LOOKING SOUTH

How Obama can mend relations in Latin America

By Alejandro Lelo de Larrea and Hugo Hernández Newsweek Web Exclusive

Since the attacks of 9/11, the Bush administration's focus on terrorism led to a neglect of Washington's relations with Latin America—and a loss of U.S. influence in the region. Barack Obama is about to change that. "He's looking at what's happening in the continent after Bush's negligence, because he wants to rebuild that bloc," says Eduardo Rosales, a professor of Latin American international affairs at the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México.
This philosophy is behind Obama's latest initiatives on Latin America. He has met recently with Brazil's president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and visited Mexico's President Felipe Calderón on his way to this weekend's Summit of the Americas in Trinidad and Tobago. Obama also dispatched Joe Biden on a visit to Chile and Costa Rica ahead of the summit. "I'm here to launch a new chapter of engagement," Obama told summit delegates to applause on its opening day Friday. "There's no senior partner and junior partner in our relations."
What else does the continent want to hear from the U.S. president? First, Obama needs to acknowledge at least two new realities about the continent, says Lorenzo Meyer, a researcher at the Colegio de México. One is that the major South American economies have been drifting apart from the Washington consensus, a term coined to explain the economic advice from Washington-based financial institutions to Latin America, but now often used interchangeably with neoliberalism or globalization. "He must accept that those countries have changed the economic model because it failed," says Meyer. And if the U.S. wants to get along with South America, he adds, "it has to get along with the leader, with Brazil, since Mexico doesn't have that leadership anymore, if it ever had it."
A key part in new U.S. policy strategy toward Latin America, says Rosales, is to prevent the bloc of radical governments led by Venezuela from expanding. The main countries forming this axis are Honduras, Nicaragua, Ecuador and Bolivia. The global drop in oil prices has weakened Venezuela's economy, giving Washington fresh leverage over the South American nation. "This puts [Venezuelan leader Hugo] Chávez in a weak position, not only internally but externally, and the same goes for his radical movement in the American continent," says Rosales.
According to Rosales, the United States has good relations with other nations not aligned with Chávez, such as Costa Rica, Colombia, Chile, Panama and even El Salvador, despite the fact that its March 15 elections were won by the leftist Frente Farabundo Martí para la Liberación Nacional (FMLN) and its candidate Mauricio Funes. These leaders realize that while criticism of the U.S. may win them political points at home, such confrontation won't solve any of the region's problems. "We must understand that if the United States does well economically, Latin Americans could also do well," says Rosales. That's a message that summit delegates should find easy to digest.
This report has been adapted from an article published in Newsweek's Spanish-language partner, Newsweek En Español. Additional reporting by Arlene Getz in New York.
© 2009