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V Summit of the Americas Concludes with ‘Winners’ and ‘Losers’
By Kaufmann | April 20, 2009 1 Comment »
The 5th Summit of the Americas has just ended, attended by 34 heads of states who spent a number of days in Trinidad and Tobago. Their teams had also spent a couple of years preparing the ‘Declaration’ for this Summit.
In the event, such ‘Declaration’ was not approved or signed by all the Heads of State. They couldn’t reach full agreement, even though it contained so little concrete. As instructed by the Heads of States participating in the Summit, a final document was issued which was signed only by the Prime Minister of Trinidad and Tobago, as the host. This particular approach to appear as if there is a modicum of consensus may have been unprecedented.
But it may be a blessing in disguise that the ‘Declaration of Commitment of Port of Spain’ was not officially and unanimously approved and thus its legal status will stay in ‘gray’ territory. Here is the ‘Declaration’ for you to be the judge (Warning: it is 22 pages long, with 97 statutes..).
A few of us had already commented on the draft prior to the Summit. In the event, the final document did not improve, remaining full of long platitudes, restatements of vague commitments from previous Summits, and devoid of concrete actions or substance.
Who ‘won’ at this Summit? We should be fair and constructive and point to some ‘winners’ of course, such as Obama’s image and improved goodwill towards the US, and the general ‘atmospherics’. ‘Obamania’ took hold yet again. One Head of State asked Obama for an autograph, others lobbied for photo-ops or to give him book gifts…
Watch it, though: some pundits and the traditional media will be quick to call this Summit a success (as they tend to do immediately after slick press conferences and press releases are issued at Summits and High Level Forums…).
The traditional media and longstanding experts will talk at length about the ‘constructive and cordial spirit’, and about great expectations of improved relations between the US and Latin America. Notions like ‘new dawn’ and ‘mutual respect among equals’ will abound.
And there will be plenty of writings about the elaborated talks on the Cuba-US relations during the Summit, which took a lot of the time (considering that Cuba was not present, and the dire economic and financial situation of the region…).
The ease by which the traditional media takes official Communiques and press releases at face value at the conclusion of these VIP events is not new. Neither is their lack of critical analysis when these events end. Interestingly, the traditional media does tend to get a bit of reality check after some time elapses, once they realize that there was spin; that the numbers (usually dollars) don’t add up; and that the concrete commitments made (if any) are not followed up.
Of course the reshaping of the US-Cuba relations is very important, and so is the expectation of improvement of US-Latin America relations. The question is whether this justifies an expensive Summit in this day and age, in the midst of such a dire crisis (particularly since Obama and Hillary Clinton were already working to attain some of those ‘Cuba’ and ‘atmospheric’ objectives aside from the Summit.
Who clearly ‘lost’ in this Summit? As expected, free trade is a big loser. Trade was the agenda that shaped the origin of the first Summit 15 years ago. It is missing in action in this fifth Summit. The US also largely avoided this critical theme, and focused on energy security instead. Others that avoided talk about trade emphasized the importance of infrastructure. As if having glittering new infrastructure without trade would deliver goods…
Another ‘loser’ is the issue of safety and security in the hemisphere. It is noticeable how scant is the treatment of the drug trafficking scourge (with its major security implications), as well as the link between inequality and crime.
In the context of political and economic inequality, the other ‘loser’ in this Summit is the challenge of governance (including elite capture). We have touched upon this in previous blog entries.
So the thematic ‘losers’ in this Summit, which took place in the midst of a major global economic crisis, are trade and governance (the latter including security and crime as well). This means that the human ‘loser’ in the short term at least is the common citizen and the entrepreneur. Perhaps it is time for a Summit moratorium?
Topics: Aid Effectiveness, Corruption, G-20, capture, financial crisis | | 1 Comment
April 23rd, 2009 at 5:58 pm
thekaufmannpost.net – da best. Keep it going!
Thanks
Tania