Resource Nationalism in Mexico

It has been in the works for quite a while, but it is still a big deal when the Mexican president declares that Mexican oil will no longer be a state monopoly.

Seven decades after his party seized fields from the predecessors to Exxon Mobil Corp. and Royal Dutch Shell Plc (RDSA), Pena Nieto is preparing for the return of international oil companies to arrest eight years of decline in crude output. An opening would probably be broad, from offshore drilling to shale fields similar to those that have revived the U.S. petroleum industry, Pena Nieto said.

This is an area rich for analysis. Lázaro Cárdenas' nationalization of the oil industry in 1938 is a landmark in Mexican political history, akin to the no re-election tradition that came out of the revolution. The debate to come will tell us a lot about the left in Mexico. Is it pragmatic, willing to take some privatization to--supposedly!--generate more funds for the state? Or will it assert itself more? Can it? This assumes that the center and right are generally willing to bring in more foreign presence, though maybe there are pockets of nationalism in the PRI or PAN (just as there are conservative currents of resource nationalism in other countries, even in Chile, supposedly a bastion of purely capitalist values).

It is also very reminiscent of the ideological flexibility of Peronism, where Carlos Menem did just about the opposite of what his party's founder/namesake would've done. In that case, of course, his policies actually prompted a return to Peronist traditions under the Kirchners. Peña Nieto's proposal is less radical than Menem's project, but the issue of party tradition is not trivial.

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Venezuela: Using State Coercion to Force Love

This is one of the weirdest story I've read this year*, and the first where the Venezuelan government sounds like the Republican Party in the United States, with a fervent desire to tell women what to do in their private lives. In an effort to promote breast feeding, there is a proposal to ban formula bottle feeding. Yes, ban it. Except in special cases as approved by the health ministry.

Odalis Monzon, from Venezuela's ruling Socialist party, said the proposal would "prohibit all types of baby bottles" as a way to improve children's health.

"We want to increase the love (between mother and child) because this has been lost as a result of these transnational companies selling formula," Ms Monzon said.

I'm pretty much speechless--there's nothing that increases love like state coercion! This is not only authoritarian but also unworkable and unenforceable. The black market for formula will skyrocket, thus prompting even more illegal activity.

To be fair, there is crazy legislation proposed all the time at all levels in the United States, with no chance of passage. Hopefully this falls into the "nutty legislator mouths off and is quickly mocked" category. I can't wait to see the debate.

* the Maduro bird thing probably will always win for weirdest.

h/t Evren Celik Wiltse on Twitter

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We Need Better LASA Resolutions

I just received two proposed resolutions from the Latin American Studies Association. One is on Bradley Manning, which is pretty much irrelevant to our organization, and yet it calls for an end to bases in Honduras, which is irrelevant to what happens to Manning. Who wrote this stuff?

The second is about Obama's foreign policy toward Latin America. It is a kitchen sink thing with a number of poorly made arguments and about ten different issues all mixed together.

Resolution on Obama Policy
Whereas: The Latin American Studies Association (LASA) is the largest professional association in the world for individuals and institutions engaged in the study of Latin America and the Caribbean. With over 7,000 members, forty-five percent of whom reside outside the United States, LASA is the one association that brings together experts on Latin America from all disciplines and diverse occupational endeavors, across the globe. For decades, LASA members have spoken in defense of democracy and human rights in the Western Hemisphere and in support of peaceful and respectful relations among states in the region. 
Whereas: President Obama’s policy toward Latin America has so far failed to fulfill the hopes engendered by his appearance at the Summit of the Americas in 2009 that the United States would strongly and consistently support democracy, human rights, social justice and national sovereignty; and 
Whereas: the embargo of Cuba has not been lifted, despite the unanimous call by the members of the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC) to end it, Cuba is still listed as a state sponsor of terrorism, and travel to Cuba by U.S. citizens remains severely restricted; and 
Whereas: the Obama administration has demonstrated persistent hostility toward progressive governments in Latin America, particularly toward Venezuela and Bolivia, and has pursued close relations with governments with poor human rights records, such as Mexico, Colombia and Honduras; and 
Whereas: the militarism of Plan Colombia and Plan Mérida and the deployment of the Fourth Fleet have been reinforced with the increasing militarization of the U.S.-Mexico border and construction of new military and police bases as part of counter-narcotics policy, especially in Central America; and 
Whereas: a number of current and former Latin American presidents as well as significant civil society organizations in the most affected countries oppose current U.S. counter-narcotics policies as ineffective and counterproductive with devastating consequences for the civilian populations; 
Therefore be it resolved that: 
1.) The Latin American Studies Association urges President Obama to reduce the U.S. military presence in Latin America, to reverse the militarization of U.S. regional and border policies, especially counter-narcotics operations, and to suspend or reduce aid to military and police forces in countries with on-going human rights abuses, especially Mexico, Honduras and Colombia; 
2.) The Latin American Studies Association urges President Obama to normalize relations with Cuba, including eliminating as many travel restrictions as possible by executive order, making the certifications necessary to end Cuba’s designation as a state sponsor of terrorism, and actively working to obtain Congressional lifting of the embargo and restoration of full freedom of travel for U.S. citizens to Cuba; 
3.) The Latin American Studies Association urges President Obama to fully respect the sovereignty of Venezuela and Bolivia and to actively pursue improved relations, including resumption of full diplomatic relations; 
4.) The Latin American Studies Association urges President Obama to reject all direct and indirect United States participation in or support for actions or policies that undermine democratically elected governments in Latin America. 
This resolution will be mailed to President Barack Obama, all members of the U.S. House of Representatives and the U.S. Senate, Secretary of State John Kerry and Assistant Secretary of State for Western Hemisphere Affairs Roberta Jacobson, the New York Times, Washington Post, and Los Angeles Times.

I dislike lumping tons of unrelated things together. Get one issue alone and drive it home. Even if this is approved, it is a jumbled mess, with parts of it perhaps written a very long time ago. Anyway, some specific comments:

1. I actually agree that we need to end the Cuba embargo, and have written so a million times, but CELAC should not be cited as a reason, since even within Latin America it is not viewed as terribly relevant. If there was a well-worded resolution about ending the embargo and getting rid of the ridiculous terrorist label, I would love it. So why can't the LASA wordsmiths handle that?

2. The Obama administration is not terribly hostile toward Venezuela. John Kerry is talking to the Maduro administration, and all the rhetoric of the Bush administration is long gone. It is fair to say that Maduro's statements are 1,000 times more crazy than anything Obama says. Questioning the outcome of the election is not unreasonable. In any case, the U.S. isn't doing much to Venezuela's sovereignty, or Bolivia's for that matter. Was this written years ago? Point #3 should just be removed entirely.

3. They mention the Fourth Fleet. There was a flurry of discussion about this in 2008, but I can't find anything more recent. Is this really a 2008 issue in a current resolution? Remove that and don't mix up Plan Colombia, the Mérida Initiative (even calling it Plan Mérida is pretty loaded) and Central America. These are all different issues--militarization is a real concern, but the contexts are better addressed separately. In particular, I think Honduras should have its own resolution that specifically tackles the unique problems there.

4. Resolution #4 is pretty much incomprehensible. Don't support anything that's akin to anything indirectly or something that's indirectly directly undermining democracy. That should be removed and replaced by something very specific and direct.

As a combination, then, these resolutions are not worth passing. Looking back, I see I blogged about annoyance at a resolution in 2008. Mike Allison has also cringed. In 2012, a similar set of resolutions failed to pass because only 12% of the membership voted, and 20% is required. This should have alerted the authors to the need for refinement.

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Talking to Maduro

The Washington Post editorial board is miffed at John Kerry. Why? Because he had the audacity, the sheer gall, to chat with the Venezuelan Foreign Minister and to suggest it might be a good idea to have ambassadors. Somehow this is taken as a ringing endorsement of Nicolás Maduro. A "lifeline" even! I guess Kerry's words will make Venezuelans forget they have no toilet paper.

This demonstrates how far we've descended in diplomatic terms.  For all the Ronald Reagan glorification, people seem to forget he actively engaged with the Soviet Union, including meeting personally with Gorbachev in 1985. Later, they even signed treaties, even though Gorbachev didn't do exactly what the U.S. wanted. Nobody mistook this for Reagan's approval of the Soviet regime.

Venezuela today doesn't even qualify as an adversary, much less an enemy, yet dialogue gets criticized from the right. Kerry wasn't even agreeing to anything beyond normal diplomatic ties. It is self-defeating and nonsensical to label basic diplomatic dialogue as endorsement of a particular government.

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Great Op-Ed on Commodities

I complain a lot about op-eds, but I am glad to report there is a great one, written by El Salvador's former Finance Minister Manuel Hinds.

These graphs show why you should not be surprised when seeing that Latin America is going down after having gone up at record rates for almost 10 years. What has changed is not policies, but the variable that traditionally determines the region’s rate of growth: the prices of commodities.  The graphs also show the superficiality of common economic commentary. The relationship between commodity prices and GDP growth in Latin America has been known for centuries. Yet, for almost a decade the mainstream press commentaries ignored the evidence and attributed the Latin American boom to superior economic policies, when it was clear that it was caused by the old, reliable predictors of growth in Latin America: commodity prices.

This is exactly on the mark, and similar to what I wrote just a short time ago. I am snagging this figure as well, which sums it up visually:

Will any analyst listen? This is how Latin American economies have been run forever, and although the reliance on commodities often gets brief mention, somehow it never gets the dedicated attention that it requires. Instead, we get a boom and hear about how great things are and what great decisions policy makers are pursuing, and then the boom ends and everyone seems surprised.

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Juxtaposition: Peru

U.S. Embassy in Peru, 2005:

We share many of Rospigliosi's concerns regarding Ollanta Humala's rise in the polls and the possibility that the latter will establish a strong pro-Evo pro-Chavez political base following the 2006 elections.

U.S. President of the United States, 2013:

Peru is one of our strongest and most reliable partners in the hemisphere.  We have a strong commercial and trading relationship.  We cooperate on a wide range of security issues, including our counter-narcotics efforts.  And we spent most of our discussion focused on how we can further deepen this important bilateral relationship. 

This isn't new, but always striking. I think many in the United States are still waiting for Humala to announce that all this moderation was a joke and proclaim himself a chavista.

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Taking Your Leak in Latin America

Now this could get interesting. Julian Assange, currently a long-term resident of the Ecuadorian Embassy in London, tells Edward Snowden to go to Latin America:

"I would strongly advise him to go to Latin America," Assange told CNN's AC360 Monday night. "Latin America has shown in the past 10 years that it is really pushing forward in human rights. There's a long tradition of asylum."

Three points come to mind.

First, it doesn't seem that harboring Assange has hurt U.S.-Ecuadorian relations all that much. They were strained already, but after a Wikileaks controversy the two countries sent ambassadors and this was not affected by Assange. So taking Snowden is not automatically a huge risk. At the same time, I'm not sure what any given country would have to gain. Rafael Correa actually had a personal stake because some of the leaked cables were about him. Maybe Nicolás Maduro would want to champion someone criticizing the U.S. government, though at the moment he is trying to improve relations.

Second, the "pushing forward in human rights" is not so simple. There is progress in pursuing court cases for past abuses during military governments, but with regard to media freedom--obviously important to Assange--there is regression in some countries and the region as a whole is dangerous for journalists. As many people noted last year, despite Latin American governments voicing sympathy for him, they would not be so kind to one of their own citizens leaking classified information.

Third, he's right that there is a long tradition of asylum, and in fact I think that would make an interesting research project. During the Cold War, for example, Venezuela and Mexico were famously open to leftists being attacked in their own countries. In the late 1930s many Jewish refugees headed from Europe to Latin America. Less admirable was the flow of Nazis to Argentina, or ousted dictators trying to find somewhere to live (e.g. Somoza in Paraguay or Stroessner in Brazil).

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U.S. Trade with Latin America: Why the Whining?

There are so many arguments out there that the United States is "ignoring" Latin America. Heraldo Muñoz, who I respect very much, just published an op-ed arguing U.S. exports to Latin America "have receded during the last decade."

This just isn't true. Let's take a look at some sources.

According to the Congressional Research Service:

Between 1998 and 2009, total U.S. merchandise trade (exports plus imports) with Latin America grew by 82% compared to 72% for Asia (driven largely by China), 51% for the European Union, 221% for Africa, and 64% for the world.

According to the Census Bureau, trade with Central and South America is at an all-time high. In 2012 the U.S. hit its highest monthly amount ever (over $16 billion) and every year see growth.

According to the United States Trade Representative, the U.S. has free trade agreements with 20 countries around the world. More than half (11 of 20) are with Latin America.

Meanwhile, according to the Inter-American Development Bank, in 2012 Latin American exports to the United States grew 3% compared to only 1% with Asia (after a big surge the year before).

I could go on and on.

So there is no evidence that the U.S. is ignoring Latin America in any way. However, it is true that Latin America is trading more with the rest of the world. But this is good. If Latin America is growing, the economic pie is growing, and that's good for everyone. The U.S. policy goal should not be dependence or exclusion--it should be prosperity. The U.S. sells more, China sells more, India sells more. Why is everyone constantly complaining as if this signals some problem that the U.S. has to solve?

Bueller?

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The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time

I highly recommend Mark Haddon's The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, which apprently now is being made into a movie. The main character Christopher is a 15 year old with Aspergers. He's high functioning but has severe sensory issues and lack of empathy.

I actually thought it was a mystery--a neighbor's dog has been killed and he is going to find out who did it. But that "investigation" doesn't go very far and instead the novel is really about understanding Christopher's view of the world but perhaps even more importantly, how the rest of the world--especially his parents--deals with it. From the perspective of a parent of a chile with Aspergers (though not nearly as severe), it succeeds in every way for me. I gobbled it up in half a day.

Adults constantly get annoyed at Christopher for his behavior, even swearing at him, not realizing that it corresponds to a clear logic. The problem is that logic is not immediately apparent to anyone except people who know him very well. That puts a strain on his parents, though without spoiling anything I will say that some of their reactions are a bit over the top.

But his navigation of new environments felt spot on. As he is inundated with new problems, he does his best to work them out according to his own logic, all the time largely unaware of how it affects other people. So as it turns out, the book is quite sad but he feels successful.

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Bring Back Latin American Debt!

Kevin Gallagher argues that the United States needs to make Latin American countries more indebted to it. Way, way, way more indebted, in fact, because since China is throwing tens of billions to the region, and therefore the U.S. should do as much or more than China.

For too long, the United States has relied on a rather imperial mechanism – just telling Latin America what it needs. Compare that with China’s approach: It offers Latin America what it wants (in the form of financing and trade from China)

.

This just puzzles me. For many years the United States did what it could to shovel money to Latin America, which went further and further into debt. That did not happen because U.S. policy makers told presidents that is what they needed. It happened because corrupt presidents saw it as a way to keep clientelist structures in place without any apparent cost.

What the U.S. ultimately got in return was economic shock that produced conflicts which in turn led to the election of governments that were either wary or openly antagonistic to the United States.

If the U.S. were to start lending on a massive scale, this would not necessaraily happen again. But at the very least it should signal caution, and lending with the sole logic of keeping up with China seems the definition of throwing that caution to the wind.

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Biden and Latin America

Nice to see this from Joe Biden:

As leaders across the region work to lift their citizens out of poverty and to diversify their economies from commodity-led growth, the U.S. believes that the greatest promise—for Americans and for our neighbors—lies in deeper economic integration and openness.

I like the explicit recognition of how commodity-based growth is problematic. Historically, of course, the U.S. has loved that type of growth because it benefited greatly from it.

At the same time, however, he was praising free trade agreements, which in fact create an incentive to use economies of scale to produce commodities. In other words, free trade alone doesn't lead to diversification. Interestingly, Biden also began the op-ed by praising...flower farms (though, to be fair, he mentioned small businesses).

In general, though, this sort of recognition of basic facts about Latin American development, so long absent in U.S. policy, is welcome. And while all kinds of pundits decry the lack of "leadership" in U.S. policy toward Latin America, in many ways this recognition is more valuable than creating grand plans to "lead" something.

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Tolerance for Homosexuality in Latin America

Really interesting article in the Washington Post, based on a Pew Research Center report, about tolerance of homosexuality. Latin America is very tolerant compared to the rest of the world (especially less developed countries) and has become more tolerant over the past 6-7 years.

So why? On the surface, Latin America seems not to be an auspicious context for tolerance. It is heavily Catholic, though certainly not as much as in the past. The region does not have a history of protecting the rights of minority groups.

There is not a large literature on the topic, but there are indicators that we need to look at the groups pushing for change. Jordi Diez argues in a recent Comparative Political Studies article that we need to focus on well-organized social mobilization. Omar Encarnación argued in a 2011 Journal of Democracy article that the answer lay in the political strategies of activists, especially in terms of framing gay rights as human rights. There are political and cultural obstacles, but activists are finding ways to navigate them.

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Immigration and NC Republicans

I may be beating a dead horse, but I find the Republican Party's internal debate on immigration reform so fascinating. Here is an op-ed about North Carolina by a former Republican County Chairman. It is specifically aimed at opposing driving permits for undocumented immigrants, but once again brings up the logical fallacies that plague restrictionist arguments.

The main problem is this:

Voting for amnesty and other liberal immigration policies does NOT increase Hispanic votes for Republicans. 

Voting for amnesty and other liberal immigration policies, however, significantly diminishes non-Hispanic conservative support for Republicans.

The first is questionable, and the second is demonstrably wrong. One the first point, remember that George W. Bush got plenty of votes from Latinos, and the vote share went down only as the party became vocally anti-immigrant. Next, the critical issue for Republicans is not just gaining Hispanic votes per se, but rather making sure they actually have a base of support in 10-20 years. The share of whites in the population is decreasing, and alone cannot win national elections, especially at the presidential level.

Second, it is crystal clear that Republicans do support immigration reform. There is no evidence that I have to seen to suggest that "non-Hispanic conservatives" (read "whites") stop supporting the party as a result of voting for immigration reform.

It's like watching a car heading for a cliff, with some of the passengers arguing strenuously that putting on the brakes is a really terrible idea.

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More on Immigration and Republicans

Phyllis Schlafly echoes what other conservatives have been saying, namely that the Republican Party needs to give up on Hispanics--including scuttling immigration reform--and focus entirely on white people. This is a suicidal strategy, but will it get legs?

Polls suggest caution. A conservative, but pro-immigration, group of organizations commissioned a poll showing overwhelming Republican support for the senate immigration bill. Other polls suggest the same. For the short term, the main question is whether the minority opinion in the party holds sway in the House of Representatives, since it seems clear the Senate is going to pass a bill.

For the longer term, this will matter for presidential politics, since Republican candidates feel the need to veer far to the restrictionist side to win the nomination, then find themselves at a serious disadvantage in the general election because of all the crazy stuff they've said on the record. This is a problem for a party that has won the popular vote for the presidency only once out of the last six elections. When you get back to the heyday of the three consecutive wins in the 1980s, you're talking about staunchly pro-immigrant Republican presidents (if you haven't seen this short clip of a 1980 Reagan/Bush debate, you should!).

One thing I have never seen is an anti-Hispanic argument that makes a case for the long term viability of the strategy. No matter how many more white people you can attract--and remember that plenty of whites are Democrats, Unaffiliated, or entirely apolitical--that pool is shrinking relative to the rest of the population. I suppose asking for logic is a fruitless exercise.

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Roberto Ampuero's The Neruda Case

Roberto Ampuero's The Neruda Case was billed as a mystery, and in fact is about the main character's first foray into private detection, but is enjoyable for reasons other than genre.

Cayetano Brulé--himself a Cuban--lives in Valparaíso, in September 1973 was contacted by Pablo Neruda to find information of a woman from his past with whom he had an affair and determine whether the child she had was his. From there the poet gives him money to make quick trips to Mexico, Bolivia, East Germany, and Cuba to find the woman's trail.

In general, I was much less interested in what he found out than the questions that arise as he investigates. One that comes up frequently is the balance between personal issues and political crises. How much should we care about ourselves when the world seems to be falling apart around us? People keep wondering that about Neruda as Brulé asks them questions.

He also meditates on detective fiction from reality. Neruda gives him Maigret novels to read as inspiration, but Brulé keeps thinking that the ordered world of France does not apply to the messiness of Latin America.

Another centers on the Chilean coup and its context in the Cold War. In many different ways Ampuero comments on the difference between the highly polarized Allende years and how so many ideologically driven people at the time lost all that by the 21st century. The descriptions of Valparaíso and Santiago in the days following up to the coup and then immediately afterward are engrossing.

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Warrior Dash 2013

Like last year, today I ran the Warrior Dash. The basic idea is that it is a 5K with fun obstacles, including crawling through mud.

This year was VERY different from last, which had three relatively easy mud/water obstacles to get through. This time there were only the dry obstacles until the mud crawl with barbed wire strung not far above the surface of the mud, which is always at the end. Last year I scooted through it because it was mostly water.

This year it was extremely thick mud, what Dr. Seuss might call Gluppity Glup, and it was impossible to feel the ground under you to get any leverage. I made the extraordinarily poor decision of going in the middle of the pit, which was the worst part. It was very hard to move, and many people were trying to bail out the sides. I had to wait several minutes for the guy in front of me, whose leg was stuck, while he waited for a group of men to yank him out. I made it through, but needed help to get over the lip and out of the pit. And I admit that toward the end my main thought was, "I want out of this goddamned mud!"

All of which might suggest that having a bunch of degrees does not mean you are smart. It was good exercise, though, as I believe I used very single muscle in my body. I definitely feel all of them right now.

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