Dear Editor,
In your editorial of Sunday February 17, on my opinion piece on Dominica and ALBA, you refer to a concept document ‘Constructing ALBA’ which lists 19 areas ‘which the proposals would encompass’. The subsequent discussion seems to suggest that Dominica’s action necessarily and automatically implies agreement to cooperate in each of the 19 areas listed; with the military area highlighted. You then draw inferences regarding Venezuelan ‘hegemonic’ designs, of which Dominica is to be an instrument.
In my article I was careful to observe that there is no basis for concluding a priori that Dominica’s action is inconsistent with its Caricom membership without knowing more about the commitments it has made, and that this ‘this is a matter on which further clarification is needed’. This point seems to have escaped your attention. Clearly, a concept document which envisages proposals is one thing; while agreement to undertake specific actions and legally binding obligations is quite another.
My article also pointed to the fact that Nicaragua, a member of ALBA, is also a participant in the CAFTA-DR trade agreement with the United States; and that Venezuela itself participates in MERCOSUR, the Southern Common Market; with neither being considered inconsistent, as far as we are aware, with ALBA membership.
As you rightly point out, there are different views about the benefits of the Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA) between the Caribbean and Europe. However, my substantive point in making the comparison between the EPA and ALBA is that the EPA involves legally binding commitments of wide scope and indefinite duration, with elements of supranational governance headed by a Joint Cariforum-EC Council with the power to make decisions that are binding on the parties to the agreement.
Indeed, I would argue that the notion that the EPA is somehow ‘non-ideological’, in contrast to ALBA, is misguided. The EPA is quite explicitly driven by the ‘ideology of the market’ and of the benefits of trade and investment liberalization, otherwise known as the ideology of neo-liberal globalization.
I reiterate the central point of my article: that the substantive issue raised by Dominica’s action, and similar actions by other Caricom member states, is the continuing need for Caricom states to forge themselves into a cohesive unit with effective organs of governance following a consistent, unified political and economic policy vis-
