Latin America’s Foreign Policies at a Crossroads

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The foreign policy actions of many Latin American governments often contradict their principles. This disconnect causes leaders to pursue short-term objectives that do not address the region’s most pressing challenges, such as authoritarianism and organized crime.

The Maduro regime’s assassination of a Venezuelan exile in Chile and the Ecuadorian government’s arrest of a convicted former vice president at the Mexican embassy in Quito illustrate how poor foreign policy exacerbates lawlessness and democratic regression in the region.

Join Hudson for a conversation with academic and columnist Hector Schamis on how Latin American governments’ approach to foreign policy destabilizes the region and what a better approach might look like.

Event Transcript

This transcription is automatically generated and edited lightly for accuracy. Please excuse any errors.

Dan Batlle:

Good afternoon and welcome to Hudson Institute. My name is Dan Batlle and I’m an adjunct fellow at Hudson and it is my pleasure today to welcome Hector Schamis to discuss Latin America’s foreign policies at a crossroads. Hector Schamis has spoken at Hudson on numerous occasions in the past. He’s currently an adjunct professor at Georgetown University School of Foreign Service. He has written for many periodicals including El País, La Nacion, Clarín, and he currently writes about Latin American affairs and world affairs for Infobae.

Hector, thank you for joining us today.

Hector Schamis:

Thank you, Dan.

Dan Batlle:

For years, Latin America has not experienced interstate conflict, but over the last year there has been increasing friction between countries in the region. I’m referring not only to the recent incidents between Venezuela and Chile and the diplomatic crisis between Mexico and Ecuador, but also to Venezuela’s threats to Guyana over the Essequibo region. Hector, what is behind, what is driving this friction in the region these days?

Hector Schamis:

Well, thank you. Thank you for having me. Yeah, we are going through difficult times, domestically in many countries as well as in our international relations, and we’re playing politics with ideology, which is always part of politics, but sometimes it feels that in our region it’s sheer ideology and there’s nothing else. There’s no pragmatic component of our foreign policies, values, and principles that are important, especially in our region by virtue of having gone through human rights issues and vulnerabilities where countries, middle-sized countries were not military powers for the most part, and all those principles and values have been left along the way and we play ideology.

And well, the case of Venezuela and Essequibo is a typical case of a dictator in trouble, right? When a dictator is in trouble, it may well be attractive to make up a war. I actually was born in a country that had exactly that in 1982 with Falkland’s Malvinas. A dictator in trouble found it convenient to fight a war and that may well happen, so that’s one. Then you mentioned the crisis, diplomatic crisis between Ecuador and Mexico. It’s a time of friction, to put it mildly. I would say

Dan Batlle:

Ecuador was clearly transgressed international norms with the raid on the Mexican embassy, but Mexico had also been giving refuge to a convicted criminal and former vice president. So we’re seeing leaders around the region who seem emboldened and willing to really transgress norms in a way that wasn’t the norm in the past.

Hector Schamis:

Yeah, well, there is a precedent, however. There was a minister of Rafael Correa’s cabinet who was in the Argentinian embassy in asylum, and then the next day showed up in Caracas, and the ambassador then just took her by secret outside of Ecuador and showed up in Caracas, also with charges also claiming political persecution. But I guess the Ecuadorian government didn’t want to go through the same again. That’s one thing. The other thing is that, well, if there are controversies about the statue of this person, Correa’s vice president by the way, and also Lenin Moreno’s vice president for a little bit, there are other mechanisms. But that is the no-no, that’s a red line you don’t cross. It’s invasion of territory, violation of sovereignty that we cannot go that way, and of course there will be a crisis and now the crisis is multifarious is affecting Alianza Pacifico. It is having very negative effects all over. It wasn’t a good idea I would say at least.

Dan Batlle:

The governments of the region have had a conflicted response to Russia’s, invasion of Ukraine. Is this a case of a missed opportunity for these governments to play a constructive role?

Hector Schamis:

Again, it’s a missed opportunity to give norms, principles and values in the foreign policy package that you choose to design and implement. There was a violation of sovereignty, there was a violation of territorial integrity and a war of aggression, unjustified and unprovoked invasion of one country by another country. Those are sensitive issues in the Americas obviously, and they should have sided with those norms. They missed the opportunity.

And of course there are explanations for that. Russia has alliances in the region, has two military bases in Venezuela, has troops in Nicaragua, and of course that plays a part, but that’s part of the problem that we’re facing. We’re also facing security threats and we are becoming, the Americas may be becoming, a playing field of large powers as well, unfortunately.

Dan Batlle:

Is this also a symptom of sort of a short-term approach to foreign policy in the region?

Hector Schamis:

You may say that, short-term, short-sighted. And again, a little bit foreign policy has the peculiarity of being state policy, not government policy. Foreign policy should not have swings from one to another and contradicting itself constantly as it is the case, and part of ideology so much present in our political processes these days is that it’s present in foreign policy and then there is a pendulum, there is a cycle, left-right, or so they say right and left. I don’t know anymore which is which certainly. But then they do exactly the opposite and they do it losing perspective of the fundamental permanent issues at stake, the integrity of the state and the norms of international right or international law that you have to side with. Especially if you’re a small power in the international system, all you have is international law. If you’re not going to side with international law, you’ll be subject, you’ll be vulnerable, you’ll be in trouble when it comes to you, problems of a similar nature.

Dan Batlle:

How do you assess the response of leaders in the region to other global events including Israel’s war with Hamas?

Hector Schamis:

Well, same thing. A number of countries run to condemn Israel for violations of humanitarian international law, international humanitarian law as it’s been going on without saying a word about Hamas terrorist attack and the same issues at stake. You denounce a terrorist attack that certainly there are 133 hostages still in captivity out of that attack, a crime against humanity, not a word on that. And yet several statements on the gross violations of international humanitarian law as it appears to be the case. And both things need to be there for foreign policy to credible, to build reputation on your standing in the world. And that’s certainly missing, unfortunately missing.

Dan Batlle:

Coming back to events within the region, you’ve described organized crime in Latin America as an occupying force in the region. It’s probably the most serious, most pressing issue in the region right now, and given the transnational nature of a lot of the crime groups that we see now, how do you think the region should be responding to this threat?

Hector Schamis:

Certainly in a collective way, in a coordinated way with the help of the international community at large, with the help of the United States most definitely. Occupying force? Yeah, I mean in my hometown, Buenos Aires, my mother used to say, “I don’t go out in the evening. I mean I go home at six and I stay home.” And that’s the reality of citizens everywhere. It’s in Quito, in Guayaquil, it’s becoming so in Bogota now because of Tren de Aragua and whatnot. People don’t go out at night. They are prisoners in their homes because the street, it’s dangerous. The street belongs to the organized crime and transnational organized crime.

What we saw on TV of these thugs taking over a TV studio in Ecuador was dramatic. Ecuador made the front page of all newspapers in the world that day for a reason. And that’s the big danger. It has taken over portions of the state apparatus, portions of the political system. There is literature in our field on subnational authoritarianism in the Americas, the fact that well, nationally democratic regimes coexist with subnational authoritarian regimes. And that has been going on for quite some time. But those subnational authoritarian regimes are criminal subnational authoritarian regimes in a good number of localities, in a good number of districts throughout our region, our continent.

And that’s the biggest threat that we have against democracy these days because it erodes rule of law. It breaks down the rule of law and there is no democratic politics without the rule of law. There is no rights without the rule of law, and citizens will certainly become disaffected with the system as the polls are showing increasingly one after the other.

Dan Batlle:

There’s been some suggestion that in one case, Venezuela has used one of its crime groups as an instrument of state policy. It’s the case of Tren de Aragua. Can you speak to that?

Hector Schamis:

Yeah, but it’s the same. It’s the same. It’s like every car manufacturer of a certain size in the world has different brands. It has a luxury brand, it has a not so luxury brand, and so on and so forth. I’m not here to mention anybody, but you know who I’m talking about. Two, even three different brands targeting different markets. Tren de Aragua is the Venezuelan regime. It’s the Maduro regime. It’s just that depending on the situation, depending on the context, repression is a responsibility of SEBIN, the intelligence service or Tren de Aragua. They’re trained, they’re equipped, they been formed in prisons. Venezuelans call it pranes. Pranes is criminal organizations organized, run and directed from prisons, and they’re out. I mean, they’re out. Yes, of course they can go to Chile and kidnap a military officer exiled there, Lieutenant Ojeda, and produce this sort of situation, which is humiliating for Chile as well, a violation of sovereignty of Chile to do something like that in addition. So it’s critical, it’s tragic. It’s the number one problem and security threat that we have in the Americas.

Dan Batlle:

Staying on Venezuela, the Maduro regime’s maneuvers to disqualify Maria Corina Machado, and then later her designated replacement I think have been a real test of the region’s commitment to democracy. How do you think leaders in the region have responded to that?

Hector Schamis:

Softly, perhaps too softly. Signals from Washington are contradictory in that sense because, well, yeah, you must run acceptable elections free and fair, but at the same time, sanctions have been reimposed, but yet it’s a sort of in a murky way, that reimposition, because companies already operating can apply for a renewal on a case-by-case basis. The signal is mixed at best. It is not good. If you want to say to the Maduro regime, you better fulfill your obligations, that’s not the way certainly.

It’s been quite confusing throughout and particularly from Washington, the liberation of Alex Saab to begin with and the consequences it had. So Maduro knows how to read the signals and we seem to be approaching another 2018 when it was fraud. Smartmatic denounced as fraud, they added a million votes. And we may be well going in that direction again. And then the international community at the time did not recognize, all the democracies in the world did not recognize that election and denounced Maduro for usurping power and the rest, you know what happened. The Guaido interim government, et cetera, et cetera. We may well be going in that direction and it’s very unfortunate. I’d be surprised if Edmundo Gonzalez would be sworn to office who would be the winner in a clean election. On the other hand, election is three months from now. There is no time to organize a decent election in three months with a electoral regime a la Venezuela. So I’m very pessimistic to tell you the truth.

Dan Batlle:

You’ve mentioned the Biden administration’s negotiations on elections in Venezuela. Can you talk more broadly about how you think the Biden administration has performed in its engagement with the region and its policy toward Latin America?

Hector Schamis:

Well, lights and shadows, luces y sombras in Spanish. Like every foreign policy, I would say the issue is that we are in an election year here in the US in a few months as well, and naturally the US political process goes inward in an electoral year. And this year a lot more, I have to say, because stakes are high. The level of rhetoric is very intense very early, because we had the two candidates early this year already, which is not usual. Usually they take some time in the primaries, but not this year. The two candidates are there, we know them, they lash at each other nonstop. The White House Correspondents Dinner was a campaign act the other day. Rightly so perhaps, my friends the Democrats would say, but that gives you an idea of how polarized the world of our time. That doesn’t mean much, but anyway. But how intense the conflict is and how harsh this campaign will be.

So there is less energy, less focus on the rest of the world. Venezuela, Latin America. Perhaps some critical areas of the world will receive the attention, say Ukraine, say Asia, the Middle East, obviously. But Latin America doesn’t represent a tangible risk threat for the US immediate risk. It is, but the others are moreso. So the election dominates US foreign policy as well. By the way, we debate immigration in our election here. Immigration is foreign policy normally, has become part of the electoral dispute. Yeah.

Dan Batlle:

So for many in the United States who observed Latin America, the influence of China has become perhaps one of the greatest threats. You have expressed more concern about other actors in the region. Can you speak to that?

Hector Schamis:

Yeah, I think the Americas Act is a great idea. I’ve had a chance to talk to lawmakers that put it together. I wrote a piece on that. It’s a great idea, a great idea since Bush 41 FTAA, Free Trade of the Americas, integration with the Americas. By the way, even when the FTAA failed because it was rejected by ALBA actually in 2005, the US signed free trade agreements with a number of individual countries in the Americas, Chile, Peru, Colombia, et cetera, et cetera. Panama, Central America as a whole, and Mexico, of course, well, Mexico already existed. In any case, I started to rethink that during the pandemic. I said, well, the economy in such a contraction in Latin America, and even when the pandemic was over and the rest of the world was recovering Latin America was very slow to recover in terms of employment, in terms of economic activity and so on and so forth.

Would it be better, the region would be better or worse if we had a Free Trade Area of the Americas? And I have no doubt in my mind we will be a lot better. We would’ve recovered faster. We would’ve had foreign investment, foreign direct investment, much more dynamic, which is fundamental for job creation, trade, et cetera. Now it’s a good idea. The US should do it, should do it, should have done it long ago. Should have had a free trade area, an integration agreement with the rest of Americas for a long time. It’s welcome.

Now China is the main trading partner. There is no Latin American country in a position to give up trade with China. It’s the main trading partner of Latin America, most countries except Mexico, I think. Mexico, it’s still the US. Of course, it’s the US. It has a free trade agreement.

I think if there are concerns with China, because it’s a foreign power, non-democratic foreign power with influence, with presence, I think there are foreign powers that are a lot more dangerous and represent more immediate risks for the Americas than China right now. Russia and Iran, to be specific, Iran has had presence for quite some time via Hezbollah in the region with attacks in Argentina and in Panama. People talk about the bombing of the AMIA Center in Buenos Aires, but there’s been the next day an attack on a Panamanian airplane, and it has had presence there. Iran has signed a defense cooperation agreement with Bolivia. Argentina’s foreign ministry complained and not this government, not the Milei government, the previous government wrote a note of complaint about that precisely because of the risk involved for Argentina, given what history has shown.

And Russia has, as I said, two military bases in Venezuela and military equipment in Nicaragua, and of course historic influence in Cuba. So China is less of a security threat as it is a commercial threat for US interests, granted, but I would approach that on trade terms purely. China, as far as I know, has not tinkered with institutions in the Americas, only has been part of a trade and investment, I will keep it that way.

Dan Batlle:

So for those who are not aware of the Americas Act that Hector mentioned it’s a bipartisan piece of legislation that I think provides a robust, comprehensive new chart toward how the US might approach the region. Among other things, in an era when there are no new free trade on the horizon, it provides an opportunity for some countries to sort of enter USMCA through sort of a back door.

Hector Schamis:

Well, yeah, but it is a long overdue idea. It’s a long overdue policy. Bush 41 was a visionary at the time. His foreign policy was visionary all around. German unification among other things, but also trade policy and investment policy for the Americas. The Americas Enterprise that worked out a deal for debt forgiveness and created lines for at the time highly indebted Latin American countries. That was interrupted, unfortunately.

Dan Batlle:

Okay. We are, I believe, nearly six months into the presidency of Javier Milei in Argentina. He has shaken things up in Argentina and in the region. What is the significance of Javier Milei in your assessment?

Hector Schamis:

Well, he’s difficult to read. On the one hand when he describes the Argentine economy and what needs to be done it’s like reading that field of literature called neoclassical political economy. Argentina is a textbook case, empirical textbook case of Anne Kruger’s The Political Economy of the Rent-Seeking Society. Argentina’s economy is a myriad of rent-seekers. It’s a place where prices don’t clear, don’t clear in terms of reflecting supply and demand, because everybody who is in the market in an economic activity enjoys some sort of subsidy, some kind of protection, extracts some kind of rent at the expense of whoever doesn’t enjoy those protections and wants to be productive and cannot. It has become difficult to export, difficult to import, difficult to invest. It’s impossible in Argentina, it’s impossible to register a car, to buy car and register it because of regulations and because of monopolies, private monopolies that administer that process.

And no economy can function like that. Argentina’s long decline has to do with that, obviously, and he wants to change that. Welcome. I support that definitely. Capitalism has to work, it has to be capitalism, not just for my friends, but for my non-friends. And Argentina has been successful capitalism for the friends of power. Nobody makes money far away from power for a long time. The question is the politics, sometimes it is contradictory, sometimes, well, I like what he said, and then the next day something happens. Senators get a hundred percent increase in their salaries while the economy is in a contraction negative 2.5% for 2024. And society supports that because the country needs our sacrifice. I mean, friends of mine say that. “No, we support him. We have to sacrifice ourselves for this to work.” Okay.

But then if lawmakers get a hundred percent increase, all of them, opposition, government people, all parties, total Senate, then it doesn’t look good, to say the least. And then you cannot go to society to ask them for more sacrifice on that notice. Sometimes the politics has left me confused. He on the other hand, President Milei communicates something important. He communicates to me. To me, he communicates, I’m here to do what I think is right. If I cannot do it, I don’t have to be here to do something else. And that’s quite original for a politician, at least in Argentina, but not only in Argentina, as you know, in several places as well.

Dan Batlle:

On the foreign policy front, he is unabashedly pro-American. He supports Israel. He is taking a different stance on Ukraine than his predecessor. Could this mark a shift in the foreign policy approach of the region?

Hector Schamis:

Perhaps. Perhaps it would, and I agree with those stance in the US, the Middle East. I mean, again, it comes down to norms and principles. You side with democracies, wherever they are. You can be wrong occasionally, but in the long run, that’s going to make you right most likely. He’s active with Ukraine. His government is collaborating with Zelensky’s idea of a Ukraine-Latin American summit. I find that to be important, and I find that positive of course. And let’s see how it goes. A shift for everybody, sort of a collective shift, well, that remains to be seen, I would say.

Dan Batlle:

Beyond foreign policy. I’d like to get your perspective on the region as a whole. It feels like much of the region is a bit adrift, very low growth, political polarization, many governments facing significant domestic crises with sort of not a lot of latitude for action, diminished appetite for cooperation between countries in the region on very pressing issues. How do you see the region broadly moving forward?

Hector Schamis:

It’s tough. And also I would add, Daniel, the resiliency of our old traits, poverty, inequality, et cetera, discrimination, all together is a very explosive mix that the pandemic magnified in a big way. And at the same time, it has put a lot of strain on our institutions, very little respect for the operation of our institutions on the part of leaders and opposition as well, on the part of society, a disdain for constitutional mechanisms. We see it all around, I mean, well, we have organized crime. We have the Bukele solution, a typical example with a concentration of power in his hands, with a total amount of public power in his hands. And he’s successful so far fighting organized crime. Good for that.

Now, is that political reconfiguration a necessary condition to fight organized crime successfully? The problem is that I don’t think so, because it’s only a question of time until, and I’m not picking on El Salvador, I’m just using it as a good example of what’s a fundamental issue and a proposed solution. Heavy hand, Mano Dura, is attractive, but it must be done with the law, with the constitution. It is just a question of time that the citizenry stops fearing organized crime in those terms will start fearing another criminal organization, the state that operates without law, without due process, et cetera, et cetera. And if so, then it’s one evil for another and it’s not a good solution either.

Dan Batlle:

Yeah, so in that litany of evils, I didn’t even mention the rise of populism and democratic regression in the region. It seems like the only momentum in the region is behind the authoritarians in the region.

Hector Schamis:

Well, I am always agnostic on the very word populism. That’s one thing. Academically I hardly ever use it. I use it only as a historical phenomenon of post-1930s, post-World War II Latin America. What there is an erosion of constitutional mechanisms and respect for those institutional norms, and it happens so pervasively. Look, I’ve known populist movements and parties that gave up power, didn’t perpetuate themselves in power. Peronism gave up power. The PRI gave up power, they reformed the electoral system, and in 2000, the PRI lost an election and the incumbent president transferred power. Zedillo, PRI president, transferred power to Vicente Fox, PAN President, PAN candidate and president.

I think that’s a critical issue that the word populism itself clouds our understanding sometimes with that. The issue is there are so many presidents in office tinkering with the rules to stay longer than the time period they were elected for, and that’s fraud. That’s fraud for the voters, and that’s a violation of the letter and the spirit of the Constitution. Now, constitutions can change, but not for my benefit while I’m in power. When that happens, it’s a violation of trust in the system, and society takes notice. It always does.

Dan Batlle:

Well, Hector, I want to thank you for coming to Hudson today, and thank you for ending on a positive note, and I want to thank our audience for coming today. I think there’s been an important conversation. You’ve provided some insights on some topics that I’ve been grappling with and which I’ve not been able to see a clear way forward on, so thank you for your insights.

Hector Schamis:

Thank you. Good answers are a product of good questions. They don’t happen by them by themselves, so thank you. It’s been a pleasure.

Dan Batlle:

Yeah, thank you.