Toward improving cooperation in the Americas.

• Author: Lowenthal, Abraham F.
• Position: Opini

The next US Administration will face many challenges: the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, Pakistan's possible implosion, conflict with Iran, high energy and food prices, climate change and its effects, the economic growth of China and India and its implications, and the festering Israel-Palestine quandary --not to mention a deepening credit crisis and wider economic recession, turmoil over immigration, growing health care costs, pending decisions on tax and energy policies, decaying infrastructure and the evident need to focus on education, criminal justice reform, competitiveness and other domestic challenges.

No one should expect the new U.S. Administration or the next Congress to give priority to relations with Latin America and the Caribbean. None of the countries of the Americas presents an imminent threat to U.S. national security, none is likely to be the source or target of significant international terrorism and none will be critical to resolving what most regard as the most pressing problems of U.S. foreign policy.

But although the countries of Latin America and the Caribbean pose no urgent issues for the United States, they will be increasingly important to the US future, not as areas of dramatic crisis but in a quotidian way. In fact, Latin America is one of the world regions with the greatest impact on the daily lives of US citizens.

This is true for four main reasons, different from the hoary axioms about Western Hemisphere security, extra-hemispheric threats and Pan-American solidarity often cited in the past.

Latin America matters to the United States today, and will matter even more tomorrow, because of:

* Transnational issues that neither the United States nor any Latin American nation can successfully handle by itself, without close and sustained cooperation from regional partners. These include energy security, global warming, pollution and other environmental issues, narcotics, crime and public health.

* Demographic interdependence, arising from massive and sustained migration that has blurred the borders between the United States and its closest neighbors and given rise to complex > issues --those with both international and domestic facets-- ranging from education to health care, remittances to drivers' licenses, youth gangs to portable retirement pensions.

* Its economic importance to the United States, both as a prime source of energy and other key resources vital for the US economy and as a priority market for the export of U.S. goods and services. The United States obtains over half of its energy imports from countries of the Western Hemisphere and exports $225 billion a year in goods to Latin America, four times more than current US exports to China. US firms have, but need to sustain, a competitive advantage in Latin American markets arising from proximity and familiarity plus cultural and demographic ties.

* And shared values, particularly fundamental human rights, including the rights of free political expression, effective democratic governance and consistent application of the rule of law. The American people intuit that these core values cannot prevail internationally if they do not succeed in the Western Hemisphere. At a time when the very difficult experiences in Iraq and elsewhere are discouraging many Americans about the prospects for expanding the influence of US ideals internationally, the shared commitment throughout the Americas to the norms of democratic governance and the rule of law should be increasingly recognized as important.

Despite Latin America's quotidian significance for the United States, US policies toward the region in recent years have been mostly ineffective. Instead of focusing on Latin America's main concerns, Washington has tended to use the prism of international terrorism to deal with Latin America, just as Washington used to make anti-Communism the core of its approach in the Americas. Both the Administrations of Bill Clinton and George W. Bush emphasized Western Hemisphere summits even though these meetings typically produce little beyond photo opportunities. Both Administrations continued to emphasize a proposed Free Trade Agreement for the Americas (FTAA) long after this goal receded from feasibility. Instead of building better bridges toward our closest neighbors, the United States started construction of a border fence at the frontier with Mexico. Resentment of the United States, its global policies, and its intermittent attentiveness to the Hemisphere have been building in much of Latin America, only a few years after Western Hemisphere cooperation had seemed to be strengthening.

For their part, various Latin American and Caribbean countries have been diversifying their international relationships, building cooperation with the countries of the European Union, the APEC countries, China, India, Russia and Iran. In many countries of the Hemisphere, there is less inclination than formerly to look to Washington for leadership or even for close cooperation. Western Hemisphere approaches to problem-solving have weakened.

The new U.S. Administration and Congress to take office in January 2009 will have an important opportunity to try to reengage the countries of Latin America and the Caribbean in order to build mutually productive cooperation.

Here are my best suggestions for the consideration of the new U.S. authorities.

1) Rather than promise to pay more attention to Latin America, and then inevitably fall short, the next U.S. Administration and Congress should enhance the quality of the limited attention that can realistically be devoted. Washington should update and improve mindsets and concepts and think more strategically. Instead of offering soaring rhetoric about partnership from Alaska to Tierra del Fuego, the new Administration should work with Latin American and Caribbean nations on issues that can be addressed soon, such as energy, the environment, crime and education, thus building credibility that has been damaged after years of unfulfilled pledges. Instead of scrambling to counter Hugo Chavez and the > of anti-U.S. movements, Washington should concentrate on confronting the underlying issues that create space for populist demagogues.

2) The new authorities in Washington should more consistently disaggregate Latin America and the Caribbean. Everyone knows, of course, that Latin American and Caribbean nations vary enormously; this is not new or profound. During the past twenty years, however, there has been a tendency to emphasize convergence within the region: toward democratic governance, market-oriented economics, and policies of macroeconomic balance and regional integration. Although these convergent trends have been important, key differences persist among the countries of Latin America and the Caribbean.

Washington must recognize that some of these differences are growing, not shrinking, along five dimensions:

* Demographic and...