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Hegemony And The Latin American Policy Of The United States in the FTAA Era
Dr. Jorge Hernandez

Paradoxically, the expectations that existed surrounding the significance of the 2000 presidential elections in the United States-the last ones of the twentieth century-culminated in a notable sense of dismay: the installation in the White House, amidst quarrels and delays, of George W. Bush as the 43rd president of that country. This did not symbolize a stage of triumphalism or greatness, but a series of irregularities, of crises of legitimacy and confidence.

Nevertheless, the events of September 11, 2001 turned the situation around in a practical and timely fashion by helping boost the personal image of the president as a leader and the dominant role of the Executive Branch(1). It would not be exaggerated to say that it has provided both entities limitless freedom in the field of foreign affairs, beyond their normal prerogatives in relation to fighting terrorism.

Within that framework, paradoxes seemed to assert themselves in a variety of ways. For example, while, to satisfaction and surprise of many, the Bush administration's new attitude initially gave Latin America and the Caribbean priority on its international agenda, the events of September 11 suddenly relegated them to the back burner(2).

However, and in spite of Latin America appearing as a tranquil, pacified place which over the past decade had not presented any significant challenges to U:S: hegemony in the spheres of governability, control and security, some developments subsequent to September 11 worried the drafters of the Latin American policy. Even if in the present, "Latin America is not part of the dispute between ideologues and pragmatists, as was the case during the Cold War"(3), facts like the persistence of the insurgent conflict and the problem of drug trafficking in Colombia, political instability in Venezuela and the economic crisis in Argentina forced them to re-evaluate the situation in the subcontinent. Since then, the survival and activism of the Cuban Revolution has by no small measure added to the factors that make it necessary to review the United States´ hegemonic project of the twentieth century(4).

In this context, filled with the arrogance of his interventionist acts on a world scale in cases like that of the invasion of Afghanistan and the looming aggression against Iraq, on August 6 Bush signed into law the Trade Promotion Authority, the so-called "fast track". That brought the implementation of the Free Trade Area of the Americas to a higher plain, as the centrepiece of the U.S: strategy, assuming that the negotiations and its coming into force materialize in spite of difficulties. With this act, another milestone is achieved in the historic unfolding of the old Monroeist Pan American ambition. While not dismissing the effect that its obvious contradictions, precarious viability and anticipated failure could still have, it can now be said that inter-American relations have entered "the FTAA era"(5). U.S. imperialism's hegemonic project for the hemisphere initiates a new and higher phase of exploitation(the final?) involving countries and governments. And, as Fidel Castro has already predicted, "Dragged along by the ill-fated annexationist current, it is only logical that many others, in the desperation created by enormous and unplayable debts and total economic dependence, will be led to the suicide of the FTAA."(6)

Just as with the study of the international situation, in analysing the introduction of the FTAA, it is still difficult- and to certain extent, risky-to arrive at definitive conclusions, to diagnose and predict the dynamics of its structure, its obstacles, limits, successes and failures.

The topic of the FTAA can be found among the themes receiving most attention from the social sciences and American studies in recent period, in those discussions that polarize the focus and positions for or against its presumed novelty, its real chances of materializing, its benefits or drawbacks. The discussion has also included clarification of its nature, as an economic and commercial programs or as a political-strategic project characterized by its hegemonic design. Numerous works have been published and events held concerning this, outlining the context, defining the content and purposes, obligations and implications of the FTAA, among many other aspects(7). As has been correctly pointed out, "the debate over the FTAA has taken up so much space in the last years that is difficult to present entirely new aspects of it, even though the polemics over it are becoming more complex all the time(8).

From this point if view, considering that the characteristics and outlines of the FTAA, its origins, objectives, instruments, implications, difficulties and possibilities have been sufficiently examined and exposed, the present essay, instead of limiting itself to the FTAA, proposes to underline its connections to the logic of the Latin American policy of the United States, examine it as an integral part of a hegemonic , strategic plan of the U.S. foreign policy of the twentieth century, place it in context and emphasize the historic trajectory that has preceded it.

The analysis is based in the following points. First, the unfolding of the FTAA symbolizes a new and conflictive era in the inter-American relations, that increases the traditional U.S. structures of domination and dependency in the countries of Our America both qualitatively and quantitatively. Secondly, the FTAA has to do with a political-strategic plan with historical antecedents that crystallize in the present convergence, with a long term perspective. Thirdly, its hegemonic nature goes beyond free trade and, in general, the strictly economic dimension, it leads to the drawing up, extension and complementariness of acts intrinsically linked to politics, security and diplomacy in inter-American relations, consistent with the global objectives of the current U.S. policy(9).

The last decade of the twentieth century would be a time of changes in the international system created following the Second World War, in which two interrelated processes were deepened: on the one hand, the relative hegemonic recomposition of the United States; on the other, the crisis and collapse of the so-called real socialism in Eastern Europe which culminated in the disintegration of the Soviet Union.

The globalizing processes that were affirmed in that context and the new geopolitical configuration tended to subordinated international conflicts to the general requirements of the new order, integrating the countries of the Third World even more into the cycle that keep reproducing their situation of marginalization, exclusion and dependence on the imperialist powers. As was the case for the countries of the south as a whole, the new global trends would be reflected in Latin America and the Caribbean, enabling the centres of world power to secure their strategic projections in the subcontinent. In this sense, among other things, the prominence of the United States in constituting an axis of free trade that would connect Canada, and whose "natural" economic and geopolitical space would be constituted by none other than the Latin American and Caribbean nations, was made manifest early in the hemisphere.

The geographic location and political subordination of the subcontinent were thereby converted into an essential zone for the formation of a "closed reserve" dominated by the United States. Beyond the Free Trade Agreement(FTA), the Free Trade Areas of the Americas(FTAA) represented, from the time of its conception, the basic component of the hemispheric strategy of U.S. imperialism, that proposed an offensive of regional expansion of the transnationals of that country against its European and Asian rivals, with the additional aim of transferring significant portion of the cost of the necessary restructuring of the U.S: economy to Latin America and the Caribbean.
In its mission of consolidating the system of hemispheric domination, the plan and policies followed by the United States are unfolding within the limits and possibilities defined by its objective place and role in the world of the twenty-first century. At the same time, the characteristics and vulnerabilities of Latin American and Caribbean capitalism, up against that system marked by the pre-eminence of neo-liberalism, consist of diverse processes in the midst of historic-concrete conditions in which the endogenous particularities are mixed in with the exogenous influx of global changes on a world scale.

Although inter-American relations should arise out of their reciprocal influence, and it would be wrong to ignore the conditions of the forces and interests inside Latin American countries, the U.S: policy towards the region has historically been the principal vector in the political and economic dynamic of those relations since the Second World War(10). In that sense, it is worth taking note of some prominent moments in a retrospective overview.

The foreign policy of the United States towards Latin America and the Caribbean during post-war (end of the 40´s and first half of the 50´s) is directed towards the preservation of the existing socio-economic structures in the countries of the sub-continent. The application of the principle of contention and liberation under the climate of the Cold War brought the doctrinal focus to bear, against any eventual changes that could modify those structures, as took place in Guatemala in 1954.

The exercise of said policy was helped in that period by the economic convergence of the war years and the first years of the post-war period, as well as by of the weakness of the popular movement in Latin America. This gave rise to a socio-classist posture that facilitated the U.S: engagement in the Latin American countries and the stepping up of their exploitation. However, starting in the middle of the 50´s, the political panorama of Latin America begins to change: reactionary regimes are defeated and the plans of the Latin American bourgeoisie are frustrated. The impact of the triumph of the Cuban Revolution by the end of the decade, as a symbolic accomplishment-as well as the fact of its reality-smashes the thesis of geographic determinism and forces a re-evaluation of the Latin American policy of the United States, based on the crisis of the neo-colonial system in the hemisphere.

Even before the transition to the decade of the 60´s U.S. foreign policy during the Eisenhower administration attempted to redefine the parameters of the restructuring of the inter-American relation and to guarantee a more harmonious Latin American insertion into the hegemonic designs of the United States. However, it would be the government of Kennedy, after 1961, that would manage to adjust the Latin American situation to fit the supposed "national security perimeter" required by that plan, to the extent that it substituted on a global scale the strategy of massive reprisals for that of flexible reaction. The reformist formula contained in the Alliance for Progress and its accompanying military focus, sustained by the counter insurgency-oriented towards an unfettered capitalist modernization of the Latin American countries and the neutralization of their revolutionary potentialities-were aimed at containing the spread of communist ideology and isolation the Cuban impact in Latin America, which were considered as threats to "national security" conceived in terms of Monroeist pan-Americanism"(11).

The application of economic, diplomatic, military and ideological instruments in this policy called "New Frontier" and tried out in Latin America, sought to develop a complete external strategic plan that bestowed on the region a priority position , in contrast with the situation it had occupied in the immediate post-war period. According to the Kennedy vision, the communist threat could be faced more effectively and with greater symbolic value in the periphery, since it was estimated that more advantageous conditions existed than in Asia or Africa. It set out what twenty years later would be the approach taken by the Reagan administration.

The consolidation of the Cuban Revolution and the advance of progressive positions in Latin America, exemplary among them being the first defeat of U.S. imperialism in Playa Giron , further attracted the attention of the United States, which witnessed the breaking of its questioned hegemony in the hemisphere and the expansion of an alternative of social change, the effects of which had to be controlled. In this context, in the middle and end of the decade of the 60´s, it was the Johnson administration which was responsible for the most overt interventionism movements.

Within the context given rise to in those years, a strategic integration was fostered, a new relation between the big Latin American bourgeoisie and U.S. imperialism. Towards the end of the 60´s, the political side of inter-American relations would vary considerably. Nevertheless, at the height of the interventionist policy of the United States, before the collapse of the Alliance for Progress, the situation which had been crated would lead many Latin American countries to search for other options in foreign policy. This set off a greater broadening and diversification of their relations with other areas of the world, including some socialist states. This takes place in the framework of the maturing and rise of a new international climate which is imposed on the global correlation of forces as a result of objective changes. The first Cold War receded and the period of easing arose, during which the Nixon administration, although it retained the aim of ensuring U.S. interests over the long term in the region, varied the tone of Latin American policy which became more pragmatic: from "aid", Alliance for Progress-style, to "collaboration". This increased the state of dependency of the Latin American countries.

Since the 70´s the crisis of capitalism as a system and of the U:S. system as its centre, was reflected in Latin America in a particular way in light of the relations determined by the transnational imperialist enterprises-and of the extremely contradictory international economic relations within which they functioned-that applied to the autonomous industrial development projects which were historically paid for. The new international capitalist division of labour that became the norm was manifested in the Latin American countries, by virtue of their underdeveloped condition, as a higher level of integration of their national economies into the system. By this measure, they were organically included in the logic of the global dynamic of capitalism as a world system and in its crisis.

The new pattern of accumulation that characterizes this phenomenon, which emerges in a dialectical contradiction with the old, brought important consequences for the countries of the hemisphere: on the one hand, a development of transnational capital can be observed in the framework of the return to neoliberal economic models, an extreme version of dependence on foreign capital, of concentration and centralization of the national wealth for this and for big "national" capital associates, and on the other hand, the application of the highest rates of exploitation of workers that were ever recorded in the contemporary history of the region. By its very nature, this model requires a political regime in which the coercive, repressive, authoritarian function of the State is strengthened so as to achieve order, protection of property and the stability of the monetary system. These material conditions explain the imposition of the "state of emergency" or the "national security" state in countries such as Chile, encouraged or made viable by the hegemonic interests of the United States, whose promotion of the subcontinent would vary in style and content during that decade, as the administrations of Nixon, Ford and Carter succeeded one another, with different focuses and even opposing ones. Notions like the hemispheric security, special relations and new dialogue, among others, contained in documents like the well known Rockefeller, Linowitz I and Linowitz II Reports, illustrate very clearly the Latin American aims of the United States in those periods.
The neoliberal adjustment policies have been implemented in Latin America since the 80´s, in keeping with the particularities of every country and region, combining orthodox variants of shock therapy and more gradual, heterodox ones that coincide in their purpose: facilitate the accumulation of international finance capital and the subordinate local groups by means of a transfer of resources that deepens the economic, political and social contradictions, such as widening the gap between the growth of the "vanguard" capital and the falling behind of the other productive sectors.

The application of neoliberalism in Latin America takes place under a confluence of external and internal conditions and factors. On the external side, technology and capital can be distinguished through the actions, above all of the industrialized capitalist countries, to induce the unilateral opening to trade and investments, promote stabilization policies through complementary political measures, pressure directed towards the renegotiation of the foreign debt and the false promise of access to markets. From the internal angle , the imperative of substituting the obsolete "development" model that had prevailed for many years. This had "conditioned" the receptive attitude of sections of the local elites which prepared to establish the new subordinate association with transnational capital.

In the decade of the 80´s , neoliberalism incorporated enormous financial resources, linked with the flight of capital, unequal exchange and fraudulent commercial operations on the part of transnational companies in their exports and imports. The U.S: policy toward Latin American and the Caribbean in that period was inspired by documents like the Santa Fe Reports I and II and by similar reports of conservative institutions like the Heritage Foundation or the American Enterprise Institute, with their recommendations about how to manage the economic, political and security situation in the subcontinent. Since then, it has been obvious that the United States was making an effort to situate its Latin American policy inside a wider plan, that is to say, within the framework of the clash over the East-West contention, unaware of the internal nature of the problems affecting the subcontinent and attributing the instability to the supposed external communist threat. This was the period in which, on a global level the U.S: military and foreign policy substituted the old doctrine of Mutual Assured Destruction for that of Assured Survival. At a regional level, the counterinsurgency re-emerged with a new look, that of low intensity conflicts.

The external debt rose to such levels that it financially asphyxiated the countries, derailed and cancelled numerous possibilities for productive investment and economic development, furthered the appropriation of strategic productive goods and natural resources by international finance capital, concentrated property and income even more in the hands of foreign corporations, promoted financial speculation, provoked greater de-industrialization and generated mass bankruptcies of national enterprises. Meanwhile, the effect of the debt deepened the recession, boosted inflation, increased unemployment and poverty.

Using the pseudo-argument of fighting inflation and in favour of stabilization, neoliberalism expanded deregulation and unilateral economic liberalization in the decade of the 90´s, artificially overvalued national currencies, weakened the monetary sovereignty of many countries and continued the process of banishing the social sector of the economy from the State, sacrificing education and health and causing an overgrowth of importation. This led to the consolidation of transnational power and the consequent deepening of unemployment, poverty and marginality.

On the political level, the decades that have been mentioned were scenarios of unrest in Latin America and the Caribbean, in which the actions of the United States played an important role. The decade of the 80´s would be especially graphic(12). Combined within it were the war in the Malvinas and the crisis of the inter-American system, the implementation of the doctrine of "low intensity conflict", the military interventions in Grenada and Panama, the Central American crisis and the process of regional democratisation. Documents like the above mentioned Santa Fe Reports I and II reflect the Latin American focus of the policy of the United States during the administrations of Reagan and the beginning of that of George Bush the father. Projects tried out in those years, apparently economics ones- like the Caribbean Basin and Americas Initiatives- in reality extended beyond their commercial and financial purposes, responding to a comprehensive strategic plan aimed at strengthening U.S. hegemony in the subcontinent.

Starting with the decade of the 90´s, when the influence and symbolism of the Soviet Union and the European socialist camp had disappeared as a support for the alleged threat-according to the bipolar geopolitical perspective- at a hemispheric level, the United States acquired a sort of hegemony because its rival was not on the scene, as Peter Smith suggests(13). The years are long gone, taking the case of the Central American crisis, when U.S. policy gave priority to the defeat of Sandinismo in Nicaragua and the guerrilla movement in El Salvador, considering them processes which resulted from the global conflict with the USSR.

The cancellation of the strategic game between the East and the West did not, however, translate, from the U.S. political viewpoint, into the relegation of inter-American relations to a secondary place, in spite of the fact that the fight against communism was no longer a priority of the day. Of course, as Abraham Lowenthal pointed out, in this sense "the Cold War having ended, some experts argued that Latin America would `fall of the map´ of U.S: foreign policy gave priority of the day. Of course, as Abraham Lowenthal pointed out, in this sense "the Cold War having ended, some experts argued that Latin America would `fall of the map´ of the U.S. foreign policy preoccupations. They suggested that with a receding of the threats to security and with the resolution of the East-West political rivalry, the United States would no longer consider Latin America relevant. However, instead of falling off the map, Latin Americans find themselves in a radical process, drawing the map from a new angle[…] The policy of the United States[…] must return to focus on Latin America for four reasons: its potential and economic impact; its significant effects in shared problems such as the traffic in narcotics and the ecological deterioration; the increasing influence on essential values of the Latin American people, and especially, the multiple consequences emanating from massive emigration"(14). In our judgement, these characteristics graphically synthesize the Latin American reality in light of the global policy of the United States at the conclusion of the 1990´s and along with it, the period of the Clinton administration.

The Latin American context of the end of the twentieth century was characterized, therefore, by a complex structure of interrelated processes which would be summarized as follows: discrediting of the executive, legislative and repressive institutions; sharpening of the contradictions with the political parties and currents leading to splits; growing lack of confidence in the electoral systems and processes; accelerated discontent within a short time of those elected to govern; a rise in abstentionism, a proliferation of scandals over corruption, the spread of the production and trafficking of narcotics, worsening of delinquency and institutionalised violence; marginalization of broad social sectors, the spread of demagogy as a way to capitalize on the desperation and frustration of the population and other phenomena that lead to the so called "credibility crisis" an d "crisis of governability". The crises reverberate in the activation of the social and popular movements, as well as in the unprecedented increase in the rejection of fraud and corruption, in many cases without partisan political, in a situation of a retreat of the left which is seeking to redefine and rearticulate itself.

Faced with this scenarios, the United States has been torn between, on the one hand, the Wilsonian impulse in the projection of its international policy which is supposedly oriented towards leading the country to realize "good works", in favour of democratic capitalism, with a missionary, messianic sense, in keeping with the traditions of Manifest Destiny, that allows it to teach other nations how to behave and how to enjoy the benefits of the American Way of Life; and on the other, as the antithesis of the Wilsonian impulse, the Vietnam syndrome, that while circumstantially neutralized by the success achieved in the Gulf War, continues to influence the national ideology and psychology in U.S. society, to ensure that the country does not again become mired in international adventures(15). And so, according to the interpretation presented by Joseph Tulchin, for the period of 1990, "the United States policy towards Latin America would try to avoid `getting embroiled´ except when domestic politics made it impossible to avoid. It will be a policy centred on commercial and economic themes, because Latin America can be included in the global framework of the United States´ economic relations. Aside from these themes, the government of the U.S. will act with extreme caution in managing other affairs on the inter-American agenda, like the protection of democracy, the elimination of poverty, control of drug trafficking, protection of the environment, treatment of refugees and illegal immigration, the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and corruption. Since the United States does not wish to `embroil´ itself and since neither the government nor the public are focusing their attention on Latin America, there seems to be an incipient tendency on the part of the U.S. to go forward alone, acting unilaterally in hemispheric affairs while relating to the nations of the hemisphere bilaterally in spite of the fact that the Clinton administration began with all kinds o support for the multilateral maintenance of peace. Ironically, contrary to the tendency to act alone, there are pressures to operate within the framework of the multilateral institutions-the United Nations, the OAS, the IADB"(16). In general sense, this assessment exposes in a summarized way, the problem that the Latin American sphere posed to the United States´ global politics during the Clinton administration and trace the landscape that the government of George W. Bush is encountering, after the contentious presidential elections of 2000.

In this context, taking the subcontinent as a whole, until the beginning of the twenty-first century the Latin American prism of the United States favoured its interest in economic matters, proliferating approaches like the so-called Washington Consensus, as it is called in geo-economics terms by not a few authors. Associated with it, of course, are closely interwoven socio-political themes, which, manipulated by the United States´ approach, were presented to Latin America as expressions of stability and confidence as well as of democracy and governability. This put the emphasis on the supposed dimensions of cooperation and understanding. But at the same time there were themes such as drug trafficking and migration which time and time again put conflict and distancing on the table and repeatedly would put forward thorny subjects like security and peace. Perhaps the best paradigmatic example, with respect to the combining of conflict and cooperation would be the case of Mexico, where the coherence of the Latin American policy of the U.S. was split between convergence in the FTA, and divergence over illegal immigration and control of the border(17).

Even if Latin America and the Caribbean have not been among the highest priorities in the foreign policy of the United States for the last fifty years- particularly when compared with the preferential treatment that, in contrast, other regions such as the Middle East or Europe receive- the imperial aspirations are focusing on the south of the Rio Bravo in the early projections of W. Bush's foreign policy.

Under the Clinton administration, on the threshold of the third millennium, the policy of the U.S. towards the subcontinent was to be oriented towards the accomplishment of several closely interconnected objectives, among which the following figured prominently: the effort to contain the increase in commercial penetration and investment of the European Union(EU) and the countries of the Pacific Basin in Latin America and the Caribbean; the push to create the FTAA as well as acceleration of the consolidation of the system of domination of the subcontinent, directed at reinforcing the commitment of the elites to the neoliberal adjustments.

With Clinton they also managed to consolidate the model of limited and dependent representative democracy, control the destabilizing excesses of the anti-people economic policy, deepen and diversify the pressures and aggression aimed at destroying the Cuban Revolution and avoided the triggering of revolutionary processes.

However, when the "end" of the Cold War and the "successes" in the "pacification" of the subcontinent led the U.S. to foresee a round of hemispheric "tranquillity", the worsening of the regional crisis during the 90´s would have, instead, a profoundly destabilizing effect that was far from being the scenario conceived for consolidating their scheme of domination(18).

In reality, the so called new world order that was so forcefully spoken about, out of the priority accorded to it by Bush, father, represented from the outset, a very contradictory picture, in which conflictive dimensions and inter-imperialist rivalries persisted alongside integrationist tendencies. There were many more focal points of tension than the ones which - as Fukuyama put it simplistically-flowed from ethnic and religious conflict or the clash of civilizations, in Huntington´s latest interpretation. The reductionism and unilaterality of focus proposed by this ideologue of U.S. imperialism is not only notorious but surprising, given the ahistoricism it implies. Doing a quick review of the international dynamism of the decade of the 1990´s, one is struck by conflictive and bellicose situations like the Persian Gulf War, the Kosovo conflict, the invasion of Afghanistan or the heightened aggression towards Iraq, developing in September 2002. On top of this, to cite one example in the Latin American and Caribbean context, the case of Cuba and the sustained U.S. hostility for more than 30 years which has even become more intense, adding new measures to the unjust and prolonged blockade such as those contained in the Helms-Burton Law that strengthen the system of restrictions and economic aggression. Along with this, the persistence of new political, ideological and diplomatic actions add to the validity of that whole expedient, defined in the best tradition of the Cold War. It shows very clearly that the Cold War has not ended or that, in the best case, the term "post-Cold War" is deceptive, limited and does not reflect the real and profound tensions of the present world.

Once these outlines are traced so as to provide a context and place the content of the Latin America policy of the United States in a brief historical perspective that does not lose sight of the realignments in the international situation, we can make some brief comments about the FTAA to recapitulate its fundamentals and antecedents. Even if it is common knowledge, reference to its connection within the whole course of U.S. domination and hegemonism with respect to Latin America and the Caribbean cannot be avoided. In this regard, it shows the continuation of the pattern of asymmetry and dependency articulated right from the early practices that served as milestones in the historic relations between the two Americas: The Monroe Doctrine, Manifest Destiny, pan-Americanism, the Good Neighbour Policy, the Alliance for Progress.

As the historian Gordon Connel-Smith notes, "the general objective of the Latin America policy of the United States has been to preserve and increase its already considerable interests in the region. In practice, this has meant the establishment and the consequent maintenance of its hegemony through the exclusion of any extra-continental power capable of challenging it; lacking any such power, Latin America in and of itself has not represented serious challenge. The interests of the U.S. in Latin America are strategic(its security is involved), economic and political. All are, of course, closely interrelated. They also have an important moral and psychological interest in the region"(19). That is the reason-and this is not forcing the historical analysis-why its origin can be found in Moroeism which leads, through Pan-Americanism and the rest of its alluded to variants, to the FTAA.

As is well known, the FTAA, as a hegemonic project put forward in a strong economic rationale, condenses a mosaic of aims and proposals whose most immediate antecedents are found in the explosiveness of the debt crisis in the 80´s, the 1988 Free Trade Agreement between the U.S. and Canada; the Brady Plan of 1989 and the Americas Initiative of 1990, both actions launched by President Bush, father, followed by the North American Free Trade Agreement(NAFTA) and the Miami Summit of the Americas, both happening in 1994, and extending to the Quebec Summit in April 2001. Ever since, the Miami Summit constitutes a culminating moment in the institutional crystallization of the FTAA, as part of the hemispheric strategy of the Clinton administration.

In strategic terms, "the FTAA serves the direct function of a pillar in the process of forming a new international order adjusted to the U.S. interests. The creation and fine-tuning of the planned accord confers increasing bargaining power on the U.S., in its capacity as a global power. It is a multilateral option headed by the U.S. in the region of the world where it possesses most influence and from the standpoint of its requirements for liberalisation, is consistent with the multilateral disposition of the WTO and frequently goes beyond it[…]As well, it serves its hemispheric economical and political interests to the extent that it guarantees the conditions of political stability and guarantees to the businessmen and investors with help of an extensive agenda of promises that touch on the most common topics of the security agenda, such as the solution of conflicts, proliferation and trafficking as well as those which could ensue from explosive situations, like corruption and flaws in the democratic systems such as violations of human rights and other fundamental liberties[…] The projected course of the establishment of the FTAA constitutes the spine of the hegemonic strategy of the U.S. for Latin America and the Caribbean, with implications that extend even beyond the hemisphere, becoming the scheme for U.S. global domination"(20).
In the unfolding of that strategy, as has been indicated on more than one occasion, U.S. efforts encounter favourable conditions just as they do factors that hold them back.

Even though with respect to current international plans of the United States, the priorities of the so called "Bush doctrine" has the national security foreign policy and the fight against terrorism at the top of its agenda, the continuation of the worldwide project oriented towards its hegemonic reaffirmation, which is compatible with it, does not exclude nor deny attention to the FTAA(21). On the contrary, everything seems to indicate that, under that umbrella, the U.S. foreign policy will be able to conserve and fortify its influence in Latin America and the Caribbean, favouring the imposition of the FTAA, combining the casual treatments, bilateralism and differentiated adjustment for critical cases, maintaining its primacy inside the international and multilateral organisms. The reach and the limits of this undertaking remain to be seen.

Notes
1. To the extent that the terrorist attacks were considered as acts of war against the nation, the President acted not only as the Head of State but as Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces, which was given effect with his decisions of October 17 of that same year. See the work of Soraya Castro Marino: The 2000 Presidential Elections of the U.S.: A Study of the Political Dynamic at the Beginning of the Twenty-first Century, CESEU, Havana, January 2001.
2. The focus on the region began with a speech that seemed to indicate Latin America's priority in foreign policy. Nevertheless, the focus has been selective: Mexico, as a border country and NAFTA; the Free Trade Area of the Americas(FTAA) as a geo-commercial project, and Colombia as a national security problem. In the multilateral arena, the advance in the reconstruction of the Interamerican system(OAS, Rio Treaty, Inter-American Defence Board, etc.) would follow a course marked by contradictions and convergences within itself. It is at that point that the terrorist attack on the WTC-Pentagon takes place. The anti-terrorist campaign set of by the U.S. seemed to relegate the region to an even lower rung on the leader of the U.S. foreign policy priorities. Isabel Jaramillo Edwards: "The terrorist attacks on the WTC-Pentagon as a turning point in the inter-American relations", in: Cuadernos de Nuestra America. CEA, Havana, N. 28, July -December 2001, pp.43-44.
3. Rafael Fernández de Castro: "Between Exception and Compromise: Bush before Latin America", Foreign Affairs in Spanish, ITAM, Mexico, Vol. I, N. 3, Autumn-Winter 2001, p. 57.
4. "Everything that has been done in this hemisphere by successive U.S. administrations, right up until now, has been strongly influenced by their obsession and fear over the troubling presence of the Cuban Revolution, from the days of the mercenary invasion of the Bay of Pigs and the Alliance for Progress, to Bush´s statements from the bunker in Quebec." Fidel Castro Ruz, Speech delivered on International Workers´ Day(May1, 2001), in Cuba Socialista, N.22, 2001, p. 4.
5. It is necessary to pay attention to the unfolding of the internal tendencies in U.S. society which are questioning different directions being taken in government policy, like the policy with respect to the FTAA, the war in Afghanistan or the looming aggression against Iraq. In this sense, the organization of the anti-globalization movement, its reach and possible alliances with the other left or liberal sections within the country should not be underestimated.
6. Fidel Castro Ruz: op. Cit., p.5
7. To mention only a few examples that reflect the attention Cuba has dedicated to the matter, recall number 22, 2002 of Cuba Socialista, produced in monograph form, with different articles about the FTAA, held in Havana, from November 13-16, 2001, and the 8th Congress of the Association of Economists of Latin America and the Caribbean, also held in the Cuban capital from November 17-19, 2002, a series of forums where the different positions of recognized academics have been presented and debated.
8. Oneida Alvarez Figueroa: "Latin American Challenges top the FTAA" in Cuba Socialista, N. 22-2001, p. 33.
9. These ideas are developed in an earlier work. See Luis Rene Fernandez Tabio and Jorge Hernández Martínez: "The United States and the FTAA: The institutionalization of hemispheric hegemony in the 21st century", in Cuba Socialista, N. 22- 2001.
10. See Robert Pastor: Whirpool. U.S. Foreign Policy Toward Latin America and the Caribbean. Princeton University Press, 1992.
11. The analysis that follows is more fully developed in an earlier work. See Jorge Hernández Martinez: "U.S. and Inter-American Relations Going into the New Millenium", in Cuadernos de Nuestra America, N 26, CEA, Havana, July 2000- June 2001
12. For a vision of inter-American relations in the decade of the 80´s, from opposing perspectives, see the different works contained in the book edited by Kevin Midlebrook and Carlos Rico: The United States and Latin America in the 1980´s. Contending Perspectives on a Decade of Crisis, Pittsburgh University Press, 1986. From Latin America, various objective studies and critiques written mainly in Mexico by the Institute of U.S. Studies of the CIDE and the Centre for Latin American Studies of the UNAM, and in Cuba by the Centre for Studies of America(CEA) and the Centre for Studies of U.S. of the University of Havana.
13. See Peter H. Smith: Talons of the Eagle. Dynamics of U.S.-Latin American Relations, Oxford University Press, 1996. [Especially chapter 9, "Hegemony by Default".]
14. Abraham F. Lowenthal: "The Interdomestic Hemisphere", in: International Relations, UNAM, N. 57. January-March, 1993, pp. 13-14. Translated back from Spanish.
15. See the analysis by Joseph Tulchin in "Reflections on the Hemispheric Relations in the 21st Century", in Sintesis, N.25, Madrid, January-June, 1996, and the article by Jorge Hernandez Martinez: "The U.S. and Latin America after the Cold War: Contexts and Processes in the World of Today(I and II)", in: Nuestra America, N.1. January-February, 1998 and N.2, March-April, 1998, AUNA, Havana.
16. Joseph Tulchin: op. cit., p 126
17. See Peter H. Simith: TroubleAhead? Prospects for U.S: Relations with Latin America, CILAS, UCSD, July, 1998.
18. A nuanced view of Inter-American relations in this period can be found in the book edited by Jonathan Hartlyn, Lars Schoultz and Augusto Varas: The United Statesand Latin America in the 1990´s: Beyond the Cold War. University of North Carolina Press, 1992.
19. Gordon Connel-Smith: The United States and LA. Cultural Economics Foundation, Mexico, 1974, p.28. Translated back from Spanish.
20. Luis Rene Fernandez Tabio and Jorge Hernández Martinez: op. cit., p. 56.
21. At the beginning of the work, it is mentioned that as a strategically oriented hegemonic project, the FTAA was inserted in the global architecture of contemporary U.S: foreign policy. The cornerstone of the latter is found in the National Security Strategy, submitted by President Bush to the Congress last September 20. According to the opinion of a specialist like James Laxer, Professor of Political Science at York University, "The document foresees a world in which the United States will count on permanent military domination over all countries, allies and potential enemies alike. […] The new doctrine throws contention and dissuasion in the garbage and with them, the notion that the United States should be the first among equals. For the first time, in a formal policy declaration, the United States presents itself as superior to all other states. Its role as guardian of a global system, whose centre is the U.S., is conceptualised as a higher ranking than the roles of all the other states. This characteristic of the doctrine makes it explicitly imperialist". See: "The Day the Empire Strikes Back". In Juventud Rebelde, September 28, 2002, p.3.