The Foreign Service Journal, January 2004

J A N U A R Y 2 0 0 4 / F O R E I G N S E R V I C E J O U R N A L 53 t the outset of his administration, President George W. Bush signaled his intention to make Latin America a key focus of his foreign policy. During an April 2001 hemispheric summit, he outlined to fellow heads of government his dream of making this “The Century of the Americas,” declaring: “We have a great vision before us: a fully democratic hemisphere, bound together by good will and free trade. That is a tall order. It is also the chance of a lifetime.” Secretary of State Colin Powell offered similar rhetoric during a Sept. 9, 2003, swearing-in ceremony for the new assistant secre- tary of State for Western Hemi- sphere affairs, Roger Noriega. Powell told a room full of Latin American envoys that, “There is no region on earth that is more impor- tant to the American people than the Western Hemisphere. This is our home. This is our neighborhood, and we are bound to our neighbors by the deepest ties — ties of family, ties of business, ties of culture.” Yet, from a political perspective, Powell left a different impression just six days later about the importance of hemi- spheric ties during an address — one of his longest as Secretary of State — delivered at the George Washington University. The speech, a comprehensive foreign policy analysis covering 8,000 words, contained just two fleeting ref- erences to Latin America: the newly enacted free trade agree- ment with Chile and the goal of a hemisphere-wide free trade accord by early 2005. Missing was any mention of other hemispheric issues, such as the potentially explosive political upheaval in Venezuela, the general economic malaise throughout Latin America, and what appears to be a worsening crisis of governance in much of the region. Even the perennial issue of narcotics came up just once — and not in reference to Colombia, the world’s largest exporter of cocaine, but to North Korea and its pen- chant for state-run trafficking in heroin and other illicit drugs. The attention Powell actually devotes to the hemisphere is probably somewhere between the contrasting extremes of the two speeches. This past June, he took part in a meeting of Organization of American States foreign ministers in Chile (an annual event that some of his predecessors routinely skipped), and he also made a stop in Argentina. During two hectic days inNovember, he traveled to Panama, Nicaragua and Honduras. Meanwhile, a parade of Latin American presidents have visited Bush in the Oval Office. He and Powell will attend a hemispheric summit in Mexico this month. The main issues are expected to be economic growth and democratic development. Jorge Castaneda, who stepped down as Mexican foreign minister in early 2003, believes there is not much substance to U.S.-Latin American ties, aside from the ambitious trade agenda. “In the post-Sept. 11 world, Latin America finds itself consigned to the periphery: it is not a global power cen- ter, but nor are its difficulties so immense as to warrant imme- George Gedda is the State Department correspondent for the Associated Press. B Y G EORGE G EDDA L ATIN A MERICA : B ACK ON THE R ADAR S CREEN ? T HE 9/11 ATTACKS DERAILED THE B USH ADMINISTRATION ’ S PLANS FOR A “C ENTURY OF THE A MERICAS .” B UT NOW THAT VISION MAY BE GETTING BACK ON TRACK . A Latin America’s democratic development generally has not been accompanied by gains in the social sphere.