Coming US elections and Caricom

United States elections, and especially presidential elections, elicit a natural fascination from citizens of Caribbean countries, and with the victory of President Obama this has certainly increased in recent years. Apart from our existence within the Western Hemisphere, there is the fact of the large number of Caribbean country nationals in various states in the United States. And both of these factors are now magnified by our extremely easy access to ongoing events in that country made possible by the Internet and related technological media.

It is unlikely, however, that the President’s four years have made any substantial impression on Caricom countries’ citizens. True, some may have been impressed at the beginning of his administration, with his appointment in early 2009, as United States Attorney General, of a person, Eric Holder, of Barbadian parentage, also the first Afro-American, to hold the position of head of the Department of Justice. And Holder has paid particular attention to an ongoing preoccupation of the United States, that of security issues arising from movement of narcotics through the Caribbean.

The President also started off with something of a bang by his presence in Trinidad & Tobago in April 2009 for the Fifth Summit of the Americas, the now flagship meeting of the membership of the Organisation of American States. His presence there seemed to emphasise the need for a continuing normalization of Inter-American relations, including managing relations with countries deemed too radical for normal treatment by the preceding Bush presidency, and support for programmes of economic growth, even as he noted “the consequences of a historic economic crisis…being felt across the hemisphere”.

In the ensuing years, of course, the President has found himself preoccupied by the extent to which that very crisis, after what turned out to be a false abatement, has gripped the United States itself, and become perhaps the central preoccupation of his Presidency. But in those years too, major Latin American economies, in Brazil, Argentina and Mexico, have seen recently-unprecedented periods of economic growth while the US economy has struggled. And this situation has set some of these countries on a path of challenge to the United States’ initiatives for trade and production patterns for future economic growth, at the Doha Development Round.

So between that Fifth Summit, and the Sixth Summit held in Cartagena and Colombia in April this year, our Caricom states have seen an enhanced stature of some of these Latin American states in both global trade negotiations, increasing institutionalized participation in the G20 discussions on the future path of global economic growth and management of the international financial and development institutions. This has been the case, too, in respect of their increased activity in concerns with the management of security arrangements that are a consequence of the movement of narcotics throughout the hemisphere, a matter of substantial interest for Caricom states.

From this latter perspective, Caricom states at Cartagena, joined other Latin American states in seeking to push Obama and the United States, though not particularly successfully, towards acceptance of alternative methods of the control of the effects of narcotics. These would focus on the issue of decriminalization as a method of dealing with the effects of this scourge on populations.

In another sphere of interest to Caricom, at the beginning of his presidency Obama found the last of the Central American countries, Costa Rica, completing the process that would bring into sub-regional effect the US-Dominican Republic-CAFTA agreement, and no doubt he must have had some hope that the Caricom countries would follow suit. But we are still on what would appear to be a tortuous road to conclusion of an FTA with the United States, as is also the case of our trade relationship with Canada, the US’s major participant in NAFTA.

As Obama’s present administration ends, we in Caricom are therefore  left to wonder whether the United States continues to believe that we are still determined to come to an agreement that can, in their perception, complete another element of the string of free trade agreements that that country has been pursuing in what we can call the Caribbean Basin sector of the hemisphere. And while we can say that it is also true that the United States and a now super-confident Brazil are still in the throes of coming to terms with the latter’s new status in international trade, we can hardly believe that a dragging out of our negotiations will have particular sympathy from either of those countries.

For in the meantime of course, and during Obama’s tenure of office, our hemispheric neighbours have invited, or drawn, some or all of us, into their own designs for the area, whether the Union of South American States (UNASUR) or the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CECAM). Yet it is not clear to many in our sub-region whether Caricom has, or is working on, a design for participation in that latter endeavour in particular, which can enhance the economic integration of our Community, even as there is specific participation in bilateral schemes with one or another Latin American state-economy. In that regard, some Caricom countries will be watching the initiatives being taken by Guyana and Trinidad & Tobago in particular towards specific Latin American states.

From the perspective of the strength of  particular Latin American economies, even in the face of the wider global economic crisis, and even while Obama might be more empathetic, it is doubtful that governments there feel at this point that a Romney presidency will make much of a difference over the next four years, in respect of Inter-American economic relations.  And in that regard, it does not seem to us that, given the relative inactivism of the Obama administration over the period of his presidency, that  if he is returned to office we can look forward to any substantial United States initiatives towards this sub-Region, except in relation to a worsening narcotics situation.

It seems therefore, that regardless of whoever attains the presidency, the initiative for pushing the envelope towards completion of a viable trade agreement with the US, or for that matter with Canada its NAFTA partner, is pre-eminently in our hands. The same can be said on the issue of our sustaining, in a manner beneficial to us, the cooperation of the US on the narcotics issue. For what is noticeable is that that issue is being increasingly intertwined with the issue of the movement of Caricom citizens to North America, as the recent Canadian actions on visa requirements has made clear.

Recent commentary suggesting that Caricom has lost its way in attaining beneficial results from trade negotiations in particular, as well as our grumbling about the visa issue, do not give much encouragement that the American administration in office in January next year, will feel particularly positive towards Caricom countries and our objectives.