Déjà vu

Anyone who remembers the violence that hit Colombia during the 1970s under the spell of narcotics and drug lords may feel a sense of déjà vu when looking at Mexico today. Many of the scenes of bombings, paid killings (sicariato), policemen and other law enforcers assassinated by the dozen at the time when Pablo Escobar Gaviria was building his empire are increasingly becoming a common part of Mexico’s scenery. Many people associate Colombia’s violence and terrorist actions with FARC, but few care to remember that the spiral of violence that brought the FARC and other guerrillas like ELN to the forefront was to an important extent the result of the drug war. The guerrilla groups as we know them today, as well as the list of violent activities they are known for (kidnappings, terrorist attacks, paid killings, assassination of judges, politicians, and other public figures) were the direct result of increasing levels of confrontation between the drug lords (the infamous drug cartels of Medellín and Cali) with the entire judicial and political system. When the main drug cartels disappeared and their direct political stakes were buried, they set the scene for others to join in.

Today Mexico is still far from attaining the levels of violence that characterized Colombia in those dark times (has it had a bright time in the last 60 years?). One cannot even speak of a spiral of violence there, but certain growing signs indicate that violence is starting to go out of control. One is the increasing level of typical drug war crimes. Recently an independent organization reported that Mexico tops the world in kidnappings, with level higher than in Iraq (BBC Mundo, August 15, 2008). Another is the perception that the police and other law enforcement organizations (including part of the judicial system) have fallen prey to the influence of the drug cartels. A third has to do with how the drug business (at least the marketing of the coca industry, last end of the industry) has migrated from Colombia and other places to be located closer to the main consumption market in the US. Finally, the haphazard and rather weak actions from the government and low enforcement agencies leads the candid observer to think that those currently in power in Mexico (including both the governing party and the two main opposition parties) don’t seem to notice that thus far they are loosing the war; worse, they don’t seem to anticipate what awaits the country if a comprehensive strategy is not urgently designed and implemented.

Ask Colombians for help, please!

Unexpected events sometimes change intractable situations. The spectacular rescue of Ingrid Betancourt –hostage by Colombia’s FARC, the oldest guerrilla in the continent –by a military command operation may be a case in point. For more than 50 years a civil war has bled the South American country, sometimes to the advantage of the insurgents, other times favoring a wiggling democracy.
The nature of the conflict, however, has not been the same. Originally a social and political conflict, it became a confrontation over the FARC’s attempt to guarantee the civil war spoils: deals with illegal drugs groups, kidnappings, blackmailing oil companies, and so on.
Two major attempts to end the conflict failed. In 1985, the peace conditions were not respected by the army, which supported a bloodbath of most combatants abandoning the conflict to enter civilian life. After the peace deal promoted by President Belisario Betancourt busted, the number of casualties from former combatants and other social leaders was estimated between 3,000 and 5,000. In other words, Colombia’s civilian establishment blew the prospects for peace.
The second attempt was led by president Pastrana after his election in 1999. This time it failed because the FARC estimated they had a chance to overturn Colombia’s democratic regime by force. The best symbol of the peace failure occurred in 2002, when FARC’s founder, Manuel Marulanda (alias “Tiro Fijo” or sure shot, who died in March 2008) did not show up in El Caguán, a broad portion of the territory cleared of military for the peace dialogue.
This brought Alvaro Uribe to the picture. Running on a Democracy Safety argument he changed the strategy from defensive to offensive, strengthening the army and going after the guerrillas. During 2007 and 2008, prior to Ingrid Betancourt’s rescue, FARC suffered a chain of political and military defeats. Cornered by the armed forces, with ravaged command and control of the rebel army as a whole, and unable to strike important military objectives, the FARC may be weighing the odds of a peace settlement when there is still time. Having lost the support of neighboring countries like Venezuela and Ecuador, for them peace might be the only solution for survival.
This possibility, however, requires the Uribe administration (or the one to follow) to articulate a very sophisticated internal and external strategy requiring high diplomatic skills in order to break the barrier of intolerance that has become the name of the game for too many years.

In the last decade a new worldwide financial trend has emerged. It is associated with around 150 million immigrants sending money back to their home countries. The total amount for 2006 was estimated at $300 billions, up from $18.4bn in 1980. To make a comparison, the Iraq war has cost approximately $200bn every year since 2002. This trend, known as remittances has been particularly important in Latin America. By 2006, when the trend peaked, the total amount sent by Latinos living in the U.S. was close to $68 billions.
Remittances are yet another example of how Hispanics living in the U.S. have become increasingly connected to their countries even if not living there. Someone has called remittances the human face of globalization. Of the $67,9bn sent by Latinos the Caribbean comprised $8,3bn, Central America $11,0bn, Mexico, the lion’s share with $24,3bn and South America $24,2bn. Nearly one Mexican in five regularly gets money from relatives employed in the United States, making Mexico the largest repository of such remittances in the world. Taken by size, however, it is in countries such as El Salvador and Guatemala in Central America where the impact has been greater. 57% of immigrants from El Salvador send remittances every year amounting to 17.1% of Gross Domestic Product. In the last few years remittances to El Salvador have roughly represented 133 percent of all exports, 655 percent of foreign direct investment, and 91 percent of the government budget.
Experts consider remittances a simple way to tackle poverty alleviation given that the money sent to places sometimes very remote is used both for consumption and for small investments, contributing to grass-root economic development. Typically, immigrants from Latin America have been unskilled workers with average monthly incomes of around US$160 in their home countries. In the United States their average income is ten times that figure, around US$1,600 a month.
An interesting aspect about remittances is that for the families sending money from places like the U.S. it involves postponing or renouncing altogether to the possibility of buying a house, for instance, or sending their children to college. It gives an idea about how the notion of prosperity is a shared one which goes beyond the border of the individual family.
Money is not sent only by individuals. Remittances by hometown associations to communities in their home countries have been used for infrastructure, like parks, church and roads. Mexico has a “Tres por uno” program, which matches three tax dollars for every one dollar donated to a regional government. So there has been increasingly quite a lot of improvisation on how to use the inflow of funds.
HOWEVER, not everything looks rosy. The current economic slowdown has affected remittances. Less and less Latin Americans are sending money home on a regular basis from the U.S. to their countries of origin, according to a survey on remittances commissioned by the Inter-American Development Bank’s Multilateral Investment Fund (MIF) in early 2008. Only 50% of those responding were still sending money regularly to their families, down from 73% in 2006. Worse, the adverse economic environment is not the only factor affecting the slowdown in remittances. Millions of Latin American immigrants are fearful about their futures in the United States and no longer feel they can afford to send remittances to their families. Many among them argue that the growing intimidating environment against immigrants is another factor in their uneasiness about committing themselves to such an economic effort. In contrast with the results of the first survey on remittances conducted in 2001, when only 37% of respondents said they considered discrimination against immigrants a major problem, in the latest survey 68% said it was a great concern.
The largest drops have taken place in Pennsylvania, Texas, Georgia, Maryland and Virginia. On the contrary, states with the largest expected increases are Nevada, Colorado, Washington, Massachusetts and California. In Mexico the reduction left at least two million people without the financial help they had once received.
Let’s hope that the current slowdown in remittances will not create chaos in places like El Salvador, or affect political stability, which had a high cost in human lives only a couple of decades ago.

Why US Latinos are important for Latin America

To many people the connection between Latinos and their countries of origin is obvious. There are, or course, remittances to their countries. For the last decades and for several countries like Mexico, El Salvador, and even for Cuba, remittances account for a good chunk of their foreign exchange inflows. The New York Times reported recently, however, that due to the upcoming recession 3 million Latinos have stopped sending remittances to their families.

Then there is the cultural connection, whereby Latinos try to preserve their culture. Despite many differences between countries, or if you come from the Caribbean region, from the Andes, or from the Atlantic coast in South America, there are still many common features. The most important is of course Spanish, the use of which has become fairly common throughout the US. It is not uncommon to signs in public spaces written both in English and Spanish. Though the US is a long way to becoming a bilingual territory, there are signs pointing to that condition in many cities.

There is a new aspect, hidden until now. It is the geopolitical influence of Latin America on US politics through the Latino population living here or vice versa, the influence of Latinos on US policy in countries throughout Latin America. Until recently, when Hispanics were a smaller minority, their political opinions mattered little. But now, as first minority group, their voices affect US relations with different parts of Latin America. Take the fence with Mexico. It is not only a disgusting method to keep illegal immigrants at bay. It has sent a negative current throughout the local Hispanic community with a powerful echo in all Latin America. The years to come will show how the way Latinos are treated in this country means a lot to their cousins elsewhere.

The most significant example is of course that of Cuba. For decades now the influence of the Cuban immigration in Florida on US policy making vis-à-vis Cuba has been notorious. The commercial blockade on the island, whose merits are less and less clear, has been the main policy, approved again and again by both presidents and Congress. To no political effect.

In times when the divide between mainstream US politics and Latin America is growing, thanks to changes in the political spectrum in the subcontinent, especially in South America, the influence of Latinos on policy making regarding their countries of origin will become a force beyond dispute. Ironically, it will be a triumph of the globalization so many of current Latin American leaders profess to abhor.