Scripps Howard Foundation Wire

WASHINGTON – Senators and experts explored how U.S. foreign policy toward Latin America should adapt to changes in the region over the last few years.

    The Senate Foreign Relations Committee held a hearing Wednesday to review Latin America events in 2010 and look ahead to 2011.

    “That old metaphor – Latin America as the United States’ backyard – is indicative of the American habit of viewing the region solely in terms of problems to be solved, not opportunities to be celebrated. In turn, our neighbors too often see us as paternalistic instead of recognizing our commonality,” Sen. Chris Dodd, D-Conn., said.

    The hearing closed Dodd’s 20 years as either the chairman or senior minority party member of the Subcommittee on Western Hemisphere, Peace Corps and Global Narcotics Affairs. Dodd did not seek re-election and will leave the Senate.

    “We talk a good game about being interested, but it seems to me that we have not quite had the agenda that engages with Latin Americans and therefore continues to permit a vacuum in which the Chávezes of the world, you know, move forward,” Sen. Robert Menendez, D-N.J., said.

    He was referring to Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez.

    Joy Olson, executive director of the Washington Office on Latin America, said the United States’ southern neighbors have enjoyed stability and prosperity over the last decade, which makes them less dependant on the U.S. Her group promotes social and economic justice in Latin America.

    Latin American countries’ economic growth has encouraged trade partnerships with China and broadened ties with Iran and Russia.

    The U.S. remains Latin America’s main trading partner with $500 billion worth of exchanges in 2009. But Asia – particularly China – is closing the gap by displacing Europe as Latin America’s second trading partner.

    Olson said long-term problems still exist. In the 1970s, guerrilla and state-sponsored human rights violations endangered security. Now, powerful organized crime groups stoke violence throughout vast parts of Latin America.

    Drug trafficking challenges governments’ authority and sets a more militarized tone for U.S. and Latin American relations.

    “There is a war against the state going on just across our southern border in Mexico, which has become the final jumping-off point to carry the bulk of Colombian cocaine into the U.S.,” Mark Schneider, senior vice-president of the International Crisis Group, said. The group advises countries about preventing conflicts.

    More than 30 percent of Latin America’s population lives in poverty – 180 million people – according to the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean.

    More than half of Latin American governments have come up with promising solutions.

    Olson praised programs in which poor families receive money if they commit to keep children in school or have regular health checkups. Twenty-six Latin America countries have started this kind of social program.

    Democratic governments now rule most Latin American countries, but Schneider said a few governments disregard political pluralism, checks and balances and separation of powers.

    Dodd singled out Venezuela and Cuba as example of “democracy denied.”

    The senior Republican committee member, Sen. Richard Lugar, R-Ind., said it is necessary to build a regional consensus opposing the government of Venezuela’s “challenges to international norms.”

    Olson said the United State’s human rights record limits the government’s ability to exhort Latin American governments to uphold human rights in their countries. She said U.S. prestige was damaged by the Guantanamo prison and the U.S. reluctance to condemn human right violations by its allies in the continent.

    “We do not need to ‘lead’ Latin America. We need to convince Latin America that it is worth partnering with us and that the United States wants to be a partner in the solution of regional problems,” Olson said.