The Summit of the Americas will open on Monday promoting the theme ‘Building a Sustainable, Resilient, and Equitable Future’. If that has little meaning for the ordinary citizen of this continent, the US State Department has given the assurance that it was developed in concert with the region’s governments, civil society, the private sector and the thirteen international organizations which comprise the Joint Summit Working Group. If that is so, then all is explained: the theme’s meaninglessness will reflect an attempt to reconcile a certain divergence of opinion among multiple factions.
Things were simpler when the first summit was held in 1994 in Miami at the instigation of then President Bill Clinton, and when everyone in the hemisphere was in attendance except for Cuba. But those were different times, and a lot of history has flowed under the bridge since then.
In the early 1990s it was all about economic liberalisation and democracy, and the participants at the first Summit without exception agreed to work on a Free Trade Area of the Americas. This was an ambition which soon fizzled out with the rise of the left-wing regimes, more especially that of Hugo Chávez in Venezuela, who embarked on setting up his own continental institutions which would exclude the US and counter the existing ones.
In 2004 together with Cuba he founded the organisation Alba, which was intended to facilitate “integral development” for South America. Its aims went far beyond the economic; it described itself as a “political, economic, and social alliance in defence of independence, self-determination and the identity of peoples comprising it.” It is now for the most part defunct, but its shadow still lingers at times like this, as do its anti-imperialist, anti-neoliberal sentiments in some quarters. It is significant that some of our sister Caricom territories joined the alliance, induced, perhaps, by the generous oil arrangements the Venezuelan President was dispensing so liberally at the time.
The State Department has published what it says that people, institutions and governments across the hemisphere have shared as their concerns. These include the pandemic and its consequences; threats to democracy; the climate crisis; and a lack of equitable access to economic, social and political opportunities which affect the most vulnerable and under-represented. The Summit together with its stakeholder forums, it said, seeks to “promote cooperation towards region-wide, inclusive economic growth and prosperity based on our shared respect for democracy, fundamental freedoms, the dignity of labor, and free enterprise.”
The United States is anxious to ensure continuity and make a commitment to democracy an entrance qualification for the Summit, but not all invitees are so persuaded. Some of them, such as Mexico, believe that democracy should not be a cause for exclusion, and that economic development should be the focus of the gathering. Nevertheless, Washington has gone ahead and denied Cuba, Venezuela and Nicaragua access to the Summit, although Cuba did attend the last two. There was a report that the State Department was prepared to reconsider Cuba’s case, but President Díaz-Canel has gone on record as saying that even if he was invited he wouldn’t attend.
While Mexico was never a member of Alba, President Andrés Manuel López Obrador gave voice to something of its perspective on hemispheric relations. “It is time for a new coexistence among all the countries of America, because the model imposed more than two centuries ago is exhausted, has no future or way out, and no longer benefits anyone,” he was quoted as saying, declaring himself unprepared to attend the Summit if Venezuela, Nicaragua and Cuba were not invited. After visits by American envoys there was some suggestion he might send his foreign minister; no doubt we will discover on Monday whether he has compromised on his position. The US particularly wants Mexico there because the topic of migration, which is on the agenda, is a critical one for Washington.
Various other countries had threatened not to attend, including Argentina, Bolivia, Chile, Guatemala and Honduras, although it remains to be seen how many of them in fact will carry through with that threat. In addition, the ten members of Alba had earlier issued a statement saying they “reject the exclusions and discriminatory treatment at the so-called Summit of the Americas in Los Angeles,” and that “this unilateral decision constitute[d] a serious historical setback in hemispheric relations.” The Caribbean members of this bloc, one excluded, now seem to have changed direction.
The members of Caricom were unable to agree on a common position in relation to the Summit, but recently Reuters reported that thirteen out of the fourteen, including Guyana, had now decided to attend. The exception is St Vincent and the Grenadines, whose Prime Minister Ralph Gonsalves wrote to his fellow heads earlier last month exhorting them not to go. “I realise it is a difficult decision, but our American friends have left us with no other credible, principled, and practical choice,” he wrote. St Vincent is one of the members of Alba.
One of those who initially was not going to put in an appearance in Los Angeles was President Bolsonaro of Brazil. As an extreme right-wing President, of course, he was not troubled by the kind of concerns which occupied the mind of President López Obrador, but he had been a friend of former President Donald Trump, and had never met President Biden. He changed his stance about attendance, it was reported, after being tempted by a one-on-one meeting with Mr Biden.
What has intervened since this Summit was arranged is the war in Ukraine, which will have serious consequences for the Americas as a whole and not least for the Caribbean. The global food crisis will give the encounters on economic prosperity a whole new complexion, not to mention the discussions on energy.
Furthermore, the matter of democracy comes back into the frame in a meaningful way, since it is the non-democratic states which will be more inclined to lend support to Russia. Cuba, Venezuela and Nicaragua all lean towards Russia to a greater or lesser degree, and the US is of the view that the international isolation of that country is a component in persuading Moscow to bring the war to a conclusion. The Americas, no less than any other part of the world has a vested interest in Russia ending the conflict, and by extension in declaring their support for democracy. Democratic governance is on the agenda at the Summit; it is just that the discussions will have acquired a new urgency with which they would not have been invested otherwise.
Just as times have changed since 1994, they have suddenly changed again since February 24, 2022. While that does not mean that the structures of Summits don’t have to be reformed for the future, at the present time the Americas have to adjust their postures to confront current exigencies.
