know it will take time. But tonight, let's agree to make that effort. And let's stop expelling talented, responsible young people who could be staffing our research labs or starting a new business, who could be further enriching this nation. (Applause.)

It is the sort of mention that shows people he is paying attention, but will have no impact on actually getting anything passed.  When I first blogged about a SOTU five years ago, and every year since, either Bush or Obama has mentioned immigration in some way without getting anything done.

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Harry Reid and Latin America

Americas Quarterly sent me a forthcoming interview with Harry Reid that will appear in their magazine, allowing me to post it here (I am happy to plug them as they do good work, and I would also recommend their blog, which you can access on their site).  They sent it to me as a PDF, which unfortunately I have been unable to successfully upload in any way to the blog.  So I will quote from it and encourage you to check it out when it is published in a few days.

I feel it is a revealing interview in the sense that it shows both political impotence and lack of policy direction.

My goal is still to pass comprehensive immigration reform that secures our borders, punishes employers who exploit immigrant labor and undercut American wages, and requires those living in the shadows to register with the government, pay fines, pay taxes, learn English, and then go to the back of the line. My hope is that the Republicans will work with us on a comprehensive approach that addresses the many complex components necessary to fix our broken system.

Keep hoping.  So what will our U.S. policy priorities be for Latin America?  Well, he can't name any.

I have traveled extensively in the region. My first two foreign trips as Majority Leader were to Latin America because I believed we needed to refocus on our neighborhood. It is precisely because we share strong cultural and economic ties with the region that Latin America should be a natural priority for us.

So taking a few trips is the same as establishing priorities.  Well, what about those people who want an FTA with Panama and/or Colombia?  Well, not going to happen.

It is my understanding the Obama administration is working with the leadership of Colombia and Panama to address different areas of concern for members of Congress. These discussions, and the outcomes they will lead to, are key to finding a way forward with those agreements. As we have seen before, sending an agreement up before building support in Congress is counterproductive. At the end of the day, what we want are agreements that are fair to American workers, farmers and businesses and that deal fairly with our friends and allies.

I have often argued that it is better to do nothing than "do something" just for the sake of it, which often creates blowback.  But this suggests an almost complete lack of even thinking about what could be done.

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Juxtaposition: NC and immigration

Interest in denying government services and jobs to illegal immigrants percolates in the legislature. Such a measure has a chance to pass this session. A proposal that has had bipartisan support requires contractors on government projects to use a federal online program that confirms employment eligibility (today's Charlotte Observer).

AND

Moving forward, we will look for more ways to reduce the regulatory burden on small businesses (incoming N.C. House Speaker Thom Tillis in today's Charlotte Observer)

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Colombian flowers

Really interesting, and I think even-handed, article in The Smithsonian about the flower industry in Colombia, which is huge (and, if the article is accurate, largely initiated in the late 1960s by an American horticulture grad student).  Basically, conditions are not great but have been improving a lot.  The practical lesson is that you should look for flowers that are certified, which means they were grown with labor protections and in an environmentally sustainable manner.

The global marketplace will always demand cheaper flowers, and Colombian farms must compete with growers in other nations, including neighboring Ecuador and rising flower power Kenya. Increasingly, though, there’s another factor flower growers must consider: independent flower certification programs, including Fair Trade flowers, VeriFlora and the Rainforest Alliance, which are working to certify farms in Colombia.

Such programs have been key to Colombia’s business in Europe, where customers pay close attention to the source of their flowers. The U.S. trade in certified flowers is tiny by comparison—my Mother’s Day bouquet bore no certification notice—but growing. “Sustainability is an attribute that consumers are seeking,” says Linda Brown, creator of the certification standards for VeriFlora, which is based in Emeryville, California. “When you are looking 10 to 20 years out, sustainability will become the way that people do business.”

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Quote of the day: Haiti

Barr "will be representing" Duvalier "in bringing his message of hope to the world," the former Republican congressman's website says.

This can't be serious, yet it is.  Here is his website if you can stomach it.

h/t Kevin Grier aka Angus

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U.S. and Mexico

Hillary Clinton will be traveling to Mexico.  From the State Department's press release:

Secretary of State Clinton and Secretary Espinosa will meet in Guanajuato to discuss key issues that the United States and Mexico face individually and as partners, including joint cooperation to combat organized crime, strengthening the competitiveness of our two economies, modernizing the border between our countries and advancing the global climate change agenda after the Cancun Summit.

Conspicuous by its absence is mention of joint cooperation to reduce drug demand.  I wouldn't mind tossing in joint cooperation to understand what immigration solutions work and which don't.  Unfortunately, all reporters were interested in was, in essence, whether we could copy Plan Colombia in Mexico.

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Ecuador ambassador

I had the great privilege to meet and hear a talk on campus by the Ambassador of Ecuador to the U.S., Luis Gallegos, who has a very distinguished career.  I was really impressed, because here is an individual who has been in his position since even before Rafael Correa's term (if the dates I am seeing are correct) and yet he is very direct and even blunt to a refreshing degree.  "Blunt" and "diplomat" are normally mutually exclusive if someone wants to be in the position for any length of time.  Yet there is no bluster--he is very articulate and reasoned from long years of working on human rights, particularly the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.  The Allegro Foundation, which is focused on disabled children, funded the visit, which also included the Ambassador from Monaco.

In general, I felt his view was very similar to that of Correa (for example, see this post from last year about really interesting Correa comments), namely that there is an admiration for the U.S. (that came out in many different comments) but deep frustration with U.S. policy.  He made a careful but to my mind clear statement that Ecuador should not be lumped in with its neighbors politically.  Correa is neither Chávez nor Morales.

A colleague and I were able to have a quick chat with him prior to his talk, where he discussed the demand side of drugs, which for him is the central bilateral problem.  Obviously, U.S. policy toward Colombia spills over in a massive way into Ecuador, which is spending an enormous amount of money to deal with both guerrillas and migrants.

But in his talk, he began by discussing human rights, since he worked in the UN to create the declaration about the rights of the disabled.  To paraphrase him, "I was idealistic, and felt no one could opposed the rights of the disabled.  Then I ran into the U.S. delegation" (which, unlike many other countries, took a few years to ratify).  He then talked about security (i.e. the effects of drug trafficking) and the effects of the Colombian displaced in Ecuador.

And, lastly, he made the point that he could not think of any other country than the U.S. where an ambassador was told he needed to hire lawyers and sign on with a lobbying firm to get his government's views made to legislators.

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Don't assimilate too much

Jonathan Chait and Ezra Klein disagree with each other about Jeb Bush's take on assimilation.  With regard to immigration and assimilation, I wish more people would pay attention to the social science literature (and Samuel Huntington does not count in that regard given that his book is essentially a long and unsubstantiated rant).  We know that recent immigrants from Latin America are healthier than the rest of us, and less likely to commit crimes.  What we should really be talking about, therefore, is how to stop people from assimilating too much in certain ways.

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James Stavridis' Partnership for the Americas

Admiral James Stavridis wrote a book, Partnership for the Americas: Western Hemisphere Strategy and U.S. Southern Command, about his time as head of the U.S. Southern Command, which is available  free of charge as a PDF.  I would not say it is earth shattering, but it is well worth checking out, if for no other reason than to get a sense of how a high level military official views Latin America.  It shows clear knowledge of the region (not something we can take for granted) and avoids exaggeration of security threats (Hugo Chávez's name does not even appear, for example).  I also like the fact that even the Latino population in the U.S. comes into the equation to explain Latin America's importance:

Continuing with this human metaphor, one might argue that the most important linkage between a nation and the nations around it and around the world is demographics. According to the August 2008 U.S. Census Bureau report, about 15 percent of us—just over 46 million—are of Hispanic descent. When undocumented Spanish-speaking workers are added to the count, it is fair to assume that the United States is now the second-largest Spanish speaking country in the world, only after Mexico. For added perspective, more Hispanics live in the United States today than there are Canadians in Canada or Spaniards in Spain. Meanwhile, the purchasing power of our burgeoning Hispanic population is pushing toward 1 trillion dollars, annually (p. 3).

Other themes include rejecting the notion that Latin America is just a "backyard," that drug demand needs to be taken into consideration along with supply, that the deep historical roots of poverty need to be acknowledged, and that using the military in drug operations is not desirable.  He even notes how Daniel Ortega was glad to see the USNS Comfort (p. 60).

I disagree with the notion that Islamic terrorism is a growing threat--we've been hearing that since about September 12, 2001 and have precious little evidence.  Vigilance is fine, but it is overblown.  Also, I don't think you will find many people who agree that Plan Colombia is "a relatively modest program" (p. 17) and he mentions the displaced only in passing despite the fact that it is a massive humanitarian disaster.

Agree or disagree with his various points, though, it is nice to see someone at that level write a book like this.

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Sanctions Ros-Lehtinen style

From Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, I learn that a) the U.S. needs to stick to its principles, even when that is unpopular; and b) our policy toward Venezuela will be based on "practical reasons" (like the flow of oil).  Basically, she wants to discuss sanctions if they have little impact on the United States, which further means her preferred policies will both make the U.S. look bad and fail to achieve U.S. policy goals.  This should come as no surprise, as she believes our current policy toward Cuba should be considered successful.

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No more bricks in the virtual wall

Remarkable.  A boondoggle of a government plan actually gets shut down instead of continuing to throw good money after bad.  It was halted for review last March, and now the virtual fence is no more.

The Obama administration canceled Friday the troubled, billion-dollar "virtual fence" project along the U.S. border with Mexico and said it will turn to other security measures to better guard the desert region.

The SBInet project, begun in 2006 and run by Boeing, was designed to pull together video cameras, radar, sensors and other technologies to catch illegal immigrants and smugglers trying to cross the porous border.

But it faced setbacks, missed deadlines and cost overruns. The Department of Homeland Security said the project spent $1 billion to cover just 53 miles in Arizona.

The virtual fence was never going to work.  Almost four years (and over $1 billion dollars) ago I poked fun at the head of the Border Patrol, who argued that the virtual fence would detect 95 percent of illegal border crossings.  That was so obviously false.

So now we can feel relief that it was stopped and/or embarrassment that it was ever started.

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Travel changes

The Obama administration took a positive but very tentative step by scaling back George W. Bush's travel restrictions to Cuba.  The administration felt even that was too controversial to try before the midterm elections.

It is so bizarre how hardliners believe that the status quo--which means keeping the dictatorship alive--is desirable.  From Ileana Ros-Lehtinen: "Loosening these regulations will not help foster a pro-democracy environment in Cuba."  The more appropriate question, however is how 50+ years of sanctions have fostered a pro-democracy environment.  If something has not worked for half a decade, it is worth trying something else.

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Chile and Palestinians 2

Fascinating article in the Jerusalem Post about the Chilean government's decision to recognize the Palestinian state.  Turns out Jewish leaders in Chile felt it was a victory of sorts.

When Brazil recognized Palestinian statehood in early December, Chile was ready to follow suit immediately, sources said. However, an important meeting between Chilean President Sebastian Pinera and former Spanish prime minister Jose Maria Aznar – who is a friend of Israel and happened to be visiting Chile at the time – combined with pressure from the local Jewish community and two late-night phone calls from Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu to Pinera, managed to postpone the planned proclamation.

“It was a miracle it took so long for the proclamation to come out,” Zaliasnik said.

“We decided to fight the core issues: No to any reference to final-status boundaries on the Green Line or 1967 borders; that Palestinians had to negotiate directly with Israel; and third, that any Chilean statement explicitly recognize the right of Israel to live in secure borders. That’s what we were fighting for.”

And what now?

The next battleground between pro-Israel and pro- Palestinian groups over Latin American recognition of Palestinian statehood will be in Lima, Peru, where the third Latin American-Arab summit will be held in February.

“I feel Colombia won’t recognize Palestinian statehood,” Zaliasnik opined. “I read the quotes of the Colombian foreign minister in Bogota on the issue. My feeling is that Mexico could feel like it has to follow us, but they don’t have a Palestinian lobby. Peru doesn’t have a Palestinian lobby either, but they are hosting an Arab League summit, so it may affect Peruvian President Alan Garcia. Of the three, Peru is the most vulnerable.”

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Latin America and Palestinian state

Regarding Latin American recognition of the Palestinian state, I have tended to believe that there is little domestic resistance.  The Middle East is not very relevant to Latin American politics, and Jewish populations--which we would reasonably expect to be the most vocally opposed--are relatively small in most (though not all) countries.  Along these lines, I got an email from William Girard, a Ph.D. candidate in Anthropology at UC Santa Cruz who has done fieldwork in Honduras.  With his permission, I copy the following:

My research focuses on Pentecostal politics in Copán Ruinas, Honduras.  I was carrying out my fieldwork in Copán when the coup happened, so the bulk of my dissertation examines Pentecostal responses to the coup and its aftermath.  One of the focuses of my research is a set of doctrines that many Fundamentalist and Pentecostal throughout the hemisphere hold called "Christian Zionism."  The most important aspect of these doctrines for my research is the view that Jews remain the chosen people of God and, as such, receive Divine blessings. These Christians pay close attention to events in Israel, and have an enormous enthusiasm for that country. In sharp contrast, they view Arabs, and particularly Palestinians with a great deal of antipathy, regarding them as continually jealous of the blessings that Jews are said to receive.  While, as I mentioned, these views are fairly common among Fundamentalists and Pentecostals throughout the Hemisphere, they take on a particular character in Honduras, where Palestinians ("Turcos") play such a large role in the national economy (as I understand they do in Chile).  

I've been following your posts on L.A. governments recognizing a Palestinian state, and I have to imagine that the Pentecostal citizens of these countries are deeply opposed to this.  As I'm sure you know, the Protestant population in many L.A. countries is fairly large (around 15% in both Chile and Brazil).  While certainly not all of them would be Christian Zionists, I would think that the majority would be, and, hence, view the recognition of a Palestinian state with great alarm.

So there could well be more opposition than I would've argued, from Protestants, assuming further that a sizable number attach enough salience to it.  From a political perspective, the big question is whether that opposition translates into political pressure.

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Irresistible Forces

At long last, the book I wrote with my dad (John Weeks at San Diego State University) is officially out: Irresistible Forces: Explaining Latin American Migration to the United States and its Effects on the South, from University of New Mexico Press.  It makes the perfect gift for any occasion, and we all know Valentine's Day is coming up soon, or maybe a loved one's birthday.  Or, if you live in Charlotte, just make it a snow day treat for yourself.

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