In his first speech to the staff of the Caribbean Community Secretariat, Secretary General La Rocque emphasized that the heads of government statement suggesting a “pause” in the integration process, naming the single currency and monetary union as candidates for the pause, did not mean a halt to the integration process itself. Many will wonder why the heads decided to single out the currency and monetary union issues, since the better part of the Caricom populations would seem to have long put those notions out of their minds. It would have been useful at the time, if the Secretary General had chosen to indicate whether there were other elements relating to Caricom’s advancement specifically towards the Single Economy that could be meaningfully pursued over the next five years, as distinct from aspects of functional cooperation, particularly that of health, which have been recognized as rather having stolen the integration show in the last decade or so.
In adverting to the difficulties of pursuing the Single Economy, and aspects like freedom of movement which have periodically become matters of contention, the Secretary General remarked on the statement made to him by one Caricom head that “all politics is national.” This, of course is a virtual repetition of the famous statement made many years ago by American Congressman, Tip O’Neil, that “all politics is local.” That these statements are undoubtedly true is uncontestable. But they are, rather often, used as an excuse by the political class for not doing what they had promised the population to do; or to signal to the population that what they had promised they now see as too challenging to undertake, in the light of what is said to be negative public sentiment.
The latest issue of this kind has been, of course, the freedom of movement issue which, having been somewhat of an election issue in the last general elections in Barbados, seemed to have been transformed by the new government there into a major roadblock to the free movement goal. The truth is, starting from the transformation in Jamaica of the federation issue into a major political bogey back in 1961-62, a precedent has been created for using integration issues as potential vote winners. But what is increasingly becoming clear over the years is that, dependent as we are on either assistance or the grant of access by other countries, local populations are not the only ones now capable of judging whether an issue is genuinely national or local, or whether, on the other hand, it has been made so by some members of the political class of one or other of our Caricom states. Particularly at this time, when countries like those of the European Union or of Latin America are continually struggling to make integration promises and plans meaningful and beneficial, our own leaders must be aware that there is increasing scepticism as to whether Caricom states are really making a sustained effort to create the greater scale and economic platforms that are seen now almost as a sine qua non of economic progress.
In those circumstances, – increasing external scepticism about the realism of the efforts that Caricom states are making towards further integration – how can perceived roadblocks towards further integration be cleared? And what would be the Secretariat’s role in any such exercise? Secretary General La Rocque, in his inaugural speech to staff, put some emphasis on the necessity for a greater effort on informing on and advocating the facts about the process. He noted the substantial developments that have been made in the technology of communications, and the consequent ease with which information can now reach the ordinary citizen.
There is certainly a case for this. But would it be true to say that the now longtime roadblock towards full Caricom membership in the Caribbean Court of Justice has been cleared, because the case has been more clearly put and more widely understood by the powers that be or their populations? Or is the apparently increasing perception among the Jamaican elite, as against the wider populace, that the British would like to let go of their judicial responsibility as a final Court of Appeal, that has gradually become decisive?
Many countries, like the United States, must be asking why their virtually simultaneous offers of free trade area arrangements have been accepted and concluded by the Central Americans and the Dominican Republic (a member of our Cariforum), while we seem to wish to take our own good time over the issue? Are we going to wait to the point where the European Union decides (even with a relatively weak Spain today) to insist more firmly that the current Cariforum is a weak reed for the holistic approach that they would like to take in the wider Caribbean, and move to make a better arrangement with a Cuba that will be anxious to balance its increasing dependence on the United States with a strong relationship with the EU?
How long are we going to allow the difficulties of international transportation to inhibit us from taking a meaningful stab at an approach to regional transportation in Cariforum at a minimum? Should the Secretariat not discreetly be seeking to persuade other governments that we should be studying the possible wider implications of the de facto integration of Caribbean Airlines and Air Jamaica? And has there been any regional response to the current (Persad-Bissessar) government’s suggestion of the relevance of an arrangement of sea transportation at least in some parts of the region? Is there any move, with the recent publication of Dr Jean Holder’s book on air transportation, giving us the benefit of his wide experience, to persuade governments of the necessity for an intergovernmental task force to study the practicalities of the issue in all its diversity?
At this time of wide regional and international crisis, with many of our governments at their wits’ end, particularly with deep fiscal crises, it is natural that a focus should be on the domestic, or the so-called national. This applies to us, as it does to governments in the European Union or to the United States – the latter’s policy-making now so obviously infested with the localism of contending politicians’ ambitions. In these circumstances, the regional process must play a hand in identifying new directions, the implementation of which will not necessarily immediately be taken up by the water-logged politicians of the present.
We do not suggest, of course, that these are the more optimistic days that produced the West Indian Commission and its pointing of a path towards a CSME. But a regional secretariat, now with the benefit of the universities and other regional institutions like the CDB and the Eastern Caribbean Central Bank, and in conjunction with the Latin American regional institutions which now appear to have a greater appreciation of our place in the hemisphere, needs to take advantage of the present times to open perspectives which can be ready to be placed before the politicians as the light of optimism reappears.
Let us not, while focusing on the fact that politics is national, allow our regional responsibilities to be defined away by others, because we have not done the preparatory work. Secretary General La Rocque, with his long experiencing of manoeuvring among our political elite, starting with the stern Eugenia Charles of Dominica, must surely be up to the task.
