Lula’s work to create a de facto anti-U.S. illiberal alliance of Latin American leftist regimes and extra-hemispheric U.S. rivals further comes at a time in which those countries geographically closest to the United States—including Mexico, the Northern Triangle, and parts of the Caribbean—are moving away from political and security cooperation with the US, and toward a deepen embrace of the PRC.
Today, the impact of Russia’s unprovoked invasion of Ukraine and its ongoing military activities against Ukraine’s population and infrastructure to occupy the country is consistent with the relationship Latin America has had with Europe historically. The effects flowing from that interdependence have been significant and multifaceted against a backdrop of a region-making an effort to distance itself from them.
Despite its novelty, the act did not plunge the country into crisis as some critics warned, nor did it mark a death knell for Ecuadorian democracy, as others argued. To the contrary, muerte cruzada acted as a constitutional release valve, helping dissipate popular discontent and providing a democratic exit for an unpopular president who was facing his second impeachment trial and third motion for impeachment in two years.
Despite a proliferation of targeted visa restrictions, the reality is that migration has continued. As the option of flights and other regular travel further north has been taken off the board, this has only pushed migrants to take more dangerous paths to the U.S. border, most infamously through the Darien Gap.
Climate change and the global energy transition place Latin America and the Caribbean at a crossroads: it can either take a leap forward to become a more prosperous and relevant region, or it can fail and see our human and economic development stagnate.
The region faces the ever-growing threat of climate change, persistent inequality, the destructive middle-income trap, growing disillusionment with democracy, the largest refugee crisis outside of a war zone, among numerous other challenges… identifying which challenges are the most pressing and challenging is a difficult task—but a necessary one if governments across the region are to address these threats.
With distinct objectives, Brazil and Mexico are increasingly open to engagement with China, which is happy to oblige in partnership with both economies.
Of special relevance in the Latin American context, Brazil, the largest nation and economy of the continent, and a country that historically managed well to sustain a course of largely autonomous but close relations with the hemispheric hegemon, finds itself today in an especially challenging position.
Chileans have never wanted a new country or a drastically different economic model. All along, they have held the same demands.
While gold plays an important role in Suriname’s economy, it has downsides, some of them related to transnational criminal activities, which benefit from relatively porous borders, stretched government resources (related to a lengthy economic crisis) and corruption.
