Obama and Latin America: A definition in the Caribbean

By
Jorge Gómez Barata                                                         Read Spanish Version

Although
some other displacements may occur in Obama’s early criticism, the
extreme left could coincide with the U.S. right. It wouldn’t be the
first time that the extremes touch each other without meaning to.

In
the first instance, as typical with U.S. governments, the suggestions
from the left will be unheard, inasmuch as the administration cannot
confront the powerful domestic forces of the bipartisan right, which
are present and influential in Congress, the press and society, and
have important forms, groups and spaces of pressure.

As
to Latin America, the delicate balance each party must maintain will
be the subject of scrutiny during April, when the Seventh Summit of
the Americas meets in Port-of-Spain, the capital of Trinidad &
Tobago.

In
July 1991, in the context of the international situation created in
the heat of the fall of real socialism and the disappearance of the
Soviet Union, along with a backward step taken by Third World
diplomacy, which, same as other multilateral spaces, had lost
influence, the First Ibero-American Summit met in Guadalajara, at
Mexico’s invitation. All chiefs of state and government from Latin
America, as well as the presidents of Portugal and Spain and the
monarchs of Spain, took part in that meeting.

The
news was that it was a forum that opened a breach in the so-called
Inter-American System built after World War II, using the
Organization of American States as its center. Noteworthy was the
fact that the United States was excluded and Cuba (which was expelled
from the OAS in 1962) was admitted. In fact, several of the countries
represented in Guadalajara did not have diplomatic relations with
Havana and some of them were well-known critics and adversaries of
the Revolution.

That
unusual and important meeting was followed by others in the same
pattern: Madrid in 1992, Salvador de Bahía in 1993 and Cartagena de
Indias in 1994, a year when U.S. pride rose highest. To vindicate its
hegemony, the United States, then governed by William Clinton,
summoned the First Summit of the Americas for December 1994 in Miami.
This time, the excluded nation was Cuba.

While
in 1994, Clinton’s administration met with a Latin America that was
basically obedient to the U.S. diktat,
the situation today is altogether new, not only because several
countries in the region are governed by a third-generation Left that
emerged from sectors that were non-oligarchic, popular and even
revolutionary, but also because an administration has made its debut
in the United States that proclaims itself an exponent of change and
has taken some steps in that direction.

In
Port-of-Spain, for the first time in the history of Latin American
nations with the United States, it may happen that an American
president — not only because circumstances require it but also
because his focus is more pragmatic than ideological — will treat
the presidents from the region not as subalterns, poor relatives or
guests of stone but as valid interlocutors, even as partners.

A
scenario of that nature will put to the test the true essence of the
new administration’s political strategy toward the region and its
ability to respectfully assume the options of each country, as well
as the maturity of Latin America’s political process. That process,
with firmness and talent and behaving like an ensemble where each
country, process and leader retains its identity, will project a true
and effective convergence in Latin America.

At
that concert, where Obama should not hope to be the principal
drummer, there will be no easy themes and it will be impossible to
evade the topic of Cuba, which — for historic and political reasons
— is the region’s linchpin.

Nobody
can cross a river before he reaches the riverbank and it is not
possible to predict the content of the dialogues at the Summit of the
Americas, although it is reasonable to assume that only the
moderation and coherence of the parties will lead to a successful
outcome. Perhaps not everything will be achieved in Port-of-Spain,
although what’s important is that some forward movement be made.
Hillary Clinton has said that the United States cannot go it alone,
nor can the other countries. It doesn’t matter whether the statement
is pretentious. Take her up at her word.

Jorge
Gomez Barata is a journalist who lives in Cuba.