Latin American Hegemony Impact File
*** LA HEG BAD
Fails – General – 1NC
Internal conflicts mean Washington is better off letting Latin America solve their
own problems
Naim 6 (Moises Naim -- a senior associate in Carnegie’s International Economics Program,
Focusing on IR and Global Politics and Chief of El País, Spain’s largest newspaper -- For the
Carnegie Endowment for International Peace -- "The Good Neighbor Strategy" July 7th, 2006 -carnegieendowment.org/2006/07/07/good-neighbor-strategy/4xa1) SM
A presidential election too close to call. Aggrieved voters in the streets. Partisans exchanging
accusations of fraud and demanding manual recounts. Lawyers drooling in expectation of weeks
of court fights. Sound familiar? It should. Mexico City today feels a lot like Tallahassee, Fla., six year ago. But Mexico's
election is about much more than who will become the country's next President, and its result will
have lasting implications for Latin America as a whole. In 2000, although U.S. voters were choosing between
two very different presidential candidates, only a minority felt that the outcome would drastically alter the basic foundations of the
nation. Not so for Mexicans. Voters believed the election would not only decide who would run the
country for six years but also, more fundamentally, what kind of political and economic system
Mexico would have. The platforms of the two leading candidates--the conservative Felipe Calderón and the leftist Andrés
Manuel López Obrador--differed on the roles of the state vs. the market, the nature of political institutions, how to fight poverty and
what kinds of links Mexico should have with the rest of the world. That clash of visions is not confined to Mexico.
Similar battles are raging throughout Latin America, which is witnessing the rise of a generation
of politicians seeking to capitalize on frustration with the free-market, pro-American policies
commonly pursued in the region in the 1990s, when much was promised and little was accomplished in terms of
raising living standards. The leader of this turn toward populism is Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez, who has cast
himself as the heir to Fidel Castro, using his country's oil bonanza to purchase political influence all over the continent. But
in recent months, the Chávez movement has run up against opposition from forces that view it as wrongheaded, militaristic and
undemocratic. In Mexico's election, as in Peru's last month, Chávez turned out to be more of a liability than an asset to the leftist
candidate carrying his banner. That ambivalence provides an opportunity for the U.S. The issues fueling the Chávez
movement--poverty, inequality, exclusion, corruption and widespread frustration--haven't gone
away. Despite the perorations of populists like Chávez and Castro, Latin America's maladies are not made in Washington but are
self-inflicted wounds originating in the predatory élites that control policymaking in places like Buenos Aires, Caracas, Brasília and
Mexico City. Those are problems for which Washington has never had the skills or the means to
influence. On the whole, the U.S. is better off letting Latin Americans figure out how to solve
Latin America's problems.
Fails – Economics – 1NC
Macroeconomic failures mean problems can never actually be solved in Latin
America
Naim 11 (Moises Naim -- a senior associate in Carnegie’s International Economics Program,
Focusing on IR and Global Politics and Chief of El País, Spain’s largest newspaper -- For the
Carnegie Endowment for International Peace "While Washington Sleeps" March 23rd, 2011
carnegieendowment.org/2011/03/23/while-washington-sleeps/3jth) SM
In politics, a new cohort of presidents has been elected through fair and free elections. All of these newly elected heads of state come
to power with broadly positive attitudes toward the United States. While just a few years ago Hugo Chávez enjoyed the admiration of
the vast majority of Latin Americans who detested George W. Bush, today Chávez’ popularity has plummeted. Meanwhile, like
everywhere else in the world, the election of Barack Obama as president was widely cheered in the Western hemisphere.
Yet, like others,
Latin Americans feel disappointed as the new U.S. president—challenged by domestic
problems and distracted by international emergencies—has failed to meet their high and clearly
unrealistic expectations about a major redefinition of U.S. policies toward its southern neighbors. They are right. President
Obama would be hard pressed to describe the fundamental ways in which his government’s policies toward Latin America differ
from those of his predecessor. Nonetheless, Obama’s personal standing and popularity in the region remain very high. Despite the
opportunities created by the U.S. president’s good standing, the many new Latin governments eager to engage constructively with
the United States, and the possibilities created by the rapid changes taking place south of the border, the U.S. government’s presence
and influence in its own backyard continues to be subdued and constrained. Meanwhile, other countries are enlarging
their footprints in Latin America. China and Iran, for example, were once remote and unknown in the region. Today,
China has gained a significant economic influence in Latin America and Iran has forged an unprecedented
political presence with several countries there—notably Venezuela and others in the Bolivian Alternative for the Americas
(ALBA) group. Russia has also made unprecedented strides as a supplier to the armed forces of countries that,
mostly in the past, relied on U.S. companies for their arms procurement. The region is also rife with political and
economic change—even in places where politics and economic policies have been stagnant for
half a century or more. In Cuba, Fidel Castro recently acknowledged to a visiting U.S. journalist
that the island’s economic model no longer works. While he quickly recanted his indiscrete comment, facts spoke
louder than his words. Just three days after Castro explained that he was misunderstood and misquoted, the Cuban government
announced the dismissal of 500,000 government employees (10 percent of the country’s workforce). According to the government,
layoffs are necessary because the economic ways of the past are no longer sustainable. Yet, in today’s Latin America,
macroeconomic failure is more the exception than the norm. While the economies of Cuba and
Venezuela rank among the worst performers in the world, those of Brazil, Colombia, Chile, Peru, and other
countries are booming. Even Mexico—which suffers from chronic slow growth and was hard hit by narcotics violence, pandemics,
and other major shocks—is recovering at an uncharacteristically fast clip. The voracious global appetite for the region’s natural
resources spurred growth while good economic policies kept inflation and deficits in check. The favorable external economic
environment, good macro-economic management, and more effective anti-poverty policies have had enormously positive social
impacts. In recent years, tens of millions of Latin Americans were able to improve their economic situation and leave the ranks of the
poor. A fast-growing middle class is an important and welcome novelty in a region where middle-income groups were not only
relatively small but were regularly pushed back into poverty by bouts of declining wages, unemployment, inflation, and banking
crises that vaporized their savings. Of course, all of this does not mean that the traditional problems that
plagued the region have been solved. Bad schools and universities, poor health care, corruption, and
inequality are still endemic. And new tragedies have emerged: the car bombs, torture, and the beheading of
rivals we saw on the news from Iraq and Afghanistan now come instead from Mexico. More people are killed in a
weekend in Caracas than in Kabul or Baghdad. Latin America is one of the most criminal regions
in the world in terms of murders and the percentage of its economy related to illicit trafficking.
This is not a problem with an easy solution.
Fails – Diplomacy – 1NC
Structural Barriers Prevent US leadership in Latin America
Tulchin 12 expert in contemporary Latin American studies, specializing in foreign policy and
comparative urban development, Senior Fellow, Mexico and Central America Program at
Harvard University(Joseph Tulchin, “Setting the Agenda: Asia and Latin America in the 21st
Century”, pg 21;
http://scholarlyrepository.miami.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1000&context=clas_publicat
ions]
In an effort to make a complicated subject as simple as possible in a short presentation, it is my ¶ view that, since 9/11, the strategic
framework used by the US government has reduced Latin America ¶ to a zone of relative
insignificance. The problem is not that some country is threatening US interests ¶ in the hemisphere or using the hemisphere to
threaten the US; instead, the US, since the beginning ¶ of the George W. Bush administration, has lacked a clear view of the role of
Latin America—either ¶ any single Latin American country or the group of countries operating within the framework of the ¶
Organization of American States (OAS) or UN—in the post-Cold War world. ¶ Neither Bush nor Obama has been able to focus
sufficiently on the hemisphere to produce a coherent foreign policy that satisfies US interests in Latin America and responds to the
newly ¶ emerging voices in the region. In consequence, the US government, in dealing with the hemisphere, ¶ has devoted most of its
attention to issues tied directly to domestic concerns, such as drug trafficking,immigration, and Cuba. Even trade, which could easily
be the focus of regional or collective attention, ¶ is handled as an outgrowth of concern for the domestic economy. The April 2012
Summit of the ¶ Americas in Cartagena was a clear indication of the absence of US leadership and focus, with almost ¶ no attempt to
find ways to tie the hemisphere together or explore increasing regional collaboration.¶ Part of the problem is that in the post-Cold
War period, the nations of Latin America have found ¶ it extremely difficult to find their own voices to express their new sense of
agency. Moreover, there ¶ are clear signs of considerable disagreement among the nations of the
region, which makes any ¶ collaborative effort among them more difficult. Any argument that US
hegemony is in decline assumes ¶ a univocal Latin American response to that hegemony. In fact, it is very difficult to
demonstrate ¶ any group consensus among the nations in Latin America, at least one that can be
translated into ¶ collective action or joint policy. ¶ That brings me back to China. China plays several different roles in Latin America.
The most ¶ prominent is its seemingly insatiable consumption of commodities, as if China were a large industrial ¶ yaw taking in
unimaginable quantities of Latin American raw materials. In addition, it continues its ¶ more traditional role of exporter of cheap
manufactured goods, the role it has played in the US for ¶ decades and, most prominently, in Mexico for the past twenty years. It is
playing both roles in Brazil ¶ at the moment, creating a serious political problem for President Dilma Rouseff. ¶ The role that
concerns the radical declinists and the Pentagon is the soft-spoken Chinese role of ¶ lender and investor. That is the role Chávez tried
to get China to play in Venezuela. The two countries ¶ signed agreements with great fanfare, but very little has happened. In Ecuador,
China has become ¶ the lender of last resort and a major investor. Throughout the Andean region, it serves as a major ¶ investor, not
lender, in the mining sector. This already has stirred nationalist sentiment in Peru, where ¶ a Chinese state-owned company sent in
uniformed Chinese security guards to protect the company’s ¶ property, setting off alarm bells about a repeat of experiences in
Africa. The evidence of Chinese ¶ intentions is ambiguous. In most examples of direct investment, Chinese state-controlled
enterprises ¶ generally operate through third parties, with due diligence performed by private firms contracted ¶ to do the work. Such
investment projects are embedded socially in ways that do not occur in other ¶ forms of loans or trade swaps. Conversely, the opaque
manner in which such Chinese enterprises ¶ operate raises suspicions. The current Pentagon nightmare is of Chinese statecontrolled investment ¶ in the lithium deposits of Bolivia, extracted with Chinese labor and protected by Chinese troops. And ¶ yet,
the nationalist reaction in the region to Chinese pretensions is much more significant than any ¶ possible US response. ¶ This brings
me to the third question, which interests me the most. If I were to write a paper on ¶ this topic, I would focus on the perception in
Latin American nations, which varies from country to ¶ country, of the roles China does or might play in the region. What are the
policy responses by Latin ¶ American nations to China’s new presence? The only clear answer is in the case of Brazil, where ¶ there is
significant tension between the two governments. The Chileans also have taken up the ¶ debate, and there are signs that if any of the
announced Chinese investments in the mining and ¶ energy sectors actually get off the ground, a serious debate will emerge in
Argentina as well. In Ecuador and Venezuela, noted for their loud rhetorical noises against the US, the Chinese presence ¶ is
considered another form of anti-imperialism and the rise of China evidence of US decline. ¶ At this moment, on balance, China’s role
in Latin America is still ill formed. The problem is not ¶ China but rather the lack of a clear US stance and a weak policy debate in
Latin America. Several ¶ scenarios are possible going forward. One is that neither the US nor the Latin America
nations will ¶ formulate a collective policy to deal with the new phenomenon, and public discussion will
continue ¶ to entertain wild speculations and conspiracy theories. Another scenario is that Brazil will take the ¶ lead to get the
Comunidad de Estados Latinoamericanos y Caribeños (CELAC) or Unión de Naciones ¶ Suramericanas (UNASUR) to formulate a
collective response based on shared values or interests. For ¶ example, it is difficult, but not impossible, to imagine a concerted effort
to formulate rules concerning ¶ investments in natural resources. Can we imagine a Mercosur policy on China? Can Mexico get the ¶
countries of Central America to join a regional response to Chinese trade? It is also possible that a ¶ policy based on
emphasis of the rule of law will provide a framework for dealing with any external ¶ influence on
the region’s domestic policies.
Fails – Anti-Americanism – 1NC
Attempts at reasserting US hegemony in the region increases Anti-american
backlash
Crandall 11 – Associate Professor of International Politics at Davidson College and the
author of The United States and Latin America After the Cold War. He was Principal Director
for the Western Hemisphere at the U.S. Department of Defense in 2009 and Director for
Andean Affairs at the National Security Council in 2010-11 (Russell, “Post-American
Hemisphere: Power and Politics in an Autonomous Latin America,” Foreign Affairs. 90.3 (MayJune 2011): p83,
http://heinonline.org/HOL/Page?handle=hein.journals/fora90&div=49&g_sent=1)//HAL
LETTING GO OF LATIN AMERICA In his first term, U.S. President George W. Bush adopted a
heavy-handed, unilateral approach to Latin America, attempting to force governments there to
approve the U.S. invasion of Iraq and ensure U.S. soldiers' exemption from the jurisdiction of
the International Criminal Court. This strategy backfired, and many governments, including
traditional U.S. partners such as Chile and Mexico, refused. So in his second term, Bush attempted
a more conciliatory approach, for instance, cultivating a personal relationship with the leftist Lula. But it
was too little, too late; Chavez and other radicals still played up Bush's reputation as a bully. After Obama
took office, however, it became much harder to use the U.S.-bashing strategy. In April 2009, at the
Summit of the Americas in Trinidad, Obama tried to put his imprimatur on Washington's Latin America
policy, emphasizing mutual respect and outlining a vision of equal partnerships and joint responsibility.
His deferential yet serious style quickly put the most conspiratorial anti-U.S. critics, such as Chavez,
Morales, and Ortega, on the defensive--where they have remained ever since. The United States'
enhanced image should not be dismissed as a mere public relations victory; rather, it is indispensable to
restoring Washington's influence in Latin America, since it makes it easier for willing governments to
cooperate with Washington on shared priorities without appearing to be subservient to the old hegemon.
Obama's approach to the region can be seen as a more concerted continuation of the one Bush adopted in
his second term, emphasizing responsibility as a prerequisite for cooperation and leadership - an implicit
call for Latin America to solve its own problems. Other than focusing on Mexico's drug violence , the
Obama administration has not made Latin America a priority. This may not be so bad: a little
breathing room is appropriate, given the region's current stability. Having recast the mood of
the relationship between the United States and Latin America, the Obama administration must
now figure out how to put its strategy into practice. It will need to show what strategic patience
and understated leadership actually look like. A critical test of that is Mexico, a country sorely in
need of U.S. assistance to combat its drug violence. Yet Mexico's deeply ingrained suspicion of
U.S. motives means that any initiatives to counter this cross-border threat must be pursued
delicately, lest Washington find itself accused of violating Mexico's sovereignty yet again. The
Obama administration also needs to resist the temptation to allow strategic patience to slide
into neglect. And it remains to be seen whether it will invest time in Brazil and other "noncrisis"
cases when so much of Washington's already limited attention has been occupied by Haiti,
Honduras, and Mexico.
Fails – Anti-Americanism – 2NC
US softpower fails in Latin America- anti-american populist leaders
Hellinger 11, Professor of Political Science at Webster University in St. Louis, where he also
directs the International Relations Program(Daniel Hellinger, June 23, 2011, “Obama and the
Bolivarian Agendas of the Americas”;Latin American Perspectives 2011;
http://lap.sagepub.com.proxy.lib.umich.edu/content/38/4/46.full.pdf+html]
internationalists, headed by the distinguished scholar Joseph Nye, argue that the United States should prefer
multilateral diplomacy (Cohen,¶ Nye, and Armitage, 2007). During the presidential campaign Nye told the¶ Huffington Post ((June 12, 2008), “Soft power
rests on the skills of emotional¶ intelligence, vision, and communication that Obama possesses in abundance.”¶ The Obama administration has
adopted his updated version of “soft power”— “smart power” (Nye, 2008), combining “soft” and “hard”
power—as the moniker¶ for its own diplomacy. Nye and others have published, under the¶ patronage of the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a blueprint for¶
smart power. The report laments that “a strong and growing sentiment—¶ promoted by a new generation
of populist leaders—has also emerged in the¶ region that U.S.-led globalization has left large
pockets of Latin American¶ societies behind.” This sentiment, combined with fears of U.S.
unilateralism¶ and disregard for international law and institutions, is “tapping into old threads¶
of anti-Americanism” (Cohen, Nye, and Armitage, 2007: 19).¶ The theory of smart power can be viewed as an attempt to
reconcile promotion¶ of globalization with the reality that the “ghost of Westphalia” (Kegley¶ and Raymond,
2001) continues to haunt the liberal internationalist vision of a¶ universal order based on comparative advantage, governance by
Liberal
intergovernmental¶ organizations, and civil liberties. The principle of national sovereignty¶ conflicts with attempts to frame a universal order based on a laissez-faire¶ global
economy, human rights, and liberal democracy. Hardt and Negri¶ (2000) have argued that we are already some way down the road toward such¶ a globalized world order, one
that resembles the empires of ancient Greece¶ and Rome. As in the ancient world, the United States is a central political and¶ military power presiding over a vast system of
decentralized economic power,¶ diffusing its cultural and political norms throughout the world. However,¶ these writers also see resistance to such an order in the figure of the
The capacity and will of elites in the United States to advance such a
project¶ poses obstacles to the prospects for Bolivarian diplomacy. Consider the choices¶
confronting the region’s leaders: Should they put the emphasis on linking¶ their economies in a
trade block led by the United States, or should they pursue¶ regional economic integration
independent of the United States and attempt¶ also to diversify their trade partners by dealing with Asia and Europe? Should¶ they develop independent
“multitude”¶ (Hardt and Negri, 2004).¶
security policies in areas like the drug trade and terrorism,¶ or should they work to enhance security through the OAS? Should they¶ welcome Washington’s attempts to promote
liberal democracy and use it to gain¶ diplomatic leverage in defense of populist or revolutionary regimes that gain¶ legitimacy through elections, or should they be suspicious
and insist on their¶ sovereign right to choose the form of government best suited to their needs?
No hope for Latin American Hegemony-Bolivarianism is inherently
anti-American
Hellinger 11, Professor of Political Science at Webster University in St. Louis, where he also directs the International
Relations Program(Daniel Hellinger, June 23, 2011, “Obama and the Bolivarian Agendas of the Americas”;Latin American
Perspectives 2011; http://lap.sagepub.com.proxy.lib.umich.edu/content/38/4/46.full.pdf+html]
Venezuelan diplomacy under Chávez does not mince words in describing¶ Washington’s goals for Latin America (see Ministerio
Popular para la Comunicación y Información, 2008). In a letter welcoming the founding of¶ the Union of South American Nations
(UNASUR) on August 11, 2009,¶ Chávez wrote,1¶ It is evident that, in light of the progressive and democratic steps of our
continent,¶ the
North American Empire—which in the last hundred years has exercised¶ its hegemony over
the lives of our republics—has initiated an anachronistic¶ and reactionary counteroffensive with the purpose of subverting
the union, sovereignty¶ and democracy of our continent and imposing the restoration of imperial¶ domination
upon all aspects of our societies.¶ Although Chávez has sometimes praised Obama, this statement is more reflective¶ of
his worldview and orientation in foreign policy.¶ While critics often write off Chávez’s nationalist and anti-imperialist rhetoric¶ as a
tactic to distract Venezuelans from problems at home, in fact the roots¶ of Bolivarian diplomacy are to be found in the debates and
discussions that¶ took place among young Lieutenant Chávez, leftist intellectuals, and former¶ guerrillas, veterans of the defeated
armed insurgency of the 1960s. Chávez’s¶ views were also influenced by the arguments of the Argentine nationalist¶ Peronist
Norberto Ceresole (1999). While Chávez never adopted the Argentine’s¶ anti-Semitism and anticommunism, he did embrace
the claim that U.S. unilateralism¶ is the greatest threat to world peace and to the exercise of
sovereignty¶ in Latin America. Over time, other leftist intellectuals, including Noam Chomsky¶ (who is often quoted by
Chávez), helped the Venezuelan put these views in a¶ more progressive framework, but Chávez’s affinity for leaders like
Iran’s¶ Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Libya’s Muammar Kaddafi can be explained in¶ part by the
way Ceresole shaped his worldview. Harold Trinkunas (2010: 17)¶ summarizes Chávez’s shift from Venezuela’s past
foreign policy as follows:¶ Venezuela’s foreign policy is revolu tionary not for its methods but for its objectives.¶ It is driven by a
profound departure e in its leader’s strategic analysis of the¶ international order. . . . What is new about foreign policy thinking in the
Chávez¶ regime is its identification of the United States as the main threat to Venezuela,¶ and of U.S. hegemony as a threat to the
international community that should be¶ contained by the development of alternative poles of global power.
Fails – Delay Trick – 1NC
Anti-American sentiment dooms any attempt to restore hegemony in Latin
America now --- stepping back gradually restores credibility in the region
Paterson, 9 (Commander Pat, U.S. Navy, “Our Waning Influence to the South,” Proceedings
Magazine, May 2009, Volume 135, Issue 5, http://www.usni.org/magazines/proceedings/200905/our-waning-influence-south, Tashma)
We are still respected as the world's most powerful military, but the economic motor that drives
the global economy and U.S. cooperation with Latin America is in bad shape. Leftist
governments are proliferating—and are opposed to U.S. policies. Counter-drug efforts are barely
maintaining status quo. Our interference in the internal politics and sovereign issues of Latin American countries
has left a resentment and suspicion of our activities. The Free Trade of the Americas has basically collapsed.
Our unilateralism in Iraq and Afghanistan has alienated what few friends we had to the south.
Foreign powers like Venezuela, Brazil, China, and Iran are filling the vacuum that U.S. hegemony has left behind. Open
communication, honesty,
and awareness of suspicions about U.S. action will help to repair relations
with those who should be our natural allies. This will also help to avoid further damage by those
hostile to us. But the remedy for long-damaged relations will not be quick. We need a strategic
patience to achieve the long-term investment in our regional partners. Secretary of Defense Robert Gates
understands the long-term effort necessary. "The solution is not to be found in some slick campaign or by trying
to out-propagandize [American opponents]," he says, "but through a steady accumulation of actions and results
that build trust and credibility over time." 11 For now, U.S. policy in the area should be humble, not arrogant;
modest, not boastful; multilateral, not unilateral; compassionate, not belligerent; honest, not hypocritical. Unlike our past
behavior in Latin America, now is the time to speak quietly and put down our big stick.
Unsustainable – 1NC
US influence in Latin America is declining now
Crandall 11 – Associate Professor of International Politics at Davidson College and the author of
The United States and Latin America After the Cold War. He was Principal Director for the
Western Hemisphere at the U.S. Department of Defense in 2009 and Director for Andean
Affairs at the National Security Council in 2010-11 (Russell, “Post-American Hemisphere: Power
and Politics in an Autonomous Latin America,” Foreign Affairs. 90.3 (May-June 2011): p83,
http://heinonline.org/HOL/Page?handle=hein.journals/fora90&div=49&g_sent=1)//HAL
On August 18, 2010, a Venezuelan drug trafficker named Walid Makled was arrested in Colombia. U.S. officials accused him of shipping ten tons of
cocaine a month to the United States, and they made a formal extradition request to try him in New York. Although the Venezuelan government had
also made an extradition request for crimes Makled allegedly committed in Venezuela, senior U.S. diplomats were confident that the Colombian
government would add him to the list of hundreds of suspects it had already turned over to U.S. judicial authorities in recent years. So it came as a
surprise when Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos announced in November that he had promised Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez that
Makled would be extradited to Venezuela, not the United States. Colombia, Washington's closest ally in South America, appeared to be unveiling a
new strategic calculus, one that gave less weight to its relationship with Washington. What made the decision all the more unexpected is that the U.S.
government still provides Colombia with upward of $500 million annually in development and security assistance, making Colombia one of the
Across
the region in recent years, the United States has seen its influence decline. Latin American
countries are increasingly looking for solutions among themselves, forming their own regional
organizations that exclude the United States and seeking friends and opportunities outside of
Washington's orbit. Some U.S. allies are even reconsidering their belief in the primacy of
relations with the United States. Much of this has to do with the end of the Cold War, a conflict that
world's top recipients of U.S. aid. For the United States in Latin America today, apparently, $500 million just does not buy what it used to.
turned Latin America into a battleground between U.S. and Soviet proxies. Washington has also made a series of mistakes in the years since then,
At the same time as U.S. influence
has diminished, Latin America's own capabilities have grown. The region has entered into an
era of unprecedented economic, political, and diplomatic success. Most visibly, Brazil has emerged as an
arrogantly issuing ultimatums that made it even harder to get what it wanted in Latin America.
economic powerhouse, attracting foreign investment with an economy that grew 7.5 percent last year. (Regionwide, average GDP growth last year was
5.6 percent.) Regular free elections and vibrant civil societies are now commonplace in Latin America, and the region's diplomats are more visible and
confident in global forums than ever before. After decades on the receiving end of lectures from Washington and Brussels, Latin American leaders are
eager to advertise their recent gains. Santos has been known to tell visiting foreign counterparts that this will be "Latin America's century." Although
star performers such as Brazil and Chile have recently surged ahead, Latin America has yet to realize its full collective diplomatic and political capacity.
The problems that have plagued the region in the past--income inequality, a lack of law and order, illicit trafficking networks--still exist, threatening to
derail its hard-earned successes. Guatemala, to take just one example, not only ranks among the world's poorest countries; it also has one of the
highest homicide rates in the world, with 6,000 people murdered each year in a population of only 13 million. Ironically, moreover, Latin America's
entry into a "post-hegemonic" era, a product of its own advancements, could undermine its past progress. As the balance of power in the region is
redistributed, unexpected alliances and enmities could arise. Many observers have assumed that less U.S. involvement would be an inherently positive
development, but that may be too optimistic. No one should underestimate the capacity of the Venezuela-led bloc of quasiauthoritarian leftist
governments to stop the regional trend toward greater openness and democracy--values that the bloc sees as representing a capitulation to the U.S.controlled global system. Nonetheless, Latin
America's emerging democratic consensus seems inevitable, and as
Latin America's
master, the United States must adapt to the new realities of this post-hegemonic era, lest it see
its influence diminish even further. It must demonstrate an ability to quietly engage and lead when appropriate--an approach that
its strategic posture finally matures, the region will be more directly responsible for its own successes and failures. Long
will allow Washington to remain actively involved in the region's affairs without acting as though it is trying to maintain its legacy of hegemony. Given
The
era of U.S. hegemony in Latin America began over a century ago, when the United States
started flexing its emerging economic and military might in Central America and the Caribbean.
how accustomed the United States is to dominating the region, this project will be harder than it sounds. FROM HEGEMONY TO AUTONOMY
In the jungles and mountains of Nicaragua, Haiti, and the Dominican Republic, American soldiers and diplomats used persuasion, coercion, and force
to advance U.S. political and economic interests. During the Cold War, Washington sought to stem the threat of Soviet and Cuban communism, acting
directly, for example, when it invaded Grenada in 1983 and Panama in 1989, and indirectly, as when it provided covert funding to undermine Chilean
President Salvador Allende's leftist government in the 1970s. Sometimes these efforts worked, as in Chile and Grenada, but often they did not; both
the Bay of Pigs operation in 1961 and U.S. efforts to overthrow by proxy the Sandinista regime in Nicaragua in the 1980s were outright failures.
U.S. hegemony in Latin America is unsustainable and doomed – litany of factors
Paterson, 9 (Commander Pat, U.S. Navy, “Our Waning Influence to the South,” Proceedings
Magazine, May 2009, Volume 135, Issue 5, http://www.usni.org/magazines/proceedings/200905/our-waning-influence-south, Tashma)
Decades of foreign-policy hypocrisy and economic double standards have resulted in a pervasive
resistance to and suspicion of U.S. involvement in Latin America. The animosity manifests itself in ways that are
direct threats to our national security: U.S. diplomats have been expelled, narcotics trafficking has reached
record heights, and our military is being ousted from strategically important bases in the region.
The United States is losing access and influence in Latin American and Caribbean nations like never
before. Unless we act quickly, we may be unable to regain our standing in this vital area. Since 1800,
Latin America has endured almost 100 U.S. military or intelligence interventions. Concerned about
communist expansion during the 1970s and 1980s, the United States supported a number of autocrats and
military juntas fighting against insurgents. These internal conflicts led to prevailing governments' brutal suppression
of leftist groups and civilians caught in the middle, often at the cost of civil liberties and human rights. The "dirty wars"
revealed a hypocrisy in U.S. foreign policy: publicly we promoted democracy and individual freedoms
while privately providing support for abusive dictators. The United States moved from passive to active
intervention with the CIA-engineered coups of democratically elected governments in Guatemala in
1954 and Chile in 1973, causes célèbres for those who today oppose U.S. involvement in the region. In
the 1980s in Central America, U.S.-supported right-wing governments resulted in nearly 400,000 deaths. In Guatemala, a 36-year
civil war left nearly 200,000 killed, most poor indigenous farmers, making it one of Latin America's most violent wars in modern
history. In 1982, an Amnesty International report estimated that over 10,000 indigenous Guatemalans and farmers were killed in a
four-month period, most by government death squads. The Nicaraguan civil war (1950-79) left 50,000 dead, 600,000 homeless, and
$1.6 billion in debt. The Sandinista Revolution that followed (1979 - 90) left another 50,000 dead. In the El Salvadoran civil war
between 1979 and 1989, the combined death toll for civilians and combatants was 75,000. While no U.S. military interventions have
occurred since Grenada in 1983 ("Urgent Fury") and Panama in 1989 ("Just Cause"), deep-seated suspicions of the
United States hinder modern-day goodwill efforts. Fortunately, the dark years of mass violence and dictatorial
military rule in Latin America appear to be over. Since the 1990s, a wave of democratization has brought liberal and enlightened
ideas to the area, forcing hard-line military governments and conservative forces to cede power. All Latin American countries today
have democratic processes, with the exception of Cuba. In recent years, progressive and populist policies have taken root in the
region. This is as much a backlash to the conservative military governments as it is a public cry for assistance against poverty, which
averages 40 percent in Latin America. Leftist governments now head 12 of the 16 South and Central American nations (or 75
percent), a complete shift from just 20 years ago. At that time, 75 percent were led by right-wing governments. Since 2000,
populist-leftist leaders like Hugo Chavez of Venezuela, Daniel Ortega of Nicaragua, Evo Morales of Bolivia, and
Rafael Correa of Ecuador have been elected to office. They rose to power, in part, on a wave of antiAmericanism. Angered by decades of U.S. economic hegemony and military unilateralism, most
Latin Americans hold strongly negative views of U.S. policies. In Zogby International's 2006
poll, 86 percent of Latin American elites rated U.S. relations in the area as negative, with only 13 percent as positive. 1 One witness
testifying before Congress quantified the problems as, "We've never seen numbers this low." 2 As a result, our strategic interests
there are in jeopardy. This overarching anti-American
sentiment presents a danger to our national security
Bolivia, President Morales ordered U.S. Ambassador Philip Goldberg to leave the
country in September 2008. Venezuela's President Chavez followed suit by ejecting Ambassador Peter Duddy later the
same day. This marks a first in U.S. history; never before have two ambassadors been expelled
from their assignments simultaneously. It also demonstrates how the leadership of these countries
works closely together , in this case against our interests. Some of the most important U.S. initiatives
in Latin America have been recently blocked or replaced. Venezuela and Brazil have convinced
some countries to establish a collective security agreement (called the Union of South American Countries, or
UNASUR) that would exclude the United States. The U.S.-led Free Trade of the Americas initiative, an
attempt to establish a hemisphere-wide economic-cooperation zone, has been stalled by resistance from Venezuela
and others. Ecuador has refused to renew our lease on the airbase at Manta, forcing the shutdown of a strategically vital forward
interests. In
operating location. Venezuela, one of the wealthiest countries on the continent because of its vast oil reserves, is emerging as a
powerful and alarming regional leader at the hands of Hugo Chavez, a loud, charismatic leader who has rewritten the constitution to
allow himself to stay in power. We must rapidly answer Chavez and his petroleum-fueled anti-U.S. rhetoric. Venezuela is the fifthlargest oil exporter in the world and has the ninth-largest oil reserves. With these rich coffers, Chavez has been providing five times
more financial assistance to Latin America than has the United States—and has been gaining influence and power. Chavez has been
vehemently critical, referring to former President George W. Bush as the "Devil" and asserting that "the hegemonic pretension of
U.S. imperialism . . . puts at risk the very survival of the human species." 3 In 2007, John Negroponte, then-director of National
Intelligence, said that President Chavez was "among the most stridently anti-American leaders anywhere in the world, and will
continue to try to undercut U.S. influence in Venezuela, in the rest of Latin America, and elsewhere internationally." 4 Evidence
indicates that Chavez is in cahoots with drug traffickers and terrorists. On 14 May 2007, the State Department determined that
Venezuela was a major trafficker of narcotics to the United States and was friendly with quasi-terrorist organizations like the Armed
Forces of Colombia (Fuerzas Armadas de la Republica de Colombia, or FARC). The 2006 International Narcotics Control Strategy
Report stated: Rampant corruption and a weak judicial system are the main reasons for the prominent role Venezuela is now playing
as a key transit point for drugs leaving Colombia for the United States. Colombian guerrillas such as the FARC, National Liberation
Army [Ejercitos de Liberacion Nacional, ELN], and the Self-Defense Forces of Colombia [Auto Defensas de Colombia] move freely
through Venezuela, unchallenged by the authorities. 5 Venezuela also presents a threat to other regional countries that oppose
Chavez or support us. During the past four years, he has been on a $4 billion shopping spree for weapons in Russia, Spain, and
elsewhere. Using its oil wealth to modernize and expand its military, Venezuela has been trying to buy state-of-the-art fighter
aircraft, attack helicopters, and submarines. Strong U.S. allies like Colombia are rightfully worried. The Colombian government
watched as Chavez first aligned himself with the FARC (a group trying to topple the Colombian government) and then mobilized
Venezuelan troops on the Colombian border following a March 2008 dispute with Ecuador. The growing resentment of
the United States is reflected in new challenges for the war on drugs. A congressional report in October 2008
revealed that despite a $6 billion effort designed to reduce Latin American cocaine cultivation and
distribution by 50 percent over the past six years, we have not stemmed the influx of drugs.
Despite U.S.-led military successes against leftist insurgents in Colombia that have decimated the top FARC leadership and reduced
the number of guerillas by 50 percent, coca cultivation has skyrocketed by 27 percent. Drug czar John Walsh of the
Office of National Drug Control Policy said that the trafficking has increased by as much as 40 percent. No longer receptive to
Washington's requests for cooperation, countries that are the most opposed to our policies are also the
source of many of the narcotics. Air trafficking of cocaine from Venezuela has increased 400 percent in the past three years.
In September 2008, the U.S. Treasury announced sanctions against two of the heads of Venezuelan intelligence agencies for their
role in trafficking. Upon entering office in Bolivia in 2006, former coca grower President Evo Morales nearly doubled the amount of
authorized land available for its cultivation. According to UN figures, Bolivia coca cultivation has risen 5 percent since 2000. In
November 2008, Morales expelled U.S. drug-enforcement agents working in the country. In Ecuador, the forced closure of the U.S.
airbase denies us an important airfield from which to patrol the eastern Pacific Ocean, a transit zone for nearly 70 percent of the
cocaine that reaches the United States. Coast Guard Rear Admiral Joseph Nimmich, head of the interagency counterdrug
headquarters in Key West, Florida, acknowledged the scope of the challenge his group faces. "We're lucky we get 5 percent," he said,
referring to the amount of drugs intercepted. 6 This growing problem has always represented a national security threat, but never
more so than now. Colombian traffickers have used their profits to create a new and dangerous vessel. In the past, drugs were
transported on fishing vessels and speedboats, both susceptible to U.S. Navy and Coast Guard search-and-seizure efforts. But now
smugglers have begun to use small self-propelled semi-submersibles (SPSS). In 2008 alone, an estimated 60 - 80 of these craft
sailed from Colombia toward Central American and Mexican destinations. Each SPSS carried an average of 3 - 5 tons of cocaine;
some had a capacity of 8 - 10 tons of cargo. In a time of proliferating weapons of mass destruction, the idea of 80 to 100 enemy
vessels steaming undetected toward the California or Florida coastline represents a major national security threat. The threat comes
from land as well as sea. The flow of cocaine surging northward from South American regimes has pulled Mexico into an
increasingly dangerous war. The drug-related murder rate there resulted in nearly 5,400 deaths in 2008, more than double the 2007
rate of 2,500. Many U.S. government officials worry that the conflict has taken a turn toward so-called Colombianization. In the late
1980s and throughout the 1990s, cartels responded to a federal crackdown with a violent and unlimited war against the government
and military officials. Both the head of the federal police and the national drug czar were recent victims of these cartels. An
estimated 90 percent of the coke entering the United States travels through Mexico. 7 The conflict threatens to spill over our
southern border. More than 60 Americans have been kidnapped or murdered so far. In 2005, U.S. Ambassador Tony Garza closed
the U.S. consulate in Nuevo Laredo due to threats against personnel in that border city. In October 2008, men with rifles and
grenades attacked the U.S. consulate in Monterrey. The problems in Mexico threaten the very existence of that country, and some
strategists have warned that it could become a failed state. This would be a very worrisome development in a country that shares a
1,700-mile border with us and is our second-biggest trade partner. A December 2008 U.S. Joint Forces Command report on
worldwide securty threats predicted that Mexico could experience a "rapid and sudden collapse." 8 But we do not have the resources
to prevent this from occurring. The Merida Initiative, a $400 million package provided in 2008 to Mexico to combat trafficking, is
only a fraction of the estimated $23 billion that Mexican cartels earn for the drugs flowing across our border. Additionally, in 2007
the Pentagon reduced funding for anti-drug efforts in Mexico by more than 60 percent, to free up $8 - 10 billion needed monthly for
the war in Iraq. President Barack Obama's election offers an opportunity to extend an olive branch to our southern neighbors. His
election was well received in Latin America; a worldwide BBC poll showed a preference for Obama to McCain in every single country
surveyed, by a four-to-one overall margin. Evo Morales seemed to share these hopes when he said: "The entire world is hoping there
will be changes. We Bolivians want to improve diplomatic relations." 9 Brazilian leader President Luiz Lula da Silva echoed the same
cautiously optimistic sentiment. The timing is right. According
to an influential new report on emerging global
multilateralism, U.S. influence is expected to wane as China and Russia come online, and
globalization further distributes economic opportunities for developing nations in Latin
America. A new U.S. foreign policy focused on the Western Hemisphere makes sense, considering our ties here economically and
demographically. By 2050, more than 30 percent of our population will be Latino, making it the country's largest minority. That
represents a tripling of the current Hispanic population here. Already we are the second most populous Spanish-speaking country in
the world, after Mexico.
Several other factors destroy U.S. influence in Latin America --a) The failure of the IMF
Weisbrot, 13 (Mark, director of the Centre for Economic and Policy Research, “Latin America:
The End of an Era,” International Journal of Health Services, Volume 36, Issue 4, Tashma)
The Collapse of a Cartel One reason the historic nature of these changes has not been appreciated is that Washington’s most
powerful influence over the region – especially in the realm of economic policy – has never gotten much
attention. And that particular influence has now quietly collapsed. Until recently the International
Monetary Fund (IMF) headed a powerful creditors’ cartel that was arguably more important than
Washington’s other levers of power – including military, para-military, diplomatic and other “soft power” projections
such as foreign aid and “democracy promotion” programs. This cartel was not a conspiracy but rather an informal
arrangement – not written into law or into the charters of the participating financial institutions – but
nonetheless generally very effective. The way it worked is that the IMF was the “gatekeeper” for most other sources of
credit for developing country governments. If a government did not reach an agreement with the IMF, it would not be eligible for
most lending from the World Bank, regional banks such as the important Inter-American Development Bank in this hemisphere, G7 government loans and grants, and sometimes even the private sector. The 184-member IMF has always been dominated by the
U.S. Treasury Department. Technically, the other rich countries, including European nations and Japan, could outvote the United
States (voting is proportional to a quota system of contributions which gives the rich countries a huge majority) but this has virtually
never happened over the last 62 years. During the last 25 years especially, this creditors’ cartel was enormously influential in shaping
the “Washington Consensus” policies that were adopted throughout Latin America and most other low and middle income countries.
It extended far beyond just the raw power of using control over financial resources to influence policy. As has been known for
decades, the IMF acting as gatekeeper and enforcer of “sound economic policy” allowed the U nited
States (and sometimes the other rich countries) to operate through an ostensibly multilateral, neutral,
technocratic institution when pressuring developing country governments to privatize their natural
resources or run huge primary surpluses to pay off debt. It is much more politically delicate for U.S. officials to publicly tell
sovereign governments what to do. And as we witnessed in the recent Argentine debt restructuring, individual creditors – even big
banks – do not have all that much power against a government that is willing to go to the brink. In a default situation, it is in their
individual interest to settle for what they can get, cut their losses, and look to the future. It takes an external enforcer – outside of the
market – to hold the threat of future punishment over the offending government, in the interest of the creditors as a class. This
arrangement began to break down in the wake of the Asian economic crisis of the late 1990s, after
which the middle-income countries of that region piled up huge foreign exchange reserves. They had suffered through a terrible and
humiliating experience with IMF-imposed conditions during the crisis, and although the post-crisis accumulation of reserves had
other causes, it also ensured that they would never have to take the Fund’s advice again. But it was in Latin America that
the IMF was reduced to a shadow of its former self. Argentina defaulted on $100 billion of debt at the end of
2001, the largest sovereign debt default in history. The currency and banking system collapsed, and the
economy was continuing to shrink. Almost everyone assumed that the government would have
to reach a new agreement with the IMF and receive an injection of foreign funds in order to get the
economy growing again. But a year went by without any agreement, and when it was finally reached there
was no new money. In fact, the IMF took about $4 billion net – a huge sum amounting to four percent of GDP – out of the
country during 2002. Yet in defiance of the experts, the Argentine economy contracted for only three months after the default before
beginning to grow. Four years later it is still growing quite rapidly. In fact it has grown at the highest rate in the hemisphere, more
than 9 percent annually for three years, despite a continued net drain of money out of the country to pay off the official creditors (the
IMF, the World Bank, and the Inter-American Development Bank) that reached more than $14 billion between 2002 and 2005. The
Argentine government under Nestor Kirchner, who took office in May 2003, also enacted a series of unorthodox economic policies
that were strongly opposed by the Fund, including a hard line in bargaining over defaulted debt, which invoked hostility from the
international business press, along with predictions of prolonged economic punishment and stagnation. In one of a number of
showdowns with the Fund, Argentina even temporarily defaulted to the IMF itself in September of 2003 – an unprecedented and
uncharted move that had previously only been made by failed or pariah states such as Congo or Iraq. Default to the Fund had
hitherto carried the threat of economic isolation, even the denial of export credits necessary for trade. But the world had already
changed, and the IMF backed down. Argentina’s long battle with the Fund – from the disastrous four year depression, brought on
and exacerbated by IMF-backed macroeconomic policies, through the standoff of 2002, and the economy’s subsequent rapid
recovery on its own – was the final blow to not only the Fund’s credibility as an economic advisor, but as an enforcer. How much
difference does the collapse of this creditors’ cartel make? Consider Bolivia today, where the leftist, indigenous former leader of the
coca growers’ union, Evo Morales, was elected with the voters’ largest mandate ever in December. He promised to nationalize the
country’s energy resources --it was really more of a return to constitutionality, since the current contracts with foreign energy
companies were not approved by the congress, as required by the constitution – which account for the biggest chunk of its export
earnings, and to use these resources to increase the living standards of the country’s poor and indigenous majority. On May 1st,
Morales announced that the government was indeed nationalizing the gas and oil industry, and that foreign companies would have
six months to renegotiate existing contracts. Many details remain to be worked out, and the situation is complicated by the fact that
Petrobras, the state-run Brazilian energy company is the largest gas producer, and that Bolivia can only export natural gas (which is
the main energy export) by pipeline to Argentina and Brazil. But the Bolivian government has already increased its revenue from the
gas producers, from 3.4 to 6.7 percent of GDP as a result of last year’s hydrocarbons law. The increase amounts to a share of the
economy comparable to most of the United States’ federal budget deficit. The May 1st nationalization will increase these revenues
even more, allowing the government to deliver on some of its promises to the poor. The Bolivian government has since announced
its intention to pursue an ambitious land reform program, which has also been met with hostility from the media. According to the
ministry of rural development, over the next five years the government hopes to redistribute some 54,000 square miles of land, an
area the size of Greece, to some 2.5 million people – about 28 percent of the population. The Bush administration had expressed its
displeasure with the new government a couple of times, but until very recently has been relatively cautious about public statements
ever since the U.S. Ambassador’s denunciation of Morales sent the charismatic leader surging in the polls and almost carried him to
victory in the 2002 Presidential election. But on May 22, in an ominous new turn, President Bush told the press that he was
“concerned about the erosion of democracy” in Bolivia and Venezuela. There will be further frictions in the near future, not least
over drug policy. Washington has pursued its coca eradication agenda in Bolivia for years with little regard to its political, economic,
or environmental impact on an increasingly angry local population. Anyone who has been to Bolivia and seen how ubiquitous coca is
there, from the coca tea in restaurants to the leaves that people chew as a stimulant and to relieve altitude sickness, can only imagine
what it would be like if people in United States were told that they must co-operate in a “coffee eradication” program at the behest of
a foreign government so as to help prevent foreigners from abusing the product. Most of Morales’ electoral base wants to kick the
DEA (the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration) out of the country tomorrow. Morales has taken a moderate position, pledging to
co-operate in the fight against cocaine and drug trafficking, while supporting the legalization of the coca plant and the development
of new markets for legal products. The Bush administration will most likely find this unacceptable. But what can Washington do
about its new “problem” government? Not all that much. This is all the more unprecedented because Bolivia is not Venezuela, the
world’s fifth largest oil exporter, nor Argentina, which until the late 1990s depression had practically the highest living standards
south of our border. It is not a giant like Brazil, with a land area as big as the continental United States. It is the poorest country in
South America, with nine million people and an economy not even one-thousandth the size of the United States’, at current
exchange rates. It is poor and indebted enough to have qualified for the IMF/World Bank HIPC (Heavily Indebted Poor Country)
debt cancellation initiative, and in fact had its IMF and World Bank debt – about 35 percent of the country’s total foreign public debt
– cancelled this year after passing through the requisite gauntlet of conditions for several years. But Bolivia is a free country now. On
March 31, after twenty straight years of operating continuously (except for eight months) under IMF agreements – and a real per
capita income amazingly less than it was 27 years ago – Bolivia let its last agreement with the IMF expire. The government decided
not to seek a new agreement with the Fund. One of the first questions that arose was, what about money from other sources? Bolivia
receives not only loans but grants from the governments of high-income countries, and until now even grants from the more liberal
European countries were contingent on Bolivia meeting the IMF’s approval. But it appears that this requirement has disappeared
along with the IMF agreement. The Bush administration cut military aid – an insignificant $1.6 million – and may reduce other aid
flows related to anti-drug efforts. The Spanish government expressed some concern over Bolivia’s nationalization of the gas industry,
since Repsol YPF, Spain’s largest oil company, is the second biggest producer there. But so far none of the rich country governments
have tried to use the threat of cutting off loans or grants as a mean of trying to change Bolivia’s policies. Such a threat, or even an
actual aid reduction, would almost certainly not alter the government’s behavior; it would therefore be useless and counterproductive from their point of view. The fact that we have arrived at such a situation illustrates how
dramatically hemispheric relations have changed. A few years ago, a government like that of Evo Morales would
have had a pretty short life expectancy. Washington would have had the ability to economically strangle
the country, as it did to Haiti in order to topple the democratically elected government there just two years ago. The government
of Haiti, which was overwhelmingly dependent on foreign aid flows, was cut off from virtually all international funding from 2001
on, thus assuring its ultimate downfall in the U.S.-backed coup of March 2004. For very poor countries and especially those that are
without allies or media attention, the old rules may still apply – although even that is beginning to change. And in many low-income
countries, for example in Africa, major economic policies are still subject to IMF approval. But the Fund has lost its
influence in middle-income countries, and that includes almost all of Latin America. Although it has received little
attention in most of the media, the collapse of the IMF-led creditors’ cartel is by itself probably the most important change in the
international financial system since the end of the Bretton Woods system of fixed exchange rates in 1973. This is especially true for
developing countries.
b) Latin American nations are no longer influenced by U.S. threats
Kinzer, 13 (Stephen, former New York Times reporter and author, “Latin America is ready to
defy the US over Snowden and other issues,” The Guardian, 6/25/13,
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2013/jun/25/edward-snowden-ecuador-defyunited-states, Tashma)
No offense to Iceland, but Latin America is where the fugitive leaker Edward Snowden should settle. He
apparently has the same idea. News reports suggest that he is in Moscow awaiting transport to Cuba, Venezuela, and/or Ecuador. A
Facebook post suggests Bolivia may have granted Snowden asylum. Nothing has been heard from Nicaragua, Peru, Brazil, or
Argentina, but any or all might also welcome him. Any
country that grants asylum to Snowden risks
retaliation from the United States, including diplomatic isolation and costly trade sanctions. Several
don't seem to care. The fact that Latin America has become the favored refuge for a United States citizen accused of
treason and espionage is an eye-popping reminder of how fully the continent has emerged from Washington's
shadow. "Latin America is not gone, and we want to keep it," President Richard Nixon told aides as he was pressing the covert
operation that brought down the Chilean government in 1973. A decade later, the Reagan administration was fighting proxy wars in
Nicaragua, El Salvador and Guatemala. In the 1980s the US Army invaded two Caribbean countries, Grenada and Panama, to
depose leaders who had defied Washington. During the 1990s the United States sought to impose the "Washington
Consensus" on Latin American governments. It embodied what Latin Americans call "neo-liberal"
principles: budget cuts, privatization, deregulation of business, and incentives for foreign companies. This campaign
sparked bitter resistance and ultimately collapsed. In spite of these military, political, and economic assaults – or
perhaps because of them – much of Latin America has become profoundly dissatisfied with the made-in-USA
model. Some of the continent's most popular leaders rose to power by denouncing the "Washington
Consensus" and pledging to pull their countries out of the United States orbit.
c) China and Brazil have become regional hegemons
Khanna, 8 (Parag, senior research fellow in the American Strategy Program of the New
America Foundation, “Waving Goodbye to Hegemony,” New York Times, 1/27/08,
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/27/magazine/27world-t.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0,
Tashma)
The Big Three dynamic is not just some distant contest by which America ensures its ability to dictate affairs on the other side of the
globe. Globalization has brought the geopolitical marketplace straight to America’s backyard,
rapidly eroding the two-centuries-old Monroe Doctrine in the process. In truth, America called the
shots in Latin America only when its southern neighbors lacked any vision of their own. Now
they have at least two non-American challengers: China and Chávez. It was Simón Bolívar who fought ferociously for South
America’s independence from Spanish rule, and today it is the newly renamed Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela that has inspired an
entire continent to bootstrap its way into the global balance of power on its own terms. Hugo Chávez, the country’s clownish
colonel, may last for decades to come or may die by the gun, but either way, he has
called America’s bluff and won,
changing the rules of North-South relations in the Western hemisphere. He has emboldened and
bankrolled leftist leaders across the continent, helped Argentina and others pay back and boot out the I.M.F. and
sponsored a continentwide bartering scheme of oil, cattle, wheat and civil servants, reminding even those
who despise him that they can stand up to the great Northern power. Chávez stands not only on the ladder
of high oil prices. He relies on tacit support from Europe and hardheaded intrusion from China, the former still the country’s largest
investor and the latter feverishly repairing Venezuela’s dilapidated oil rigs while building its own refineries. But Chávez’s challenge
to the United States is, in inspiration, ideological, whereas the second-world shift is really structural. Even with Chávez still in
power, it is Brazil that is reappearing as South America’s natural leader. Alongside India and South Africa,
Brazil has led the charge in global trade negotiations, sticking it to the U.S. on its steel tariffs and to Europe on
its agricultural subsidies. Geographically, Brazil is nearly as close to Europe as to America and is as keen to build cars and airplanes
for Europe as it is to export soy to the U.S. Furthermore, Brazil, although a loyal American ally in the cold war, wasted little
time before declaring a “strategic alliance” with China. Their economies are remarkably
complementary, with Brazil shipping iron ore, timber, zinc, beef, milk and soybeans to China and China investing in Brazil’s
hydroelectric dams, steel mills and shoe factories. Both China and Brazil’s ambitions may soon alter the very
geography of their relations, with Brazil leading an effort to construct a Trans-Oceanic Highway
from the Amazon through Peru to the Pacific Coast, facilitating access for Chinese shipping tankers. Latin
America has mostly been a geopolitical afterthought over the centuries, but in the 21st century,
all resources will be competed for, and none are too far away.
d) New organizations
Wyss, 11 (Jim, “Latin and Caribbean leaders challenge US role in region; Summit”, The Miami
Herald, 12/1/11, lexis, Tashma)
On Friday, the leaders of 33 Latin American and Caribbean countries are gathering in Venezuela to
forge a new organization that will include every nation in the region — except the United States and
Canada. Some are hoping the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States, or CELAC, will blunt U.S.
influence in the region and replace the Organization of American States, the only group that’s opened to all
countries in the hemisphere. The OAS, which promotes democracy and development in the region, has been accused by some
nations of being a U.S. mouthpiece. The new body comes to life as Latin America is flexing its muscles on the
world stage and the region is expected to see economic growth of almost 5 percent this year on the back of surging commodity
amid hand-wringing over waning U.S. influence in the region. Venezuelan President
Hugo Chávez — the event’s host and promoter — has called the CELAC a “historic” organization that will bring the region
closer together as it shakes off the United States’ imperialist pretensions. The event culminates Saturday with
prices. It also comes
the signing of the Caracas Declaration that formally launches the bloc. Chile will head the organization in its first year, followed by
Cuba in 2013. The administration is not worried that the organization will someday replace the OAS, said Dan Restrepo, President
Barack Obama’s senior advisor on Latin America. “The notion that you can create an organization simply to be anti-American is not
viable over a sustained period of time,’’ Restrepo told The Miami Herald on Thursday. Despite the flailing U.S. economy, it’s still the
hemisphere’s powerhouse and the principal destination for most Latin American exports, including Venezuela’s. And unless the
CELAC receives solid financial backing, such as the OAS receives from the United States, it’s unlikely to flourish, said Dennis Jett,
the former U.S. ambassador to Peru and a professor at Penn State University. “This organization will probably last as long as Chávez
is willing to underwrite it,” Jett said, “and I’m not sure how much longer he can do that.” While the CELAC is a regional effort, it’s
Chávez’s baby. Originally scheduled for July, the formation of the CELAC was delayed as Chávez traveled to Cuba to undergo
treatment for an undisclosed form of cancer. He says that he’s cured and has stepped up his public appearances, but that hasn’t
stopped reports that his condition is far more serious than he lets on. In that sense, the CELAC marks Chávez’s return to the world
stage as he eyes a tight presidential race in October. While the full impact of the organization won’t be known for years, some worry
that it could become a tool for governments that have bristled under international criticism. Ecuador President Rafael Correa is
proposing the creation of a human rights venue within the CELAC that would supplant the OAS’s influential Inter-American
Commission on Human Rights. “It’s
not possible that Latin American conflicts have to be dealt with in
Washington, where the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights is, when even United States doesn’t
recognize the commission,” he said in a statement. “Sooner rather than later [the CELAC] should replace the OAS, which
has historically been distorted.” While it’s true that the United States has ignored commission rulings — most notably to close the
Guantánamo detention facility — the body has been a powerful voice in the hemisphere. The commission and the OAS’s InterAmerican Court “have been essential in protecting human rights and fundamental freedoms in the region,” said Jose Miguel
Vivanco, the director of the America’s division of Human Rights Watch. Correa’s call for an alternative forum comes after he has
effectively muzzled dissent at home by consolidating power and attacking the press, Vivanco said. The OAS recently held a special
session to look at deteriorating press freedoms in Ecuador. “Now Correa feels like it’s time to take it a step further and openly
propose to restructure the international mechanisms we have to promote and protect human rights,” Vivanco said. “The more
serious and democratic governments that are participating in this meeting should not echo this type of initiative.” The OAS did not
respond to interview requests, but in a press release said it looked forward to cooperating with the CELAC. Just what kind of
organization the CELAC will become remains to be seen. While moderate, free-market nations such as Brazil, Chile and Peru have
the economic power to make the CELAC viable, it’s countries like Venezuela, Ecuador and Bolivia that have been some of its biggest
backers. “If you look at who is really pushing the organization, it’s countries that don’t want the United States to have any dominant
kind of role in the region, but equally, and more importantly, they don’t like to be criticized by international organizations,” said
Susan Purcell, the director of the Center for Hemispheric Policy at the University of Miami. “This is a way of setting up an alternative
world where they have more control over who can say what about them.” The initiative comes as some see signs of waning U.S.
influence in the region. “Without
a doubt, this has not been a wonderful time for U.S.-Latin American
relations,” said Sally Shelton-Colby, the former Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Latin America, a former ambassador in
the Caribbean and a diplomat in residence at The American University. “The U.S. is focused like a laser beam on the
Middle East, South Asia and China for reasons of national security.”
e) Record U.S. trade deficits
Weisbrot, 13 (Mark, director of the Centre for Economic and Policy Research, “Latin America:
The End of an Era,” International Journal of Health Services, Volume 36, Issue 4, Tashma)
There are two other important economic changes that will reinforce Latin America’s drift away from
the United States in the coming years. One is that the United States will no longer provide a rapidly
growing market for the region’s exports, as it has in the past. The reason is that the United States is
running a record trade deficit , now more than 6 percent of GDP, that almost all economists recognize
must adjust over the next decade. The United States does not have to balance its trade, but the deficit must fall
to a level that allows the U.S. foreign debt to stabilize, rather than growing at an explosive rate. If the U.S. trade
deficit were to remain at its current level, in 18 years the U.S. foreign debt would exceed the value of our entire stock market. This is
not going to happen; instead, the dollar will fall and the deficit will be reduced. But one consequence of
this adjustment is that the U.S. market for imports, measured in non-dollar currencies, will barely grow or
possibly even decline. This means that Latin American countries hoping to expand their exports to
the U.S. in the near future will mainly have to displace other exporters, which will be very difficult.
So the United States does not have so much to offer in its proposed bilateral trade agreements. On the other
hand, it is demanding concessions that are economically costly, as in the areas of patented medicines, where Washington insists on
even stronger protectionism than is afforded by the World Trade Organization; and politically costly, as in agriculture, where the
demands for opening up to subsidized exports from the U.S. have sparked considerable political opposition in most countries in the
region. At the same time, just as the growth of the U.S. import market will be slowing to a standstill,
another market to which Latin American countries can export is expected to grow by about $ 1
trillion Euros over the next decade: China. This will reinforce the decline in the United States’ relative
economic importance to Latin America. Perhaps even more importantly, China has the potential to be an
enormous alternative source of financing for investment in Latin America. So far the Chinese
have proceeded relatively slowly; but they have discussed plans for $20 billion worth of investment in Argentina, for
example, including major investments in railroads and infrastructure. The Chinese government now holds more
than $800 billion in foreign exchange reserves. Most of this money is sitting in U.S. treasury bonds, where the government has lost
tens of billions of dollars in the last few years – both from currency changes, as the dollar has fallen against other currencies, and
capital losses, as U.S. long-term rates have risen. These trends are likely to continue. Until now, the Chinese have held these bonds
as part of their overall economic strategy, which presumably has included keeping U.S. long-term rates low so as to support the
economic recovery here (since 2001) and therefore increase demand for their exports. But this strategy will not persist indefinitely.
As it stands now, the Chinese could invest hundreds of billions of dollars in Latin America, get a zero return on their investment, and
still come out ahead as compared to their present strategy of holding U.S. treasuries. In reality they would most likely get a positive
return. The Chinese are already interested and investing in energy and extractive industries to secure supplies of these materials for
their booming economy. But as
an emerging economic superpower, they may also come to see it as part
of their strategic interest to have closer political and economic ties with Latin America. This would be
especially true if current tensions between the United States and China get worse, but it is likely to happen in any case.
f) Eruption of socialism
RT, 9 (The Real Truth, cites Miguel Tinker-Salas, professor of Latin American history at
Pomona College, and cites David Rothkopf, a former Commerce Department official in the
Clinton administration, “Latin America Looks East Where Does This Leave the United States?,”
5/10/09, http://realtruth.org/articles/090504-004-americas.html, Tashma)
Searching for Like-minded Partners In addition to increasing economic ties, many Latin American countries relate to
eastern countries who share the same political goals. This includes the development of a
socialist state. A 2008 Gallup poll revealed that of 19 countries polled in Latin America, all but Mexico
primarily consider themselves socialists, rather than capitalists. Professor Tinker-Salas said there has
been a shift of mentality in America’s southern neighbors. “The region has undergone a political
transformation beyond US control that was unimaginable a generation ago. It began with the election of
Venezuela’s leftist-populist (and anti-gringo) President Hugo Chávez in 1998, and has culminated with the victory in March of
Mauricio Funes, El Salvador’s first leftist president” (Christian Science Monitor). China and Russia have strongly
advocated for increased reform of the international economic system and regulation of financial
markets. Further, China confirmed its position in January as a member of the Inter-American Development Bank, which helps
finance long-term projects in the region. President Hugo Chávez stated that Venezuela is relying on China to get them through this
economic crisis. “‘This is how the
balance of power shifts quietly during times of crisis,’ said David
Rothkopf, a former Commerce Department official in the Clinton administration. ‘The loans are an example of the checkbook
power in the world moving to new places, with the Chinese becoming more active’” (The New York Times). “Currently, China is
the biggest motor driving the world amidst this crisis of international capitalism,” Mr. Chávez said,
before meeting with Hu Jintao, China’s president and Communist Party leader. Later, addressing the president, he said, “No one can
be ignorant that the
center of gravity of the world has moved to Beijing ” (Associated Press). During his recent
two-day trip to China, Mr. Chávez said the two countries, along with others, were working to create “a new world order.” This
realignment is at the expense of capitalism, with many nations and their leaders clamoring for a
more stable economic system and form of governance. In times of great political upheaval
and economic uncertainty, some believe the answer is socialism.
Unsustainable – Leadership Ineffective – 2NC
U.S. influence is doomed – Latin American nations are finally teaming up and
reacting to decades of U.S. neoliberalism
Munckton, 5 (Stuart, international editor of Green Left Weekly and a member of the
Australian Socialist Alliance national executive, “Latin America in revolt : Continent defies
USA,” 4/27/05, Tashma)
For over two decades the US has forced neoliberalism — and its accompanying poverty and
despair — down Third World throats in order to make the world better for US business. To many, the
spreading US economic empire, backed by the point of a gun and a loan, has seemed unassailable. But now, unable to defeat a ragtag bunch of Iraqi militias, and rapidly
losing allies in Latin America, the empire is not looking so strong.
America, Resistance's Stuart Munckton looks at the continent
that might defeat Uncle Sam. January 1, 2005 was a significant date — not for what happened, but for what didn't. On
As yet another neoliberal, pro-US government falls in Latin
that day, the Free Trade Area of the Americas was supposed to be signed. The FTAA was one of Washington's pet projects — it was a
major step in removing barriers against US corporate plunder in Latin America. But by late 2004, the FTAA negotiations had been
suspended, with governments in Venezuela, Brazil, Argentina, Bolivia and Uruguay refusing to negotiate their people's future away.
The failure of the FTAA negotiations was just another indication of how on the nose Washington is in the continent. A more
dramatic indication came on April 21, as embattled Ecuadorian President Luis Gutierrez was forced from office by a Congress faced
with mass protests demanding widespread political change. Although elected on an anti-neoliberal platform, Gutierrez abandoned
his promises in an attempt to keep Washington happy. Gutierrez is the latest on a long list of neoliberal Latin American politicians
thrown out of office — in elections, or by popular revolt. In the last five years, uprisings have overthrown governments in Ecuador,
Peru, Argentina and Bolivia. In Brazil, Chile, Venezuela, Ecuador and Uruguay, governments have been elected on anti-neoliberal
platforms in the last seven years. Left-wing forces are considered a serious chance in upcoming presidential elections in Mexico and
Nicaragua. In Bolivia, even if President Carlos Mesa, himself first brought to power in an upsurge of protest, manages to avoid being
overthrown before elections are due in 2007, he looks to be defeated by radical Movement for Socialism leader Evo Morales. In
Colombia, the US-backed government has been unable to destroy a left-wing insurgency, despite staggering amounts of military aid
from Washington. Behind this revolt is a continent that no longer buys the myth of a neoliberal-led drive out of poverty and
inequality. Since the 1980s, Washington, and its tame international financial institutions like the World
Bank and the International Monetary Fund, pushed "free trade", privatisations and redirecting funds to debt
repayment from basic services as a way to prosperity. By opening up their economies to "competition" and the "efficiency" of
market forces, Latin American countries were promised significant economic growth that would reduce poverty. In fact, what
happened was a significant increase in the hold over the economies of Latin America by
multinationals, especially US corporations. Between 1990 and 2002 multinational corporations acquired 4000 banks,
telecommunications, transport, petrol and mining interests in Latin America. William I. Robinson, in an article entitled "Storm
clouds over Latin America" published in the December 2002 Focus on Trade, wrote that, after a decade of neoliberalism
in Argentina, which culminated in an economic collapse in December 2001, the number of people living in
poverty increased from one to 14 million. In a statement to the US Congress House Armed Service Committee on
March 5, General Bantz Craddock, explaining the reason for Latin America's widespread "political instability", said: "The free market
reforms and privatisation of the 1990s have not delivered on the promise of prosperity for Latin America... The richest one tenth of
the population of Latin America and the Caribbean earn 48% of the total income, while the poorest tenth earn only 1.6% ... Uruguay
has the least economic disparity of Latin American and Caribbean countries, but its unequal income distribution is still far worse
than the most unequal country in Eastern Europe and the industrialized countries." This increased poverty has brought
with it a
deep discrediting of the whole neoliberal project. And anger against those who keep
implementing the pain has led to huge mobilisations, street protests , factory occupations and militant
movements, which in turn have forced many governments to retreat on neoliberal policy in order to
maintain control. In Argentina, Nestor Kirchner was elected president in 2003, after more than a year of crisis, during which
the country went through four presidents in less than a week. Kirchner was elected with just over 20% in 2003, in a situation where
old-style politics was too discredited to keep control, but the popular movements were not strong enough to take power. Kirchner,
despite emerging from one of the traditional parties of government, has stood up to the international financial institutions, he has
managed to renegotiate Argentina's crippling foreign debt down. In a statement on April 5, the Council for Hemispheric Affairs, a
Washington-based think-tank, pointed out that both the US and the IMF have not applied their usual pressure on Argentina to
adhere to strict debt repayments — no doubt recognising that any government that attempted to continue with the same policies as
before the 2001 uprising would not last very long. However, the most significant breakthrough for the poor majority searching for an
alternative to corporate domination has come in Venezuela. Since the 1998 election of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, the
government has challenged US imperialism and its local allies. Domestically, Venezuela's extensive oil wealth is
being used to fund ambitious social programs to improve the lives of the majority who live in poverty. One of the most significant
gains has been the mass literacy program, which has succeeded in eradicating illiteracy according to United Nations standards. An
attempted 2002 coup against Chavez, backed by the US, was defeated by mass mobilisation, a part of the organisation of working
people that characterises the country's Bolivarian revolution. One of the biggest reasons Chavez's Bolivarian revolution is a threat to
the US is because he is seeking to unite Latin American countries, economically and politically, enabling a continent-wide fight back
against US economic tyranny. Chavez has been the most outspoken critic of the FTAA, and his government has worked overtime to
promote an alternative — the Bolivarian Alternative for the Americas (ALBA), based on economic cooperation and integration
amongst Latin American nations. Venezuela has prioritised trade agreements with other Latin American nations with the aim of
creating an alternative bloc to that promoted by the US. This includes two significant projects — Petrosur and Telesur. Petrosur
is a proposed Latin America-wide petroleum company, which would unite the state-run oil industries of different governments to
create an economic weapon that can challenge US hegemony. Telesur is the Venezuelan-promoted
Latin America-wide TV channel that aims to provide news from the perspective of the Latin American people. The only continentwide TV channel at the moment is CNN In Spanish, which reflects the biases and interests of the US. Argentina, Brazil and the newly
elected government in Uruguay are backing both projects. Chavez has also refused to sign any fresh agreements with the IMF,
denouncing them as the "road to hell". This willingness to stand up to Washington has put enormous pressure on other nations not
to meekly submit to whatever Washington insists, or else stand exposed in front of their own people. This has naturally put
Venezuela in Washington's target sights. The US is especially upset with the political and economic ties Venezuela maintains with
socialist Cuba. Since the 1959 Cuban revolution, the US has sought to overthrow — at various times by invasion, assassination,
propaganda bombardment and economic terrorism — the Cuban government led by Fidel Castro. The US understands that Cuba is a
key threat: not because it has oil or weapons, but because its free education and health care, its world class science and research and
development — all are living proof that it is possible for Third World people to live in less than desperate poverty, and to live with
dignity. Perhaps more importantly, Cuba provides an example of people taking their destiny into their own hands, and not waiting
on politicians. Cuba is a beacon of hope for the masses of Latin America. Venezuela's staunch support of revolutionary Cuba is
helping ease Cuba's isolation. And, like Cuba, Venezuela is increasingly seen as proof that there is an alternative to neoliberal misery.
The resulting popularity of the Bolivarian revolution throughout Latin America has helped protect Chavez from Washington's wrath.
Despite numerous attempts, Washington has been unable to either overthrow or isolate the Chavez government. The internal
opposition to Chavez is now discredited, and the US, which imports 15% of its oil from Venezuela, cannot cut economic ties.
Washington has moved this year instead to try to pressure other nations in the region to diplomatically
isolate Venezuela. This campaign has failed dismally — not one country has joined the public
condemnations. In recent months, Venezuela has signed far-reaching economic agreements with Argentina, Brazil and
Uruguay. The Brazilian agreement includes selling Venezuela military equipment, at the same time as Washington is attacking what
it calls Venezuela's "arms race". In December, in a plot almost certainly involving the US, Colombia kidnapped, from within
Venezuela, a leader of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, which has been waging a decades-long guerrilla war against the
right-wing Colombian regime, from within Venezuela. Outraged by the attack on its sovereignty, Venezuela recalled its ambassador
and suspended economic ties. Washington promptly backed Colombia, and demanded other American nations "diplomatically
isolate" Venezuela. Not only did no other country respond, but Colombia, shaken by the potential loss of lucrative business deals
with Venezuela, successfully asked the Cuban government to mediate talks to resolve the crisis. Then, on April 11, the Organisation
of American States, which includes all countries in the hemisphere except Cuba, split
down the middle with a tied
vote in the election for a new OAS secretary general. The US proved unable to pressure enough
nations to win outright support for the candidate it is backing, Mexican foreign minister Luis Ernesto Derbez.
The US is far from out for the count in Latin America. While movements in several countries are threatening to blockade, rally or
occupy until there is change, their strength and development varies. However, the concessions forced from the Latin
American people, the increased pressure on Latin American governments to take at least some
independent stands from Washington, and the support enjoyed by the developing Venezuelan revolution
are all signs that the US can no longer force its will on Latin America. And every time people
organise to get rid of a US collaborator, or beat back neoliberal policy — you know that others
on the continent are watching and learning.
The widespread shift toward leftist governments demonstrates all-out resistance
to U.S. hegemony – Latin American nations are turning to other nations for
support
Valencia, 11 (Robert, COHA Research Fellow, “After Bin Laden’s Demise, Are U.S.-Latin
American Relations At Bay Again?,” Council on Hemispheric Affairs, 5/20/11,
http://www.coha.org/after-bin-ladens-demise-are-u-s-latin-american-relations-at-bay-again/,
Tashma)
Of course, Washington’s lack of attention toward the region is hardly a novelty. The war on terror
arguably has become the administration’s main foreign policy focus in the last ten years, as
Latin American affairs were systematically overlooked. In 2001, former Mexican President Vicente Fox and
former American President George W. Bush finally met to tackle illegal immigration and open their joint borders. But soon after the
September 11 attacks in Washington, D.C. and New York City, a 700-mile fence across the U.S.-Mexico border was erected, sparking
criticism from Latinos both in the United States and south of the Rio Grande.[1] The fence’s creation was based on the
misconception that the terrorists who perpetrated the 9/11 attacks illegally crossed U.S. borders, when, for the most part, they came
as legal residents. As the United States’ interventions in Iraq and Afghanistan escalated into bloody wars,
Latin American countries such as Venezuela, Ecuador, Honduras, and Brazil, began to steer away from U.S.
influence by switching to leftist, or at least left-leaning, governments. In fact, most of these countries
became vociferous opponents of what they deemed “Yankee Imperialism.” Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez,
an unrelenting critic of Bush’s policies, served as a main advocate for the opposition. This leftist shift consolidated the rise of
regional powerhouse Brazil and the subsequent creation of UNASUR (Union of South American Nations) and ALBA (the Bolivarian
Alliance for the Americas). Moreover, other international players like Iran, Russia, and China began to
wield increasing influence in Latin America by way of diplomacy and infrastructure
development. In realizing its slipping stronghold in Latin America, former President Bush finally took the time to visit several
Latin American countries during the last year of his presidency, only to discover that it was too late to convince the region’s leaders
that they were not being forgotten.
U.S. hegemony is being rejected in every area of the world.
Brzezinski 7 (Zbigniew Brzezinski -- formerly President Carter’s National Security Advisor,
counselor and trustee at the Center for Strategic and International Studies and professor of
American foreign policy at the School of Advanced International Studies @ Johns Hopkins
University “Second Chance” p 176-7) SM
The near-term threat of terrorism does not remotely approach that level. Yet when confronted by the possibility of painful but
essentially sporadic acts of terrorism, Bush made it a point to designate himself a "wartime" president. Official stoking of public
anxiety spawned a huge array of terror "experts" conjuring apocalyptic predictions. The mass media plunged into a competition in
popularizing almost on a daily basis their various horror scenarios. As a result a confident national psyche is being transformed into
a nation driven by fear. In
its present garrison-state mentality, America risks becoming a huge gated
community, self-isolated from the world. The nation's tradition of civil rights and its
capacity to project itself worldwide as an appealing and self-confident democracy are
diminished. As Global Leader III, George W. Bush misunderstood the historical moment, and in just five
years dangerously undermined America's geopolitical position. In seeking to pursue apolicy based on the
delusion that "we are an empire now, andwhen we act, we create our own reality," Bush endangered America. Europe is now
increasingly alienated. Russia and China are both more assertive and more in step. Asia is turning away and organizing itself while
Japan is quietly considering how to make itself more secure. Latin American democracy is becoming populist
and anti-American. The Middle East is fragmenting and on the brink of explosion. The world of Islam is inflamed by rising
religious passion and anti-imperialist nationalisms. Throughout the world, public opinion polls show that U.S.
policy is widely feared and even despised .
Leadership is uniquely low in Latin America
Niblett 9 (Robin Niblett -- PhD with expertise UK foreign policy, US foreign policy, and
economic security -- Director of the Chatham House -- The Royal Institute of Internatoinal
Affairs in the United Kingkdom
www.chathamhouse.org/sites/default/files/public/Research/Americas/r0209us_role.pdf) SM
In Latin America, the Obama administration faces much more assertive governments seeking a new
relationship with the developed world, and especially with the United States.26 The region’s economic fate
is no longer determined by its geographic proximity to the US: Latin American economies now sell their
commodities and services to and receive inward investment from a growing array of countries,
of which China is the most important. This has helped them achieve an unusually prolonged period of fast
growth since 2003, with low inflation and, for many, a balance of-payments surplus. The leverage
enjoyed previously in Latin America by the US-dominated IMF and World Bank has declined, while
US influence over the Organization of American States (OAS), which had been a creature of the United States
during the Cold War, has been completely eroded. Today, leaders in the region, from Brazil’s Lula da Silva to
Venezuela’s Hugo Chávez, are jointly committed to designing a new development bank for Latin
America, a project for political integration (designed to replace the OAS) and a plan for regional defence, which is
intended to replace the 1947 Inter-American Treaty of Reciprocal Assistance. Even if several of Latin
America’s numerous leaders on the left fall victim to the current economic crisis, it is highly unlikely that their
successors will want to return to the status quo ante of US regional leadership.
US international leadership has diminished because of policies in Latin America
Niblett 9 (Robin Niblett -- PhD with expertise UK foreign policy, US foreign policy, and
economic security -- Director of the Chatham House -- The Royal Institute of Internatoinal
Affairs in the United Kingkdom
www.chathamhouse.org/sites/default/files/public/Research/Americas/r0209us_role.pdf) SM
Barack Obama has taken on the US presidency at a time when many of the pillars of America’s
international leadership have been weakened. For example: The chaos of the US financial collapse has given
credibility to those who have long criticized the ‘Washington Consensus’ and its emphasis on deregulation and market liberalism as
a model for national economic reform. It will be difficult to reassert US leadership on international financial and economic issues in
this context. Following the invasion of Iraq, the United States has become directly entangled in the instability of the Middle East,
rather than serving as an external contributor to its security. This is constraining its room for diplomatic leadership in the region.
The spread of democracy that US governments have championed in recent decades has stalled
and has even shifted into reverse in certain parts of the world, calling into question one of the
lodestars of America’s international leadership. America’s position of power relative to other key international
actors such as China and the European Union is changing, as their leaders seek to define for themselves the parameters of future
international cooperation. New regional institutions that exclude the United States are on the rise
from Southeast Asia to Latin America and cannot now be ignored.
A global political awakening, fed largely by
the spread of the internet and satellite communications, is constraining the remit of national governments across the world,
including their ability to follow a US lead where they might want to. Increasingly, the new global challenges to
international security in areas ranging from climate change and energy security to terrorism,
poverty and global health demand solutions where leadership by one country would be counterproductive.
Retrenching in Latin America now
Crandall 2011 (Russell Crandall – associate professor of International Politics at Davison
College -- Principal Director for the Western Hemisphere at the U.S. Department of Defense in
2009 and Director for Andean Affairs at the National Security Council in 2010-11, “The PostAmerican Hemisphere Subtitle: Power and Politics in an Autonomous Latin America”, Foreign
Affairs, May/June, Lexis) SM
Yet over the past decade or so, the United States' willingness and ability to exert control in the
region have diminished. This has occurred in part because more important issues, including the wars in
Afghanistan and Iraq, have forced Latin America down the policymaking food chain. But there is also the
indisputable reality that the region itself is now more confident acting on its own. For the most part, this was
inevitable, given the end of external and local communist challenges and the shift to an increasingly multilateral
world that had room for new powers. Latin America's greater autonomy is both a cause and a
result of decreased U.S. influence.
Unsustainable – China – 2NC
China is rapidly increasing influence in the region at the expense of the U.S. --statistics and new partnerships prove
RT, 9 (The Real Truth, “Latin America Looks East Where Does This Leave the United States?,”
5/10/09, http://realtruth.org/articles/090504-004-americas.html, Tashma)
Looking for New Economic Partners Weeks before the Summit of the Americas, Hugo Chávez attempted to strengthen
economic and political ties with several Asian countries by visiting China, Iran and Japan. In
February, China’s Vice President Xi Jinping visited Mexico, Jamaica, Colombia, Venezuela and Brazil to seek stronger ties with the
five countries. The following week, Vice Premier Hui Liangyu stopped in Argentina, Ecuador, Barbados and the Bahamas to offer
Chinese aid to those nations. Visits to the Caribbean and Latin America by U.S. delegations seem meager in comparison. Thus far,
three U.S. leaders—the secretary of state, attorney general and head of homeland security—have made trips to Mexico, and President
Barack Obama visited with Mexican President Felipe Calderón on his way to the Summit of the Americas in Trinidad and Tobago. In
addition, Vice President Joe Biden met with leaders in Chile and Costa Rica. Although the United States is still Latin America’s
largest trading partner, U.S.
trade with Latin America fell to $35.3 billion in February 2009—a 28.9
percent drop from the same month last year. “The falling trade is mainly due to weak demand in the United States,
although the leading trade partners in Latin America are also buying fewer products from U.S. companies” (Latin Business
Chronicle). As Washington struggles to contain its own financial troubles, Caribbean and Latin
American nations are looking eastward, with delegates from China and Russia making regular visits
to these nations to offer economic assistance and increase bilateral trade talks , including military
development. China’s Emergence as a Global Trade Force The New York Times reported that in light of apparent U.S.
disengagement and increasing economic uncertainty, China offered to provide the struggling
region with necessary financial assistance. In contrast to rapidly diminishing trade with the United States, Bloomberg
reported that Chinese Central Bank Governor Xiaochuan Zhou said China’s trade with Latin America has grown
from $15 billion in 2001 to $140 billion in 2008. “In recent weeks, China has been negotiating deals to double a
development fund in Venezuela to $12 billion, lend Ecuador at least $1 billion to build a hydroelectric plant, provide Argentina with
access to more than $10 billion in Chinese currency and lend Brazil’s national oil company $10 billion. The deals largely focus on
China locking in natural resources like oil for years to come” (The New York Times). A report published by the International
Committee of the Fourth International said that Venezuela is angling to increase its export ratio to China.
“While Venezuela now exports 60 percent of its oil to the US, the agreements between Beijing and Caracas could change that.
Venezuela aims to triple its exports to China to one million barrels a day by 2013. (Today, the US consumes 1.5 million barrels a day
of Venezuelan oil.)” In a 2008 multibillion-dollar deal, China’s Chinalco Corporation purchased the Peruvian
Toromocho Mountain, securing a virtual monopoly on copper production in Peru. In the past,
this type of deal would likely have been made with an American corporation. But not now. This
transaction shows the diminishing influence of the United States in its own hemisphere—and
China’s growing need for natural resources and the great lengths to which it will go to get them. As the Christian
Science Monitor stated, “The U.S. is no longer the only game in town.” The New York Times reported that “just one of China’s
planned loans, the $10 billion for Brazil’s national oil company, is almost as much as the $11.2 billion in all approved financing by
the Inter-American Bank in 2008. Brazil is expected to use the loan for offshore exploration, while agreeing to export as much as
100,000 barrels of oil a day to China, according to the oil company.” China’s interest in Brazil comes on the heels of
Brazilian President Luiz Ignacio Lula da Silva’s call for an economic new world order. In a telling statement
about where many Latin American heads-of-state place blame for the economic situation, the popular leader blamed
“white people with blue eyes” for the current global financial mess. He said this during a meeting with
British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, and repeated it publicly in weeks to come. Even Jamaica, heavily indebted and
confronting growing unemployment, turned to China after failing to secure credit from the U.S. or Britain.
The Caribbean island nation negotiated $138 million in loan packages from Beijing, turning China into its principal
financial partner overnight.
US has already abandoned Latin America and China has already filled
in
Tulchin 12 expert in contemporary Latin American studies, specializing in foreign policy and
comparative urban development, Senior Fellow, Mexico and Central America Program at
Harvard University(Joseph Tulchin, “Setting the Agenda: Asia and Latin America in the 21st
Century”, pg 21;
http://scholarlyrepository.miami.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1000&context=clas_publicat
ions]
In an effort to make a complicated subject as simple as possible in a short presentation, it is my ¶ view that, since 9/11, the strategic
framework used by the US government has reduced Latin America ¶ to a zone of relative insignificance. The problem is not that some
country is threatening US interests ¶ in the hemisphere or using the hemisphere to threaten the US; instead, the US, since the
beginning ¶ of the George W. Bush administration, has lacked a clear view of the role of Latin America—either
any single Latin American country or the group of countries operating within the framework of the ¶ Organization of American
States (OAS) or UN—in the post-Cold War world. ¶ Neither Bush nor Obama has been able to focus sufficiently on the hemisphere to
produce a coherent foreign policy that satisfies US interests in Latin America and responds to the newly ¶ emerging voices in the
region. In consequence, the US government, in dealing with the hemisphere, ¶ has devoted most of its attention
¶
to issues tied directly to domestic concerns, such as drug trafficking,immigration, and Cuba. Even trade, which could
easily be the focus of regional or collective attention, ¶ is handled as an outgrowth of concern for the domestic economy. The April
2012 Summit of the ¶ Americas in Cartagena was a clear indication of the absence of US leadership and focus, with almost ¶ no
attempt to find ways to tie the hemisphere together or explore increasing regional collaboration.¶ Part of the problem is that in the
post-Cold War period, the nations of Latin America have found ¶ it extremely difficult to find their own voices to express their new
sense of agency. Moreover, there ¶ are clear signs of considerable disagreement among the nations of the
region, which makes any ¶ collaborative effort among them more difficult. Any argument that US
hegemony is in decline assumes ¶ a univocal Latin American response to that hegemony. In fact, it is very difficult to
demonstrate ¶ any group consensus among the nations in Latin America, at least one that can be
translated into ¶ collective action or joint policy. ¶ That brings me back to China. China plays several different roles in Latin America.
The most ¶ prominent is its seemingly insatiable consumption of commodities, as if China were a large industrial ¶ yaw taking in
unimaginable quantities of Latin American raw materials. In addition, it continues its ¶ more traditional role of exporter of cheap
manufactured goods, the role it has played in the US for ¶ decades and, most prominently, in Mexico for the past twenty years. It is
playing both roles in Brazil ¶ at the moment, creating a serious political problem for President Dilma Rouseff. ¶ The role that
concerns the radical declinists and the Pentagon is the soft-spoken Chinese role of ¶ lender and investor. That is the role Chávez tried
to get China to play in Venezuela. The two countries ¶ signed agreements with great fanfare, but very little has happened. In Ecuador,
China has become ¶ the lender of last resort and a major investor. Throughout the Andean region, it serves as a major ¶ investor, not
lender, in the mining sector. This already has stirred nationalist sentiment in Peru, where ¶ a Chinese state-owned company sent in
uniformed Chinese security guards to protect the company’s ¶ property, setting off alarm bells about a repeat of experiences in
Africa. The evidence of Chinese ¶ intentions is ambiguous. In most examples of direct investment, Chinese state-controlled
enterprises ¶ generally operate through third parties, with due diligence performed by private firms contracted ¶ to do the work. Such
investment projects are embedded socially in ways that do not occur in other ¶ forms of loans or trade swaps. Conversely, the opaque
manner in which such Chinese enterprises ¶ operate raises suspicions. The current Pentagon nightmare is of Chinese statecontrolled investment ¶ in the lithium deposits of Bolivia, extracted with Chinese labor and protected by Chinese troops. And ¶ yet,
the nationalist reaction in the region to Chinese pretensions is much more significant than any ¶ possible US response. ¶ This brings
me to the third question, which interests me the most. If I were to write a paper on ¶ this topic, I would focus on the perception in
Latin American nations, which varies from country to ¶ country, of the roles China does or might play in the region. What are the
policy responses by Latin ¶ American nations to China’s new presence? The only clear answer is in the case of Brazil, where ¶ there is
significant tension between the two governments. The Chileans also have taken up the ¶ debate, and there are signs that if any of the
announced Chinese investments in the mining and ¶ energy sectors actually get off the ground, a serious debate will emerge in
Argentina as well. In Ecuador and Venezuela, noted for their loud rhetorical noises against the US,
the Chinese presence ¶ is considered another form of anti-imperialism and the rise of China
evidence of US decline. ¶ At this moment, on balance, China’s role in Latin America is still ill formed. The problem is not ¶
China but rather the lack of a clear US stance and a weak policy debate in Latin America. Several ¶ scenarios are possible going
forward. One is that neither the US nor the Latin America nations will ¶ formulate a collective policy to
deal with the new phenomenon, and public discussion will continue ¶ to entertain wild speculations and conspiracy
theories. Another scenario is that Brazil will take the ¶ lead to get the Comunidad de Estados Latinoamericanos y Caribeños (CELAC)
or Unión de Naciones ¶ Suramericanas (UNASUR) to formulate a collective response based on shared values or interests. For ¶
example, it is difficult, but not impossible, to imagine a concerted effort to formulate rules concerning ¶ investments in natural
resources. Can we imagine a Mercosur policy on China? Can Mexico get the ¶ countries of Central America to join a regional
response to Chinese trade? It is also possible that a ¶ policy based on emphasis of the rule of law will
provide a framework for dealing with any external ¶ influence on the region’s domestic policies.
US influence in LA is declining now—causing China rise of influence
Hongbo, 13 – (Sun, “Latin America area for global powers,” BBC Monitoring Asia Pacific –
Political Supplied by BBC Worldwide Monitoring, June 4th, 2013, LexisNexis)
New Chinese
President Xi Jinping chose Latin America as part of the destinations for his second
state visit, a sign that the new leadership will concentrate more on Latin America's role and
influence in the transforming global pattern. There are likely to be more major steps forward to
tune up Sino-Latin American cooperation. China's investment in Latin America will be enlarged
dramatically, along with a more specific and practical policy aiming to actively balance the
different expectations of the interests of both sides. Obviously, China has become an important
strategic partner with Latin America in terms of economic exchanges and foreign affairs. Compared
with other regions such as the Asia-Pacific and the Middle East, Latin America is not pivotal in the change of the international
pattern. Nevertheless, Latin America is becoming more fully engaged with international affairs. More
importantly, Latin
America is no longer constrained to a US-dominated Western hemisphere, but is
developing relationships with emerging economies from the rest of the world. However, challenges still
remain in those countries' China policies in terms of policy coordination and implementation. It requires both China and
Latin America to make efforts to guide and design the direction of the bilateral relationship . It is
also unavoidable that Latin America has become an arena for another round of power struggles. The
US is trying to regain its influence in Latin America, while Russia, India and Japan, no matter
whether out of consideration of Latin America's resources and market or the need to readjust their foreign policy, are also
looking to take a share. Both traditional powers and emerging economies are looking for leverage in the region. Every major
power is speculating on the changes inside Latin America. The dominant US position in this region has started
to decline. Brazil is a rising power, but it is uncertain whether it can establish leadership in this region. Meanwhile, left-wing
governments in Latin America are being challenged over the sustainability of their policies. And most Latin American countries are
readjusting their foreign policies for a diverse system of foreign relations. Major powers are re-evaluating their
interests and readjusting their policies in this region to compete for influence. But whether they can live
up to their own expectations depends on their national strength and future growth, and more importantly, whether they can balance
their interests with Latin America's. Both China and the US have denied any intention of rivalry in Latin
America, but the thriving relationship between China and Latin America has already impacted
the traditional USinfluence over this region. Latin America has become an unavoidable topic if
China and the US want to establish a new pattern of relationship. Setting up mechanisms to enhance
communication, negotiation and mutual trust between both countries over this region should be a top priority. More challenges than
opportunities will prevail in the future relationship between the US and Latin America. The challenges are mostly left over by
history, such as immigration, drug dealing and US policies toward Cuba and Venezuela. Besides, its domestic policy has blocked the
development of its Latin America policy. There might be a strong resistance if the US wants to improve its
relationship with Latin America. For China, it will embrace more opportunities than challenges
in this area. Although frictions have taken place in Sino-Latin American economic relationship, they are auspicious signals that
the relationship between China and Latin America is in a booming development. These problems, produced by prosperity, will also
be addressed amid such development. Both China and the US are seeking ways to foster a constructive mechanism, so that trilateral
cooperation among China, the US, and Latin America will be achieved. Nonetheless, the trust deficit is the major obstruction that
blocks both countries to deepen this cooperation. And China also needs to learn how to better respect Latin America'sinterests. More
importantly, all three parties, including China, the US and Latin America, have to find out feasible areas of cooperation.
China has been ramping up economic influence throughout Latin America due to
high resource demand
Vega, 5 (Juan, J.D. candidate at the University of Minnesota Law School, M.B.A at the
University of Florida, “China's Economic and Political Clout Grows in Latin America at the
Expense of U.S. Interests,” 14 Minn. J. Global Trade 377, Summer 2005, lexis, Tashma)
2. China's Investments in Key Sectors in Latin America: Oil, Commodities, and Infrastructures China's high demand for
commodities has driven up the price of metals, agricultural products, and oil. 74 China is a major importer of raw
materials, a plentiful commodity in Latin America. 75 This makes doing business with
China very attractive to Latin American countries, especially Brazil. 76 For example, China's top steel
maker, Baosteel, is considering a joint venture with Brazil's Companhia Vale de Rio Doce, the world's top iron ore miner. 77 Latin
America and the Caribbean provide over thirty percent of U.S. imported oil, which is more than all of the Middle Eastern countries
combined. 78 But China is not just securing oil and commodities from Latin American countries, it is
becoming intimately involved in its extraction, transportation and infrastructure construction.
79 China's approach has been to show Latin American countries that, unlike the U nited States, it
will treat them as sovereigns and as partners. In 2003, trade between China and Brazil totaled eight billion dollars,
making China Brazil's second-largest trading partner [*388] after the United States. 80 Brazil is China's largest trading
partner in Latin America and annual bilateral trade has tripled since 2000. 81 Both countries recently
took part in a workshop entitled "Brazil and China in the 21st Century," at which Chinese entrepreneurs sought Brazilian partners in
economic sectors such as oil and agriculture. 82 China seeks to invest directly in Brazil's infrastructure, 83 where it has agreed to
invest between $ 3 billion and $ 4 billion in railways and refineries. 84 With Argentina, China seeks not only bilateral
trade agreements but also to
become an investment partner, particularly in the infrastructure and
transportation sectors. 85 To this end, Argentine President, Nestor Kirchner, and Chinese President, Hu Jintao, signed an
agreement on June 28, 2004, which enables both countries to jointly begin construction of a railway and allows Argentina to export
its citrus fruit to China. 86 Realizing that it must work with China because it cannot compete against it, Mexico has decided
to increase its exploration and production of oil to satisfy China's demand. 87 In February 2004, Mexico
held a conference entitled "China's Influence on Mexico's Future," at which Mexico's ambassador to China [*389] announced that
Mexico will increase its oil output to meet China's demands. 88 China has agreed to invest in Venezuela's state oil
company, Petroleos de Venezuela (PDVSA). 89 Venezuela's Foreign Minister met with the managers of China National
Petroleum Corporation (CNPC) in order to establish a strategic alliance over the exploration, transformation, and transportation of
crude oil, including upgrading necessary infrastructure. 90 China also has indicated interest in investing $ 3 billion in Ecuador,
primarily in its oil sector. 91 China is even courting smaller, sometimes forgotten countries. China
expressed interest in investing in the construction of a new canal through Central America. 92 The
proposed canal would cost $ 20 billion and would utilize Lake Nicaragua and one river in southeast Nicaragua. 93 Guyana and China
enjoy bilateral economic and technical cooperation. 94 President Hu Jintao said that China is willing to develop relations with
Caribbean countries that would be of mutual benefit to Latin America and China. 95 This cooperation increases access for Latin
American businesses to the growing Chinese consumer market. [*390] 3. Chinese Market Attractiveness to Latin American
Countries Eager to obtain new customers, foreign manufacturers and distributors want to tap into all areas of the growing Chinese
market. 96 China is rapidly creating the largest middle class in the world, which will have tremendous buying power. 97 Foreign
direct investment in China increased nineteen percent, to $ 43.6 billion, from January to August 2004 alone. 98 China consumes an
increasing amount of oil and commodities and it opened its agricultural market because it needs to import great quantities of food.
99 Latin American leaders welcome an economic power that treats them as true partners and
provides an attractive economic alternative to dealing with the United States. 100 The trade trip to China by
Brazil's president in May of 2004 underscores this point. 101 Given China's needs for the raw materials that Latin
American countries have and given China's cooperation in infrastructure and satellite technology development, it
appears as though China, Brazil, and other Latin American countries are entering an era of
greater cooperation. 102 [*391]
Unsustainable – New Challengers – 2NC
Venezuela is gaining regional hegemonic status – crowds out U.S. influence
Weisbrot, 13 (Mark, director of the Centre for Economic and Policy Research, “Latin America:
The End of an Era,” International Journal of Health Services, Volume 36, Issue 4, Tashma)
In Latin America this has coincided with a major and unanticipated change that, combined with the IMF’s
loss of influence, has helped usher in the new era of independence. A new international lender has
emerged: Venezuela. When Argentina decided last December to say its final goodbye to the IMF by paying off its remaining
debt of $9.8 billion (5.4 percent of GDP) at once, Venezuela committed $2.5 billion to the cause. "If additional help is needed to help
Argentina finally free itself from the claws of the International Monetary Fund, Argentina can count on us," Chávez announced on
December 15. Kirchner’s statement announcing the decision was even harsher: "[the IMF has] acted towards our country as a
promoter and a vehicle of policies that caused poverty and pain among the Argentine people," he said. Last year Venezuela also
committed to buying $300 million of Ecuador’s bonds; in December, it turned out that Ecuador had sufficient demand for its bonds
that it only needed to sell $25 million to Venezuela, but the latter’s commitment was there as a lender of last resort. Chávez has
proposed to formalize this new relationship by establishing a “Bank of the South,” to finance development in the region, and offered
to start it off with a $5 billion contribution. In the meantime, Venezuela is also providing discounted oil financing
for the Caribbean countries under its PetroCaribe program. The result for Bolivia is that despite its poverty and
underdevelopment, the new government will not have to worry too much about whether the United States approves of what it is
doing with regard to foreign energy companies, trade negotiations (a bilateral trade deal, long sought by Washington, is now pretty
much dead), macroeconomic policies, or drug policy. Any aid cuts from Washington, Europe, or international lending agencies will
be more than replaced by Venezuela. When Bolivia was about to lose $170 million in soybean exports to Colombia as a result of the
latter’s decision in April to sign a bilateral trade agreement with the United States, Venezuela stepped in as a replacement buyer.
Such is the paradox of the new hemispheric order: it is now even easier for a small, poor country to reject “the Washington
Consensus” than it is for larger, middle income countries to do so – although the choices for all have been greatly expanded.
Venezuela has more than $30 billion in foreign exchange reserves; whatever Bolivia might need will be pretty small relative to
Venezuela’s capacity for lending and aid. In just the last month (May), Venezuela has announced a $100 million loan to Bolivia and a
similar amount to support the proposed land reform, as well as numerous other forms of aid. And Venezuela’s lending and aid
programs, unlike that of the international financial institutions or the G-7 governments, do not have economic policy conditions
attached to them. This makes all the difference in the world. Viewed through the Cold War lens of official
Washington and the foreign policy establishment, these disbursements and initiatives are either as
part of an attempt to build an “anti-American” axis , or, as Chávez simply buying friends in the region.
Chávez himself, who has named his revolution after the 18th century liberator Simon Bolivar, sees it as freeing South America from
the grip of the U.S. empire. But regardless of how it is seen in ideological terms, the impact of this alternative source of financing has
already had an enormous impact on the ability of governments to ignore pressures from Washington. This trend is likely to
continue unless there is a sudden and very severe collapse of oil prices.
Russia and Iran are ramping up influence in the region --- it’s zero-sum with U.S.
influence
RT, 9 (The Real Truth, “Latin America Looks East Where Does This Leave the United States?,”
5/10/09, http://realtruth.org/articles/090504-004-americas.html, Tashma)
Russia and Iran Assert Themselves
It is not just China that is capitalizing on opportunities in the Western hemisphere. Russian and Iranian ties and
support for Latin America have also been growing. Last month, Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin met
with socialist-leaning Chilean President Michelle Bachelet, promising to step up cooperation with the
nation. “‘We are satisfied with the development of our relations, including regular contacts and trends in trade and economic
relations,’ [Mr.] Putin said. ‘Yet bilateral trade is rather modest so far. It is necessary to think about
diversification’” (Itar-Tass). “For Russia, its Caribbean naval jaunt is a symbolic riposte to America’s
plan to place missile batteries in Poland and to its dispatch of naval vessels to distribute aid in Georgia after
Russia’s incursion in August. The same goes for its recent revival of ties with Cuba…But Mr Medvedev’s main purpose in Latin
America is business. Mr Chávez has already bought arms worth $4.4 billion from Russia—including a Kalashnikov factory due to
start producing 50,000 rifles a year in 2010. Russia was reported this month to have signed a contract to sell Venezuela portable airdefence missiles” (The Economist). In light of these developments, it must be considered that Russia’s goals may not be so
economically singular. Russian warships docked on Cuban shores, just 90 miles off the U.S. border, for the first
time since the end of the Cold War. There was a time when the United States would have viewed
this with heightened alarm. But in this age of “new beginnings,” and as President Obama distances the U.S.
from the “diplomacy of the past,” it is not. Everything seems to be business as usual. For a variety of reasons, Latin America
has been of increasing interest to Iran as well. Not only has Iran identified the same economic opportunities in the
region as China and Russia, but it recognizes Latin America, specifically Venezuela’s anti-American President Hugo
Chávez, as a like-minded diplomatic partner. “The motive for Iran’s recent interest in Latin
America seems to be a desire to add to its small stock of diplomatic friends around the world, and to score
propaganda points against the United States. Mr. Chávez has signed no fewer than 200 co-operation agreements with
Iran. Venezuelan officials say that Iran has invested more than $7 billion in their country—in plants
to assemble cars, tractors, farm machinery and bicycles, as well as oil—and that bilateral trade has reached $4.6
billion” (The Economist). Recently, Brazil’s foreign minister visited Iran and invited Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to
visit Brazil. Additionally, Iran has promised $1.1 billion in investments to develop Bolivia’s natural gas
industry (ibid.). With growing concern from the United States, Iran has also been in ongoing talks with
Nicaragua and its former Marxist guerrilla-turned-president, Daniel Ortega. The talks have focused on pursuing the construction
of a $350 million Caribbean port financed by Iran to alleviate the ongoing energy crisis in the small Central American nation.
US influence in Latin America is declining now and it fails—no respect
Llana, 12 – Monitor's European Bureau Chief based in Paris, masters in journalism from
Columbia University and a BA in history from the University of Michigan (Sara Miller, “50 years
after Cuba Missile Crisis, US influence in hemisphere waning;
Investment from emerging economies like China and Russia are diminishing Latin
America's reliance on the United States, making it more difficult for Washington to isolate
regimes like Cuba,” The Christian Science Monitor, October 14, 2012, LexisNexis)//HAL
It was what many consider the most dangerous moment the world has ever faced: the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962, which saw the
United States square off over nuclear missiles stationed by the Soviet Union in Cuba. This week marks the 50th anniversary of the
beginning of the tense standoff. And while the politics of the Cold War have little relevance for US-Latin American relations today, in
some ways the US finds itself in the very position that set the stage for conflict in the first place, says Philip Brenner, a historian of
the missile crisis at American University. With US influence waning in the region, Latin America is forging
ahead with its own agenda. It was not only the containment of communism that drove US
attempts to oust Fidel Castro from the helm of Cuba in the early 1960s says Mr. Brenner. The US was
also concerned about Latin American countries emulating Cuba, particularly its geopolitical
stance in the Cold War, and thus undermining American leadership in the western hemisphere. Some 50
years later, the US faces the same situation, just a more modern iteration. "What the US feared the most in 1962
has come to pass," says Brenner, who authored "Sad and Luminous Days: Cuba's Struggle with the Superpowers after the
Missile Crisis." "We were concerned about our sphere of influence that we had taken for granted....
[Today] we cannot dominate this region anymore. They do not look to us for leadership.
Countries look within the region, and to some extent to Cuba still." After the terrorist attacks of
9/11, the US turned its attention from Latin America as it focused on terrorism and threats from
the Middle East. At the same time, over the past decade Latin American democracy has
flourished and the global economy shifted, with Latin America no longer looking just north to
the US for leadership and investment, but to India, China, and Russia. China surpassed the US
as Brazil's biggest trading partner in 2009. Investment from outside Most of these relationships are economic in nature among
emerging economies. If Russia, for example, once eyed Cuba to buoy its political project close to the American border, today it is
inking energy deals and selling arms in Latin America because it finds willing partners and purchasers there. "Russia is going to sell
all kinds of arms to Venezuela, not because [Venezuelan President] Hugo Chavez is saying he is socialist. It's because he has money
to pay for it," says Alex Sanchez, a senior research fellow at the Council on Hemispheric Affairs. The flurry of investment in countries
ranging from Venezuela to Bolivia helps to further undermine US global dominance in the region, a scenario that many leaders
welcome today. Chief among them is Mr. Chavez, who just won another six-year term in office, and his allies including President Evo
Morales in Bolivia and President Daniel Ortega in Nicaragua. Indeed, the anniversary of the Cuban Missile Crisis
will likely provide an opportunity for the "extreme left" in Latin America to express support for
Cuba, says Johns Hopkins Latin American expert Riordan Roett. "They will be in solidarity about the survival of the Castro
brothers," Mr. Roett says. 'A lynchpin' in the region That kind of defiance - showing respect for a nation that
for so long the US has considered a thorn in its side - would have been unthinkable 50 years ago.
Before the Cuban Missile Crisis, after the failed Bay of Pigs invasion, the US pressured Latin American
countries to suspend Cuba's membership from the Organization of American States (OAS). At the
same time, Cuba signed onto the non-aligned movement, and Brenner says it was that move that the US feared other countries
in Latin America might follow. At the time, US thinking on the movement was, 'you are with us or you are
against us.' The politics surrounding Cuba at the OAS highlights the declining influence of the
US on the region. Fifty years ago the US advocated for Cuba's suspension, and was successful; but during the group's summit
in April, leaders across political spectrums said they would question attending another summit without Cuba at the table. "This
comes from [Colombian President Juan Manuel] Santos, our most loyal ally in the region," says Brenner. "Cuba was once the
pariah state; it is now a lynchpin for all the other countries."
Unsustainable – New Organizations – 2NC
All former need for US leadership is gone—new institutions have grown to stabilize
Latin America without the United States
Puntigliano, 7 - Assistant Professor in Economic history and Lecturer in Latin American
Studies at Stockholm University (Andres Rivarola, “Global shift: the U.N. system and the new
regionalism in Latin America,” Article from: Latin American Politics and Society | March 22,
2007, http://business.highbeam.com/425060/article-1G1-160801168/global-shift-un-systemand-new-regionalism-latin-america)//HAL
This is a mainly theoretical article that intends to rethink the role of Latin America in the light of global systemic changes; and, as
Delich (2004) holds, to rethink is to discover. The point of departure is that with the end of the Cold War, a new economic order
and security bal- ance is taking form in the new institutional environment generally called globalization. An important implication
of this change is that with the end of bipolarity and the erosion of superpower hegemony, new spheres of authority (SOAs) have
emerged on the world scene (Rosenau 1997). One increasingly relevant sphere of authority is the U.N. system, which has gained
prominence as a source of normative and moral authority. This article explores the links between the U.N. system as a global sphere
of authority and emerging regional constellations from the periphery in Latin America. Some overall inquiries examine the extent
to which nation-states are using regional formations as vehicles of development and security
strategies. The article further analyzes whether a stronger link between
periphery groupings and the U.N. system might improve
the groups' bargaining power, and what this could mean for how peripheral states formulate their long-term foreign and
development strategies. For such analysis, two important elements are the waning significance of the dichotomy between domestic
and foreign markets, and the new forms of diplomatic articulations and regional expressions (e.g., values, norms, or organizations),
which function as a kind of local (political, cultural, and economic) answer to the globalization process. The word new, however,
should not lead to a neglect of the past. Probably as a reac- tion to the homogenizing force of globalization, regionalism
presents an important alternative that includes the awareness of the local identities and former
experiences that are remixed into the new system. History does indeed matter, and we must keep in mind that
social processes contain lines of continuity and change. A basic hypothesis in this article is that the U.N. system is becoming a new core as a sphere of authority, causing an erosion of the hegemony of industrialized
countries from North America and Europe (the traditional core) that have held dominant economic and normative control over the system. The U.N. system still is a rather loose network of organizations, each with its own governing bodies, budgets,
and secre- tariats, without supranational structures in the areas of security and for- eign policy.' Each component of the system has
a different kind of inter- national leverage and is subjected to different forms of national control. The U.N. system
agencies, furthermore, often hold different positions on major issues, such as economic and social matters. Yet there
appears to be a tendency for greater supranational interaction among them, together with a homogenization
of norms that conveys a kind of moral identity on the system. Some of these norms relate to
human rights, the fight against poverty, respect for international law, fair trade rules, and the
environment. The tendency for interaction does not imply an absence of conflict in the system, nor does it suggest that all
agencies interpret the norms in the same way. But it does imply that the norms are increasingly interwoven, making
it necessary for actors, such as states or national and international nongovernmental organizations, to dichotomies in the
international system. That conception is still true, but it should be analyzed in light of the systemic shifts produced by post-Cold
War institutional changes. This essay presents a more detailed analysis of regionalization and the U.N. system and the theoretical
implications of this relationship for the study of international relations. The discussion also outlines elements
inherent to the globalization process that contribute to a closer discussion of the Latin
American case. These include the waning dichotomy between domestic and foreign markets; the diplomatic artic-
ulations,
trade partnerships, and legitimating values at work in the rela- tionship; the contradictions between the regional and international
orders; and the awareness of local identities and former experiences that are remixed into the new system. A THEORETICAL
OVERVIEW A major assumption of mainstream studies in international relations since the end of World War II has been a statecentric point of view in which nation-state interests were the key units of analysis. Another piv- otal assumption was bipolarity,
with superpowers setting the agenda of alliances and conflicts along which states delineated their strategies. Since the post-1989
transformations, however, both pillars have been severely challenged. In relation to the former, pundits maintain that state-centric
literature is an uncertain foundation for theorizing about how domestic and international politics interact (Putnam 1993). The issue
is thus not whether to combine domestic and international expla- nations, but how best to do so (Evans et al. 1993, 9). Rosenau goes
even further, arguing that this perspective is imprisoned by the idea that the line between domestic and foreign affairs still serves as
the cutting edge of analysis. His approach lies in a world view that recasts the relevance of "territoriality," highlighting instead the
"porosity of boundaries" (1997, 64). This means that instead of a state-centric predominance, there are complex multicentric
structures, processes, and rules, which he calls spheres of authority (SOAs). There is a growing interest in research on new spheres
of author- ity; for example, through concepts such as world culture (Boli and Thomas 1999), global governance (Held et al. 1999),
and empire (Hardt and Negri 2001). Common among these approaches is that they go beyond nation-states to include international
governmental, nongovern- mental, or regional organizations as central actors in the formation of spheres of authority (see also
Amin 2000). More and more studies point to the strengthening of non-state-centered sources of rulemaking. These include
transnationally organized sources of power and legitimacy, including states, and international governmental and nongovernmental
elaborate strategies that take into account the different (and sometimes antagonistic) components of the system. Along this same
line, a second hypothesis in this study is that regional constellations are becoming a new means of expression for nation-states,
which are starting to amalgamate security and develop- ment strategies and take advantage of the room to maneuver opened
through the U.N. system. The European Union (EU) is a pioneer in this sense, in acting with one voice in the World Trade
Organization (WTO). Whereas the EU has received much attention, however, regionalism in the periphery has drawn little,
probably because these regional group- ings have still not reached the EU's level of institutionalization and influ- ence. Yet there are
indications of change in both senses. Moreover, an interesting dimension of periphery regionalism and its link to the U.N. system is
that it appears to challenge the established Cold War percep- tion of core and periphery, which has been seen as one of the major
organizations, but also standardization organizations, private companies, epistemic communities, and other groups (see Bayne and
Woolcock 2004; Etzioni 2004). Some of these regulators are states themselves or are connected to states, but some are more
loosely connected or even not connected at all. In the words of Brunsson and Jacobsson (2000), "the world is full of organizations
that produce rules for others-be they states, companies or individuals-to follow." Taking all these elements into account, this study
shares the view of those who argue that the globalization process is changing the way we think about global
"authority." Of course, the United States, with its
powerful military machine, could step over international law and invade Iraq
(certainly a point for the neorealists). On the other hand, Iraq has also shown the limitations of "hard power" and the need for "soft
power" (the ability to attract others by the legitimacy of policies and values), given that the United States "cannot
confront the new threat of terrorism without the cooperation of other countries" (Nye 2004, 17).
Therefore, the U.N. matters. There is, though, a debate around the role of the U.N. Some com- mentators portray the
organization as largely a failure because it does not reflect thie underlying dynamics of power, culture, and security. According to
such a view, U.S. unilateralism during the Iraq crisis shows that "the first and last geopolitical truth is that states pursue security by
pursuing power" (Glennon 2003). There are certainly many challenges to international law as well as structural problems at the
U.N.; but this does not necessarily reflect an increasing hegemony of the United States. Paradoxically, in spite of its crisis, the
U.N. system is increasingly a source of global legitimacy and a kind of "morality of last resort."
1111It is also becoming a central node in a system of international governmental and nongovernmental organizations that is
forming a new dimension of world polity. This can be appreciated, for example, in the role that U.N. agencies play as promoters,
defenders, and creators of human rights standards, development priorities, health- and education-related issues, or, as recently, in
helping to mobilize resources to assist the tsunami vic- tims or in nation-building missions (Dobbin 2005). Thus, parallel to the
centrifugal forces unleashed by the globaliza- tion process, there is also a centripetal force that creates coherence among global
units of the system and its regional subunits. Etzioni's words give perhaps a good picture of the U.N.: Another consequence of the
end of the East-West dichotomy that is relevant for this study is the emergence of a new pattern of global secu- rity relations, in
which concepts such as "third world" have lost their meaning. About this, Buzan (1991, 431) holds that "the best available set of
terms to capture the relationships of the 1990s comes from the center- periphery approach elaborated in the dependency literature
of the 1960s and 1970s." That is true, but it is narrow to look at it from the per- spective of the pre-1989 system, when there was a
state-centered notion of the core attached to the industrialized countries and their economic groups as the dominant sphere of
authority. It is also important to note that the so-called dependency literature had very divergent perspectives on the centerperiphery issue, ranging from the structuralist work of Pre- bisch (1949) or Cardoso and Faletto (1974) to the Marxist-inspired studies of Frank (1971). But other center-periphery studies also are very important, albeit generally ignored by the development debate.
These stem from the perspective outlined by Shils (1975). In a model reminiscent of Friedrich Hegel's thesis, antithesis, and
synthesis approach, Shils proposes three central ideas: integration, con- flict, and countercenters. He argues that there must always
be some measure of integration for a society to exist, which does not imply that all societies must be highly integrated or that they
are all equal (Shils 1988). He views conflict as an expression of the periphery's resistance to assimilation by the core.
Countercenters are seen as designating the periphery's permanent desire to penetrate the sphere of authority dom- inated by the
core. Rejecting the rigidities inherent in many core- periphery views, Shils does not see power as a one-way street of core
dominance over periphery. Hence, periphery is seen not necessarily just as a victim but also as a source of power, through the
formation of countercenters. A main value of this perspective is that it contains a dynamic model that is very useful for analyzing
current changes in the international system, such as the one expressed through the "new regionalism." According to Hettne et al.
(1999), processes of economic globaliza- tion and regionalization are occurring simultaneously.
new regionalisms is that the new are
not only concerned with economic issues, but also have security imperatives. This means that the
There have been regional groupings in the past, yet a major difference between old and
relation- ship between development and security must be reconsidered, because, as Hettne (2001) notes, "development has more
explicitly become a security issue and this is taking form as exhibited by the new kind of regional constellations." Another feature of
the new regionalism is that it takes place in a multipolar global order, whereas the old regionalism was marked by bipolarity. This
point is central in linking the ideas of Shils and of Hettne et al.; the latter see the rise of regional powers as contributing to the
decline of hegemony of the industrial powers (Hettne et al. 1999). In a way, the regional powers in Hettne's formulation are
analogous to what Shils refers to as countercenters. Along this line, the new region- alism can be seen as a way of coping with global
transformations, because an increasing number of states realize that they lack the capa- bility and the means to manage such a task
alone. Thus, the mixing of security, economic, and social initiatives is transforming the "region" into a "synthesis" of national
security and development aspirations. There is, of course, no single answer about how to adapt to the new global structures.
Indeed, the issue of defining globalization is itself an endless theme (Hettne 2001, 16). Furthermore, "there is no consensus on
what kind of world order, if any, we can expect to emerge from the combination of whatever changes are actually occurring in the
global configuration of power" (Arrighi and Silver 1999, 21). It should there- fore be remembered that regions are not given but
rather created and recreated in the process of global transformation. Turning more specifically to the Latin
American case, some researchers maintain that the end of the Cold War has not meant a more
flexible environment for the Latin American countries and that "eco- nomic matters appear to
have replaced political ones as the fulcrum upon which core influence is pressed on Latin
America" (Hey and Mora 2003). It is true that many Cold War economic and military inequalities still persist, yet this view fails
to perceive the effects of the post-Cold War changes discussed above. Traditionally, the issue of security in Latin America has been
related to national defense, restricted to the military, and lacking civilian leadership or input from the academic community
(Diamint 2004). That position was particularly true for the Cold War period, when "development" and "foreign policy" were largely
separate issues. The latter generally had an imperative in the ideological alignment behind one of the two superpowers, which
meant giving priority to military security perspectives. Such logic motivated international alignments and policies that often left
aside long-term development advantages and fos- tered an overwhelming concern about the role of the United States as an
economic and security counterpart. With globalization, however, a whole new agenda emerged, together
with new regional actors. One of
the most remarkable is Mercosur, the Common Market of the South, formed by
Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay, and Uruguay. This emerging bloc is becoming a new catalyst of regional positions in multilateral
arenas and is one of the clearest expressions of the "new regionalism."
The eruption of new organizations erodes U.S. influence in the region
Ellner, 12 (Steve, professor at the Universidad de Oriente in Puerto La Cruz, Venezuela “Latin
American Unity Takes Center Stage as U.S. Influence Declines,” 7/20/12,
http://venezuelanalysis.com/analysis/7117, Tashma)
In spite of surprises in the lead-up to the Sixth Summit of the Americas in Cartagena, Colombia, on April 14–15, the results of the
conference were predictable. The
United States and Canada found themselves distanced from their neighbors
to the south, particularly on the key issues of Cuba, decriminalization of drugs, and the dispute over the Malvinas—otherwise
known as the Falkland Islands. For Washington, the conference was the latest in several years of diplomatic
reverses highlighted by the defeat of the U.S.-promoted Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA) at the
Fourth Summit of the Americas in Mar del Plata, Argentina, in 2005. The most far-reaching development leading up to the
Cartagena summit was the new hemispheric configuration manifested by the consolidation of organizations promoting Latin
American unity, specifically the Bolivarian Alliance for the Peoples of Our America (ALBA), the Union of South American Nations
(UNASUR), and more recently the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC). A lack of consensus prevented the
summit from producing a final document. In the previous summit in Trinidad in 2009, a 22-page document was signed by only the
host country for the same reason. On that occasion, however, Trinidadian prime minister Patrick Manning in his closing speech
spoke optimistically of “the more open and conciliatory position” of the then recently elected U.S. president Barack Obama, which
would assure Cuba’s participation in hemispheric discussions in the near future.[1] Following the Cartagena summit, Colombian
president Juan Manuel Santos pointed out that the “direct and open” manner in which a wide range of “hot issues” were discussed
constituted a breakthrough in inter-American relations. The Obama administration’s acceptance of this style of debate represented a
concession, albeit a relatively minor one. “Historically, the summit agenda has been seen as dictated by the United States,” explained
the Christian Science Monitor.[2] The newly created organizations that exclude the United States were at
least partially responsible for the change. “ALBA has acted somewhat as a bloc within UNASUR
and CELAC and the resolutions and stands of all three organizations have hardened the
positions of Latin American governments vis-à-vis the United States,” Bolivia’s UN ambassador Rafael
Archondo told me. CELAC, which was founded in Caracas, Venezuela, in December, goes beyond the confines of the South
American-based UNASUR by bringing the Caribbean and Central American nations into the organizational fold. Much of
the
U.S. media—and the foreign policy experts they quote— dismisses the importance of these organizational
developments. Venezuelan president Hugo Chávez, it is claimed, is bankrolling all three organizations as venues for
grandstanding.[3] This depiction ignores UNASUR’s impressive track record in conflict resolution following rampant political
violence in Bolivia in 2008, Colombia’s military incursion in Ecuador in the same year, and the attempted Ecuadoran coup in 2010.
In all three conflicts, the OAS was left on the sidelines. More recently, The Wall Street Journal labeled CELAC “Mr. Chávez’s party.”
The paper quoted Christopher Sabatini of the Council of the Americas, who called CELAC a forum for Chávez to
“pontificate and fan anti-U.S. sentiment.” In the same article, economist Boris Segura of Nomura Holdings stated
that “in terms of what . . . [CELAC] is going to achieve, it will be very little, because the region is divided.”[4] Latin America’s unified
positions at the Cartagena summit put the lie to these statements, but the full impact of the issues that are being raised by these
organizations is an open question. After all, the UN General Assembly has passed near unanimous resolutions condemning the
Cuban embargo over the last two decades without tangible results. I asked Venezuela’s OAS representative, Carmen Velásquez, one
of her country’s chief negotiators at Cartagena, whether anyone is taking the debate and infighting seriously. She responded
affirmatively pointing out that the Summit of the Americas is “Washington’s baby.” Indeed, it was an initiative of President Bill
Clinton, who in 1994 intended it to provide momentum for the FTAA proposal. “Any breakdown of the summit tradition,” Velásquez
added, “will look bad, particularly because the U.S. boasts that Latin America is a safe place for democracy and free of the head-on
clashes seen elsewhere in the world.” Velásquez pointed to additional evidence of U.S. apprehension over the possibility that Latin
American nations may distance themselves from their neighbor to the north. She recalled that at the OAS General Assembly in 2009,
the United States voted with the rest of Latin America in favor of Cuba’s readmission into the OAS. However, it did so only out of
fear of being isolated on the Cuban issue, and only if Cuba promised to respect the human rights of its citizens—a condition,
Velásquez said, that “the Cubans rightfully considered humiliating and predictably rejected.” The U.S. stratagem was risky. The mere
appearance of acquiescence on the issue of Cuban membership into the OAS brought down the wrath of the U.S. right, including
Congressman Connie Mack (R-Fla.), who called for defunding the organization. The Cuban issue again flared up just two months
before the Cartagena summit. In a surprise move, Ecuadoran president Rafael Correa called on the ALBA nations to boycott the
conference if Cuba were not allowed to participate. The call caught different actors by surprise. In response to the U.S. veto on
Cuban participation in the Summit of the Americas on grounds of alleged human rights violation, Santos traveled to Havana in an
attempt to stave off a boycott by all ALBA nations. Cuba surprised some by announcing its interest in attending the summit. After
some hesitation, Bolivia and Venezuela decided against following Ecuador’s lead, in large part because they were eager to maintain
cordial relations with summit host Colombia, particularly in light of Santos’s activist role as conciliator on Cuba and other issues,
according to Archondo. Correa, whom the U.S. State Department has hoped to rein in for some time, proved more intransigent than
the alleged firebrand Chávez, who opted for a diplomatic strategy and a broad-based alliance.[5] The ALBA nations, along
with Argentina and Uruguay,
refused to sign any document at Cartagena that failed to commit itself to
Cuban participation at the next summit to be held in Panama. Santos, for his part, called the U.S. policy toward Cuba
“anachronistic” and “ineffective,” and added that Cuba’s exclusion in Panama would be “unthinkable.” Another issue that
pitted the countries of the south against those of the north was the Malvinas dispute. Since the defeat
of the Argentine invasion of the Malvinas in 1982, Great Britain has beefed up its military presence on the
islands, culminating this year in the alleged deployment of a nuclear submarine, while in recent years
it has engaged in exploratory offshore oil drilling in the area. The Obama administration refuses to take a stand
on the issue, even to the extent of urging both sides to sit down and negotiate, as it had done up until recently.[6] In contrast,
CELAC’s founding document, the “Declaration of Caracas,” rejects the “anachronistic colonial situation on
American soil” and applauds the “disposition of the Argentine government to reach a peaceful
solution.” The CELAC resolution reflects the more militant and active role of the Argentine
government of Cristina Fernández de Kirchner and the support for its position by nations that had turned
their backs on Argentina at the time of the war, such as Chile and Colombia. Fernández, evidently
annoyed at the Cartagena summit’s failure to arrive at a consensus on the issue, left the conference early. Recently elected
Guatemalan president Otto Pérez Molina sprung another surprise shortly before the summit when he attempted to secure Central
American support for the decriminalization of illegal drugs, a position supported by several former Latin American presidents.
Although other Latin American governments were not convinced of the proposal’s feasibility, they nevertheless applauded
Guatemala’s initiative for starting a much-needed debate on the failed war on drugs. Bolivia, for instance, hopes that the new open
atmosphere on the topic will generate support for its recent proposal to take cultural traditions into consideration in order to exempt
certain nations from enforcing international agreements on prohibiting coca leaf cultivation, Archondo told me. Shortly after
Guatemala proposed that illegal drugs be decriminalized, Álvaro Forero, a prominent columnist for the centrist Colombian El
Espectador, wrote, “It is said that the United States opened the door to discussion, but the reality is that they had no choice because
the Central Americans were pushing hard on the issue. After . . . the opposition to Cuba's participation in the summit, the Americans
were left without veto power.”[7] From the viewpoint of the more radical nations like Venezuela, the consolidation of
ALBA, UNASUR, and CELAC forms part of what could be called a “war of position,” in which
new spaces are occupied that undermine U.S. hegemony and favor the assertion of national
sovereignty and other just causes.[8] Many in Washington feel threatened by these developments, although they may not admit
it. This was inadvertently made clear by Eliot Engel (D-N.Y.), chairman of the House of Representatives’ Subcommittee on the
Western Hemisphere, in a speech to the OAS shortly before the Cartagena summit. Engel harshly attacked Venezuela and Bolivia
and denounced CELAC as a “rival” to the OAS that fails to “promote unity or cooperation.”[9] The defiant positions on
specific issues from the conservative presidents of Colombia and Guatemala reflect
Washington’s waning influence in the region (particularly in light of Santos’s hope that the United States
will quickly implement the recently approved U.S.-Colombia Free Trade Agreement). In more general terms, the failure to
produce a final document at Cartagena is a setback for Washington in two respects. First, it
weakens the OAS, which sponsors the summits, thus creating a vacuum that UNASUR and CELAC are in
a position to fill. Second, the lack of an agreement was largely the result of Latin America’s
resolve to push for certain changes. Only important concessions by Washington can forestall an
organizational shift in the hemisphere, a reality that will thrust hard choices on Washington in the
immediate future.
Unsustainable – Trade Deficits – 2NC
High trade deficits make other aspects of U.S. influence in Latin America
completely moot --- economic weaknesses derail hegemonic efforts
Carranza, 4 (Dr. Mario E., Associate Professor of Political Science, Texas A & M UniversityKingsville, Ph.D., University of Chicago, “LATIN AMERICAN PERSPECTIVE: MERCOSUR,
THE FREE TRADE AREA OF THE AMERICAS, AND THE FUTURE OF U.S. HEGEMONY IN
LATIN AMERICA,” 27 Fordham Int'l L.J. 1029, February 2004, lexis, Tashma)
An alternative interpretation is that although asymmetry is an essential characteristic of U.S.-South American relations, the
dramatic rise in the relative power of Brazil since the 1970s and the structural problems facing the
U.S. economy make it possible for MERCOSUR to narrow its current gap in GDP with the United
States in the next decades. 20 The asymmetric distribution of structural power in favor of the United
States in the Western hemisphere does not automatically translate into U.S. hegemony. Coercive
leadership is not the same as hegemony by consent. 21 The ability of the United States to exercise
hegemony by consent has been damaged by the unfulfilled promises of the neo-liberal reforms
promoted by the Washington Consensus in the 1990s. On the other hand, the relative decline of U.S.
hegemony in the globalized post-Cold War international economy is a serious structural constraint on
the ability of the United States to assert its authority over the rest of the Western hemisphere in economic
matters, despite the structural power of its U.S. $ 10 trillion economy. 22 The United States may be the [*1037]
world's most powerful country in terms of military capabilities. However, its economic weaknesses, including
dependence on foreign capital in order to finance current account deficits, impair its ability
to exercise hegemony even in Latin America (its traditional sphere of influence) thus opening up a window of
opportunity for Latin American countries to have independent foreign economic policies.
Unsustainable – AT: Obama Solves
Obama can’t do anything about waning U.S. influence in the region
Sabatini, 13 (Christopher, Editor in Chief of Americas Quarterly and Senior Director of Policy
at the Americas Society and the Council of the Americas, “WILL LATIN AMERICA MISS U.S.
HEGEMONY?,” Journal of International Affairs, Volume 66, Issue 2, Spring 2013, pg. 1-XVI,
Proquest, Tashma)
Many saw the election of an African-American president as a way to restore U.S. moral and
political standing in the hemisphere. However, President Barack Obama and his team found a changed
hemisphere in which disputes with the gringos to the north were more than just an easy way of
scoring populist points. For the countries that made up ALBA, there were genuine policy disputes that
challenged U.S. interests beyond ideology. Moreover, the region itself had become more diverse,
with competing and conflicting needs and interests from the marketfriendly policies of Chile to the knee-jerk insecurity
of Argentina and the growing diplomatic assertiveness of Brazil. Readjusting the political
image of the United States was not enough given the political and ideological shifts
that had started in 1998; the power equation within the hemisphere had shifted.
Obama’s promises are irrelevant --- the region is turning to the East for assistance
RT, 9 (The Real Truth, cites Miguel Tinker-Salas, professor of Latin American history at
Pomona College, “Latin America Looks East Where Does This Leave the United States?,”
5/10/09, http://realtruth.org/articles/090504-004-americas.html, Tashma)
United States’ Waning Influence Evidence of diminishing U.S. influence in Latin America became
evident with its exclusion from the Rio Group summit in 2008. The purpose of the annual meeting is to
address regional issues impacting Latin American and Caribbean countries. Summit leaders invited Cuba, but
excluded the United States, Portugal and Spain for the first time since the founding of the meeting. The
United States hoped to rekindle relations with many South and Central American nations at the fifth Summit of the Americas held in
April 2009. As 34 leaders from the Caribbean and Central, South and North America gathered to discuss the future of the region,
U.S. President Barack Obama promised a fresh approach to diplomacy for the hemisphere in his
opening address: “There’s no senior partner and junior partner in our relations. There’s simply engagement based on mutual
respect, and common interests, and shared values. So I’m here to launch a new chapter of engagement…” Mr. Obama also
extended an olive branch to longtime political rival Cuba in hope of a “new beginning.” In doing so,
the U.S. president endured criticism from socialist presidents Hugo Chávez of Venezuela, and Daniel Ortega of Nicaragua, who
delivered a fiery speech at the summit in which he condemned Washington’s terroristic aggression in Central America and its
isolation of Cuba’s Communist government. Miguel Tinker-Salas, professor of Latin American history at Pomona College in
Claremont, Calif., said
that the waning influence of the U.S. has recently begun to manifest itself.
“The last 10 years have produced dramatic changes in Latin America,” he said, “and one of the most
striking is the loss of the United States’ formerly towering dominance in a wide range of areas”
(Christian Science Monitor). President Obama indicated a desire for a “new beginning,” but Latin
American nations may already have found a new beginning—with growing superpowers
of Asia.
Unsustainable – AT: Plan Solves
Retaking hegemonic control of Latin American is impossible – uncontrollable
factors dictate the future of Latin America
Weeks, 11 (Gregory, associate professor of political science and director of Latin American
Studies at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte, “Don’t blame U.S. for the changes in
Latin America; LATIN AMERICA,” The Miami Herald, 12/8/11, lexis, Tashma)
Conventional wisdom holds that the United States has been ignoring Latin America, thus prompting
governments there to seek new trading partners, different investors, and fresh commitments. The United States has been too
focused on the Middle East and the “War on Terror,” the argument goes, which has served to
diminish our own influence. This is repeated endlessly. Like so many commonly accepted arguments,
there is a factual nugget there, but overall it is mistaken. It is certainly the case that the United States pays
relatively little attention to Latin America compared to the rest of the world. But that has been true for
much of the past 200 years, and therefore does not adequately explain recent change. Instead, there are
international economic forces at work that go far beyond U.S. policy. We cannot control them,
and should not pretend that we can. One of the main examples analysts and politicians alike use is China, which has
pursued economic agreements across the region and is entering markets once dominated by the
United States. China is hungry for raw materials such as soy, wood pulp, copper, iron and, of course, oil. It is willing to pay
handsomely for the commodities it wants. With its vast reserves, China is also eager to finance governments looking for loans, and
there are always takers. These
economic relationships have nothing to do with the United States, and
would have moved forward no matter what the administrations of George W. Bush or Barack Obama
did. The United States is not “losing” Latin America to China. A second example is Colombia, which had to wait six
years for a free-trade agreement to be ratified by the United States. Supposedly Colombia became tired
of waiting and therefore established trade ties not only with China, but also with the European Union,
Canada, and much of South America. For this argument to hold, we would have to believe that
Colombia would not bother looking to other parts of the world if only it had a free-trade agreement
with the United States. That is hard to swallow. Just take a look at Chile and Mexico, both of which have
those free-trade agreements yet simultaneously embrace economic globalization. Granted, U.S. presidents have
pressing interests elsewhere, and only a tiny fraction of Congress pays much attention to the region. That is not new. Meanwhile,
Latin American governments are riding high on a commodity boom and are trying to get the
best deals they can. They would not change that strategy based on anything the United States did. There
are more economic actors at the table in Latin America than ever before, and in that sense U.S. influence is not as high as
it once was. There are many different reasons for this — China’s rise, liberalization of international trade,
and the 2008 crash among them — but few relate directly to U.S. policy toward Latin America. In
other words, changing the policy will not change basic economic realities.
U.S. leadership is doomed in Latin America – it’s on a long-term, irreversible
decline
Weisbrot, 13 (Mark, director of the Centre for Economic and Policy Research, “Latin America:
The End of an Era,” International Journal of Health Services, Volume 36, Issue 4, Tashma)
The changes that have taken place in Latin America in recent years are part of an epoch-making transformation. To borrow from the
Cold War framework that still prevails in U.S. foreign policy circles: we have witnessed the collapse of the Berlin Wall, and the
formation of newly independent states. A region that has been dominated by the United States for more than a
century has now, for the most part, broken away. Of course there are still strong commercial, political, cultural
and even military ties; but as in the states of the former Soviet Union after 1990, these do not have the same economic or
political implications that they had a decade or even a few years ago. These changes seem to have been largely
misunderstood – and vastly underestimated – across the political spectrum. They are certainly noticed. Hardly a day goes by without
prominent warnings that the region – or at least a good part of it – is on the road to “populist” ruin, or worse. On the right –
including the Bush administration – this process is viewed through a Cold War prism, a Castro-Chávez-Evo Morales axis that poses
a strategic threat to the United States. Imagined or implied links to terrorism and the drug trade (little or no evidence is provided)
are sometimes added for effect, as when the State Department cut off arms sales to Venezuela on May 15 for “lack of cooperation” in
fighting terrorism. The liberal/center views are less bellicose, but similarly pessimistic about what is happening in the region.
Foreign Affairs has run three articles since the beginning of the year warning of the dangers of Latin America’s left-populist drift, as
well as sorry state of U.S.-Latin American relations. The news reports, editorials, and op-ed pages of America’s major newspapers
mostly carry the same themes. But from the point of view of the vast majority of the hemisphere, including people in the United
States, there is actually much to be optimistic about. As French President Jacques Chirac noted during a recent visit to South
America, "there is a strong movement in favor of democracy in Latin America, a movement that is growing.” He added that the
newly elected leftist presidents cannot be cause for concern because they were elected in free democratic elections. Furthermore,
there is every reason to believe that the changes of the last few years will not be reversed, and that the region will continue
in the direction of further economic and political independence, diversification of trade and finance, some
regional integration, and more successful macroeconomic policies. Not all of these economic policies and experiments will succeed,
but most importantly it appears very possible that Latin America’s long quarter-century of economic failure will be reversed in the
foreseeable future, and that its hundreds of millions of poor people will be among the main beneficiaries. Causes and Consequences:
Latin America’s Long-Term Economic Failure The most important cause of Latin America’s regional leftward shift has been vastly
misunderstood: it is the long-term economic growth failure in the region. This is something that even most critics of “neoliberalism”
– a one-word description of the last quarter-century’s economic reforms that is more common in Latin America than it is here –
have barely mentioned. Most often we read that these reforms have been successful in promoting growth, but that too many
people have been left behind and that poverty and inequality have worsened, leading to political
unrest. This explanation misses the most important, indeed historic change, that has taken place in Latin America over the last 25
years: the collapse of economic growth. If we ignore income distribution and just look at income per person – the most basic
measure of economic progress that economists use – the last quarter-century has been a disaster. From 1960 to 1980, per capita
income in Latin America grew by 82 percent, after adjusting for inflation. From 1980 to 2000, it grew by only 9 percent; and for the
first five years of this decade (2000-2005), growth has totaled about 4 percent. To find a growth performance in Latin America that
is even close to failure of the last 25 years, one has to go back more than a century, and choose a 25-year period that includes both
World War I and start of the Great Depression. Of course, Latin America also has the worst income inequality in the world. The
contrast between the luxury condos in the Barra da Tijuca neighborhood of Rio de Janeiro and the favelas in the hillsides where the
police fear to tread, or between the poor barrios of Caracas and the wealthy estates of Alta Mira jumps out at you. But inequality in
the region has not increased dramatically over the last 25 years. It is the growth failure that has deprived a generation and a half of
any chance to improve its living standards. And without growth, it is very difficult to do anything about inequality or poverty. If the
economy is growing rapidly, it is at least possible to redistribute some of the increases in income and wealth towards those who need
it most. When it is not growing, any gains for the poor must be taken from someone else – something that is difficult to do without
violence. Poverty and inequality are glaringly obvious in Latin America, and take the form of flesh and blood, street children and
beggars – whereas economic growth is an abstract concept that most people do not follow. So it is understandable that the main
cause of Latin America’s political changes is overlooked. But economic growth – which is primarily defined by increases in
productivity, or output per hour of labor – is vital, especially over such a long period of time. It is the main reason that we live better
than our grandparents. Mexico would have average living standards at the level of Spain today if its economy had simply continued
to grow at the rate that it grew prior to 1980. There would be far fewer Mexicans willing to take the risks of illegal immigration to the
United States. Since these pre-1980 growth rates were good but not spectacular (e.g. as compared to South Korea or Taiwan), there
is no obvious reason that they shouldn’t be the relevant level of comparison. In Washington, policy-makers engage in
a special form of denial about Latin America’s economic failure. After all, they have gotten most of what they
wanted: governments have drastically reduced restrictions on international trade and on investment flows. Public enterprises have
been privatized, even including social security systems in many countries. Governments are running tighter budgets and central
banks are more independent and tougher on inflation. The state-led industrial policies and development planning of the past have
been abandoned. But the cumulative results have been an economic disaster, and so it is not surprising that presidential candidates
who campaigned explicitly against “neoliberalism” have in recent years won elections in Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Ecuador,
Uruguay, and Venezuela. The question of which policies contributed to the many and varied national economic failures is more
complex, and the possible alternatives for restoring growth and development – only now beginning to be explored – vary greatly by
country. But it should be clear that what we are now witnessing is a response to this epoch-making economic failure, and – following
a series of revolts at the ballot box, and some in the streets – a number of governments looking for more practical and effective ways
to make capitalism work. The long era of “neoliberalism” in Latin America has not yet come to an end –
that end is just beginning , for reasons discussed below. What really defines this as a new era is that the influence of
the United States in a region that was until very recently its “backyard” has plummeted so rapidly ,
drastically, and probably irreversibly, that the current situation is truly unprecedented in the
modern history of the hemisphere.
Unsustainable – AT: Economic Influence
China has taken the lead economically in Latin America
Sabatini, 13 (Christopher, Editor in Chief of Americas Quarterly and Senior Director of Policy
at the Americas Society and the Council of the Americas, “WILL LATIN AMERICA MISS U.S.
HEGEMONY?,” Journal of International Affairs, Volume 66, Issue 2, Spring 2013, pg. 1-XVI,
Proquest, Tashma)
In the economic and financial realm, the influence of the United States has also become less
significant but has far from disappeared. The primary reason for this relative decline of influence is the
rise of China and the economic growth of Brazil. China has become a regional commercial
presence and an implicit, though perhaps unintentional, political counterweight in the region. China's torrid
economic growth over the last decade has had three effects. The first is an increase in the prices and demand for commodities such
as iron ore, copper, oil, soy beans, and meat produced by countries such as Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Peru, and Venezuela.12 The
resulting global commodities boom has fueled economic growth in these countries over the last seven years, averaging over 5 percent
a year. The second effect has been the growing importance of Chinese markets and investments to
raw-material exporting economies like Argentina,
Brazil, Chile, Ecuador, Peru, and Venezuela. Today, China
is the number one trade partner for Chile and Brazil and ranks in the top five for Peru,
Argentina, and Venezuela - allowing all of these countries to diversify their exports away from
the United States and thus lessening the sway of the U.S. market. China is also the fastest growing
source of foreign direct investment in countries as politically diverse as Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador, Mexico, and
Peru. Third, due to the increased value of exports (principally, though not only, to China) and investment and
commercial loans, the region is facing a fiscal bonus. This bonus has allowed countries like Ecuador,
Argentina, and Venezuela to avoid private credit markets in the West and has reduced the power of
U.S. banks and the international financial institutions over sovereign debt, much the way they did in the 1980s.
Unsustainable – AT: Military Influence
Sustaining leadership via military power fails
Sabatini, 13 (Christopher, Editor in Chief of Americas Quarterly and Senior Director of Policy
at the Americas Society and the Council of the Americas, “WILL LATIN AMERICA MISS U.S.
HEGEMONY?,” Journal of International Affairs, Volume 66, Issue 2, Spring 2013, pg. 1-XVI,
Proquest, Tashma)
Understanding the Realities of U.S. Power Today in Latin America To get a real measure of where the United States stands today, we
need to consider in what ways U.S. power has been exercised and has worked in the Western Hemisphere. Historically, U.S. power
has come from three main sources: military, economic and financial, and diplomatic, and to those should be added the admittedly
vague factors of moral and aspirational power. Of these three main sources of power, the first is one of the least relevant today. The
era in which the United States could unilaterally send in its marines to occupy a country has ended.
One need only see the fraught debate over actual U.S. military involvement in Mexico's recent war on
narcotraffickers to realize that military intervention (even at the invitation of the local government) in Latin
American countries is conditioned on international and domestic politics and norms. Yet even
during the era of U.S. hegemony, Latin American countries benefited from the umbrella of US security. The United States' military
dominance over the hemisphere had the benefit of preventing the need for strong national militaries that could thwart outside
intervention (though too often those militaries diverted their attentions to meddling in domestic politics and pursuing political
opponents). Latin American governments did not need to worry about fending extra-hemispheric threats thanks to U.S. interests,
and armed forces with limited offensive capabilities also reduced the risk of border conflicts. At the same time, U.S. support through
security and technical cooperation has helped governments in Colombia, Mexico, and Central America in their battles with
organized narcotraffickers and criminal groups.
Other Latin American countries prove –US supported insurgencies fail
Crandall 12 (Russell Crandall – associate professor of International Politics at Davison College
-- Principal Director for the Western Hemisphere at the U.S. Department of Defense in 2009
and Director for Andean Affairs at the National Security Council in 2010-11 -- "A Hot Cold War"
-- November 30th, 2012
www3.davidson.edu/cms/Documents/Academics/Departments/Political%20Science/Hot%20C
old%20War.pdf) SM
***Note: Crandall is citing historian Hal Brands (Professor of Public Policy and
History at Duke)
Brands concludes that, while often effective in helping defeat the myriad Marxist insurgencies in the region, the
US-supported counter-insurgencies proved detrimental to democratic reform’ and helped
provoke an ideological and diplomatic backlash that damaged Washington’s standing in the
region. Brands might have added that the extent to which a US-manufactured counter-insurgency ‘blowback’
occurred depended on each case at hand. One could make a reasonable argument that US counterinsurgency training
and support in Guatemala in the 1960s and 1970s had a far more morally and strategically dubious outcome than, for example,
similar anti-insurgent training and assistance in Colombia, Bolivia, or El Salvador during roughly the same years.
Military power doesn’t determine the effectiveness of U.S. influence in the region -- and if it did, hegemony is declining anyways
Carranza, 4 (Dr. Mario E., Associate Professor of Political Science, Texas A & M UniversityKingsville, Ph.D., University of Chicago, “LATIN AMERICAN PERSPECTIVE: MERCOSUR,
THE FREE TRADE AREA OF THE AMERICAS, AND THE FUTURE OF U.S. HEGEMONY IN
LATIN AMERICA,” 27 Fordham Int'l L.J. 1029, February 2004, lexis, Tashma)
Part of the ambiguity surrounding the issue of U.S. hegemony in Latin America stems from the
use of different definitions of international hegemony in contemporary literature. Realist
scholars tend to equate hegemony with military power. For example, William Wohlforth argues that the gap
between U.S. military capabilities and its potential competitors is so wide that there is no danger of "hegemonic rivalry" (hegemonic
wars) and "the only options available to second-tier states [such as Brazil] are to bandwagon with the polar power [the United
States] ... or at least to take no action that could incur its focused enmity." 85 A better definition of hegemony is the one
provided by Antonio Gramsci, which combines the concepts of coercion (military force) and consent
( ideological leadership ) as in the often quoted equation: "State = political society + civil society, in other words hegemony
protected by the armor of coercion." 86 For Gramsci, hegemony cannot be based only on sheer force. If one applies Gramsci's
definition of hegemony to United States-Latin American relations, it becomes clear that the Bush administration has failed to
exercise ideological leadership in the FTAA negotiations. During Bush's administration, there
has been a structural shift
in the balance between force and consent in the exercise of U.S. hegemony. The Bush
administration has a tendency to use force without (or with very little) consent, as in the case of the U.S.'
invasion of Iraq, which was strongly opposed in Europe and Latin America. 87 Robert Zoellick's strong-arms trade
strategy after the Cancun debacle fits nicely in George W. Bush's go-it-alone foreign policy which is unwittingly
encouraging the emergence of anti-U.S. coalitions , such as the group of [*1059] twenty-two developing nations at
Cancun ("G-22") that seek to redefine the rules of the game of globalization. Even if one uses a realist, narrow
definition of hegemony as "the power of one state to enforce its will over others," 88 the Miami Trade
Ministerial Meeting shows that U.S. hegemony in Latin America is declining. Brazil, supported by most
Latin American trade ministers, managed to block the U.S. attempt to have its way on the deep integration agenda without making
concessions regarding agricultural subsidies. 89 On the other hand, an FTAA a la carte gives the United States enough room to
exercise its considerable structural power over smaller Latin American countries, such as Panama and the Dominican Republic. 90
Alliance DA – Generic – Uniqueness Wall
Regional organizations are on the rise with the decline of the US in
Latin America
Brand et al 12, Alexander Brand is Lecturer and Post-Doc Researcher at the Department of
Political Science at the University of Mainz. Susan McEwen-Fial is Lecturer at the Department
of Political Science at the University of Mainz. Wolfgang Muno is Visiting Professor of Political
Science at the University of Erfurt. Andrea Ribeiro Hoffmann is Lecturer at the Willy Brandt
School of Public Policy, University of Erfurt. (04/2012, “BRICs and U.S. Hegemony: Theoretical
Reflections on Shifting Power Patterns and Empirical Evidence from Latin America”,Mainz
Papers on International and European Politics (MPIEP) Paper No. 4,
http://international.politics.uni-mainz.de/files/2012/10/mpiep04.pdf,jj)
The main institutional arena in Latin America is the Organization of American States (OAS),¶ founded in 1948. The driving force
behind the OAS was and still is the U.S. In comparison,¶ several
institutional innovations like Mercosur,
UNASUR, ALBA, and just recently CELAC , are¶ efforts of Latin American emancipation
and balancing. As Raúl Zibechi, a journalist of Mexico’s¶ centre-left La Jornada newspaper said in this regard: ”The
creation of the Community of Latin¶ American and Caribbean States is part of a global and
continental shift, characterised by the¶ decline of U.S. hegemony and the rise of a group of
regional blocs that form part of the new¶ global balance” (Zibechi 2010).¶ A more recent institutional
innovation on behalf of the U.S. with the aim to promote hemispheric cooperation was the creation of the Summit of the Americas,
meetings of the head of¶ states and governments of all democratic countries of the hemisphere, therefore Cuba was and¶ is excluded.
The first summit, held 1994 in Miami, was initiated by Bill Clinton. The aim of¶ the summit was to promote democracy and markets,
especially the FTAA. As mentioned earlier,¶ at the Fourth Summit in Mar del Plata, the FTAA practically died. The next summit in
2009 in¶ Trinidad and Tobago was used by Barack Obama to start a charm offensive, declaring a new¶ era of good neighborhood
policy. Although this was widely perceived as positive by the media,¶ people and governments in Latin America, disappointment
soon arose because actions did not¶ follow words (Gandasegui 2011). The last summit in Cartagena, Colombia, in April
2012 clearly¶ showed this disappointment. Several
Latin American states criticized the U.S.
especially for the¶ Cuban policy and for the war on drugs, the presidents of Venezuela, Ecuador and Nicaragua
did¶ not participate, Ecuador officially in order to protest against the exclusion of Cuba. The U.S.¶ insisted on excluding Cuba also
from the next summit, upholding the democracy clause of the¶ meeting. This dissent inhibited a final declaration.¶ Aside from this
initiative, U.S. institutional innovations in the hemisphere have been limited ¶ to the above mentioned
bilateral trade treaties and the security initiatives. This might have¶ provided both China and Brazil with the opportunity to
strengthen ties with Latin American¶ countries vis-à-vis the U.S.
Alliance DA – Generic – Link Wall
Decline in US leadership in Latin America allows for the formation of alliances
Shifter, 8 – Vice President for Policy, Inter-American Dialogue in Washington, Adjunct
Professor of Latin American Studies at Georgetown University's School of Foreign Service,
member of the Council on Foreign Relations (Michael, “No Way to Influence Latin America, The
Washington Post, October 9th, 2008, LexisNexis) //HAL
The Oct. 6 editorial "A Choice for Latin America" described the regional situation in excessively stark terms, leading to a misguided
policy prescription. Latin America is indeed going through profound changes, some of which are more
salutary than others. While the erosion of democratic checks and balances is troubling, the growing participation of once-
marginalized groups in the political process in Venezuela, Bolivia and Ecuador is a welcome trend. It is important not to exaggerate
Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez's sway in the region. The editorial's assertion that Ecuador, Nicaragua, Bolivia and Cuba are
"satellites" of Mr. Chávez and that "Honduras and Paraguay may be swinging his way" overstated Mr. Chávez's influence and
glossed over fundamental differences among these countries. As U.S. influence declines, Latin American nations
are understandably diversifying their alliances and jockeying to advance their interests.However
tempting it might be for Washington to cut off trade preferences and aid to governments that
"dismantle democratic institutions and attack U.S. interests," it is hard to see how such punitive
measures would improve U.S. standing in Latin America. On the contrary, by alienating the United States from
regional allies such as Brazil and Chile while fostering anti-American sentiment among the hundreds of thousands who would lose
their livelihoods, these moves would undermine U.S. interests. As president, Barack Obama or John McCain will
hopefully try to repair U.S. relations with Latin America, but the choice is not between ignoring
the region and disciplining governments that resist U.S. policies. Happily, there is a middle ground.
The United States can help shape an environment more congenial to its interests -- but only if it resists myopic, self-defeating
measures and stays engaged even in unfriendly places.
Alliance DA – Generic – LA Stability Impact
Regional partnerships are the best way to counter problems in the region
Alvarao 13 (Liza Torres Alvarado -- Diplomatic Courier for the International Relations and
Security Network "The US Must Re-evaluate its Foreign Policy in Latin America" May 31st 2013
www.isn.ethz.ch/Digital-Library/Articles/Detail/?id=164370&lng=en) SM
Historically, relations between Latin America and the United States have been complex, yet constantly
evolving. During the 1960s, political changes and social movements challenged the structural basis of United States’ hegemony in
the hemisphere. The election of Salvador Allende in Chile, the arrival of Peronism in Argentina, and the development of relations
between nationalist governments of the time such as Peru, Bolivia, and Mexico became an obstacle for the United States.
Washington re-established its power in the 1970s by revoking any policy that interfered with U.S. interests in the region by
supporting military figures. The United States needed to suppress every nationalist, socialist democratic and popular movement,
over fears of the spread of Communism in its backyard. Dictatorships secured financial support through easy access to loans from
the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund. The economic support from United States for certain loyal groups brought
great inequalities, unemployment, and poverty in the region. During the 1980s social upheavals occurred against Pinochet’s military
dictatorship in Chile and Argentina’s military junta. Citizens demanded free elections and social improvements, such as the
transition to civilian rule and direct popular elections. In both cases, amid economic turmoil, the military rulers were willing to cede
some power to semi-democratic regimes controlled by elites in exchange for the irreversibility of privatization and respect for the
status of the military. The supremacy of the United States deepened in the 1990s, and neoliberal policies favored corporations at the
expense of disadvantaged populations. The collapse of the Soviet Union deepened the economic crisis in Cuba, which reduced its
support for leftist movements in Latin America. In Argentina, President Carlos Menem privatized public enterprises, while in Brazil,
President Fernando Henrique Cardoso privatized state companies that generated significant revenue for the country. President
Carlos Salinas in Mexico privatized 110 enterprises and signed the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) with the United
States, whereby the U.S. was allowed access to raw materials and other services at very low prices. These policies provoked action
from social movements aligned with the poor. The financial crisis in Argentina led to the overthrow of Antonio De la Rua. In Bolivia,
insurrections demanded the removal of Sanchez de Lozada, a staunch follower of Washington’s policies. In Ecuador, uprisings
prevented the privatization of oil and gas industries. In Brazil, the peasant movement led to the election of syndical leader Lula Da
Silva as President. In Venezuela, U.S. efforts to destabilize the government of Hugo Chavez were unsuccessful and instead
strengthened the morale of leftist movements across the region. Subsequently, regional leaders either nationalized industries or
broke agreements with international oil corporations or others revolving around natural resources, as occurred in Bolivia with the
gas companies and in Venezuela with the oil company. As these social movements found solidarity, U.S. influence was weakened.
None of the promises of better standards of living from neo-liberal policies had materialized, and free market policies had
bankrupted farmers. Deregulation destroyed the banks, and the middle class lost their savings. At the hemispheric level, the U.S.’s
proposal to remove barriers to trade through the Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA) was subsequently rejected by Venezuela,
Ecuador, Bolivia, Argentina, and Brazil in the mid-2000s. Subsequently, ALBA (Bolivarian Alliance for the Americas) was born as a
counterpart to the FTAA, changing the dynamics in the hemisphere. The Alliance posed as a new model, with the purpose being
international cooperation based on the idea of social and economic integration of Latin America and the Caribbean countries.
China appeared as an alternative market for the sale of raw materials from Latin America,
reducing dependence on U.S. markets. Failed attempts by the United States to destabilize Chavez’s administration
radicalized the Venezuelan government's position, which privileged sub-regional energy agreements and broke contracts with
American oil companies as the decade progressed. Venezuela became an important counterweight to the United States, not only for
its ability to provide an alternative to U.S. policies in the region, but also because oil revenues had enabled the country take Cuba’s
place in financing an anti-imperialist crusade across the continent. Ironically, oil prices rose as a result of increased demand caused
by the Iraq war, further helping Venezuela in this mission and weakening the U.S.’s influence in the Western Hemisphere as it was
focused its efforts on dual war fronts on the other side of the globe. Although there has been a decline in U.S.
influence in the region, its presence is still there. In Venezuela, for example, U.S. oil companies have seen their
actions limited, yet they still operate there. The United States is Venezuela’s top commercial partner, as Venezuela supplies 12
percent of U.S. oil imports. Relations between the United States and Latin America have experienced
cyclical ups and downs. Geographically, the United States and Latin America are linked and have a natural shared market,
so there will always be a relationship of one sort or another. The United States will continue to seek to exert its influence over the
region, whether through future plans for the placement of military bases or the promotion of bilateral trade agreements. Leftist
governments will have to address challenges such as those caused by social divisions and economic inequality. They will likely
continue to focus on implementing their leftist discourse, particularly in the wake of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez’s death.
However, it is important to consider that neoliberal philosophies are also still pervasive in many countries of Latin America. This is
an advantage for the United States, giving it an opportunity to push for further privatization, but Latin American leftist movements
should evaluate themselves and take actions to if they are to avoid a return of neoliberal policies of the 1990s. All that said, how
can the United States improve its foreign policy towards Latin America? There are many
problems in the region that should be faced together. Accepting this reality is the beginning to
improving relations. Transnational organized crime, drug trafficking, and immigration
problems are worth making joint efforts to resolve. The U.S. should encourage the strengthening
of political and economic ties in the Americas as well as promoting compliance of international
commitments as a sign of willingness to improve relations. There are many hemispheric conventions that
provide the legal framework to begin to work together against negative outcomes. An example is the Declaration on Security in the
Americas signed by the countries of the hemisphere in 2003. This document describes the new concept of multidimensional
security, and incorporates as new threats issues such as terrorism, drug trafficking and organized crime, environmental degradation,
natural resource and food scarcity, and uncontrolled population growth and migration. The United States should take
active part in establishing institutional networks through which policies can be coordinated, and
through these promote the expansion of employment opportunities for the population, stimulate
fair trade agreements, and encourage the protection of the hemisphere against drug trafficking
and organized crime. These are all proposals that would certainly help to create better relations
between the states of the Western Hemisphere. Relations between the United States and Latin
America are complex and changing. If they are based on cooperation, with respect to the
principles of self-determination and non-intervention, they can become stronger. As such, the
U.S. must be willing to re-evaluate its foreign policy and perspectives toward the rest of the
Western Hemisphere.
That solves global warfare
Rochlin, 94 [James Francis, Professor of Political Science at Okanagan U. College,
Discovering the Americas: The Evolution of Canadian Foreign Policy Towards Latin America,
130-131, Wake Early Bird File]
While there were economic motivations for Canadian policy in Central America, security considerations were perhaps more
important. Canada possessed an interest in promoting stability in the face of a potential decline of U.S. hegemony in the
Americas. Perceptions of declining U.S. influence in the region – which had some credibility in 1979-1984 due to
the wildly inequitable divisions of wealth in some U.S. client states in Latin America, in addition to political repression, underdevelopment, mounting external debt, anti-American sentiment produced by decades of subjugation to U.S. strategic and
economic interests, and so on – were linked to the prospect of explosive events occurring in the
hemisphere. Hence, the Central American imbroglio was viewed as a fuse which could ignite a cataclysmic process throughout
the region. Analysts at the time worried that in a worstcase scenario, instability created by a regional war,
beginning in Central America and spreading elsewhere in
Latin America, might preoccupy Washington to
the extent that the United States would be unable to perform adequately its important
hegemonic role in the international arena – a concern expressed by the director of research for Canada’s
Standing Committee Report on Central America. It was feared that such a predicament could generate
increased global instability and perhaps even a hegemonic war . This is one of the motivations which led
Canada to become involved in efforts at regional conflict resolution, such as Contadora, as will be discussed in the next chapter.
Alliance DA – ALBA – 1NC
Decline of U.S. influence in Latin America promotes the development of new
organizations --- specifically ALBA
Sabatini, 13 (Christopher, Editor in Chief of Americas Quarterly and Senior Director of Policy
at the Americas Society and the Council of the Americas, “WILL LATIN AMERICA MISS U.S.
HEGEMONY?,” Journal of International Affairs, Volume 66, Issue 2, Spring 2013, pg. 1-XVI,
Proquest, Tashma)
The United States' reduced ability to unilaterally get what it wants in the hemisphere is already
shaping Latin American countries' calculations of domestic and foreign policies and the formation of multilateral
alliances. The last ten years have witnessed the emergence of regional and multilateral powers
seeking to assert regional diplomatic power, if not to specifically reduce the role of the United
States in intra-regional diplomacy. The most obvious and pointed example is the Bolivarian Alliance for the Peoples of
our Americas (ALBA) formed by former President of Venezuela Hugo Chavez, which includes Bolivia, Cuba,
Ecuador, Nicaragua, and Venezuela among others in a bloc vowed to oppose a now-defunct plan to
establish a hemisphere-wide free-trade agreement. At the same time, as its economy rebounded quickly and
strongly from the 2007 global financial crisis until 2012, Brazil has sought a greater regional and even global role, exerting its newfound diplomatic and economic muscle, often as an alternative to U.S. influence in matters as diverse as the threat of political
upheaval in Venezuela to the UN drive to sanction Iran for its nuclear ambitions.3
That’s key to a transition away from neoliberalism
Cole, 11 (Ken, Honorary Research Fellow, International Institute for the Study of Cuba at
London Metropolitan University, “Progress into the 21st Century: the Bolivarian Alliance for the
Peoples of Our America,” International Journal of Cuban Studies, Volume 3, Issues 2 & 3,
Summer-Autumn 2011, pg. 116, Tashma)
The political and ideological stakes could not be higher. The challenge is not simply to institutionally challenge
United States' market hegemony and competitive advantage, as with UNASUR. The resolve is to eliminate the
capitalist organisation of social existence itself. The Bolivarian Alliance for the Peoples of Our
America is a union of poor countries challenging the oppressive consequences of (unequal) market
exchange and economic exploitation. The richer countries that have spearheaded UNASUR (such as Brazil and Argentina),
and are politically, ideologically and culturally bonded to a capitalist social consciousness, are unlikely to become full members of
ALBA any time soon (although, no doubt, will continue to expediently take economic advantage of ALBA initiatives). The continental
reach of ALBA extends beyond the eight member states, and additionally includes Argentina, Brazil, Belize, Grenada, Montserrat,
Turks and Caicos Islands, the Bahamas, British Virgin Islands, Guyana, St Kitts and Nevis, Suriname, Jamaica, Saint Lucia,
Colombia, Paraguay and Uruguay. The ALBA agenda contains a hemispherical affiliation to address common regional needs for:
oil/petroleum, information and the media, instruction and education, health, natural gas, sport, culture, etc. (see Cole 2008).
Various institutional components of the ALBA process regionally address: petroleum (PETROSUR); media (TELESUR); education
(Universidad del Sur); international credit (the ALBA Bank); a regional seed bank and Agro-Ecology School organised by Brazil's
Landless Workers Movement; regional health initiatives, such as Cuba's Operacion Milagro to tackle ophthalmic problems, and
Latin American medical schools in Havana and Caracas, and a planned regional natural gas distribution system (Gasducto del Sur).
ALBA is a region-wide, progressive, evolutionary initiative, to direct and harness the global division of
labour of the twenty-first century to enhance human potentials and individuals' well-being,
extirpating the neoliberal, capitalist project , which is financial globalisation. Public policy
addressing human needs is intended to usurp free-market exchange for profit, to the advantage of
los humildes--the poor and disadvantaged masses of Latin America--Our America (see Cole 2010a, b): hence,
the inclusion of non-member Latin American countries to begin to lay the foundations of a longterm, regional, evolutionary process to effect progress.
Unchecked neoliberal expansions risks extinction
Nhanenge 7 [Jytte Masters @ U South Africa, “ECOFEMINSM: TOWARDS INTEGRATING
THE CONCERNS OF WOMEN, POOR PEOPLE AND NATURE INTO DEVELOPMENT]
There is today an increasing critique of economic development, whether it takes place in the North or in the South. Although
the world on average generates more and more wealth, the riches do not appear to "trickle down" to the
poor and improve their material well-being. Instead, poverty and economic inequality is growing. Despite the
existence of development aid for more than half a century, the Third World seems not to be "catching up" with
the First World. Instead, militarism, dictatorship and human repression is multiplied. Since the mid
1970, the critique of global economic activities has intensified due to the escalating deterioration
of the natural environment. Modernization, industrialisation and its economic activities have been
directly linked to increased scarcity of natural resources and generation of pollution, which increases
global temperatures and degrades soils, lands, water, forests and air. The latter threat is of great
significance, because without a healthy environment human beings and animals will not be able to
survive. Most people believed that modernization of the world would improve material well-being for all. However, faced with
its negative side effects and the real threat of extinction, one must conclude that somewhere
along the way "progress" went astray. Instead of material plenty, economic development generated a
violent, unhealthy and unequal world. It is a world where a small minority live in material luxury,
while millions of people live in misery. These poor people are marginalized by the global
economic system. They are forced to survive from degraded environments; they live without personal or social security; they
live in abject poverty, with hunger, malnutrition and sickness; and they have no possibility to speak up for themselves and demand a
fair share of the world's resources. The majority of these people are women, children, traditional peoples, tribal peoples, people of
colour and materially poor people (called women and Others). They are,
together with nature, dominated by the
global system of economic development imposed by the North. It is this scenario, which is the subject of the
dissertation. The overall aim is consequently to discuss the unjustified domination of women, Others and nature and to show how
the domination of women and Others is interconnected with the domination of nature. A good place
to start a discussion about domination of women, Others and nature is to disclose how they disproportionately must carry the
negative effects from global economic development. The below discussion is therefore meant to give an idea of the "flip-side" of
modernisation. It gives a gloomy picture of what "progress" and its focus on economic growth has meant for women, poor people
and the natural environment. The various complex and inter-connected, negative impacts have been ordered into four crises. The
categorization is inspired by Paul Ekins and his 1992 book "A new world order; grassroots movements for global change". In it,
Ekins argues that humanity is faced with four interlocked crises of unprecedented magnitude. These
crises have the potential to destroy whole ecosystems and to extinct the human race. The first
crisis is the spread of nuclear and other weapons of mass destruction, together with the high level of
military spending. The second crisis is the increasing number of people afflicted with hunger and
poverty. The third crisis is the environmental degradation. Pollution, destruction of ecosystems and extinction
of species are increasing at such a rate that the biosphere is under threat. The fourth crisis is
repression and denial of fundamental human rights by governments, which prevents people from developing their
potential. It is highly likely that one may add more crises to these four, or categorize them differently, however, Ekins's division is
suitable for the present purpose. (Ekins 1992: 1).
Alliance DA – ALBA – Link Wall
Lack of U.S. hegemony in the region catalyzes the development of ALBA
Crandall, 11 (Russell, Associate Professor of Political Science at Davdison College, “The PostAmerican Hemisphere: Power and Politics in an Autonomous Latin America,” Foreign Affairs,
Volume 90, Issue 3, May-June 2011, pg. 83, Tashma)
With the end of U.S. hegemony in Latin America, the region's authoritarians -Venezuela's Chavez,
Cuba's Fidel and Raul Castro, and Nicaragua's Daniel Ortega -have taken the opportunity to expand their own
influence. Chavez, the Castro brothers, and Ortega form part of the Bolivarian Alliance for the Americas
(ALBA), a band of leftist governments led by Venezuela. Contending that Latin America remains shackled by the imperial United
States and its lackeys at the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, members of this group remain committed to a
nonaligned diplomacy and seek friendships with the governments of such countries as Iran, Russia, and, to some extent, China.
With the United States less involved in the region, the ALBA bloc will continue to play its
cherished role as diplomatic spoiler and its members will face
they transform their societies.
far fewer constraints on how radically
Alliance DA – ALBA – Neolib Impact – 2NC
ALBA is necessary to organize the masses into a global movement against the
capitalist system
Cole, 11 (Ken, Honorary Research Fellow, International Institute for the Study of Cuba at
London Metropolitan University, “Progress into the 21st Century: the Bolivarian Alliance for the
Peoples of Our America,” International Journal of Cuban Studies, Volume 3, Issues 2 & 3,
Summer-Autumn 2011, pg. 116, Tashma)
As human potential, in the capitalist, globalised, era of social organisation, is exhausted with the machinations
of international market exchange, ALBA, an emergent, progressive, initiative, advancing the ethics of human
existence, seeks to offer an alternative to the 'premises now in existence'. The exponential growth in
productive potential, effected by the emergence of a global division of labour, is being harnessed to enhance individuals' well-being.
To this end, the political hegemony of the ruling order in capitalist society , what Jeff Faux denotes as a 'global
class'--'globalization.[is] not just a borderless market, but a borderless class system' (Faux 2006: 1)--is under challenge. The
political and economic hegemony of this global ruling class has been debilitated by successive, deepening, economic crises, which,
oxymoronically in market societies, increases exploitation and exacerbates the social and economic predicament of capital
accumulation. The injustice of social production in the service of private enterprise becomes ever more
apparent, which presages human consciousness (and social organisation) evolving to a higher plane:
What we have to deal with here is a communist society, not as it has developed on its own foundations, but, on the contrary, just as it
emerges from capitalist society; which is thus in every respect, economically, morally and intellectually, still stamped with the birth
marks of the old society from whose womb it emerges. (Karl Marx 1972, quoted in Guevara 1964: 186) The
progressive
warrant of the Bolivarian Alliance for the Peoples of Our America is now revealed. With globalisation
and the emergence of an international division of labour and a 'borderless class system', individuals' struggles to realise their social
potentials are merging into a 'borderless class struggle'. The struggle to challenge and change the conditioning
circumstances of social existence, which, in a globalised world, necessarily are international in scope,
is regional in reach. It is an endeavour to advance social consciousness and to raise citizens'
awareness of cultural injustice to a global level. Concomitantly, it is also a process of building empathy
and creating solidarity, without which the multitude of exploited individuals would be stymied
in their efforts to organise themselves into a social force to prosecute their class interests and
enrich their life chances.
The growth of ALBA sparks a third world movement against the hegemonic and
neoliberal world order --- distinct from past attempts
Miller, 10 (Rosalie, graduate of the University of Auckland Faculty of Law and is now a
practising barrister in London, Mohsen al Attar, lecturer in law, University of Auckland and was
previously at Osgoode Hall Law School and York University, Auckland, “Towards an
Emancipatory International Law: the Bolivarian reconstruction,” Third World Quarterly,
Volume 31, Issue 3, pg. 347-363, Taylor and Francis, Tashma)
In this article, we argue that a unique South American treaty known as ALBA—the Bolivarian Alliance for the Americas—puts
forward a cohesive counter-vision of international law rooted in notions of complementarity and
human solidarity. We further argue that Third World Approaches to International Law (TWAIL) scholars might use
this initiative as a springboard to push forward a long-overdue reform of the international legal
regime. While, on its own, ALBA is unlikely to pose much of a challenge to the structural imbalances that permeate global
society, when juxtaposed alongside the many initiatives of the Bolivarian Revolution, it appears to
possess significant democratic potential. With both scholarly and popular support, ALBA may even have
the capability of sparking a renewal of a united Third World movement. For decades
Third World legal scholars have challenged the existing international legal regime, confronting
the structural imbalances that permeate contemporary global society. The Third World Approaches to
International Law (TWAIL) movement has consistently worked towards producing a credible critique of
international law, primarily by identifying procedures and structures injurious to Third World states and
peoples. The aim has been to redress the historical biases that pervade the global order and that undermine Third World well-
being. Yet, despite decades of struggle, historical power imbalances persist in the international legal regime, as does material
deprivation within Third World societies. In contrast to Bhupinder Chimni, we argue that this ‘failure’ lies not with TWAIL
scholars for their inability to articulate a cohesive counter-vision but, rather, is
a result of the forceful counterchallenges waged by First World actors, unmoved by the Third World plight and unwilling to
surrender First World political power. Moreover, and more importantly, the triumph of such a grand legal
(and social) reformative project necessitates a veritable rebirth of global social relations, itself
dependent on political and popular will. Impetus for such a project has been largely missing;
that is, until now. We argue that a unique South American treaty known as ALBA embodies this will and offers
TWAIL scholars the opportunity to actualise their reformative aspirations. In the Bolivarian Alliance for the
Americas (ALBA), we find a platform from which TWAIL might transcend its reactive nature and develop a proactive character.1
Building on a practical prototype that is shaping a participatory model of democratic engagement and a progressive model of social
relations, we argue that ALBA's philosophy and substantive workings present the structure needed for the
reinvention of international law along similarly equitable lines: from a formal regulatory regime
to a substantive emancipatory paradigm , from a purely Eurocentric endeavour to one representative of the multitude
of global society.
Alliance DA – ALBA – AT: Chavez Death
Chavez’s death will revitalize ALBA --- brings in more effective leadership and gets
China on board
Ellis, 13 (Dr. R. Evan, associate professor with the William J. Perry Center for Hemispheric
Defense Studies in Washington, D.C., “Without Venezuela's Chavez, ALBA Could Turn to
China,” World Politics Review, 1/23/13,
http://www.worldpoliticsreview.com/articles/12658/without-venezuelas-chavez-alba-couldturn-to-china, Tashma)
Although it is difficult to predict the precise course of Venezuela’s current leadership transition, it is almost certain that President
Hugo Chavez will pass away within the coming weeks or months. His departure will impact not only Venezuela,
but also the Bolivarian Alliance for the Americas (ALBA), the regional bloc that Chavez founded to promote
his vision of Bolivarian socialism. While conventional wisdom assumes these impacts will be
mostly negative, this is not necessarily the case. In fact, another outcome is possible: A
rejuvenated ALBA could take shape, one centered on a new coalition of pragmatists
and restructured around economic cooperation with China. Vice President Nicolas Maduro and
National Assembly chief Diosdado Cabello, either of whom might succeed Chavez in the short term, will attempt to maintain the
status quo in Venezuela for as long as possible. But change will come quickly once Chavez’s death is officially recognized. The
constitutional requirement for elections within 30 days of the president’s death is not only legally unambiguous, it has become a
cornerstone of the current debate. The Venezuelan ruling elite may be thoroughly corrupt, but they are pragmatic; they will likely
gamble that permitting an election in which they control the machinery of the state is less risky than ignoring the requirement, given
a military whose guidepost during crises has consistently been its responsibility to defend the constitution. Generalized violence,
whether spontaneous or orchestrated, could always derail elections, yet the incentives are strong for both Chavez’s loyalists and the
opposition to seek legitimacy through the ballot box. Virtually any victor in such elections would likely pursue a centrist course.
Henrique Capriles, the probable opposition candidate for president, might do so out of conviction, yet any opposition victor would
face a Venezuelan National Assembly dominated by Chavistas. On the other hand, if the Chavista candidate -- probably Maduro, but
possibly Cabello -- won, he would need to establish his legitimacy, and might cultivate allies in the opposition as a hedge against
Chavista rivals. For any post-Chavez government, a tempting option to free up resources to address domestic needs and
constituencies would be to cut low-interest financing for oil sold under the auspices of Petrocaribe, a Caribbean energy cooperation
agreement that has sent $12 billion in subsidized oil to its 18 member countries since 2005. The loss of oil subsidies could prompt
the exit from Petrocaribe of Caribbean states such as Dominica, although committed regimes such as that of Suriname President
Desi Bouterse would likely remain. Chavez’s successor might also target ALBA for funding cuts, although the organization’s
symbolism as Chavez’s international political legacy would likely inhibit a new Venezuelan
president from defunding it completely. In a smaller ALBA, without Chavez’s dominant personality, the voice of
Ecuadorian President Rafael Correa would gain prominence, elevating his more intellectually
coherent and better managed approach for leveraging Chinese resources into a new model for
sustaining ALBA as a bloc. The 12th ALBA summit, which is scheduled for the early 2013 but will probably delayed due to
Chavez’s condition, could serve to launch this transition. Since 2009, Ecuador has received almost $8 billion in loans
from China and used them relatively effectively to transform the nation’s power infrastructure, in
particular with four major new hydroelectric projects and a $12 billion refinery, as well as to make major improvements to Ecuador’s
road infrastructure. Correa has also used Chinese companies both to spearhead new mining investment and to develop the
petroleum sector alongside Western firms. It is this kind of effective use of Chinese capital that ALBA as a whole needs to survive
decreased Venezuelan funding. And
ALBA will provide Correa with the arena he needs to fill the
leadership vacuum Chavez will leave behind. The timing is also about right, with Chinese projects blossoming
across the bloc, including a satellite launch, a new refinery and a possible $30 billion canal project in Nicaragua; another satellite
launch as well as hydroelectric, petroleum and mining projects in Bolivia; and investments in roads, timber and palm oil in
Suriname. Leveraging China’s surplus of funds and preference for predictable, competent
administration, Correa could become instrumental in securing more Chinese resources for
ALBA members, with interrelated projects promoting greater ALBA integration. One could envision, for example,
Chinese financial backing to transform the Sucre, the exchange medium adopted by ALBA in 2010, into a true common currency, or
an ALBA telecommunications architecture leveraging Venezuelan, Nicaraguan and Bolivian satellites, made and launched by China,
and fiber optic and cellphone infrastructures built by Chinese telecoms Huawei and ZTE. Similarly, China-funded Venezuelan oil
production, the new Nicaraguan canal and Ecuador’s refinery could work together to supply petroleum to Chinese markets. The
implementation of such a vision would be complemented by a new “core of pragmatists” within ALBA, supportive of functional,
mixed-market solutions, including President Daniel Ortega in Nicaragua, Bouterse in Suriname and, probably, Chavez’s successor in
Venezuela. Venezuela’s oil revenue would continue to give it a major voice in the new ALBA, with the
country’s fiscal position probably improving through increased private-sector participation and the improved management of state
oil company PDVSA that might accompany a pragmatic, post-Chavez government. The
Chinese might even invest more
in such a Venezuela, perhaps speeding up promised investments as PDVSA accomplished more
of its share. As analysts across the region contemplate the collapse of the Bolivarian socialist movement, it is prudent to
contemplate instead the possibility that Chavez’s departure could be the source of the movement’s recentering and rejuvenation in a fashion that reinforces a newfound pragmatism, while fortifying
China’s strategic position in the region.
Alliance DA – CELAC – 1NC
Lack of US influence in LA spurred CELAC—the new multilateral institution that
solves conflict
BBC, 11 (Text of article in English by official Chinese news agency Xinhua (New China News
Agency, Mexico City, December 3rd, 2011, “China article says new bloc embodies Latin
America's global vision,” British Broadcasting Corporation, LexisNexis)//HAL
When leaders of 33 Latin American and Caribbean nations co-founded a new regional bloc here Saturday,
they are envisioning the region as a bigger player on the world stage. While the newly-formed Community
of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC) is politically diverse with varied national aspirations, its
historic importance cannot be ignored, political analysts said. "The creation of CELAC is part of a global and
continental shift, characterized by the decline of U.S. hegemony and the rise of a group of
regional blocs that form part of the new global balance," Mexican analyst Raul Zibechi wrote in his column on
the La Jornada daily. Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez has made it clear that he wants Latin America to
stand stronger, more united and independent from U.S. influence, a view echoed by a number of
CELAC member countries including Bolivia, Ecuador and Nicaragua. Considered as strong allies of
Washington, leaders of Mexico, Chile and Colombia have also enthusiastically embraced the idea of
CELAC. And Brazil, South America's leading power, refers to the grouping as being the region's "new
common voice" at many international fora. The formation of CELAC has been welcomed across
the region, from the most leftwing anti-U.S. Latin American nations to the most conservative
pro-U.S. allies. "With the advent of CELAC we have created a mechanism that we haven't been
able to do during our 200 years of independence," said Mexican President Felipe Calderon. Cuban leader Raul
Castro described the founding of CELAC as "the biggest independence event of our time." Latin American leaders want it
to be a forum similar to the Organization of American States (OAS), but free of
political influence from the United States. "It's clear that major issues in Latin America and the
Caribbean will be addressed by this new regional body and the OAS will lose the little-exercised
leadership it still possesses," said an op-ed piece in the Bolivian paper La Razon with a cartoon of a sinking ship named
OAS. According to "The Caracas Declaration," a key document signed at the new bloc's founding summit, CELAC will take on
the role as "regional spokesman" at ministerial talks at key international forums. But there was no
indication whatsoever in the declaration that CELAC would seek to replace the OAS, which welcomed the new bloc as "a new
mechanism for political coordination and agreement in the region." And OAS Secretary General Jose Miguel Insulza said CELAC
was certain to "enrich dialogues" in North and South Americas. Analysts, however, will continue to debate what kind of global role of
the new grouping would take, or whether it would eventually replace the OAS. They said few CELAC countries would want to see the
OAS replaced and the United States would not stand by in case of any attempt to exclude it from Latin American affairs. "The U.S.
should regard this move as a firm warning that its neglect of Latin America and the Caribbean's development needs and issues is not
in the interest of the United States," said an analyst, adding that Washington needs to "engage in Latin America and the Caribbean"
and make the countries feel like "genuine partners and neighbours."
Alliance DA – MERCOSUR – 1NC
Restoring U.S. influence in Latin America crushes the MERCOSUR alliance
Carranza, 4 (Dr. Mario E., Associate Professor of Political Science, Texas A & M UniversityKingsville, Ph.D., University of Chicago, “LATIN AMERICAN PERSPECTIVE: MERCOSUR,
THE FREE TRADE AREA OF THE AMERICAS, AND THE FUTURE OF U.S. HEGEMONY IN
LATIN AMERICA,” 27 Fordham Int'l L.J. 1029, February 2004, lexis, Tashma)
During the Cold War, the United States and the Soviet Union favored regionalist arrangements as long as they
"reinforced the strength of their respective alliance systems or provided [*1044] support for important
clients." 47 The United States rhetorically supported the Latin American Free Trade Area ("LAFTA") created by the Treaty of
Montevideo in 1960. 48 However, the World Bank and its subsidiaries ignored LAFTA's existence in their lending activities and the
International Monetary Fund openly opposed the creation of regional payment mechanisms. 49 MERCOSUR has been
openly opposed by the United States and the international agencies controlled by the U.S.
government. 50 The United States failed to prevent MERCOSUR from becoming an imperfect customs union in January 1995.
The United States' attempts to disarm MERCOSUR in stages in the name of Western hemisphere trade
liberalization have been hindered by the United States' failure to support Argentina during the severe economic
crisis of 2001-2002. U.S. indifference to the Argentine crisis created incentives for the MERCOSUR countries to cling together and
seriously damaged the model of a NAFTA-centered FTAA promoted by Washington.
MERCOSUR is key to Brazilian hegemony
Carranza, 4 (Dr. Mario E., Associate Professor of Political Science, Texas A & M UniversityKingsville, Ph.D., University of Chicago, “LATIN AMERICAN PERSPECTIVE: MERCOSUR,
THE FREE TRADE AREA OF THE AMERICAS, AND THE FUTURE OF U.S. HEGEMONY IN
LATIN AMERICA,” 27 Fordham Int'l L.J. 1029, February 2004, lexis, Tashma)
Neo-realists claim that States that feel threatened by U.S. benign hegemonic pretensions will inevitably form a coalition (or even an
alliance) in order to balance U.S. power. 51 The Argentine and Brazilian governments describe MERCOSUR
as a "strategic alliance" and MERCOSUR has become "extremely important to Brazil's
overall economic and foreign policy goals." 52 After the South American presidential summit in Brasilia, in
August 2000, the countries in the region are increasingly committed to developing a specifically
South American international policy, reducing reliance on the United States and expanding [*1045]
their external contacts. Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva is leading this effort, arguing that merging South
America's two largest trading blocs (MERCOSUR and the Andean Community) will force the United States to grant concessions in
the final round of the FTAA negotiations. 53.
Brazil regional power key to a laundry list of extinction impacts
Cervo, 10 – a historian Brazilian author of several books, focusing mainly on the country's
foreign policy, It PhD in History by University of Strasbour (Amando Luiz, “Brazil's rise on the
international scene: Brazil and the World,” vol.53 no.spe Brasília Dec. 2010,
http://www.scielo.br/scielo.php?pid=S0034-73292010000300002&script=sci_arttext)//HAL
Global governance Brazil is a firm believer in multilateralism. A rules-based international order is
indispensable for a more just and democratic world. This is true as much for peace and security
as it is for climate change or trade. The G-20 of the WTO - a group of emerging countries (Brazil, India, Argentina,
South Africa and others), which came to include China and at least one LDC, Tanzania - was formed with a view to ensure that the
Doha Development Agenda (DDA) would not be another unfulfilled promise and would effectively bring the development dimension
into the trade negotiations. More specifically, these countries rebelled against a proposed agreement that would not address the
main issues concerning agriculture reform and its impact on international trade. Agriculture had always been considered as a part of
the unfinished business of the Uruguay Round and constituted one of the central aspects of the DDA. At later stages, it came to be
recognized not only by Brazil and other developing countries, but also by the US herself, that agriculture was the locomotive (sic) of
the Doha Round. Former USTR Robert Portman expressly agreed with me on this point, during an informal ministerial meeting
sponsored by the OECD in May 2005. Until that moment, the WTO negotiations followed the same informal procedure that used to
be the norm of its predecessor - the GATT. All crucial questions were sorted out by a small group of countries - the Quad, constituted
by the US, the European Commission, Japan and Canada. The rebellion of developing countries - by the way,
with the support of a number of LDCs and smaller countries - not only prevented a bad result in
Cancun, but also led to a new pattern in the decision-making process in the WTO. Since then, Brazil
and India have been meeting with the US and the EU (and, on occasion, with other rich countries, such as Japan and Australia, later
joined by China) in the so-called G-4, which eventually replaced the Quad. Most of the progress made from Cancun until the July
Package of 2008 was produced in G-4 meetings. The ability of the G-20 to articulate its positions with other
group of developing countries was fundamental for progress made during the Hong Kong Ministerial Meeting
of December 2005, which decided that the export subsidies for agriculture must be eliminated by
2013. It was not the first time developing countries tried to articulate a common position, but, unlike what happened on previous
occasions, in which they had essentially a defensive - although justifiable - posture, this time, developing nations were able to
advance a constructive agenda based on forward-looking proposals. It was, for example, the G-20 negotiations that
became - with adjustments, of course - the architecture for agricultural negotiations. In Cancun,
Brazil was fighting two parallel battles: one was at the negotiating table, against the perpetuation of asymmetries in trade
negotiations. Another battle was for winning the "hearts and minds" in a time when the media was selling (or being sold) a totally
distorted version, according to which Brazil and her G-20 partners were blocking a deal out of plain obstructionism. Besides, the
participation of developing countries (including the poorer ones) gave the whole process more
legitimacy. The change in global governance became all the more evident during the financial
crisis. As a response to the turmoil in the markets, which almost brought the world into a
depression as severe as that of the thirties, a new G-20 sprung up. It is hard not to relate those two groups
which carry the same denomination, even though there is no causal relationship between their respective creations. The fact that the
G-20 of the WTO had been successful in enabling developing countries to have a greater say in matters of international trade may
have been in the back of the minds of some decision-makers at the time of the consolidation of the Financial G-20 as a high-level
forum. The Financial G-20, thus upgraded, became the leading forum for macroeconomic coordination. It replaced the G-8 (in
reality, the G-7, since the presence of Russia in the group had more to do with her nuclear status then with her economic weight).
When I said, in a conference at the Science-Po in Paris in mid-2009, that the G-8 was dead, this was seen by many, especially in
Brazil, as a manifestation of hubris. Soon after that, the Pittsburgh Summit confirmed the G-20 as the premier forum for economic
and financial matters. Brazil has also been a fundamental player in the negotiations concerning the
most critical matter of our time: climate change. Brazil is firmly attached to the principle of
"common but differentiated responsibilities", which takes into account the rich countries'
historic share in global warming and recognizes the right of poor countries to develop. Nevertheless,
we made an ambitious offer of emission cuts at the 15th Conference of the Parties in Copenhagen, in December 2009, which actually
helped push others, especially among the so-called "emerging nations", to do the same. With her bold proposal, and
unlike other countries, including some of the rich ones, Brazil chose not to hide behind other
countries' reluctance. At the same time, we did not allow anyone to hide behind Brazil. In a situation in which the survival of
mankind was at stake we decided to preach by example. Unfortunately, the Copenhagen Summit did not reach a consensus. The
feasible alternative was the so-called "Accord". Although circa thirty countries were included in the discussions, the crucial
negotiation of the Accord was to take place between US President Barack Obama, on one side, and the leaders of the "BASIC" group President Lula of Brazil, President Jacob Zuma of South Africa, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh of India and Prime Minister Wen
Jia-Bao of China - on the other. This again points to the changes in global governance already underway. In the event, all this effort
came to naught, partly because the Accord was in itself insufficient (on finance and on reduction commitments by some countries,
most notably the US), partly because the method to conduct the meeting left some countries excluded and justifiably resentful. On
another theme more directly related to the survival of mankind, i.e., disarmament and non-proliferation, Brazil has renewed
her engagement with the struggle for the total elimination of nuclear weapons. Brazil chaired the 2005
Review Conference of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and gave a strong push for the positive outcome of the 2010 Review
Conference, which reaffirmed the "thirteen steps to disarmament", adopted in 2000, but which had fallen into oblivion. These
steps were based on the proposals made by the New Agenda Coalition, a group composed by
developed and developing countries of different regions, committed to a world free of nuclear
weapons.
Alliance DA – MERCOSUR – Trade Impact
MERCOSUR is key to regional trade and infrastructure development
Valadao, 9 (Marcos Aurelio Pereira, Professor of Law at Universidade Catolica de Brasilia
School of Law, “LEGAL AND INSTITUTIONAL DIMENSIONS OF REFORM: Washington
Consensus and Latin America Integration: MERCOSUR and the Road to Regional
Inconsistencies--To Where Are We Going Exactly?,” 15 Law & Bus. Rev. Am. 207, Winter 2009,
lexis, Tashma)
Perhaps because of the region's closer ties to Europe, MERCOSUR defined itself in terms that went beyond just economic
cooperation. They agreed to develop together regional infrastructure in transport, energy, and
telecommunications. And in 1998, the four countries signed a Declaration on Workers' Rights and a separate agreement to
support democracy, human rights, and a "peace zone." The MERCOSUR countries have also negotiated associate membership with
Bolivia and Chile, and are consulting with the Andean Community. Although MERCOSUR has been tested by the
financial crisis in Brazil and rising unemployment in Argentina, it has continued to expand and
deepen economic cooperation. The member governments have reached a sectoral agreement on
automotive trade, and they are negotiating ways to harmonize immigration policies (though a MERCOSUR passport and
greater workforce mobility), financial statements and statistics, and macroeconomic coordination. Most important has
been MERCOSUR'S extraordinary growth of intraregional trade - averaging 19 percent a year
during the 1990s, almost three times higher than the rate of growth of their world trade. 36 The
MERCOSUR Parliament has started to discuss a large array of issues, pushing into the agenda themes such as visa fees exemption,
cattle [*218] diseases (a common problem to MERCOSUR countries), energy production and distribution and, of course, issues
relating to the formation of a customs union zone, toward a common market. Brazil has also been forced to finance the poor
countries of the block to decrease economic discrepancies between the member countries. But it is very difficult, from a political
point of view, to convince Brazilian taxpayers to pay higher taxes to finance the development of other countries, as has happened in
Europe. There is also an ongoing process to link the South American logistical infrastructure through the Initiative for the
Integration of Regional Infrastructure in South America (IIRSA). The IIRSA was adopted at a Meeting of South American Presidents
held in Brasilia, in August 2000. At that meeting, regional leaders agreed to take joint actions to increase South American political,
social, and economic integration, including the streamlining of regional infrastructure. This demands precise measures to promote
integration and development of isolated sub-regions. 37 Also worth mentioning, is the so-called project "Red de Mercociudades",
which can be literally translated as "Mercocities Net". 38 This is a network of cities within the MERCOSUR
region that will develop joint projects, joint solutions to common problems by sharing
experiences, and foster development through the process of integration. 39 VII. WHAT IS NEXT? The
next phase, especially for MERCOSUR, is to foster economic integration. This is one of the reasons
Venezuela is attempting to become a full member of MERCOSUR. The FTAA will not move ahead if the United States does not
rescind subsidies or does not give affirmative signs that it will for developing countries when discussing services at the WTO. In
other words: the DOHA Round is blocking the countries' negotiations with regards to FTAA and MERCOSUR. The Europeans have a
persistent policy of attempting to demonstrate to Latin America that public policies toward social cohesion are better than leaving
society alone to be controlled by the ancient (and blind) invisible hands of the market, 41 as epitomized by the Washington
Consensus policies. This point of view would push Latin American countries to a more EU-like style of distributive policies. Another
example of these new trends is Brazil's threat to cross-retaliate regarding the upland cotton subsidies adopted by the U.S.
Government. These subsidies have been deemed to be illegal and have affected Brazilian cotton exports, according to a WTO
decision. Now, Brazil will request WTO authorization to apply cross-retaliation to U.S. exports to Brazil, if the United States does not
implement the WTO ruling. 42 In 2005, after Brazil won the cotton case against the United States, 43 it formally requested the right
to retaliate against U.S. patents, copyrights, [*220] and services providers, and further suspended cross-retaliation request against
the United States. 44 In line with this position, there is a proposed bill in the Brazilian Congress that, if adopted, will widen the
scope of the breaking of patents on drugs for AIDS treatment - which has been a paradigmatic issue since the beginning of the Doha
Round. The bill states in its first clause that the law will establish procedures for the adoption of measures relating to the
suspension, weakening, and extinction of property rights in the Brazilian territory when a foreign country does not accomplish
multilateral obligations according to the WTO. 45 VIII. CONCLUSIONS The facts that have been discussed here explain why
MERCOSUR, CAN, and FTAA are not working together to acquire a common destiny, while MERCOSUR is still in evolving.
Despite all the deterrence factors presented in this paper that would halt MERCOSUR development (in
the sense of economic integration), there
are economic and non-economic factors that are pushing the
region to a position where economic and trade integration will be easier in the future. When
economic and trade integration will be accomplished, however, is a question yet to be answered.
Solves global nuclear war
Miller, Pres—International Society for Indiv. Liberty, 1998 (www.isil.org/resources/lit/freetrade-protectionism.html)
WHEN GOODS DON'T CROSS BORDERS, ARMIES OFTEN DO
History is not lacking in examples of cold trade wars escalating into hot shooting wars:
Europe
suffered from almost non-stop wars during the 17th and 18th centuries, when restrictive trade policy (mercantilism) was the rule;
rival governments fought each other to expand their empires and to exploit captive markets. British tariffs provoked the
American colonists to revolution, and later the Northern-dominated US government imposed
restrictions on Southern cotton exports - a major factor leading to the American Civil War. In the late 19th
Century, after a half century of general free trade (which brought a half-century of peace), short-sighted politicians
throughout Europe again began erecting trade barriers. Hostilities built up until they eventually
exploded into World War I. In 1930, facing only a mild recession, US President Hoover ignored warning pleas in a
petition by 1028 prominent economists and signed the notorious Smoot-Hawley Act, which raised some tariffs to 100%
levels. Within a year, over 25 other governments had retaliated by passing similar laws. The result? World trade came to
a grinding halt, and the entire world was plunged into the "Great Depression" for the rest of the
decade. The depression in turn led to World War II. THE #1 DANGER TO WORLD PEACE The
world enjoyed its greatest economic growth during the relatively free trade period of 1945-1970,
a period that also saw no major wars. Yet we again see trade barriers being raised around the world by short-sighted
politicians. Will the world again end up in a shooting war as a result of these economicallyderanged policies? Can we afford to allow this to happen in the nuclear age? "What generates
war is the economic philosophy of nationalism : embargoes, trade and foreign exchange
controls, monetary devaluation, etc. The philosophy of protectionism is a philosophy
of war."
Alliance DA – UNASUR – 1NC
Brazil has risen as a regional superpower due to decreased US influence in the
region—key to regional institutions like the UNASUR
Tessman, 12 - Ph.D. Political Science, University of Colorado, assistant professor of
International Affairs and associate director of the Center for the Study of Global Issues (Globis)
at the University of Georgia (Brock F., “System Structure and State Strategy: Adding Hedging to
the Menu,” May 22nd, 2012, Taylor and Francis Online)//HAL
A current and very clear case of Type B hedging is found in Brazil’s approach to regional leadership in South America. Brazilian
foreign policy, rather than focusing on sharpening a competitive edge against the United
States, is primarily concerned with developing regional institutions that are capable of
addressing threats to South American stability. These threats may be more likely to emerge as
American influence subsides, and its ability to promote economic, military, and diplomatic
stability in the region wanes. It is hard to doubt Brazil’s emergence as a global economic,
cultural, and political superpower. With a GDP approaching two trillion US dollars per year, it is currently the eighth
largest economy in the world. If it is able to sustain anything close to the 8 percent GDP growth it enjoyed last year, it is projected
to be one of the world’s top six economies by 2015.57 Unlike many other states in the Western Hemisphere, Brazil had a trade
surplus in 2010, totaling over twenty billion US dollars. Brazil is also set to enjoy cultural
ascendance in the next half decade,
as Rio de Janeiro will host the FIFA World Cup in 2014 and the Summer Olympic Games in 2016. Politically, Brazil
leading candidate for a permanent seat on the UN Security Council (UNSC),
is a
an important member of the
expanded G20 economic organization, and at the forefront of improved “South-South Cooperation” organizations like the IndiaBrazil-South Africa triad (IBSA).58 How does Brazil’s foreign policy strategy reflect its rapid emergence? In an interesting twist,
Brasilia perceives its future as a global power to be dependent on its solidification of regional
leadership and stability in South America. The emphasis makes sense when one considers that Brazil shares a land
border with every country on the continent except Chile and Ecuador. IBSA Secretary Figueiredo de Souza makes this point clear in
stating that, “in the case of Brazil, the relationship with our South American neighbors is a necessary and absolute priority.”59 This
approach has carried over from the presidency of Lula da Silva to that of his successor, Dilma Rousseff. Given its sheer geographic,
demographic, and economic size, Brazil is a clear leader among South American states. It has been the
catalyst in regional integration efforts such as the Union of South American Nations
(UNASUR), which is designed to promote free trade, monetary stability, and, through the South
American Defense Council (CDS), collective security.60 Brazil’s emergence as the leading power
in South America occurs within the context of more than a century of effective US hegemony in
the Western Hemisphere. Brazil’s relative ascendancy is accelerated, of course, by the ongoing
economic troubles of the United States, Washington’s decision to focus most of its foreign policy
attention on the Middle East and East Asia, and the recent leftward shift in South American
politics.61 As such, its more assertive approach to regional leadership could be seen as a challenge to US primacy, and perhaps as
an example of Type A hedging. This is clearly not the case. Despite its interest in promoting regional economic and security
autonomy, disagreements over the international approach to Iran and Israel, and a different attitude toward intervention and
democratization, there is nothing about Brazil’s approach to regional leadership that addresses military vulnerabilities that the
United States would look to exploit in the event of a future military crisis.62 In fact, Brazil has made very little attempt to bolster its
military capabilities in any significant way. Its army is a small, defensive force, and it has been somewhat marginalized politically
since it withdrew from government in 1985. Currently, the army is more concerned with domestic unrest that results from
organized crime and drug violence, particularly in the favelas. And, despite some recent tension over the scope of inspections
granted to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), Brazil is still committed to its constitutionally mandated renunciation of
nuclear weapons.63 Indeed, Brazil’s relations with the United States have been generally positive during the post-Cold War era. Its
regional ambitions seem more collaborative than competitive: “Our self-perception involves nothing less than being the organizing
principle of the continent—not displacing theUnited States, as Venezuela would like, but alongside it.”64 This essentially
conciliatory approach is reciprocated by language from key American leaders. The Obama administration’s 2010 National Security
Strategy states that the United States “welcomes Brazil’s leadership and seeks to move beyond dated North-South divisions to
pursue progress on bilateral, hemispheric, and global issues.”65
UNASUR is critical to maintaing democracy and stability in Latin
America
Kašpar 11, Petr Kašpar, Master Thesis at Aalborg University Denmark (“The Logic of
UNASUR: Its Origins and Institutionalization “;
http://projekter.aau.dk/projekter/files/53154638/The_LOGIC_OF_UNASUR.pdf, jj)
Apparently, external political factor seems to be a strong argument for UNASUR´s creations and ¶ existence. It has
edged
the United States out of the most South American countries internal affairs, ¶ plus successfully
resolved democratic crises . The organization, contrary to the OAS, assembles ¶ presidential
summits, rather than creating dialogue between domestic actors. Indeed it preserves ¶ democracy on the
continent, but it concentrates even greater power in internal matters as a result of ¶ UNASUR´s summits. Hence, Presidents
have an explicit interest in backing other presidents from ¶ domestic opposition and simultaneously establishing a precedent that
favors their own position in ¶ the future. Solingen claims:” dominant domestic political coalitions create regional institutions that ¶
strengthen their own position in power”.83 Besides, while the OAS has listened to all sides “at the ¶ table”, UNASUR
consistently oppresses the domestic opposition. In the environment where groups ¶ lack institutions of horizontal
accountability to legal political change, the only means of appeal are ¶ strikes, streets blockades, or protests. In other words, this
mechanism safeguards democracy on the ¶ continent, but at the cost of potential democratic quality.
That solves global warfare
Rochlin, 94 [James Francis, Professor of Political Science at Okanagan U. College,
Discovering the Americas: The Evolution of Canadian Foreign Policy Towards Latin America,
130-131, Wake Early Bird File]
While there were economic motivations for Canadian policy in Central America, security considerations were perhaps more
important. Canada possessed an interest in promoting stability in the face of a potential decline of U.S. hegemony in the
Americas. Perceptions of declining U.S. influence in the region – which had some credibility in 1979-1984 due to
the wildly inequitable divisions of wealth in some U.S. client states in Latin America, in addition to political repression, underdevelopment, mounting external debt, anti-American sentiment produced by decades of subjugation to U.S. strategic and
economic interests, and so on – were linked to the prospect of explosive events occurring in the
hemisphere. Hence, the Central American imbroglio was viewed as a fuse which could ignite a cataclysmic process throughout
the region. Analysts at the time worried that in a worstcase scenario, instability created by a regional war,
beginning in Central America and spreading elsewhere in
Latin America, might preoccupy Washington to
the extent that the United States would be unable to perform adequately its important
hegemonic role in the international arena – a concern expressed by the director of research for Canada’s
Standing Committee Report on Central America. It was feared that such a predicament could generate
increased global instability and perhaps even a hegemonic war . This is one of the motivations which led
Canada to become involved in efforts at regional conflict resolution, such as Contadora, as will be discussed in the next chapter.
Alliance DA – UNASUR – LA Instability Impact – 2NC
UNASUR ensures no Latin America transition wars—Brazil maintains stability
through retrenchment
Tessman, 12 - Ph.D. Political Science, University of Colorado, assistant professor of
International Affairs and associate director of the Center for the Study of Global Issues (Globis)
at the University of Georgia (Brock F., “System Structure and State Strategy: Adding Hedging to
the Menu,” May 22nd, 2012, Taylor and Francis Online)//HAL
Through the formation of the South American Defense Council, increased efforts at mediation, and greater economic
coordination through UNASUR, Brazil is developing a regional network that will be able to function,
and perhaps flourish, during and after the process of American retrenchment. Meanwhile, there is
no evidence that Brazil is engaging in competitive, Type A hedging that would directly increase
its ability to succeed in a military confrontation with the United States. Actions that place Brazil
at odds with the United States are more apt to reflect differing views on foreign intervention or
negotiation methods rather than a tendency toward military confrontation. It is always possible to
draw a blunt connection between behavior that improves a country’s position in the regional and international system and a desire
for greater leverage vis-a-vis the system leader. Type A strategic hedging, however, in- ` volves a specific, conscious, and observable
attempt to bolster capabilities in a way that will significantly help the hedging state in the event of a militarized dispute with the
system leader. With this criterion in mind, there is simply no compelling reason to interpret Brazil’s approach to regional
leadership as an instance of Type A hedging. As such, the analysis of Brazil presented here serves to illustrate the conceptual
distinction between Type A and Type B strategic hedging. It is also important to note, with reference to the strategic hedging
identification mechanism developed earlier in this paper, that there are no additional considerations associated with Brazil’s
approach to regional leadership that would disqualify it as an instance of Type B strategic hedging; nothing close to traditional
balancing behavior is under way and, because Brazil’s leadership in South America has been driven by the
highest levels of its leadership (most notably, former President Lula da Silva), there is little question about
the strategic nature of Brazilian behavior. In the end, this case does, along with some of the other examples
mentioned in passing at the beginning of this section, serve as a prime example of behavior that can be considered a case of Type B
hedging, but not a case of Type A hedging.
That solves global warfare
Rochlin, 94 [James Francis, Professor of Political Science at Okanagan U. College,
Discovering the Americas: The Evolution of Canadian Foreign Policy Towards Latin America,
130-131, Wake Early Bird File]
While there were economic motivations for Canadian policy in Central America, security considerations were perhaps more
important. Canada possessed an interest in promoting stability in the face of a potential decline of U.S. hegemony in the
Americas. Perceptions of declining U.S. influence in the region – which had some credibility in 1979-1984 due to
the wildly inequitable divisions of wealth in some U.S. client states in Latin America, in addition to political repression, underdevelopment, mounting external debt, anti-American sentiment produced by decades of subjugation to U.S. strategic and
economic interests, and so on – were linked to the prospect of explosive events occurring in the
hemisphere. Hence, the Central American imbroglio was viewed as a fuse which could ignite a cataclysmic process throughout
the region. Analysts at the time worried that in a worstcase scenario, instability created by a regional war,
beginning in Central America and spreading elsewhere in
Latin America, might preoccupy Washington to
the extent that the United States would be unable to perform adequately its important
hegemonic role in the international arena – a concern expressed by the director of research for Canada’s
Standing Committee Report on Central America. It was feared that such a predicament could generate
increased global instability and perhaps even a hegemonic war . This is one of the motivations which led
Canada to become involved in efforts at regional conflict resolution, such as Contadora, as will be discussed in the next chapter.
Backlash DA – 1NC
US heg fails in Latin America and only triggers greater backlash
Velez-Velez, 11 – Professor who focuses on the subjects of social movements, collective
memory and Latin America and the Caribbean, PhD from SUNY-University at Albany (Robert,
“Anti-American Resistance in Latin America: An Issue of Sovereignty, Militarization, and
Neoliberalism,” Sociology Compass, Volume 5, Issue 8, pages 696–711, August 2011, Blackwell
Synergy)//HAL
Conclusion (and Reflection)¶ The subject of anti-US resistance in Latin America takes a particular meaning in recent¶ years as we
consider the shifting towards left-leaning governments and the growing progressive base-movements in the region. The previous
discussion on the anti-US resistance movements as tied to US-Latin America relations’ historic
trajectory provides a context¶ to better assess the changes of both inter-America relations and
anti-US resistance in the¶ region. The articulation of anti-US sentiment have evolved and transfigured
in the last¶ century to challenge different manifestations of United States’ influence; whether
intervention, occupation, paternalism, or mere capitalism.¶ The impact of these new political
trends in Latin America has been translated into the¶ mobilization of new actors from both
directions, ground-up and top-down, and the carving of alternative forms of resistance and
paths for action. To these new trends we can¶ add the gathering of thousands of activists for the World Social Forum at Porto
Alegre in¶ 2005 and their claim of ‘Another World is Possible’. The changing patterns in resistance¶ towards the
United States’ political, economic, and military influence over Latin America¶ must be
interpreted as tied to changes in the United States’ approaches of influence. The¶ expansion of
anti-US resistance will continue as the diverse forms of intervention – overt¶ and covert – enter
into other fields of Latin American life. However, it would be imperative not to confuse all forms of resistance in the
region with anti-US sentiment, even¶ when these are directed to the United States, because that would undermine and reduce¶ the
root of social struggles for equality and justice.
Backlash DA – Yes Backlash
US hegemony in Latin America caused multiple atrocities and
continuing these policies undermines US hegemony and turns the
case
Sanchez and Sholar 12, Peter Sanchez(PhD) is a Professor & Graduate Program Director
(GPD) @ Loyola University in Chicago. Megan Sholar is a PhD @ Loyola University in Chicago.
(“Power and Principle: A New US Policy for Latin America”; International Journal of
Humanities and Social Science Vol. 2 No. 23; December 2012;
http://www.ijhssnet.com/journals/Vol_2_No_23_December_2012/3.pdf, jj)
America’s Cold War policies in Latin America, therefore, were very harmful for both US interests
and Latin ¶ American interests. The United States maintained a cosy, conspiratorial relationship
with repressive regimes that ¶ routinely violated the rights of its citizens. Worse yet, documents
show that Washington at times helped with this ¶ repression, playing an instrumental part in
establishing paramilitary groups that often turned into notorious death ¶ squads (See Haines,
1995). Evidence also suggests that U.S. officials or quasi-officials were at least indirectly ¶
involved in murders and torture. The saddest aspect of this drama is that America probably
gained little from ¶ becoming involved in these nefarious activities, while simultaneously
harming the prospects for democracy in the ¶ region and its own image in the region. By
inflating the power of the armies in the region, the precarious civilmilitary balance that existed
in Latin America in the late 1950s was quickly skewed so that civil institutions were ¶
overwhelmed by the power of the new praetorians (See Lowenthal and Fitch, 1986). The result
was brutal military government that wreaked havoc on civilians and their weak
institutions, the likes of which had seldom been seen ¶ in Latin America. In Argentina, Brazil,
Chile, El Salvador, Nicaragua, and Guatemala, thousands upon thousands of deaths can
be ¶ blamed on the domestic armed forces and the complicity of the US government and
its representatives overseas. ¶ A more ethical, long range policy, on the other hand, could have
safeguarded America’s vital interests and ¶ bolstered the image of the United States as a nation
committed to the promotion of democracy, self-determination, ¶ and human rights. Even if we
were to accept the notion that a hard-line policy was inevitable during the Cold War ¶ period of
super-power conflict, now that no threat from an extra hemispheric power or ideology exists in
Latin ¶ America, there is no reason for Washington to continue policies that focus on security
and short-term, realpolitik¶ strategies. Continuing such policies will most likely
undermine US leadership.
US leadership in Latin America catalyzes conflict—invigorates dictatorships and
increases tensions
Dosal, 5 - Professor of History at the University of South Florida, received his PhD in Latin
American history from Tulane University in New Orleans (Paul J., Journal of Developing
Societies, “The Latinamericanization of American Foreign Policy,”
http://jds.sagepub.com/content/21/3-4/253)//HAL
During the Cold War, the United States launched at least seven preemptive strikes against alleged communist threats in
Guatemala, Cuba, the Dominican Republic, Chile, Grenada, Nicaragua, and Panama. The means by which the United States
struck varied from covert operations run by a few CIA agents, to invasion by a proxy force, to a
full-scale invasion by United States troops. In none of these cases did the Latin Americans attack
the United States homeland. They had confiscated American properties, established relations with the Soviet Union,
adopted an independent foreign policy, or allegedly violated international law, but they had not threatened to attack the United
States homeland with weapons of mass destruction. The
United States has been going ‘in search of monsters to
destroy’ in Latin America for nearly 200 years, with or without the Cold War or weapons of mass
destruction to rationalize this policy. America has been acting preemptively and unilaterally in
the western hemisphere to preserve the Pax Americana, which is the general objective of the neo-conservative
foreign policy agenda. In the early 20th century, the United States intervened militarily in Cuba, Haiti, the Dominican Republic,
Mexico, Nicaragua, and Panama to preserve order and stability. These are the forerunners of the constabulary missions that form
one of four essential American military missions in the neoconservative policy (Kagan et al., 2000). According to the neo-
conservative interpretation of United States relations with Latin America, the way that the
United States slew monsters in Nicaragua, Cuba, Haiti, and the Dominican Republic illuminates
the path to the future of an allegedly ‘benevolent global hegemony.’ Although the Bush doctrine does not
draw explicitly on any Latin American precedent, the current and future behavior of this superpower reflects the imperial character
of American policy as it has been applied to Latin America since the Monroe Doctrine. There is a straight line that runs from
Monroe, through the Polk and Roosevelt Corollaries, right through the Alliance for Progress, the Johnson Doctrine, and Reagan’s
Contras. America was not converted into an aggressive power by the unprovoked and cowardly attacks of 9/11; the United
States has acted preemptively in Latin America to acquire territory, maintain stability, remove
alleged threats, protect its economic interests, and even arrest drug traffickers. The adversary is new,
but the champion of preemption is old. Consequently, we can learn much from even a cursory examination of US policy toward Latin
America. History can teach valuable lessons. From Latin American history we can derive several
principles that apply to contemporary foreign policy. 1) American Intervention Provokes
Militant Opposition No matter how altruistic the motive, no matter how benevolent the intention, United
States military intervention drives nationalists to take up arms against the invader. In 1915, President
Wilson sent the Marines to Haiti after a mob attacked the Haitian president and hacked him to
bits in the street. The Marines undoubtedly restored order where anarchy once reigned, but
within a few years the Marines suddenly found themselves confronting a dangerous guerrilla
movement that kept them bogged down for years in a vicious and controversial
counterinsurgency campaign. 2) The Opponents of US Intervention Are Not Only Bandits Many
criminals undoubtedly took advantage of the disorder in Haiti and elsewhere to rob and kill. Yet the United States too
often underestimated and denigrated the objectives of its enemies. The most flagrant
misrepresentation of a people’s aspirations probably occurred in Nicaragua, where the Marines
unsuccessfully pursued a bandit named Augusto César Sandino. He might have been a confused political
leader, but he was more than just a bandit. He was a nationalist, and his cause resonated among
Nicaraguans for two generations after his assassination. 3) The Results of Preemptive Action
May Be Worse Than the Threat It Sought to Eliminate The results of American military
intervention in Nicaragua, Cuba, and the Dominican Republic, to name only three, were the Somoza, Batista, and
Trujillo dictatorships. Were the Nicaraguan, Cuban, and Dominican people any better off because of American military
intervention? If the United States had never intervened, one can argue that these dictatorships
would have come into power. 4) Dictatorships and Double Standards Will not Win Us Many Friends or Allies The United
States rationalized its support for these and other dictators on the grounds that they served short-term American interests. Today,
neo-conservatives are defending United States relations with authoritarian regimes in Pakistan, Egypt, and Saudi Arabia because we
must tolerate ‘unfreedom in certain places’ in order to win ‘the larger battle for freedom on the global scale.’ Columnist Charles
Krauthammer dusted off Jeanne Kirkpatrick’s old doctrine to justify support for unsavory regimes today. Looking back on Pinochet,
the Shah of Iran, and Mobutu, Krauthammer (2002a: 90) claims, ‘for all their faults, they were at the time better for their own
people than those who would replace them.’ 5) It Is Difficult to Grow Democracy in Infertile Soil The Bush
Doctrine calls for the promotion of democratic values around the world because freedom is allegedly a ‘universal value.’ The Bush
administration hopes that success in Afghanistan and Iraq will unleash democratic reform throughout the Middle East. Theodore
Roosevelt, William Howard Taft, and Woodrow Wilson all attempted to teach the Latin Americans ‘to elect good men.’ Despite their
best efforts, their policies produced dictatorial regimes throughout the region. It is difficult to spread democracy by
force. Any attempt to impose a form of government on any foreign people violates the
fundamental right enjoyed by citizens in a democracy: the right to self-determination. Conclusions
Latin Americans have enjoyed a right of self-determination only to the extent that they did not
challenge the hegemony of the United States. Henry Kissinger explained the rationale for American opposition to
the election of Salvador Allende with the infamous statement: ‘I don’t see why we need to stand by and watch a country go
Communist due to the irresponsibility of its own people’ (Hersch, 1983: 265). When the United States launched a covert preemptive
strike against Salvador Allende in 1973, the Europeans begrudgingly accepted it and the Soviets acknowledged it as if it were a
legitimate act in the United States sphere of influence. The policies of preemption and unilateralism have been
developed and refined through nearly 200 years of interaction with Latin America. Now that the
United States has asserted its right and duty to police the entire world, the Europeans object to a
display of imperialist behavior that has been all too common in Latin America. The history of United
States behavior in Latin America provides clues, but not a blueprint for the application of the Bush Doctrine to the rest of the world.
It is difficult to imagine that the Bush administration would attempt to impose the language of the Platt Amendment into the
constitutions of Iraq or Afghanistan, but it is not inconceivable. However, the policy of preemption needs no Platt Amendment. Even
after the United States repudiated the policy of non-intervention at the Montevideo Conference of 1933, the United States intervened
repeatedly in Latin American affairs. All presidents and presidential candidates have affirmed the right of preemption, as John Kerry
did in his first debate with President George W. Bush on 30 September 2004. The history of United States relations with Latin
America shows that preemptive and unilateral actions are not the domain of a single party. Democrats and Republicans, Woodrow
Wilson and Theodore Roosevelt, John Kennedy and Ronald Reagan, have launched preemptive strikes when and where they
perceived threats to American economic and strategic interests. The United States is now the preeminent military
power on the planet. In this, the neo-conservatives are absolutely correct. The neo-conservatives succeeded in taking over the
Bush administration foreign policy partly because they had a grand strategy to use that power in defense of what they call ‘American
interests and values.’ There is not a clearly articulated opposition to the neo-conservative grand strategy. With Liberals and
Democrats focused exclusively on the task of defeating Bush at the polls, they have not devoted the time and energy to a new grand
strategy to replace it. Such a reconsideration of American foreign policy should take advantage of the
lessons learned in a region where the United States has long exercised hegemony. Teddy Roosevelt
and Ronald Reagan, while the darlings of the neo-conservatives at home, are not so widely respected or regarded in Latin America,
while Franklin Roosevelt and John Kennedy are much more popular in the region. The Good Neighbor Policy and the Alliance for
Progress, for all their faults, demonstrated a respect and concern for Latin Americans all too rare in American foreign policy.
Roosevelt’s policy of non-intervention won allies for the Second World War. Kennedy’s great development project fell far short of its
objectives, but it also won friends and allies. The invasion of Panama in 1989, however, was denounced by every Latin American
country except by the puppet regime in Panama. Although preemptive strikes may sometimes be popular and even necessary, they
do not necessarily promote the long-term interests of the United States. One would be hard pressed to argue that either the people of
Guatemala or the United States benefited from the preemptive strike against Jacobo Arbenz in 1954. His government respected
democratic practices and promoted economic development more seriously and successfully than the military dictatorships that
followed him over the next 30 years. In 1954, no action at all might have been the better response to a greatly exaggerated threat to
the United States.
US hegemonic push into Latin America only can cause conflict—empirics prove
David Pion-Berlin, University of California at Riverside and Harold Trinkunas, Naval
Postgraduate School 2007 (“Attention Deficits: Why Politicians Ignore Defense Policy in Latin
America,” David Pion-Berlin and Harold Trinkunas, Latin American Research Review, Vol. 42,
No. 3 (2007), pp. 76-100, The Latin American Studies Association,
http://www.jstor.org/stable/4499390) //HAL
The United States policy has indirectly reinforced the trend away from ¶ interstate conflict by
encouraging a focus on internal defense for Latin ¶ American militaries, rather than by directly
intervening to resolve the ¶ conflicts that did occur. Contemporary international relations theory has ¶ occasionally referred to the U.S. role
in Latin America as a classic example ¶ of hegemonic management, with the United States
intervening to prevent ¶ war in the region. But we concur with Mares (2001) and Dominguez ¶ (2005) that U.S. hegemony
has had little influence on interstate conflict ¶ per se. In fact, some would point to the Central
American conflicts of ¶ the 1980s as an example of hegemonic "mismanagement" that provoked ¶
greater conflict. Instead, the United States has influenced the nature of the ¶ militaries in the region in
a way that deemphasizes conventional offensive ¶ capabilities. As early as World War II, the explicit policy of the United ¶ States was to
assume the mantle of defending the Americas against ex- ¶ tra-continental conventional military threats, and supporting and train- ¶ ing Latin American armed forces to counter domestic subversion. The ¶
United States contributed to this trend as a major purveyor of military ¶ assistance and training
to the region, through which it emphasized an ¶ internal orientation, provided counterinsurgency equipment and train- ¶ ing and discouraged the purchase of advanced war fighting platforms ¶ by
Latin American states. Latin American states began to diversify their ¶ acquisitions to European and Asian
suppliers by the 1970s, but this still ¶ means that U.S. influence favoring a domestic orientation
influenced two generations of military officers and discouraged the development ¶ of offensive
military capabilities (Mott 2002, 89-96). ¶ The internal orientation of Latin American defense establishments ¶ was reflected in decisions about defense budgets, military training, ¶ and
acquisitions. It meant that many Latin American militaries never ¶ developed the capabilities to engage in sustained
offensive operations. ¶ The shortcomings of a relatively well-equipped Latin American military, ¶ such as Argentina's, in the face of combat against a capable European ¶ adversary is
highlighted by the outcome of the Malvinas conflict (Garcia ¶ 1995). Even conflicts between Latin American state rivals themselves ¶
reveal inadequacies in defense preparedness, a deep reluctance to engage ¶ in combat, and urgent appeals for third party mediation. ¶ The relative paucity of
inter-state conflict does not mean that there ¶ have not been serious, enduring rivalries in Latin America; Argentina ¶ and Chile, Peru and Ecuador, Venezuela and Colombia, and El Salvador ¶ and Honduras are
key examples. Each rivalry is a source of continuing ¶ tension and occasionally raises the possibility of militarized border dis- ¶ putes, and even war. Certainly, militaries in the region have pointed to ¶ such
disputes as justifications for their own existence or for acquisition ¶ of major weapons systems. However enduring, these rivalries in and of ¶ themselves have not led to the development of military forces with sig¶ nificant offensive capabilities or resulted in sustained civilian attention ¶ to defense policy.' In fact, in cases where such a "war scare" has occurred ¶ during periods of civilian rule, the response of anxious
politicians has ¶ been improvised, more often than not, with an immediate resort to a ¶ negotiated solution as the preferred solution. ¶ The most recent Latin American conflict, which took place between ¶ Peru
and Ecuador in 1995, illustrates the almost instinctive civilian aver- ¶ sion to war and resort to diplomacy that has characterized inter-state ¶ relations in the region. This conflict revealed Ecuadorian armed forces
¶ that performed unexpectedly well on defense, but neither state exhibited ¶ much in the way of offensive military capabilities, and both states lim- ¶ ited their theater of operations to a small sliver of disputed
territory in ¶ the Upper Cenepa region of their Amazonian border. Neither side had ¶ the desire or ability to escalate the war, and the Peruvian armed forces, ¶ considerably larger in size and resources, were
nevertheless noticeably ¶ unprepared for combat operations, lacking logistical capabilities and ¶ enough troops (Herz and Pontes Nogueira 2002). Within one day of the ¶ commencement of hostilities, the
Ecuadorian president was already ¶ making urgent appeals to the OAS, Brazil, and the other guarantor states ¶ 1. Although not relevant to explaining civilian inattention to defense policy, we should ¶ also note
that even states ruled by military governments, a relatively frequent circumstance ¶ in twentieth-century Latin America, have not produced particularly effective or offensive ¶ minded armed forces. ¶ Latin
American Research Review ¶ to intervene diplomatically; the Peruvians were equally anxious for a ¶ negotiated settlement, which came on February 17,1995, just three weeks ¶ after the fighting had begun. As
Herz and Pontes Nogueira point out, ¶ "Fear of a general escalation certainly contributed to limiting the scale of ¶ violence and to attempts to end the war quickly" (2002,46). In the wake ¶ of the war, it is
important to note that neither state attempted to remedy ¶ the deficiencies in their military performance through the development ¶ of a credible defense policy. Instead, civilian leaders on both sides in- ¶ vested
Other recent inter-state militarized
disputes that took place between ¶ civilian-led governments in the region, such as the
Nicaraguan-Honduran ¶ border tensions during the 1980s and the confrontation between
Colombia ¶ and Venezuela over maritime boundaries in the Gulf of Venezuela in 1987, ¶ also
revealed a preference for diplomacy, a notable civilian inattention to ¶ defense policy, and a general lack of preparedness for conducting effective ¶ military operations.
Both Nicaragua and Honduras required significant ¶ support, including combat and training troops from their Cold War spon- ¶ sors, to mount credible military preparations. Even as the
United States ¶ and Cuba attempted to prepare their proxies for war, the region as a whole ¶ was
engaged in a long-term diplomatic effort, crafted and pressed forward ¶ by civilian politicians in
Mexico, Colombia, Venezuela, and the Southern ¶ Cone, the so-called Contadora group, to
peacefully resolve the Central ¶ American conflicts of the 1980s. It is notable that once the Cold War ended
¶ and the superpowers lost interest in the region, Central American states, led ¶ by President
Oscar Arias of Costa Rica, quickly negotiated an end to their ¶ disputes and pursued an
aggressive demilitarization of the region (Barletta ¶ and Trinkunas 2004). Similarly, the Colombian-Venezuelan dispute over ¶ maritime borders in 1987 showcased
their attention and resources in the (successful) development of ¶ a permanent diplomatic solution to their border dispute. ¶
a general lack of preparation for war ¶ on both sides, and a civilian disinterest in military planning during the ¶ conflict. Neither side developed any significant new military capabilities ¶ or engaged in long-term
planning to address the shortcomings of their ¶ defense forces in the wake of the conflict. In fact, Colombia and Venezuela ¶ instead pursued regional economic integration, dramatically increasing ¶ the flows of
goods and persons along their common borders during the ¶ 1990s (Trinkunas 1999). ¶ These rivalries reinforced civilian preferences for diplomatic over ¶ military solutions to conflict, as did the process of
essence, the relative ¶ absence of war in Latin America during
the last two decades would ¶ seem to support the often debated "democratic peace" hypothesis
set ¶ forth by liberal theorists of international relations (Maoz and Russet ¶ 1993). In the Southern Cone, democratizers in Argentina sought to ¶
democratization that ¶ swept the region during the 1980s and 1990s. In
demilitarize and eliminate conflicts with their neighbors to undermine the rationale for the existence of a large (and politically active) military. ¶ They had greater success initially convincing Brazil than Chile, but
¶ by the end of the 1990s, Argentina had successfully resolved all of its ¶ major border disputes. They also sought greater regional integration ¶ through the MERCOSUR treaty framework, and David Pion-Berlin ¶
(2000) has documented how economic integration in the Southern Cone ¶ has reinforced an expectation of peaceful interstate dispute resolution. ¶ The Contadora process in Central America also hinged on an
expecta- ¶ tion that democratization would produce a more peaceful subregion. ¶ Whether or not this logic was correct, it certainly appeared to be so ¶ for the civilian leaders of these major regional powers
This sustained peace has been reinforced by diplomatic and legal ¶ (i.e., civilian)
institutional innovations in the region. Dominguez (2005) ¶ documents contributions to international law that originate in inter- ¶ American
diplomacy, the most important of which is uti possidetis juri, ¶ which established that a modern state's boundaries should
match those ¶ of its colonial predecessor and favors the territorial integrity of states. ¶ He also points to the role
of the OAS in managing interstate disputes ¶ and organizing peacekeeping mechanisms. Kacowicz (1998) goes fur- ¶
ther and argues that South America has developed a "zone of peace" in ¶ which states no longer expect to go
to war with each other. Certainly, the ¶ Southern Cone has come the furthest towards developing a pluralistic ¶ security community whose members no longer have an expectation that
(Barletta and ¶ Trinkunas 2004). ¶
¶ force will be used in their interstate relations. The concept of zone of ¶ peace has even been enshrined in certain limited forms by regional trea- ¶ ties, such as the 1967 Treaty of Tlatelolco establishing Latin
America as a ¶ nuclear-weapons free zone (Barletta and Trinkunas 2004). Mares (2001) ¶ has disagreed with the concept of zones of peace as a description of the ¶ international relations of Latin America,
pointing out that states still ¶ make the choice to militarize interstate disputes. However, the conflicts ¶ he identifies are small in scale and have not sparked significant civilian ¶ interest in defense policy beyond a
brief "rally around the flag" effect ¶ during the period of the conflict itself. ¶ In the absence of sustained international or regional military threats, ¶ both liberal and realist theories of international relations would
predict ¶ that Latin America is an unlikely candidate for arms races, balance of ¶ power behavior, or acute security dilemmas. Without such a stimulus ¶ for the development of offensive capabilities, it makes
sense that civilian ¶ elites preferred diplomacy and international law as solutions to interstate ¶ disputes, reinforcing the prolonged peace in the region. The overall ef- ¶ fect of history and structure is to produce a
path by which civilian elites ¶ have consistently turned away from developing an interest in national ¶ defense as an important field of public policy.
Brazil DA – 1NC
Brazil controls Latin American influence—increased US presence disrupts
regional power balances
Bethell, 10 - English historian, university professor, and Brazilianist who specialises in the
study of 19th and 20th Century Latin America, emphasizing on Brazil in particular, PhD in
History at the University of London (Leslie, “Brazil and “Latin America”,” Journal of Latin
American Studies, Studies, page 467-485, Volume 42 / Issue 03 / August 2010,
http://journals.cambridge.org/abstract_S0022216X1000088X)//HAL
Brazil and South America since the End of the Cold War¶ There is one final twist to this story of Brazil’s
relationship with ‘Ame´rica Latina’/‘Latin America’. As a result of the end of the Cold War, the
profound changes in world politics that followed, the intensification of the process of globalisation and, not least,
fundamental political and economic change in Brazil itself, Brazil’s presence and influence in the world has
grown significantly, especially under¶ the presidencies of Fernando Henrique Cardoso (1995–2003) and Luiz Ina´cio Lula da
Silva (2003–10). Brazil has played an increasingly important role in North–South and South–South
relations and has been a key player in discussions on a whole range of global issues, including
trade, reform of multilateral institutions and climate change. Brazil is considered
internationally, along with China and India, as one of the ‘emerging global powers’ in the first
half of the twenty-first century. At the same time, there has been a major development in Brazil’s
relations with the other states in its region. Brazil has continued to support the work of the
Organisation of American States, founded in 1948 at the ninth Pan- American Conference in Bogota´, and its
presidents have attended all five Summits of the Americas held since December 1994, while resisting the US
agenda for the economic integration of the western hemisphere. Brazil has attended the annual meetings of
the Rio Group of Latin American and Caribbean states, founded in 1986, and is now giving its support to the¶ proposed creation of a
community of all 32 Latin American and Caribbean states. But Brazil has also, for the first time in its history,
actively pursued a policy of engagement, both economic and political, with its immediate
neighbours in South America. This was a conscious decision deliberately taken in 1992–3,
reinforced by the fact that in 1994 Mexico joined the United States and Canada in ‘North
America’. President Cardoso hosted the first summit of South American presidents in Brası´lia in 2000. At the third summit¶
held in Cusco in December 2004, during the Lula administration, a South American Community of Nations was formed. It consisted
of 12 nations, including Guyana and Suriname. At the summit held in Brası´lia in May 2008 ¶ the community became a Union of
South American Nations (UNASUR). Improved relations with its South American neighbours and, indeed, the economic and
political integration of South America has been the principal¶ focus of Brazilian foreign policy under President Lula. Also for the first
time, and with a good deal of hesitancy, uncertainty and ambivalence, Brazil has begun to think of itself as a
regional power, not only in its long-term economic and strategic interests but because, it is
argued in Itamaraty, regional power is a necessary condition for global power. The region in question,¶
however, is South America, not Latin America.66
Brazil regional power key to a laundry list of extinction impacts
Cervo, 10 – a historian Brazilian author of several books, focusing mainly on the country's
foreign policy, It PhD in History by University of Strasbour (Amando Luiz, “Brazil's rise on the
international scene: Brazil and the World,” vol.53 no.spe Brasília Dec. 2010,
http://www.scielo.br/scielo.php?pid=S0034-73292010000300002&script=sci_arttext)//HAL
Global governance Brazil is a firm believer in multilateralism. A rules-based international order is
indispensable for a more just and democratic world. This is true as much for peace and security
as it is for climate change or trade. The G-20 of the WTO - a group of emerging countries (Brazil, India, Argentina,
South Africa and others), which came to include China and at least one LDC, Tanzania - was formed with a view to ensure that the
Doha Development Agenda (DDA) would not be another unfulfilled promise and would effectively bring the development dimension
into the trade negotiations. More specifically, these countries rebelled against a proposed agreement that would not address the
main issues concerning agriculture reform and its impact on international trade. Agriculture had always been considered as a part of
the unfinished business of the Uruguay Round and constituted one of the central aspects of the DDA. At later stages, it came to be
recognized not only by Brazil and other developing countries, but also by the US herself, that agriculture was the locomotive (sic) of
the Doha Round. Former USTR Robert Portman expressly agreed with me on this point, during an informal ministerial meeting
sponsored by the OECD in May 2005. Until that moment, the WTO negotiations followed the same informal procedure that used to
be the norm of its predecessor - the GATT. All crucial questions were sorted out by a small group of countries - the Quad, constituted
by the US, the European Commission, Japan and Canada. The rebellion of developing countries - by the way,
with the support of a number of LDCs and smaller countries - not only prevented a bad result in
Cancun, but also led to a new pattern in the decision-making process in the WTO. Since then, Brazil
and India have been meeting with the US and the EU (and, on occasion, with other rich countries, such as Japan and Australia, later
joined by China) in the so-called G-4, which eventually replaced the Quad. Most of the progress made from Cancun until the July
Package of 2008 was produced in G-4 meetings. The ability of the G-20 to articulate its positions with other
group of developing countries was fundamental for progress made during the Hong Kong Ministerial Meeting
of December 2005, which decided that the export subsidies for agriculture must be eliminated by
2013. It was not the first time developing countries tried to articulate a common position, but, unlike what happened on previous
occasions, in which they had essentially a defensive - although justifiable - posture, this time, developing nations were able to
advance a constructive agenda based on forward-looking proposals. It was, for example, the G-20 negotiations that
became - with adjustments, of course - the architecture for agricultural negotiations. In Cancun,
Brazil was fighting two parallel battles: one was at the negotiating table, against the perpetuation of asymmetries in trade
negotiations. Another battle was for winning the "hearts and minds" in a time when the media was selling (or being sold) a totally
distorted version, according to which Brazil and her G-20 partners were blocking a deal out of plain obstructionism. Besides, the
participation of developing countries (including the poorer ones) gave the whole process more
legitimacy. The change in global governance became all the more evident during the financial
crisis. As a response to the turmoil in the markets, which almost brought the world into a
depression as severe as that of the thirties, a new G-20 sprung up. It is hard not to relate those two groups
which carry the same denomination, even though there is no causal relationship between their respective creations. The fact that the
G-20 of the WTO had been successful in enabling developing countries to have a greater say in matters of international trade may
have been in the back of the minds of some decision-makers at the time of the consolidation of the Financial G-20 as a high-level
forum. The Financial G-20, thus upgraded, became the leading forum for macroeconomic coordination. It replaced the G-8 (in
reality, the G-7, since the presence of Russia in the group had more to do with her nuclear status then with her economic weight).
When I said, in a conference at the Science-Po in Paris in mid-2009, that the G-8 was dead, this was seen by many, especially in
Brazil, as a manifestation of hubris. Soon after that, the Pittsburgh Summit confirmed the G-20 as the premier forum for economic
and financial matters. Brazil has also been a fundamental player in the negotiations concerning the
most critical matter of our time: climate change. Brazil is firmly attached to the principle of
"common but differentiated responsibilities", which takes into account the rich countries'
historic share in global warming and recognizes the right of poor countries to develop. Nevertheless,
we made an ambitious offer of emission cuts at the 15th Conference of the Parties in Copenhagen, in December 2009, which actually
helped push others, especially among the so-called "emerging nations", to do the same. With her bold proposal, and
unlike other countries, including some of the rich ones, Brazil chose not to hide behind other
countries' reluctance. At the same time, we did not allow anyone to hide behind Brazil. In a situation in which the survival of
mankind was at stake we decided to preach by example. Unfortunately, the Copenhagen Summit did not reach a consensus. The
feasible alternative was the so-called "Accord". Although circa thirty countries were included in the discussions, the crucial
negotiation of the Accord was to take place between US President Barack Obama, on one side, and the leaders of the "BASIC" group President Lula of Brazil, President Jacob Zuma of South Africa, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh of India and Prime Minister Wen
Jia-Bao of China - on the other. This again points to the changes in global governance already underway. In the event, all this effort
came to naught, partly because the Accord was in itself insufficient (on finance and on reduction commitments by some countries,
most notably the US), partly because the method to conduct the meeting left some countries excluded and justifiably resentful. On
another theme more directly related to the survival of mankind, i.e., disarmament and non-proliferation, Brazil has renewed
her engagement with the struggle for the total elimination of nuclear weapons. Brazil chaired the 2005
Review Conference of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and gave a strong push for the positive outcome of the 2010 Review
Conference, which reaffirmed the "thirteen steps to disarmament", adopted in 2000, but which had fallen into oblivion. These
steps were based on the proposals made by the New Agenda Coalition, a group composed by
developed and developing countries of different regions, committed to a world free of nuclear
weapons.
Brazil DA – Uniqueness Wall
Brazil is pursuing a hegemonic strategy in face of declining U.S. influence in the
region
Stalcup, 12 (Travis C., George and Barbara Bush Fellow at the George H.W. Bush School of
Government and Public Service at Texas A&M University, “What is Brazil Up to with its Nuclear
Policy?,” Georgetown Journal of International Affairs, 10/10/12,
http://journal.georgetown.edu/2012/10/10/what-is-brazil-up-to-with-its-nuclear-policy-bytravis-stalcup/, Tashma)
What is Brazil up to? That is the question national security planners should be asking. Since abandoning its nuclear
weapons program in the late 1990s, Brazil has appeared the model for nonproliferation. Relations
with Argentina, its longtime rival, have warmed and the two states even cooperate on nuclear and other security issues. Compared to
the Middle East, South America is stable and peaceful, hardly an environment that would necessitate nuclear weapons. Yet, changes
in Latin America and a perceived shift in the balance of power away from the West require a reconsideration of that assessment.
Moreover, Brazil’s refusal to adopt the Non-Proliferation Treaty’s Additional Protocol and its
pursuit of nuclear propulsion technology raise worrisome questions about its intentions. To
Brazil, Latin America is not as stable as often believed. To the north, Venezuela chaffs at the prospect of Brazil as
regional hegemon. In 2010, Russia and Venezuela reached a deal to build the Latin American country’s first nuclear reactor.
Although the project was scrapped after the Fukushima disaster, the prospect remains. Venezuela has also challenged
Brazilian influence in Bolivia and Ecuador, two countries that have or have attempted to nationalize the facilities of
Petrobras, Brazil’s state oil company. In 2008, the government of Hugo Chavez levied a controversial $282 million tax
on a Brazilian construction firm. Such actions have riled Brazilian leaders. Further north, the United
States, long the guarantor of South American stability, appears hamstrung by economic challenges. According to
former Argentine diplomat Emilio Cárdenas, Brazil believes that the West is in gradual decline and that
Brazil is jockeying with other rising nations for position. This shift in the balance of power engenders a greater
degree of uncertainty about U.S. capabilities and intentions in the future. Such uncertainty, in addition to Brazil’s new political and
economic prowess, gives it the ability to challenge the U.S. at the margins of its power. Moreover, if the ability of the U.S. to
maintain order in the hemisphere is truly constrained, it is incumbent upon the Brazilian
government to seek alternative sources of security. This perceived shift in the balance of power
presents Brazil with an opportunity for international leadership. That is why Brazil is seeking to achieve a degree
of political clout commensurate with its new economic power, setting as its chief foreign policy goal a permanent seat on the United
Nations Security Council. A key component of permanent membership is the ability to share the burdens of maintaining
international security. Currently, there is some question as to whether Brazil is capable of such a charge. Looking at the current
permanent members as well as the other BRICs – Russia, India, and China – Brazil sees nothing but countries with nuclear
weapons. According to Kenneth Waltz, the preeminent realist international relations scholar, states mirror other
states – states without nuclear weapons see the power and prestige of states with nuclear
weapons and they want in. Former Brazilian Vice President José Alencar who died last year, remarked that Pakistan won
international relevance “precisely because it has a nuclear bomb.” A nuclear weapon would not only deter rogue neighbors
but solidify Brazil’s regional dominance and prove that it possesses the military capability to
contribute to international security. In addition to this perceived shift in the balance of power, consider Brazil’s
more aggressive military strategy from 2003 to 2010 during the presidency of Luiz Inácio Lula da
Silva. Part of that strategy is the development of an enormous nuclear attack submarine analogous
to India’s ballistic missile-capable Arihant-class. In addition to its potential as a missile platform, the propulsion reactors in Brazil’s
submarines would require a higher degree of uranium enrichment than those for commercial power, possibly above 90 percent. In
2004, Brazilian Ambassador to the United States Roberto Abdenu remarked that “submarines are not subject to the
[IAEA] safeguards regime.” This interpretation provides Brazil the capability to enrich weaponsgrade uranium and develop a full fuel cycle outside of international scrutiny and without violating its
agreements, such as the Treaty of Tlatelolco. Furthermore, although Brazil does participate in various nonproliferation
agreements, it refuses to adopt the Additional Protocol of the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT). This protocol would strengthen the
International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA)’s ability to detect clandestine weapons programs through various mechanisms,
including a stronger inspections regime. According to Brazil’s National Strategy of Defense, a precondition to any additional
restrictions under the NPT, such as the Additional Protocol, is the disarmament of nuclear states. However, even modest decreases
in the nuclear inventories of the United States and Russia have proven difficult to accomplish. If the U.S. and Russia are unable or
unwilling to disarm, Brazil feels no responsibility to take further steps to tie its hands by acceding to the Additional Protocol. Taken
independently, these actions are not necessarily provocative. However, when
one considers how Brazil’s security
environment is changing, these actions bring Brazil’s intentions into question. The perceived
decline in the United States’ willingness and ability to intervene militarily in Latin America, hostility of
neighboring countries to Brazil’s economic interests, and the hopelessness of nuclear disarmament provide powerful
incentives to explore nuclear capability. None can claim that Brazil is actively pursuing a nuclear weapon, but its
more assertive military posture, refusal to sign the NPT’s Additional Protocol, and pursuit of nuclear propulsion technology should
give American policymakers and nonproliferation analysts pause.
US led multilateral organizations fail—Brazil has tried to
counterbalance US hegemony
Brand et al 12, Alexander Brand is Lecturer and Post-Doc Researcher at the Department of
Political Science at the University of Mainz. Susan McEwen-Fial is Lecturer at the Department
of Political Science at the University of Mainz. Wolfgang Muno is Visiting Professor of Political
Science at the University of Erfurt. Andrea Ribeiro Hoffmann is Lecturer at the Willy Brandt
School of Public Policy, University of Erfurt. (04/2012, “BRICs and U.S. Hegemony: Theoretical
Reflections on Shifting Power Patterns and Empirical Evidence from Latin America”,Mainz
Papers on International and European Politics (MPIEP) Paper No. 4,
http://international.politics.uni-mainz.de/files/2012/10/mpiep04.pdf,jj)
Concerning institutional innovation and the use of alliances a/o multilateral coordination¶ as a
means to strengthen one’s influence, things look remarkably different. Here we can detect a
mixture of institutional failure (OAS, FTAA), the fostering of bi- and multilateral trade¶
institutions as well as non-activism on behalf of the U.S. In contrast, even the Chinese have –¶ as
actors traditionally and geographically external to the region – significantly expanded their¶
institutional ties to LA lately. State visits, applications for observer status, summits and common
institutional frameworks constitute a relatively significant level of activism. Brazil, on the¶ other
hand, has for years sought to use the institutional level to strengthen its status as regional¶
power (and potential contender to U.S. regional hegemony). Here, the idea of an intended¶
counterbalancing of U.S. hegemony is particularly clear.
Now is the key moment for Brazilian foreign power projection
BURGES, 13 – PhD (Warwick) in Politics and International Studies; MA (Western Ontario)
in Political Science and Lecturer in International Relations at ANU College of Arts and Social
Sciences (Sean, “POST-CHAVEZ TEST FOR BRAZIL LEADERSHIP,” The Australian, March 7,
2013, LexisNexis)//HAL
VENEZUELA's President Hugo Chavez has just died after a prolonged battle with cancer. While his death raises questions about
the longevity and sustainability of his Bolivarian revolution, it also stands as a significant test of the democracypromoting credentials of Brazil and the two important regional clubs it runs: the South
American political grouping Unasur and the trade bloc Mercosur. Venezuela's presidential succession
procedures are clear. Article 232 of the constitution mandates a new election within 30 days if a president dies during the first four
years of their term. The questions many are asking now is if this vote will happen -- vice-president Nicolas Maduro says ``yes'' -- and
how democratic it will be, which is open to debate based on past precedent. Historically, a technically free vote on schedule would
satisfy Brazil's pro-democracy requisites. But, events in 2012 suggest Brazil may now be valuing the spirit as much as the process of
democracy. Venezuela's upcoming vote stands as a test of this new pro-democracy policy in Braslia. On June 22, 2012, Paraguay's
Liberal and Colorado parties joined forces to impeach leftist president Fernando Lugo in a process that many in the region now call a
``coup-peachment''. Strictly speaking, the process was legal, but politicised to the point of farce. Charges were laid, a congressional
trial held, and a conviction delivered in less than a day. What astonished many was the degree of political pressure Brazilian
president Dilma Rousseff applied in Mercosur and Unasur to punish the political factions that had deposed her leftist ally,
suspending Paraguay from both groupings. Suggestions that she was simply playing ideological favourites were strengthened when
Brazil refused to take a similarly strong stance against Venezuela when Chavez failed to take his oath of office in January. Such
criticism may have been a bit unfair and missed the nuance in Brazil's approach. Brazilian presidential foreign policy adviser Marco
Aurelio Garcia offered the opinion, which became his country's policy, that he agreed with the Venezuela Supreme Court judgment
that as a re-elected president article 234 of the constitution allowed Chavez up to six months leave of absence before a new election
would be necessary. In an act of quiet bureaucratic resistance Brazilian diplomats pointedly noted that article 232 still applied and
that prompt elections would be required if Chavez died within the next four years. With new elections now required in
Venezuela we have an opportunity to see if there has been a real change in Brazil's regional
foreign policy to advancing substantive democracy or if the Lula-era tradition of selectively
advocating a brand of pro-leftist democratic outcomes remains in place. The upcoming election in
Venezuela is going to be difficult and divisive. The obvious strategy for Maduro will be to wrap himself in the mantle of Chavez's
memory while Henrique Capriles will likely resume his message of bringing Chavez's social welfare policies to a sustainable path. All
of this is an expected part of electoral politics. Where matters get tricky is the extent to which Maduro deploys executive presidential
powers to artificially boost his campaign. One standout tactic from the October 2012 election was Chavez's proclivity for mandating
lengthy broadcasts of ``government service'' programming to pre-empt television coverage of Capriles's campaign events. Another
question is whether or not the military and security forces will take on the role of passive spectator expected in a consolidated
democracy or if they will directly or covertly interfere with the campaign. Indeed, the temptation for political intervention by some
sectors in the military will be immense if reports about their links to narcotrafficking and organised crime are correct. Brazil has
the back-room influence to prevent these sorts of violations of the democratic spirit of an
election. Dilma, as well as key advisers such as Garcia, have enormous influencewith the Chavez faithful. Moreover, Rousseff's
2010 presidential campaign advisers are likely to again play an important role in the pro-Chavez electoral push, fulfilling much the
same role as Clinton campaign hothouse Carville and Associates did around the world in the 2000s. A behind the scenes
steadying hand on Maduro-camp temptations to unduly exploit their position of power will be
essential to the country's future political stability. Venezuelans will know if the election is rigged, which would
erode the credibility of a possible Maduro victory and further polarise the country. But if he were to win in a truly clean race it could
create the conditions needed for a national political reconciliation. The same holds true for a possible opposition win. Even if
uncomfortable for diplomats, helping to make this happen is exactly the sort of responsibility
that goes with the regional leadership role Brazil has been claiming in South America. PostChavez Venezuela may prove to be Brazil's first real test.
Brics aiming for no less than a new world order. THE fifth Brics summit in Durban might well
represent the emergence of an interesting new power bloc. Brics's objective is to reshape the
international economic order by challenging the historic dominance of the US, Germany, the UK
and France, with a bloc composed largely of countries of the global south, comprising two
international and three regional powers. In previous centuries, Russia's striving to become a
world power was stifled by the backwardness of its political institutions. It required the social
and political revolutions of 1917, followed by the industrial revolution Stalin brutally imposed on
it, for Russia to survive the Second World War, making possible its emergence as a world power.
Russia's old ruling classes proved incapable of realising Peter the Great's dream. After the
Decembrist Uprising of 1825, modernist intellectuals dashed their heads against the iron-clad
defences of the ancien regime in their attempts to overthrow Tsarism. It was the intellectuals
who adopted the most revolutionary ideas of their age, the Bolsheviks, who proved equal to the
task, raising Russia from a European backwater to the international power it became after 1945.
The Bolsheviks defeated counterrevolution, supported by Britain, France, the US and Japan,
because they offered the oppressed nationalities of the Tsarist empire autonomy, selfgovernment and equality. Joseph Vissarionovich Djugashvili, who assumed the pseudonym
Stalin, was the son of one such minority, the Georgians. China is the dominant economic player
in Brics - made possible by the radical transformation of a declining Asiatic despotism by
revolutionary means. After a century of political and social upheavals from 1850 to 1950, the
communists reasserted China's national sovereignty, reunited the country and created stability
by offering leadership to a peasant revolt that brought much-needed economic and social
change. The communists were the agents of modernisation in Russia and China. Ruthless
programmes of social engineering, driven by the intelligentsia, recast them into modern
industrial powers. India, the world's second-most populous country and its largest
parliamentary democracy, is a rich tapestry of languages and religions that has been moulded
into one nation under the leadership of nationalist intellectuals. India has wrestled with
modernity in an environment riddled with the uncertainties of democratic government since
independence in 1947. Continuing tensions could not deter India from transforming itself into a
leading centre for the design, manufacture and servicing of digital software. Like India, SA is
composed of a diversity of racial, cultural and religious communities that will become a united
nation thanks to an African nationalist intelligentsia. The newest member of the Brics bloc, SA,
with its relatively small economy and population, is visibly punching above its weight by
associating with the four others. For close to a century, backward political institutions frustrated
its potential. SA's economic development was distorted by white racism - its industrial economy
managed to address the needs of less than 20% of its small population. Yet SA's economic
muscle on the continent comes with a number of obligations. Peace and stability in our region
are essential for the realisation of SA's continental ambitions. On the world stage, order and
security in the oceans on which the country's international trade relies have required SA to reequip and modernise its navy. On a continent where its relative prosperity attracts thousands of
legal and illegal migrants, SA necessarily is a status quo power.
Brazilian hegemony on the rise now --- exerting power on an international scale
Shifter, 12 (Michael, President of the Inter-American Dialogue, Adjunct Professor of Latin
American Studies at Georgetown University's School of Foreign Service, “The Shifting
Landscape of Latin American Regionalism,” Current History, Volume 111, Issue 742, February
2012, pg. 56-61, Proquest, Tashma)
For such a significant regional power and emerging global player - today it has the world's sixth largest economy - Brazil was notably
delayed in promoting regional organizations in South America. Although Mercosur was set up in the early 1990s, it was not until
2000 that then-President Fernando Henrique Cardoso of Brazil convened the first meeting of South American leaders. But
Brazil's sheer size and economic and political power made such a turn toward greater
engagement with the region highly plausible.
Over the past dozen years Brazil's approach toward its neighbors has been substantially shaped by two connected objectives: the
desire to keep things under control in its immediate sphere of influence, and its pursuit of global aspirations. One of Brazil's main
priorities has been to secure a permanent seat on the United Nations Security Council. It was that aim - more than any regional goals
- that led Brazil to play a leading role in the UN peacekeeping mission in Haiti starting in 2004. The country has also sought a
significant voice in other global arenas. It has actively participated in the World Trade Organization, and has been a serious,
respected player in the Group of 20 in the context of the recent economic crisis.
Moreover, Brazil
has emphasized alliances with other emerging powers more than with other Latin
American countries. As one of the so-called BRICS (along with Russia, India, China, and South Africa), Brazil
has strengthened relationships that are aimed at enhancing its leverage with traditional powers,
particularly the United States. Brazil has for the most part preferred to deal with the United States bilaterally, and has been wary of
any hemisphere-wide - and presumably US-led - arrangements, such as the Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA), a proposal that
emerged from the first Summit of the Americas in Miami in 1994.
During the Lula era - and particularly its final years, when the country witnessed remarkable economic vitality and growing
influence in global affairs - Brazil became increasingly active in social development efforts in Africa, and
also tried its hand in Middle Eastern diplomacy. Its boldest move came in 2010 with a joint
proposal developed with Turkey to deal with Iran's nuclear program. Brazil's accommodating approach
differed sharply from Washington's more hard-line posture, reflecting mutual irritation that has been alleviated somewhat during
the current Rousseff administration.
At the same time, Brazil has developed more expansive economic and political roles within the
region. The Lula government devoted considerable attention to building the Union of South American Nations (UN ASUR), which
evolved from a fairly loose, amorphous grouping. Today UNASUR has a formally organized structure with a permanent secretariat
that was initially headed by the former Argentine president Néstor Kirchner. Although other leaders responded to the Brazilian
initiative with varying degrees of enthusiasm - Peruvian President Alan García showed little interest and Colombian President
Alvaro Uribe was notably resistant - the exclusively South American organization appears to have taken hold.
Brazil DA – Link Wall
Brazil controls Latin American influence—increased US presence disrupts
regional power balances
Bethell, 10 - English historian, university professor, and Brazilianist who specialises in the
study of 19th and 20th Century Latin America, emphasizing on Brazil in particular, PhD in
History at the University of London (Leslie, “Brazil and “Latin America”,” Journal of Latin
American Studies, Studies, page 467-485, Volume 42 / Issue 03 / August 2010,
http://journals.cambridge.org/abstract_S0022216X1000088X)//HAL
Brazil and South America since the End of the Cold War There is one final twist to this story of Brazil’s
relationship with ‘Ame´rica Latina’/‘Latin America’. As a result of the end of the Cold War, the
profound changes in world politics that followed, the intensification of the process of globalisation and, not least,
fundamental political and economic change in Brazil itself, Brazil’s presence and influence in the world has
grown significantly, especially under the presidencies of Fernando Henrique Cardoso (1995–2003) and Luiz Ina´cio Lula da
Silva (2003–10). Brazil has played an increasingly important role in North–South and South–South
relations and has been a key player in discussions on a whole range of global issues, including
trade, reform of multilateral institutions and climate change. Brazil is considered
internationally, along with China and India, as one of the ‘emerging global powers’ in the first
half of the twenty-first century. At the same time, there has been a major development in Brazil’s
relations with the other states in its region. Brazil has continued to support the work of the
Organisation of American States, founded in 1948 at the ninth Pan- American Conference in Bogota´, and its
presidents have attended all five Summits of the Americas held since December 1994, while resisting the US
agenda for the economic integration of the western hemisphere. Brazil has attended the annual meetings of
the Rio Group of Latin American and Caribbean states, founded in 1986, and is now giving its support to the proposed creation of a
community of all 32 Latin American and Caribbean states. But Brazil has also, for the first time in its history,
actively pursued a policy of engagement, both economic and political, with its immediate
neighbours in South America. This was a conscious decision deliberately taken in 1992–3,
reinforced by the fact that in 1994 Mexico joined the United States and Canada in ‘North
America’. President Cardoso hosted the first summit of South American presidents in Brası´lia in 2000. At the third summit
held in Cusco in December 2004, during the Lula administration, a South American Community of Nations was formed. It consisted
of 12 nations, including Guyana and Suriname. At the summit held in Brası´lia in May 2008 the community became a Union of
South American Nations (UNASUR). Improved relations with its South American neighbours and, indeed, the economic and
political integration of South America has been the principal focus of Brazilian foreign policy under President Lula. Also for the first
time, and with a good deal of hesitancy, uncertainty and ambivalence, Brazil has begun to think of itself as a
regional power, not only in its long-term economic and strategic interests but because, it is
argued in Itamaraty, regional power is a necessary condition for global power. The region in question,
however, is South America, not Latin America.66
Brazil will revolt if US steps into their sphere of influence
Sotero, 10 – director of the Brazil Institute of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for
Scholars, MA in Journalism and Public Affairs from the American University, adjunct lecturer
at Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service, Georgetown University (Paulo, “Brazil's Rising
Ambition in a Shifting Global Balance of Power,” Perspectives on the Changing Global
Distribution of Power Volume 30, Issue Supplement s1, pages 71–81, December 2010)//HAL
Although Brazil has begun to assert itself on the global stage in the twenty-first century, historically the
nation's world perspective has been heavily conditioned by geography. From the early years of the republic, in the late nineteenth
century, the key foreign policy objectives were the consolidation of the national territory through the peaceful resolution of all border
disputes and the pursuit of closer ties with a then emerging United States. One hundred years later, President Cardoso set
Brazil in a new direction in regional affairs, in order to assert the country's autonomy while
pushing for integration with its immediate neighbours. With the nation's position strengthened by the
legitimacy of its democratic regime and successful economic stabilisation policies, Cardoso sought to define Brazil's
sphere of influence by engaging its South American neighbours in a strategy of economic
integration independent of the US. In September 2000, he convened in Brasília the first-ever summit of South
American presidents (OEI, 2000). Six months later, speaking at the Third Summit of the Americas in Quebec City, Cardoso made
clear Brazil's scepticism of the continent-wide integration project the United States was promoting by way of the proposed Free
Trade Area of the Americas (Cardoso, 2001, p. 3): ‘the FTAA will be welcome if its creation is a step towards access to the most
dynamic markets; if it is an effective way to shared rules on anti-dumping; if it reduces non-tariff barriers; if it avoids the
protectionist distortions of the good sanitary rules; if, while protecting intellectual property, it fosters our peoples technological
capacity; and, furthermore, if it goes beyond the Uruguay Round and correct the asymmetries it enshrined in agricultural trade. If it
does not do so, [FTAA] would be irrelevant or, in the worse hypothesis, undesirable’. Lula stayed the course on regional affairs. In
the first year of his government, Brazil blocked further negotiations of the FTAA. The new president, however,
substantially changed Brazil's style of diplomacy, in favour of a more vocal foreign policy, reflective of his talent as a charismatic
leader who loves the limelight and does well on the stump. In his first trip abroad as president, he said in Quito, Ecuador, that his
country's diplomacy would ‘blossom’. Lula described Brazil as the region's ‘natural leader’ and proclaimed that the country was
‘ready to assume its greatness’ (Veja, 2003, p. 68). Brazil sought to expand existing regional mechanisms, such as Mercosur, by
proposing the accession of Venezuela, and promoted the creation of new ones, such as the Union of South American Nations, the
South American Defence Council and the Community of Latin America and Caribbean States in order to promote faster integration.
In mid-2004, Brazil assumed the military command of the UN stabilisation mission in Haiti, a bold move calculated to enhance
Brazil's credentials as a candidate to a permanent seat on the UNSC, according to Clovis Brigagão (Osava, 2006). The regional
activism of the Lula administration led his government to act to defuse the internal crisis in Bolivia, after forgiving the country's
president, Evo Morales, for unceremoniously nationalising Petrobras assets in Bolivia. Brazil expanded staffs of its embassies in the
region and established a total of 35 new ones, mostly in the developing world. The powerful Brazilian National Bank for
Development (BNDES) became an instrument of the regional policy. By 2009, the bank had more than $15.7 billion in lines of credit
extended to countries interested in contracting Brazilian companies' services (BIC, 2009). Surprisingly, Brazil's activism in regional
affairs did not extend to efforts to settle disputes between neighbours – a point not lost on critics of Lula's Iran initiative. ‘The
Iranian adventure is incomprehensible, especially since there are various conflicts closer to us which we haven't tried, or haven't
managed, to mediate’, noted Sérgio Amaral (The Economist, 17 June 2010). In contrast with the Cardoso government, which had,
with the US, Chile and Argentina, successfully mediated the 1995 border dispute between Peru and Ecuador, the Lula administration
did not get involved in a dispute between Argentina and Uruguay, both Brazil's partners in Mercosur, over the operation of a
cellulose plant on the Uruguayan side of the Uruguay River. Brasília also showed no interest in helping to lower tensions and avoid a
possible military confrontation between Venezuela and Colombia, which border Brazil. Lula's attempt to bring Caracas and Bogota
closer together in August 2010, after Chávez severed diplomatic relations with Colombia, reacting to accusations of harbouring
FARC rebel groups in Venezuela, had little impact and did not alter the mismatch between Brazil's assertions of leadership at the
global level and its modest interest in assumeing the risks of leadership closer to home, where it should have a better chance of
success. There are various possible reasons for the Lula government's lack of appetite to mediate in regional conflicts. Such disputes
generate little interest and no political dividends in Brazil. An amalgamation of African descendants indigenous peoples and
European and Asian immigrants who speak Portuguese, Brazilians do not see themselves as Latin Americans. Historically, they have
been quite distant from their immediate neighbours (Bethell, 2009). Moreover, the region is seen more as a source of potential
problems than as presenting opportunities for Brazil. A survey of senior diplomats, business executives, scholars and opinionmakers conducted in 2001 and 2008 indicated decreased support for pursuing relations with the region (De Souza, 2008). This
finding suggests that South America and Latin America are generally perceived by Brazilian elites as a poor platform for Brazil to
project itself as a global power. Nonetheless, there are a few indications that suggest that the Lula government has come to see the
region as valuable to the exercise of leadership in so far as it helps to project Brazil's opposition to US dominance. From the early
days of the republic, there has been an anti-American strand among Brazilian elites. This strand is
likely to be manifest in the foreign policy of any government of an ascendant Brazil, the only
country emerging in the United States's so-called ‘back yard’. The US recession and a general
disappointment with US President Barack Obama's timid policies for the hemisphere – on Cuba, trade and regional
security – strengthened the hand of key figures in Lula's foreign policy known for their lack of sympathy to the US, and
reinforced a tendency to distance Brazil from Washington. In the reverberations of the Wall Street collapse, in
December 2008 Brazil convened a summit to launch the Latin America and Caribbean
Community of Nations – an event planned to highlight Brazilian leadership in regional affairs
and underline the US's loss of influence. ‘There is no question that this is about exclusion, about
excluding the United States’ (Peter Hakim, quoted in the Barrionuevo, 2008). There was also the ill-disguised
confrontation between Brasília and Washington over how to respond to the June 2009 constitutional crisis in Honduras,
precipitated by a coup against President Manuel Zelaya. The Lula government's unexpected and ultimately unsuccessful intervention
in the Honduras crisis showed again that while Brazil has not generally sought to assert its regional
leadership, it has been more than willing to stand up to the United States.
Brazil DA – Africa War Impact
Brailian hegemony solves Africa war
White, 10 – PhD in Political Studies from the University of Cape Town, independent
researcher and consultant specialising in political economy issues in Africa, Asia and Latin
America, Gordon Institute of Business Science, University of Pretoria, South Africa (Lyal,
“Understanding Brazil’s new drive for Africa,” South African Journal of International Affairs,
http://www.tandfonline.com.ezp1.lib.umn.edu/doi/abs/10.1080/10220461.2010.494345#.Uc3
45zsqZsk)//HAL
Brazil’s new Africa strategy: political diplomacy, neo-mercantilism and development cooperation Brazil’s contemporary relations
with Africa may at first appear to be a complex — even poorly defined — mix of political alliances (old and new) and commercial
interests, underpinned by foreign policy priorities that have varied from administration to administration in Brazil. On closer
inspection, however, Brazil’s
relations with Africa can be neatly divided into three broad categories.
a useful strategic map of Brazil’s engagement with
Africa which correlates strongly with Brazil’s broader foreign policy goals as an emerging global
power. The first category is political diplomacy and Brazil’s multilateral engagement with Africa.
While these may be interrelated, they certainly do offer
This has been a primary feature of Brazilian foreign policy under President Lula, who single-handedly changed the face of Brazilian
international engagement and multilateral activism during his two terms in office. Under Lula, Brazil’s multipolar
approach reprioritised the developing South through various multilateral forums and placed
special attention on Africa through unprecedented direct attention and visits, advancing the historical
Brazilian notion of responsible pragmatism with universal democratic principles, and development through increased globalisation.
The second category is trade and investment, wherein certain Brazilian companies have maintained a long
standing interest (especially in lusophone Africa). However, the recent surge of interest shown by emerging Brazilian
MNCs in resource extraction, construction and agriculture beyond the former Portuguese colonies to other parts of Africa represent
a new era of commercial exchanges between Africa and Brazil, which certainly appears to be a strong driver of
Brazilian foreign policy on the continent. Finally, development and development co-operation have become an
important component of Brazilian foreign policy, and is sure to be a principal driver of foreign policy in Africa. Brazil’s relative
success in social development programmes in its own country has made it a primary exporter of ‘social technology’ to other
developing countries. This has become an important tool in is foreign policy in the developing world. Africa is clearly an important
arena for the exercise of Brazil’s new foreign policy approaches. Its engagement in Africa is generally well-
received. Brazil seems to have opted for a middle-ground approach between the Chinese-style of engagement — which is highly
political and supported by the weight of the state-run machinery behind investments and development initiatives—and the Indian
approach—which is characterised more by private sector investments and entrepreneurial activities across the continent. This is
continent in need of political support and better representation through functional coalitions at
multilateral forums. Africa also needs investment in resource extraction, in construction and civil
engineering (all areas of commercial focus for Brazilian companies), and development co-operation, as well as increased
technology and knowledge transfers. Africa is an ideal location for rolling out Brazilian-styled social
programmes and to put in practise nuanced approaches to enterprise and technology-led
development, which will test the real world application of Brazil’s instructive lessons for
developing countries. In turn, beside reliable access to strategic resources like oil, Brazil also seeks political support from
a
African countries in various global forums, especially in its pursuit of permanent membership of the United Nations Security Council
(UNSC) and, more generally, their recognition of Brazil as a leading global power. Political diplomacy, geopolitics and multilateral
engagement Brazil’s prioritising of Africa in the current period can be attributed largely to President Lula.26Since taking office in
2003, Lula has visited no less than 19 African countries in eight trips. During this time Brazil has doubled the number of
its embassies in Africa to 30,27 and Lula was invited as a special guest to the African Union summit in Sirte, Libya, in 2009.
Brazil has hosted a number of large second track initiatives with African academics and policy thinkers and was behind the creation
of the South AmericaAfrica summit.28 In 2007 Lula stated that, ‘South America is a priority in Brazilian external policy. Our region
is our home ...We also feel ourselves connected to Africa through cultural and historical threads. Having the second largest black
population in the world, we are committed to share the destiny and challenges of the region.’ 29With these words Lula set a political
precedence for his administration and those that follow. On a personal note, Lula has also pledged his commitment to alleviating
poverty in Africa when he leaves office at the end of 2010.30 All these efforts have helped build Brazilian ‘soft
power’ in Africa, and particularly in countries like Angola where the Lula administration has advanced existing cultural and
historical linkages through diplomatic exchanges and a range of agreements. Brazil’s political advances have also
brought targeted funding, credit lines and technical assistance to Africa. The Brazilian Development Bank
(BNDES) and the Brazilian Agricultural Research Corporation (EMBRAPA) have rolled out a number of development initiatives
across the continent, the fact of which has gone a long way in developing Brazil’s strategic interests and promoting the country in the
eyes of Africans. The role of BNDES and EMBRAPA, which have become an important part of Brazil’s commercial expansion and
drive for development cooperation in Africa, will be described in more detail in the two sections that follow. From a geopolitical or
multilateral perspective, these ‘on-the ground’ efforts — which go beyond high profile but largely vacuous political visits — have not
gone unnoticed among African leaders. In turn, Brazil, like any emerging power in Africa, seeks privileged status for its contractors
and development plans. Beyond this, African support for Brazil’s grand plans of global governance reform
is important. This is especially the case in the UN where each nation has a vote and Brazil is vying for a permanent seat on the
UN Security Council.
Large-scale African conflict will draw in outside powers and escalate to nuclear
war
Deutsch 02 – Founder of Rabid Tiger Project (Political Risk Consulting and Research Firm
focusing on Russia and
Eastern Europe Jeffrey, “SETTING THE STAGE FOR WORLD WAR III,” Rabid Tiger Newsletter, Nov 18,
http://www.rabidtigers.com/rtn/newsletterv2n9.html The Rabid Tiger Project believes that a nuclear war
is most likely
to start in Africa. Civil wars in the Congo (the country formerly known as Zaire), Rwanda, Somalia and
Sierra Leone, and domestic instability in Zimbabwe, Sudan and other countries, as well as
occasional brushfire and other wars (thanks in part to "national" borders that cut across tribal ones) turn into a
really nasty stew. We've got all too many rabid tigers and potential rabid tigers, who are willing to push the
button rather than risk being seen as wishy-washy in the face of a mortal threat and overthrown.
Geopolitically speaking, Africa is open range. Very few countries in Africa are beholden to any
particular power. South Africa is a major exception in this respect - not to mention in that she also probably
already has the Bomb. Thus, outside powers can more easily find client states there than, say, in Europe where the political
lines have long since been drawn, or Asia where many of the countries (China, India, Japan) are powers unto themselves and don't
need any "help," thank you. Thus, an African war can attract outside involvement very quickly. Of course, a
proxy war alone may not induce the Great Powers to fight each other.
But an African nuclear strike can ignite a
much broader conflagration, if the other powers are interested in a fight. Certainly, such a strike
would in the first place have been facilitated by outside help - financial, scientific, engineering,
etc. Africa is an ocean of troubled waters, and some people love to go fishing.
Brazil DA – AIDS Impact
Brazil regional leadership is key to solve AIDS
Kelley Lee, Luiz Carlos Chagas, and Thomas E. Novotny, 10 – (1) Centre on Global
Change and Health, London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, London, United Kingdom,
(2) Independent Researcher – Public Health and Trade Policies, London, United Kingdom, (3)
Graduate School of Public Health, San Diego State University, San Diego, California, United
States of America (Brazil and the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control: Global Health
Diplomacy as Soft Power,” April 20, 2010,
http://www.plosmedicine.org/article/fetchObject.action?uri=info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjourn
al.pmed.1000232&representation=PDF)//HAL
Brazil’s New Prominence in Global Health Brazil has become increasingly prominent in international
relations in recent years through its leadership in climate change [7], trade, energy policy, and
nuclear nonproliferation negotiations [8]. By combining economic growth with progressive
domestic social policies, the country has defied orthodox thinking on development. It has been
in the realm of global health, however, that Brazilian diplomacy has been particularly noteworthy,
beginning with negotiations on access to medicines for treatment of HIV/AIDS . Because of its
constitutional requirement for equity in access to antiretroviral (ARV) therapy [9], and the political will
to address the issue, Brazil successfully confronted and negotiated a satisfactory resolution to
barriers imposed on drug availability by the Agreement on TradeRelated Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights
(TRIPS). With the US government aligning with powerful corporate interests, Brazil’s championing of free and universal access to
ARVs earned worldwide respect among public health advocates [10]. While other countries, such as Thailand and South Africa, also
sought to challenge the pharmaceutical industry on restrictive pricing policies, as Nunn and colleagues argue, Brazil became
the first developing country to offer free ARV treatment to HIV/AIDS patients despite claims by
the World Bank that such a policy was not cost-effective [11]. Importantly, the country has seen a
dramatic decline in AIDS related morbidity and mortality as a result of its treatment program, a
success story that has served as a role model for the expansion of global support for HIV/ AIDS
treatment in other countries. In this way, Brazil helped bridge a chasm between public health and
trade policy through its national HIV/AIDS policy [12].
AIDS will kill hundreds of millions if not stopped. It threatens to extinguish life on
the planet
Mathiu, 2K – (Mutuma, Africa News, July 15, 2000, “AIDS: Devastation!” LexisNexis)
Every age has its killer. But Aids is without precedent. It is comparable only to the Black Death of the Middle
Ages in the terror it evokes and the graves it fills. But unlike the plague, Aids does not come at a time of scientific innocence: It flies
in the face of space exploration, the manipulation of genes and the mapping of the human genome. The Black Death - the plague,
today easily cured by antibiotics and prevented by vaccines - killed a full 40 million Europeans, a quarter of the population of
Europe, between 1347 and 1352. But it was a death that could be avoided by the simple expedient of changing addresses and whose
vector could be seen and exterminated. With Aids, the vector is humanity itself, the nice person in the next seat in the bus. There is
nowhere to run and nowhere to hide. Every human being who expresses the innate desire to preserve the human genetic pool
through the natural mechanism of reproduction is potentially at
risk. And whereas death by plague was a merciful five days of
is not satisfied until years of stigma and excruciating torture have been wrought on its
victim. The plague toll of tens of millions in two decades was a veritable holocaust, but it will be
nothing compared to the viral holocaust: So far, 18.8 million people are already dead; 43.3 million
infected worldwide (24.5 million of them Africans) carry the seeds of their inevitable demise - unwilling participants in
a March of the Damned. Last year alone, 2.8 million lives went down the drain, 85 per cent of them African; as a matter of
fact, 6,000 Africans will die today. The daily toll in Kenya is 500. There has never been fought a war on these shores that was
so wanton in its thirst for human blood. During the First World War, more than a million lives were lost at the Battle
agony, HIV
of the Somme alone, setting a trend that was to become fairly common, in which generals would use soldiers as cannon fodder; the
lives of 10 million young men were sacrificed for a cause that was judged to be more worthwhile than the dreams - even the mere
living out of a lifetime - of a generation. But there was proffered an explanation: It was the honour of bathing a battlefield with young
blood, patriotism or simply racial pride. Aids, on the other hand, is a holocaust without even a lame or bigoted
justification. It is simply a waste. It is death contracted not in the battlefield but in bedrooms and other venues of furtive
intimacy. It is difficult to remember any time in history when the survival of the human race was so hopelessly in jeopardy.
Brazil DA – BRICS Impact
Brazils regional influence is key to BRIC
Christensen, 13 - Associate Professor at Aalborg University, PhD in Socialogy and Social
Condition (Steen Fryba, April 23rd, 2013, “Brazil’s Foreign Policy Priorities,” Third World
Quarterly, Vol. 34, No. 2, 2013, pp 271–286,
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/01436597.2013.775785)//HAL
Since 2003 Brazil has been actively engaged in an agenda of diffusion of global power and of
gaining more influence in global governance both in the economic and in the security realms. It
has sought to defend national autonomy, strengthen its economy and gain more influence in the
global political arena. Brazil has prioritised South–South cooperation in order to reach these aims. Relations with South
American countries and the other countries of the BRICS grouping have been prioritised. This builds on two main logics. One is that
South America is important in Brazil’s geopolitical strategy and in the aim of creating a Brazilian
sphere of interest, as well as a platform for Brazil’s competitive insertion in the global economy. Brazil has been
relatively successful in these regard, with the creation of the South American Defence Council, significant economic
trade and investment links, and infrastructural developments improving access to Brazilian
export markets in Asia and in South America itself. BRICS cooperation largely builds on a common interest in
gaining more influence in the global economic and political order. This strategy has been relatively successful as BRICS are
increasingly influential players in global economic governance, although this has not assured an agreement in multilateral trade
negotiations at the WTO. However, the global security order is still dominated by the USA and its Western allies, and Brazil is still
far from gaining a permanent position on the UN Security Council and cannot even rely on explicit support from China and Russia,
which are members. Brazilian strategies have been broadly successful. At the regional level the council has
successfully promoted the establishment of a Common Defence Council in Unasur, making South America a security region. This
means that South America has increasingly become Brazil’s sphere of influence. However, South America is
not a cohesive bloc, as national interests and strategies diverge significantly. Therefore Unasur functions strictly as an
intergovernmental institution based on the respect of national sovereignty and autonomous policy making. Nevertheless, the
region functions well from the perspective of Brazilian development and global power
projection. Arguably Brazil’s main priority has moved from South American cooperation to its cooperation
with the other members of BRICS. The coalition has become an increasingly important player in key
multilateral institutions. This has created a situation in which the traditional Western powers increasingly need to negotiate
matters of security and economic governance with emerging powers.
Multipolarity key to preventing nuclear war
Dyer, ’04 (Gwynne, military historian and lecturer on international affairs, “The End of War”,
Toronto Star, 12/30/2004, http://www.commondreams.org/views04/1230-05.htm)
War is deeply embedded in our history and our culture, probably since before we were even fully human, but weaning ourselves
away from it should not be a bigger mountain to climb than some of the other changes we have already made in the way we live,
given the right incentives. And we have certainly been given the right incentives: The holiday from history that we
have enjoyed since the early '90s may be drawing to an end, and another great-power war, fought
next time with nuclear weapons, may be lurking in our future. The "firebreak" against nuclear weapons use
that we began building after Hiroshima and Nagasaki has held for well over half a century now. But the proliferation of
nuclear weapons to new powers is a major challenge to the stability of the system. So are the
coming crises, mostly environmental in origin, which will hit some countries much harder than others, and may
drive some to desperation. Add in the huge impending shifts in the great-power system as China and India grow to rival the United
States in GDP over the next 30 or 40 years and it will be hard to keep things from spinning out of control. With good luck and
good management, we may be able to ride out the next half-century without the first-magnitude
catastrophe of a global nuclear war, but the potential certainly exists for a major die-back of human population. We
cannot command the good luck, but good management is something we can choose to provide. It depends, above all, on
preserving and extending the multilateral system that we have been building since the end of World War II. The
rising powers must be absorbed into a system that emphasizes co-operation and makes room for them,
rather than one that deals in confrontation and raw military power. If they are obliged to play the
traditional great-power game of winners and losers, then history will repeat itself and everybody loses. Our hopes for
mitigating the severity of the coming environmental crises also depend on early and concerted global
action of a sort that can only happen in a basically co-operative international system. When the great
powers are locked into a military confrontation, there is simply not enough spare attention, let alone enough trust, to make deals on
those issues, so the highest priority at the moment is to keep the multilateral approach alive and avoid a
drift back into alliance systems and arms races. And there is no point in dreaming that we can leap straight into
some never-land of universal brotherhood; we will have to confront these challenges and solve the problem of war within the context
of the existing state system.
Brazil is key to BRIC
Laidi, 11 – Professor at the European Center of the Johns Hopkins Bologna, Research
Professor at the Centre d’Etudes Européennes de Sciences Po (The BRICs Against the West?”
CERI STRATEGY PAPERS, N° 11 – Hors Série, Novembre 2011,
http://www.sciencespo.fr/ceri/sites/sciencespo.fr.ceri/files/n11_112011.pdf)//HAL
Brazil: the BRICS as an identity support This brings us to Brazil, which is unquestionably one of the central BRICS
actors. Under the leadership of Lula and his Minister of Foreign Affairs Celso Amorim, Brazil played a
significant role in the emergence of the BRICS. As mentioned earlier, it was a driving force in forming
the Cancun front. More recently, with Turkey, it was central to a political maneuver to counter the
Americans with regard to Iran by attempting to negotiate a trilateral agreement with Teheran
on nuclear waste reprocessing. Brazil sees the BRICS as an intermediary political circle in
between the West – and particularly the United States, with which it enjoys close relations – and Latin America,
which forms its natural economic and political sphere of influence. The complementarity of Brasilia’s
objectives is expressed in the fact that Lula both centrally integrated Brazil into the BRICS and crucially contributed to the
creation of UNASUR.
Brazil DA – Democracy Impact
Brazils regional power is key to democratic promotion—solves better than the US
Stuenkel, 13 - BA from the Universidad de Valencia in Spain, a Master in Public Policy from
Harvard's Kennedy School of Government, where he was a McCloy Scholar, and a PhD in
political science from the University of Duisburg-Essen in Germany, assistant professor of
international relations at the Getúlio Vargas Foundation (FGV) in São Paulo, where he
coordinates the São Paulo branch of the School of History and Social Science (CPDOC) and the
executive program in international relations (Oliver, Third World Quarterly, Vol. 34, No. 2,
2013, pp 339–355, “Rising Powers and the Future of Democracy Promotion: the case of Brazil
and India,” http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/01436597.2013.775789)//HAL
Western democratic governments and organisations spend billions of dollars every year on
democracy-related projects, turning them into the dominant actors in the field of democracy
promotion. Yet a notable shift of power is taking place towards countries that are more hesitant when it comes to
systematic democracy promotion. Have Brazil and India promoted democracy in the past? How do analysts and policy makers in
emerging democracies—using Brazil and India as an example in this analysis—think about democracy promotion? How can we
characterise their arguments in relation to the critiques cited above? Brazil and democracy promotion Brazil accounts for over half
of South America’s wealth, population, territory and military budget, which suggests that it is
relatively more powerful in
its region than China, India and Germany are in their respective neighbourhoods. 46 Yet, despite this
dominant position, it shied away from intervening in its neighbours’ internal affairs before the 1990s. The preservation of national
sovereignty and non-intervention have always been and remain key pillars of Brazil’s foreign policy, so any attempt to promote or
defend self-determination and human rights abroad—a commitment enshrined in Brazil’s 1989 constitution—stands in conflict with
the principle of non-intervention. The tension arising from these two opposing visions—respecting sovereignty and adopting a more
assertive pro-democracy stance, particularly in the region—is one of the important dilemmas in Brazilian foreign policy of the past
two decades. In fact, particularly during the 1990s, Brazil abstained several times from promoting or defending democracy. In 1990,
under President Fernando Collor de Mello (1990–92) and largely because of economic interests, Brazil blocked calls for a military
intervention in Suriname after a military coup there. A year later it opposed military intervention to reinstall President Aristide in
Haiti. In 1992 it remained silent over a political crisis in Ecuador. In 1994—when a member of the UN Security Council—it abstained
from Security Council Resolution 940, which authorised the use of force in Haiti with the goal of reinstating President Aristide, who
had been removed from power in 1991 through a coup.50 However, contrary to what is often believed, Brazil has
defended democracy abroad in many more instances, and over the past two decades its views on
intervention have become decidedly more flexible.51 Even under indirectlyelected President José Sarney (1985–
89), the first president after democratisation, Brazil supported the inclusion of a reference to democracy in a new preamble to the
Organization of American States (OAS) Charter.52 Under President Fernando Henrique Cardoso (1995–2002), Brazil
intervened in neighbouring Paraguay in 1996 to avoid a military coup there—workingthrough Mercosur
and the OAS to obtain higher leverage, and ultimately convincing General Lino Oviedo not to stage a coup d´état against then
President Juan Carlos Wasmosy.53 The Brazilian president again played an important mediating role during political crises in
Paraguay in 1999 and 2000.54 When then Peruvian President Fujimori falsified the election results in 2000, Brazil’s President
Cardoso refused to criticise him and Brazil was the major obstacle to US and Canadian efforts to condemn Peru at the OAS General
Assembly.55 Yet, in an important gesture, President Cardoso stayed away from President Fujimori’s inaugural ceremony, and a year
later Brazil supported the Inter-American Democratic Charter, largely aimed at Fujimori, which includes the norm of democratic
solidarity.56 Following the coup in Venezuela Brazil has assumed a more assertive prodemocracy
stance in the region. In 2002 it actively engaged in Venezuela when a group sought to illegally oust Hugo Chavez, who was
reinstated 48 hours later.57 Looking back over the past decade, Santosi argues that Brazil has played an exemplary and
fundamental role in strengthening democratic norms and clauses across the region.58 In his
memoirs Cardoso reflected on the issue by saying that ‘Brazil always defends democratic order’. 59 Burges and Daudelin argue that
‘one can say that Brazil has been quite supportive of efforts to protect democracy in the
Americas since 1990’. 60 This tendency has been further strengthened in the 21st century. In 2003
President Lula (2003– 2010) swiftly engaged to resolve a constitutional crisis in Bolivia and, in 2005, he sent his foreign minister to
Quito to deal with a crisis in Ecuador. In the same year Brazil supported the OAS in assuming a mediating role during a political
crisis in Nicaragua, including financial support for the electoral monitoring of a municipal election there. In 2009 the
international debate about how to deal with the coup in Honduras was very much a result of
Brazil and the USA clashing over the terms of how best to defend democracy, rather than
whether to defend it.61 Over the past two decades Brazil has systematically built democratic references and clauses into the
charters, protocols and declarations of the subregional institutions of which it is a member. The importance of democracy
in the constitution and activities of the Rio Group, Mercosur and the more recent South American Community of
Nations (Unasul) can to a large extent be traced back to Brazil’s activism.62 At the same time Brazil has
sought to ensure that the protection of democratic rule be calibrated with interventionism,
combining the principle of non-intervention with that of ‘non-indifference’. 63 This term’s policy
relevance remains contested, yet it symbolises how much Brazil’s thinking about sovereignty has evolved. For example, when
explaining why Brazil opposed a US proposal to craft a mechanism within the OAS’S Democratic Charter, which permits the group
to intervene in nations to foster or strengthen democracy, Celso Amorim argued that ‘there needs to be a dialogue rather than an
intervention’, adding that ‘democracy cannot be imposed. It is born from dialogue.’ 64 It thus positions itself as an alternative and
more moderate democracy defender in the hemisphere than the USA, and one that continuously calibrates its interest in defending
democracy with its tradition of non-intervention. Brazil’s decision to lead the UN peacekeeping mission, Minustah, in Haiti, starting
in 2004, cannot be categorised as democracy promotion per se, yet the mission’s larger goal did consist in bringing both economic
and political stability to the Caribbean Island, which has been the target of US American democracy promotion for years.65 In the
same way Brazil’s ongoing involvement in Guinea Bissau, a member of the Community of Portuguese Language Countries (CPLP)
proved to be a yet another important moment for Brazil’s role as a promoter of peace and democracy.66 Brazil had provided some
electoral assistance to Guinea-Bissau from 2004 to 2005 and it continued to support efforts to stabilise the country by operating
through the UN peacekeeping mission there.67 During a CPLP meeting in 2011 Brazil signed a memorandum of understanding to
implement a Project in Support of the Electoral Cycles of the Portuguese-speaking African Countries and Timor-Leste.68 In
addition, in the lead-up to the anticipated elections in April 2012, Brazil made further financial contributions to the United Nations
Development Programme (UNDP) basket fund in support of the National Electoral Commission for assistance in the execution of
the election.69 Brazil’s pro-democracy stance became most obvious in 2012, when President Dilma
Rousseff—together with the leaders of Uruguay and Argentina—suspended Paraguay from
Mercosur after the impeachment of Paraguay’s President Fernando Lugo, which most
governments in the region regarded as the equivalent of a coup d’état or a ‘parliamentary coup’.
70 The Brazilian government thus set a clear precedent that anti-democratic tendencies in the
region would cause a rapid and clear reaction from leaders in Brasília. President Rousseff’s
decision to work through Mercosur—rather than the OAS— is consistent with a growing preference to use local
regional bodies, possibly in an effort to strengthen projection as a regional leader. Yet there are also
critical voices. Summarising Brazilian foreign policy over the past two decades, Sean Burges argues that ‘Brazil has not behaved
consistently in support of democratic norm enforcement’, 71 and that decisive action to preserve democracy has been ‘tepid’. 72 Ted
Piccone reasons that ‘when it comes to wielding…influence in support of democracy in other countries…Brazil has been ambivalent
and often unpredictable’. 73 Both these evaluations were made before Brazil’s assertive stance in Paraguay in 2012. Nevertheless,
despite this strategy, the term ‘democracy promotion’ is not used either by Brazilian policy makers or by academics when referring to
Brazil’s Paraguay policy. In the same way Brazil does not promote any activities comparable to those of large US or European
nongovernmental organisations, whose activities range from political party development, electoral monitoring, supporting
independent media and journalists, capacity building for state institutions, and training for judges, civic group leaders and
legislators. This brief analysis shows that Brazil is increasingly assertive in its region, and willing to
intervene if political crises threaten democracy. Brazil is most likely to intervene during
constitutional crises and political ruptures, and less so when procedural issues during elections may affect the
outcome—as was the case during Hugo Chavez’ re-election in 2012, when several commentators criticised Brazil’s decision not to
pressure the Venezuelan government to ensure fairelections.74 Yet, despite this distinction, it seems clear that the consolidation of
democracy in the region has turned into one of Brazil’s fundamental foreign policy goals. This development must be seen
in the context of Brazil’s attempt to consolidate its regional leadership. In the 1980s Brazilian foreign
policy makers perceived the need to engage with the country’s neighbours, principally its rival Argentina, a trend that continued and
strengthened throughout the 1990s. At the beginning of Cardoso’s first term, the president began to articulate a vision that
fundamentally diverged from Brazil’s traditional perspective—a vision that identified ‘South America’ as a top priority.75 This trend
has continued ever since, and was intensified under Cardoso’s successor, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. Over the past few years, as
Brazil’s economic rise has caught the world’s attention, the region has firmly stood at the centre of Brazil’s foreign policy strategy.76
This trend continues under Brazil’s current administration, with a focus on reducing a growing fear in the region that Brazil could
turn into a regional bully; over the past few years anti-Brazilian sentiment has been on the rise in South America.77 Yet, while
Brazil may de facto defend democracy with frequency in the region, it rarely engages in the
liberal rhetoric so common in Europe and the USA. It may be precisely because of Brazil’s
traditional mistrust of the USA’s attempts to promote freedom that Brazilian policy makers
refrain from using similar arguments. Rather, Brazil can be said to be defending and promoting
political stability above all else, a key ingredient of Brazil’s interest in expanding its economic
influence on the continent.
Democracy is key to solve for extinction
Muravchik 1 – Resident Scholar at American Enterprise Institute Joshua, “Democracy and
nuclear peace,” Jul 11, http://www.npec-web.org/syllabi/muravchik.htm
The greatest impetus for world peace -- and perforce of nuclear peace -- is the spread of
democracy. In a famous article, and subsequent book, Francis Fukuyama argued that democracy's extension was leading to "the
end of history." By this he meant the conclusion of man's quest for the right social order, but he also meant the "diminution of the
likelihood of large-scale conflict between states." (1) Fukuyama's phrase was intentionally provocative, even tongue-in-cheek, but he
was pointing to two down-to-earth historical observations: that democracies are more peaceful than other kinds of government and
that the world is growing more democratic. Neither point has gone unchallenged. Only a few decades ago, as distinguished an
observer of international relations as George Kennan made a claim quite contrary to the first of these assertions. Democracies,
he said, were slow to anger, but once aroused "a democracy . . . . fights in anger . . . . to the bitter
end." (2) Kennan's view was strongly influenced by the policy of "unconditional surrender"
pursued in World War II. But subsequent experience, such as the negotiated settlements
America sought in Korea and Vietnam proved him wrong. Democracies are not only slow to
anger but also quick to compromise. And to forgive. Notwithstanding the insistence on unconditional surrender,
America treated Japan and that part of Germany that it occupied with extraordinary generosity. In recent years a burgeoning
literature has discussed the peacefulness of democracies. Indeed the proposition that democracies do not go to
war with one another has been described by one political scientist as being "as close as anything
we have to an empirical law in international relations." (3) Some of those who find enthusiasm for democracy
off-putting have challenged this proposition, but their challenges have only served as empirical tests that have confirmed its
robustness. For example, the academic Paul Gottfried and the columnist-turned-politician Patrick J. Buchanan have both instanced
democratic England's declaration of war against democratic Finland during World War II. (4) In fact, after much procrastination,
England did accede to the pressure of its Soviet ally to declare war against Finland which was allied with Germany. But the
declaration was purely formal: no fighting ensued between England and Finland. Surely this is an exception that proves the rule. The
strongest exception I can think of is the war between the nascent state of Israel and the Arabs in 1948. Israel was an embryonic
democracy and Lebanon, one of the Arab belligerents, was also democratic within the confines of its peculiar confessional division of
power. Lebanon, however, was a reluctant party to the fight. Within the councils of the Arab League, it opposed the war but went
along with its larger confreres when they opted to attack. Even so, Lebanon did little fighting and soon sued for peace. Thus, in the
case of Lebanon against Israel, as in the case of England against Finland, democracies nominally went to war against democracies
when they were dragged into conflicts by authoritarian allies. The political scientist Bruce Russett offers a different challenge to the
notion that democracies are more peaceful. "That democracies are in general, in dealing with all kinds of
states, more peaceful than are authoritarian or other nondemocratically constituted states . . . .is a
much more controversial proposition than 'merely' that democracies are peaceful in their dealings with each other, and one for
which there is little systematic evidence," he says. (5) Russett cites his own and other statistical explorations which show that while
democracies rarely fight one another they often fight against others. The trouble with such studies, however, is that they rarely
examine the question of who started or caused a war. To reduce the data to a form that is quantitatively measurable, it is easier to
determine whether a conflict has occurred between two states than whose fault it was. But the latter question is all important.
Democracies may often go to war against dictatorships because the dictators see them as prey or
underestimate their resolve. Indeed, such examples abound. Germany might have behaved more cautiously in the
summer of 1914 had it realized that England would fight to vindicate Belgian neutrality and to support France. Later, Hitler was
emboldened by his notorious contempt for the flabbiness of the democracies. North Korea almost surely discounted the likelihood of
an American military response to its invasion of the South after Secretary of State Dean Acheson publicly defined America's defense
perimeter to exclude the Korean peninsula (a declaration which merely confirmed existing U.S. policy). In 1990, Saddam Hussein's
decision to swallow Kuwait was probably encouraged by the inference he must have taken from the statements and actions of
American officials that Washington would offer no forceful resistance. Russett says that those who claim democracies are in general
more peaceful "would have us believe that the United States was regularly on the defensive, rarely on the offensive, during the Cold
War." But that is not quite right: the word "regularly" distorts the issue. A victim can sometimes turn the tables on an aggressor, but
that does not make the victim equally bellicose. None would dispute that Napoleon was responsible for the Napoleonic wars or
Hitler for World War II in Europe, but after a time their victims seized the offensive. So in the Cold War, the United States may have
initiated some skirmishes (although in fact it rarely did), but the struggle as a whole was driven one-sidedly. The Soviet policy was
"class warfare"; the American policy was "containment." The so-called revisionist historians argued that America bore an equal or
larger share of responsibility for the conflict. But Mikhail Gorbachev made nonsense of their theories when, in the name of glasnost
and perestroika, he turned the Soviet Union away from its historic course. The Cold War ended almost instantly--as he no doubt
knew it would. "We would have been able to avoid many . . . difficulties if the democratic process had developed normally in our
country," he wrote. (7) To render judgment about the relative peacefulness of states or systems, we must ask not only who started a
war but why. In particular we should consider what in Catholic Just War doctrine is called "right intention," which means roughly:
what did they hope to get out of it? In the few cases in recent times in which wars were initiated by democracies, there were often
motives other than aggrandizement, for example, when America invaded Grenada. To be sure, Washington was impelled by selfinterest more than altruism, primarily its concern for the well-being of American nationals and its desire to remove a chip, however
tiny, from the Soviet game board. But America had no designs upon Grenada, and the invaders were greeted with joy by the
Grenadan citizenry. After organizing an election, America pulled out. In other cases, democracies have turned to
war in the face of provocation, such as Israel's invasion of Lebanon in 1982 to root out an enemy sworn to its destruction
or Turkey's invasion of Cyprus to rebuff a power-grab by Greek nationalists. In contrast, the wars launched by dictators, such as
Iraq's invasion of Kuwait, North Korea's of South Korea, the Soviet Union's of Hungary and Afghanistan, often have aimed at
conquest or subjugation. The big exception to this rule is colonialism. The European powers conquered most of Africa and Asia, and
continued to hold their prizes as Europe democratized. No doubt many of the instances of democracies at war that enter into the
statistical calculations of researchers like Russett stem from the colonial era. But colonialism was a legacy of Europe's pre-
democratic times, and it was abandoned after World War II. Since then, I know of no case where a democracy has initiated warfare
without significant provocation or for reasons of sheer aggrandizement, but there are several cases where dictators have done so.
One interesting piece of Russett's research should help to point him away from his doubts that democracies are more peaceful in
general. He aimed to explain why democracies are more peaceful toward each other. Immanuel Kant was the first to observe, or
rather to forecast, the pacific inclination of democracies. He reasoned that "citizens . . . will have a great hesitation in . . . . calling
down on themselves all the miseries of war." (8) But this valid insight is incomplete. There is a deeper explanation. Democracy
is not just a mechanism; it entails a spirit of compromise and self-restraint. At bottom,
democracy is the willingness to resolve civil disputes without recourse to violence. Nations that
embrace this ethos in the conduct of their domestic affairs are naturally more predisposed to
embrace it in their dealings with other nations. Russett aimed to explain why democracies are more peaceful
toward one another. To do this, he constructed two models. One hypothesized that the cause lay in the mechanics of democratic
decision-making (the "structural/institutional model"), the other that it lay in the democratic ethos (the "cultural/normative
model"). His statistical assessments led him to conclude that: "almost always the cultural/normative
model shows a consistent effect on conflict occurrence and war. The structural/institutional
model sometimes provides a significant relationship but often does not." (9) If it is the ethos that makes
democratic states more peaceful toward each other, would not that ethos also make them more peaceful in general? Russett implies
that the answer is no, because to his mind a critical element in the peaceful behavior of democracies toward other democracies is
their anticipation of a conciliatory attitude by their counterpart. But this is too pat. The attitude of live-and-let-live cannot be turned
on and off like a spigot. The citizens and officials of democracies recognize that other states, however governed, have legitimate
interests, and they are disposed to try to accommodate those interests except when the other party's behavior seems threatening or
outrageous. A different kind of challenge to the thesis that democracies are more peaceful has been posed by the political scientists
Edward G. Mansfield and Jack Snyder. They claim statistical support for the proposition that while fully fledged democracies may be
pacific, Ain th[e] transitional phase of democratization, countries become more aggressive and war-prone, not less." (10) However,
like others, they measure a state's likelihood of becoming involved in a war but do not report attempting to determine the cause or
fault. Moreover, they acknowledge that their research revealed not only an increased likelihood for a state to become involved in a
war when it was growing more democratic, but an almost equal increase for states growing less democratic. This raises the
possibility that the effects they were observing were caused simply by political change per se, rather than by democratization.
Finally, they implicitly acknowledge that the relationship of democratization and peacefulness may change over historical periods.
There is no reason to suppose that any such relationship is governed by an immutable law. Since their empirical base reaches back to
1811, any effect they report, even if accurately interpreted, may not hold in the contemporary world. They note that "in [some] recent
cases, in contrast to some of our historical results, the rule seems to be: go fully democratic, or don't go at all." But according to
Freedom House, some 62.5 percent of extant governments were chosen in legitimate elections. (12) (This is a much larger
proportion than are adjudged by Freedom House to be "free states," a more demanding criterion, and it includes many weakly
democratic states.) Of the remaining 37.5 percent, a large number are experiencing some degree of democratization or heavy
pressure in that direction. So the choice "don't go at all" (11) is rarely realistic in the contemporary world. These statistics also
contain the answer to those who doubt the second proposition behind Fukuyama's forecast, namely, that the world is growing more
democratic. Skeptics have drawn upon Samuel Huntington's fine book, The Third Wave: Democratization in the Late Twentieth
Century. Huntington says that the democratization trend that began in the mid-1970s in Portugal, Greece and Spain is the third such
episode. The first "wave" of democratization began with the American revolution and lasted through the aftermath of World War I,
coming to an end in the interwar years when much of Europe regressed back to fascist or military dictatorship. The second wave, in
this telling, followed World War II when wholesale decolonization gave rise to a raft of new democracies. Most of these, notably in
Africa, collapsed into dictatorship by the 1960s, bringing the second wave to its end. Those who follow Huntington's argument may
take the failure of democracy in several of the former Soviet republics and some other instances of backsliding since 1989 to signal
the end of the third wave. Such an impression, however, would be misleading. One unsatisfying thing about Huntington's "waves" is
their unevenness. The first lasted about 150 years, the second about 20. How long should we expect the third to endure? If it is like
the second, it will ebb any day now, but if it is like the first, it will run until the around the year 2125. And by then--who knows?-perhaps mankind will have incinerated itself, moved to another planet, or even devised a better political system. Further,
Huntington's metaphor implies a lack of overall progress or direction. Waves rise and fall. But each of the reverses that followed
Huntington's two waves was brief, and each new wave raised the number of democracies higher than before. Huntington does,
however, present a statistic that seems to weigh heavily against any unidirectional interpretation of democratic progress. The
proportion of states that were democratic in 1990 (45%), he says, was identical to the proportion in 1922. (13) But there are two
answers to this. In 1922 there were only 64 states; in 1990 there were 165. But the number of peoples had not grown appreciably.
The difference was that in 1922 most peoples lived in colonies, and they were not counted as states. The 64 states of that time were
mostly the advanced countries. Of those, two thirds had become democratic by 1990, which was a significant gain. The additional
101 states counted in 1990 were mostly former colonies. Only a minority, albeit a substantial one, were democratic in 1990, but since
virtually none of those were democratic in 1922, that was also a significant gain. In short, there was progress all around, but this was
obscured by asking what percentage of states were democratic. Asking the question this way means that a people who were subjected
to a domestic dictator counted as a non-democracy, but a people who were subjected to a foreign dictator did not count at all.
Moreover, while the criteria for judging a state democratic vary, the statistic that 45 percent of states were democratic in 1990
corresponds with Freedom House's count of "democratic" polities (as opposed to its smaller count of "free" countries, a more
demanding criterion). But by this same count, Freedom House now says that the proportion of democracies has grown to 62.5
percent. In other words, the "third wave" has not abated. That Freedom House could count 120 freely elected governments by early
2001 (out of a total of 192 independent states) bespeaks a vast transformation in human governance within the span of 225 years. In
1775, the number of democracies was zero. In 1776, the birth of the United States of America brought the total up to one. Since then,
democracy has spread at an accelerating pace, most of the growth having occurred within the twentieth century, with greatest
momentum since 1974. That this momentum has slackened somewhat since its pinnacle in 1989, destined to be remembered as one
of the most revolutionary years in all history, was inevitable. So many peoples were swept up in the democratic tide that there was
certain to be some backsliding. Most countries' democratic evolution has included some fits and starts rather than a smooth
progression. So it must be for the world as a whole. Nonetheless, the overall trend remains powerful and clear. Despite the
backsliding, the number and proportion of democracies stands higher today than ever before. This progress offers a source of hope
for enduring nuclear peace. The danger of nuclear war was radically reduced almost overnight when Russia abandoned Communism
and turned to democracy. For other ominous corners of the world, we may be in a kind of race between the emergence or growth of
nuclear arsenals and the advent of democratization. If this is so, the greatest cause for worry may rest with the Moslem Middle East
where nuclear arsenals do not yet exist but where the prospects for democracy may be still more remote.
Brazil DA – Israeli Conflict Impact
Brazilian power key to solve the Israel-Palestinian conflict
Giselle Datz and Joel Peters, 13 – Giselle Datz is an Assistant Professor of Government
and International Affairs at the School of Public and International Affairs, Joel Peters is
Professor of Government and International Affairs at the School of Public and International
Affairs, Virginia Tech (“Brazil and the Israeli–Palestinian Conflict in the New Century: Between
Ambition, Idealism, and Pragmatism,” Israel Journal of foreign Affairs VII : 2 (2013)
http://israelcfr.com/documents/7-2/7-2-5-GiselleDatz-and-JoelPeters.pdf)//HAL
Brazil’s approach to the Israeli–Palestinian conflict has remained true to the course set by
President Lula. Brazil under Dilma Rousseff has continued to be a strong and vocal advocate of
Palestinian statehood. Shortly before the November 29, 2012 vote on Palestinian membership in the United Nations,
Brazilian Foreign Minister Antonio Patriota visited Israel and the Palestinian territories, where he reaffirmed Brazil’s willingness to
help mediate a resolution to the conflict. At home, in December 2012, Brazil hosted the Forum Social Palestina Livre [World Social
Forum for a Free Palestine], a gathering of political activists, civil society groups, and transnational networks organized by
supporters of the ruling Workers’ Party. Brazil’s promotion of the Palestinian cause serves its interests at
overseas. Domestically, it speaks to the idealism and principles of the Workers Party, which has held power since
offers Brazil greater visibility, not only reflecting its ambitions of becoming a global
player, but also forming a central element in Brazil’s efforts in challenging American
dominance, and in promoting multilateralism to address and resolve global issues, thereby
increasing the relevance of new emergent powers. But if we are witnessing the emergence of a
“post-American” global order, then Brazil’s engagement with the Israeli–Palestinian conflict
also reveals that pragmatism and self-interest will feature prominently in the approach of “new”
powers to the resolution of global conflicts. Brazil has sought to strengthen its relations with
Israel. For all its support of the Palestinian cause, Brazil sees Israeli investment, its high-tech sector,
and the procurement of Israeli technology and advanced weapons as critical in the continued modernization of its
economy and the development of its military exports. This sense of pragmatism and realpolitik has also guided
home and
2003. Abroad, it
Israel’s approach to Brazil. Recognizing Brazil’s importance as an economic actor and emerging global power, and its potential as a
market for its military exports, and aware that it has little chance of affecting Brazil’s position, Israel has chosen to
overlook its rhetoric on the conflict and work with Brazil, not against it. Indeed, Brazilian–Israeli
relations have never been stronger. Since Rousseff came to power two years ago, five Israeli ministers have visited
Brazil. Trade between the two countries has continued to flourish and Israeli military and security companies have deepened their
presence in the growing Brazilian homeland security and defense markets. In April 2012, Rafael Advanced Defense Systems, one of
Israel’s leading defense contractors, acquired a 40-percent stake in the Brazilian aerospace company GESPI Aeronautics, and that
summer the commander of the Brazilian air force paid a visit to Israel to discuss areas of future cooperation. At least until the end
of Rousseff’s term in office (2015), we are likely to see the pattern of Brazil’s engagement with Israel and
the Palestinians remain one that meshes ambition, idealism, and pragmatism in a more
assertive foreign policy agenda that, for all its normative flavor, is ultimately grounded in
material self interest. In that respect, it is a pattern of foreign policy behavior that is not too
dissimilar to that of other emerging powers.
Even without escalation, Middle East nuclear war guarantees extinction
Hoffman, 6 (Ian Hoffman, Staff Writer, December 12, 2006, “Nuclear Winter Looms, experts
say”, MediaNews Group, Inc. and ANG Newspapers)
SAN FRANCISCO -- With superpower nuclear arsenals plummeting to a third of 1980s levels and slated to drop by another
third, the nightmarish visions of nuclear winter offered by scientists during the Cold War have receded.
But they haven't
gone away. Researchers at the American Geophysical Union's annual meeting warned Monday that
even a small regional nuclear war could burn enough cities to shroud the globe in
black smoky shadow and usher in the manmade equivalent of the Little Ice Age. "Nuclear
weapons represent the greatest single human threat to the planet, much more so
than global warming," said Rutgers University atmospheric scientist Alan Robock. By dropping imaginary
Hiroshima-sized bombs into some of the world's biggest cities, now swelled to tens of millions in population,
University of Colorado researcher O. Brian Toon and colleagues found they could
generate 100 times the
fatalities and 100 times the climate-chilling smoke per kiloton of explosive power as all-out
nuclear war between the United States and former Soviet Union. For most modern
nuclear-war scenarios, the global impact isn't nuclear winter, the notion of smoke from
incinerated cities blotting out the sun for years and starving most of the Earth's people. It's not even nuclear autumn, but
rather an instant nuclear chill over most of the planet, accompanied by massive ozone
loss and warming at the poles. That's what scientists' computer simulations suggest
would happen if nuclear war broke out in a hot spot such as the Middle East, the North
Korean peninsula or, the most modeled case, in Southeast Asia. Unlike in the Cold War, when the United States and Russia
mostly targeted each other's nuclear, military and strategic industrial sites, young nuclear-armed nations have
fewer weapons and might
go for maximum effect by using them on cities, as the United States did
in 1945. "We're at a perilous crossroads," Toon said. The spread of nuclear weapons worldwide
combined with global migration into dense megacities form what he called "perhaps the
greatest danger to the stability of society since the dawn of humanity." More than 20 years ago,
researchers imagined a U.S.-Soviet nuclear holocaust would wreak havoc on the planet's climate. They showed the problem was
potentially worse than feared: Massive urban fires would flush hundreds of millions of tons of black soot skyward, where -heated by sunlight -- it would soar higher into the stratosphere and begin cooking off the protective ozone layer around the
Earth. Huge losses of ozone would open the planet and its inhabitants to damaging radiation, while the warm soot would spread
a pall sufficient to plunge the Earth into freezing year-round. The hundreds of millions who would starve exceeded those who
would die in the initial blasts and radiation. Popularized by astronomer Carl Sagan and Nobel prize winners, the idea of nuclear
winter captured the public imagination, though nuclear-weapons scientists found nuclear winter was virtually impossible to
achieve in their own computer models without dropping H-bombs on nearly every major city. Scientists on Monday say
nuclear winter still is possible, by detonating every nation's entire nuclear arsenals. The effects are
striking and last five times or longer than the cooling effects of the biggest volcanic
eruptions in recent history, according to Rutgers' Robock.
Brazil DA – LA Instability Impact
Brazil is maintaining Latin American stability now—delivering public goods better
than the US boosting confidence
Tessman, 12 - Ph.D. Political Science, University of Colorado, assistant professor of
International Affairs and associate director of the Center for the Study of Global Issues (Globis)
at the University of Georgia (Brock F., “System Structure and State Strategy: Adding Hedging to
the Menu,” May 22nd, 2012, Taylor and Francis Online)//HAL
A Council on Foreign Relations Task Force Report recommended that specific Brazil desks be created within the State Department
and National Security Council, and suggests that “U.S. policymakers recognize Brazil’s standing as a global actor, treat its emergence
as an opportunity for the United States, and work with Brazil to develop complementary policies.”66 Thus, the best way to think of
the evolving relationship between Brazil and the United States is not in terms of a nascent security competition, but as a joint
acknowledgement that Brazil is emerging as a clear regional leader, and that both states share a desire for Brazil to take on some of
the same responsibilities and pursue some of the same basic interests that the United States has in the past.67 Is it possible, then,
that Brazil’s approach to regional leadership is an example of Type B strategic hedging behavior? If so, one would expect Brazilian
foreign policy in South America to address concerns about the potential loss of public goods or subsidies that the United States has
historically provided.68 As the regional hegemon in Latin and South America for over a century, the
United States provided public goods in the region because it is “large enough, wealthy enough,
and most importantly, has enough stake in the public good in question to pay its entire cost.”69 In
addition to the less tangible (and more debatable) public good of “regional stability,” the United States has also
provided more identifiable public goods like security from external threats, intra-regional
conflict mediation, and greater monetary stability for several South American states that were
experiencing severe debt crises. Brazil—primarily through the creation of UNASUR and the associated South
American Defense Council—is driving the development of regional institutions that are increasingly
successful at generating the public goods that the United States used to deliver to the region.70
There are significant signs that this evolution is generating confidence throughout South America. As Peter
J. Meyer explains in his 2011 Congressional Research Service Report, “the successes of UNASUR have instilled a confidence in South
American nations that the region can resolve internal problems without having to turn to extra-regional powers, such as the United
States.”71 Although there is no reason to doubt that the United States is still committed to the defense of South America (and the
entire hemisphere) from external threats, it is important to note that, in pushing to establish the South American Defense Council
(CDS), Brazil is interested in taking steps toward true security autonomy for the region. Operating
the CDS aims for a defense policy that succeeds in “enhancing multilateral military
cooperation, promoting confidence and security building measures and fostering defense industry exchange.”72 Although
many of the objectives identified by the CDS are similar to those sought by the Organization of
American States (OAS), Brazil is increasingly demonstrating a preference for building regional
forums that do not include the United States. In many ways, this tendency can be seen as an attempt
to escape the shadow of US influence: until 2005, no US-supported candidate had ever lost a bid to be secretarywithin the UNASUR context,
general of the OAS. 73 As John Chipman and James L. Smith note, the new South American Defense Council is “inclined to be, in
foreign terms, a third-way actor in Latin America: respectful of desires for Latin American emancipation from a heavily burdened
past with America, but willing to strike strong bilateral relationships where these are sought.”74 Brazil is also bolstering
security ties via the India-Brazil-South Africa triad (IBSA), whichinclude biannual naval exercises that
facilitate coordination between the countries in terms of search and rescue operations as well as shipping security.75
Brazil regional leadership is key conflict diffuser in the region—empirics
Tessman, 12 - Ph.D. Political Science, University of Colorado, assistant professor of
International Affairs and associate director of the Center for the Study of Global Issues (Globis)
at the University of Georgia (Brock F., “System Structure and State Strategy: Adding Hedging to
the Menu,” May 22nd, 2012, Taylor and Francis Online)//HAL
These capabilities may become increasingly important if US naval strength is increasingly directed away from the South Atlantic
and toward the Indian and Pacific Oceans. Through UNASUR, Brazil is also taking on greater responsibility
for regional conflict mediation that used to be reserved for the United States or the OAS. This is
needed in light of the massive losses in diplomatic capital that Washington experienced in the
aftermath of the 2003 Iraq invasion and the election of several left-leaning governments in key South American states. It is
relatively easy to identify recent, and successful, instances of Brazilian conflict mediation through UNASUR. In the summer
of 2010, Colombian president Alvaro Uribe accused the Chavez government in Venezuela of harboring Colombian
rebel groups like Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC). Chavez responded to the allegations by cutting off diplomatic
relations with Colombia. Brazil immediately offered to mediate the conflict within the context of
UNASUR, and diplomatic relations were restored after Lula managed to get Chavez and the newly elected
Colombian president Juan Manuel Santos to sit down and clear the air. Given its controversial linkages with the
Colombian government, and its strong anti-Venezuelan stance, it would have been nearly impossible for the
United States to accomplish what Brazil did. Moreover, by acting through UNASUR, Brazil is able
to mediate in an efficient manner. As McCall Breuer explains, “supranational infrastructure provides a
structure through which Brazil can project its leadership without having to divert more
resources than necessary from the everyday functioning of its own government, military, and
economic machinery.”76 With Brazil playing an influential role, UNASUR also contributed to the resolution of conflicts in
Bolivia in 2008 and Ecuador in September 2010.77
That solves global warfare
Rochlin, 94 [James Francis, Professor of Political Science at Okanagan U. College,
Discovering the Americas: The Evolution of Canadian Foreign Policy Towards Latin America,
130-131, Wake Early Bird File]
While there were economic motivations for Canadian policy in Central America, security considerations were perhaps more
important. Canada possessed an interest in promoting stability in the face of a potential decline of U.S. hegemony in the
Americas. Perceptions of declining U.S. influence in the region – which had some credibility in 1979-1984 due to
the wildly inequitable divisions of wealth in some U.S. client states in Latin America, in addition to political repression, underdevelopment, mounting external debt, anti-American sentiment produced by decades of subjugation to U.S. strategic and
economic interests, and so on – were linked to the prospect of explosive events occurring in the
hemisphere. Hence, the Central American imbroglio was viewed as a fuse which could ignite a cataclysmic process throughout
the region. Analysts at the time worried that in a worstcase scenario, instability created by a regional war,
beginning in Central America and spreading elsewhere in
Latin America, might preoccupy Washington to
the extent that the United States would be unable to perform adequately its important
hegemonic role in the international arena – a concern expressed by the director of research for Canada’s
Standing Committee Report on Central America. It was feared that such a predicament could generate
increased global instability and perhaps even a hegemonic war . This is one of the motivations which led
Canada to become involved in efforts at regional conflict resolution, such as Contadora, as will be discussed in the next chapter.
Brazil DA – Smoking Impact
Brazil regional leadership is key to solve smoking
Kelley Lee, Luiz Carlos Chagas, and Thomas E. Novotny, 10 – (1) Centre on Global
Change and Health, London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, London, United Kingdom,
(2) Independent Researcher – Public Health and Trade Policies, London, United Kingdom, (3)
Graduate School of Public Health, San Diego State University, San Diego, California, United
States of America (Brazil and the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control: Global Health
Diplomacy as Soft Power,” April 20, 2010,
http://www.plosmedicine.org/article/fetchObject.action?uri=info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjourn
al.pmed.1000232&representation=PDF)//HAL
Brazilian Tobacco Control Policy as an Exemplar Brazilian leadership was critical to the successful conclusion
of the FCTC negotiations in 2003. Following the establishment of a model national tobacco
control program, Brazilian medical doctor and former coordinator of the National Tobacco Control Programme, Vera
Luiza da Costa e Silva, was recruited to lead WHO’s Tobacco Free Initiative (TFI), and Brazilian
diplomats were appointed to chair the Intergovernmental Negotiating Body (INB) for the FCTC.
A fuller understanding of Brazil’s contribution to the FCTC process may provide lessons about
the conduct of global health diplomacy in other contexts. Brazil’s National Tobacco Control
Programme implemented many innovations: Brazil was the second country (after Canada) to adopt
graphic warnings on cigarette packages, the first to create a body to regulate tobacco contents and
emissions, and the first to ban the use of ‘‘light’’ and ‘‘mild’’ terms in describing tobacco
products. According to an interview with Tania Cavalcante, Executive Secretary of the National Inter-ministerial Commission to
Implement the FCTC, Brazil promoted these advances in many INB negotiation sessions, and
encouraged other countries to support them as treaty elements. Importantly, Brazil’s status as one
of the biggest producers and exporters of tobacco, while at the same time achieving high
visibility in tobacco control, provided additional credibility for its leadership role in the FCTC
negotiations [13]. As diplomat Frederico Duque Estrada Meyer, former assistant to Ambassadors Celso Nunes Amorim and Luiz
Felipe de Seixas Correa , put it, ‘‘Some countries have restrictive anti-smoking policies like Brazil, but are not producers. Others, are
big producers but with a very liberal tobacco policy….we were leading on both sides….we represented both conflicting interests.’’ In
our interviews, the Brazilian former Director of the TFI, Vera Luiza da Costa e Silva, further emphasized this complex negotiating
position: To be a big producer, a big exporter with a strong and influential industry, and a big
consumer market for tobacco products, with pressures in the domestic market generated by
allies of a powerful industry, Brazil actively supported all the WHO resolutions that led to the
creation of the Intergovernmental Negotiating Body. To be a country subject to all these factors and also able to
implement tobacco control, we were talking at that time of being a model for other countries, mainly for
developing countries. We were sending a message that, under any circumstances, a government
committed to this priority, despite the weight of other factors, could still have one of the best
tobacco control programs in the world and support and adopt a treaty on tobacco control.
(Translated from Portuguese) Coalition Diplomacy: Bringing Together Public Health and Foreign Policy Brazil’s ability to
grapple with the diversity of interests at the national level, including a powerful tobacco industry, began
with the establishment of the Inter-Ministerial National Commission on the Control of Tobacco
Use in 1999. Backed by the highest levels of government, the Commission was a consultative body to determine the official
government position on the FCTC negotiations. Importantly, nine ministries were represented on the Commission, including Inland
Revenue, Trade and Development, and Agriculture [14–15]. This commission, including all pertinent stakeholders, ensured
that tobacco control was embodied in consistent policies throughout government and not only as a
health ministry issue. The close involvement of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, in particular, backed by the highest levels of
government, ensured a clear and unified endorsement of health goals within Brazilian foreign policy: The participation of the
Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Geneva clearly signaled, largely to tobacco industry representatives, that the Government was cohesive
in its position against smoking. The Government’s stance dispelled any doubt that the negotiations could only be about health
interests. (Translated from Portuguese) [Interview with Ambassador Santiago Alcazar, former Manager of Social Issues Unit,
Ministry of Foreign Affairs] This was an approach that protected governmental negotiation positions from the vested interests of the
tobacco industry, and it can be considered one strategy for the implementation of Article 5.3 of the FCTC on the protection of public
health policies with respect to tobacco control from commercial and other vested interests. Once negotiations commenced, the
government extended coalition building to civil society organizations (CSOs), which, through participation in health councils at the
federal, state, and municipal levels, mobilised to implement tobacco control interventions [13]. Their role proved particularly critical
in supporting its subsequent ratification by the Brazilian Senate after the signing of the FCTC by the Chief Executive. The need to
build a broad domestic coalition on tobacco control across government, civil society, and the public health community was
heightened by the industry’s own strategic lobbying of related economic interests to help it oppose stronger binding obligations of
the FCTC. As described in an internal document of British American Tobacco (BAT), released to the public in the 1990s as a result of
US litigation [16]: [W]e know how the FCTC will be negotiated and we know what countries will be involved. All end markets have
been alerted and key political and legal arguments have been distributed….British American Tobacco’s response to
date has consisted of attempting to engage in dialogue with the WHO, running a lobbying campaign based
on legal and political arguments designed to preserve adults freedom to smoke, maintain our ability to trade freely and to raise
awareness of the FCTC’s implications among finance, trade, agriculture and employment ministers around the world. We have had
some success in some countries but it is by no means complete. [17] Brazil is cited by the industry as among
the key countries where such a strategic approach was needed. Faced with this industry threat, Brazil
then extended its coalition building to the regional and global levels. In addition to formal FCTC
negotiations, informal meetings were held, according to Calvacante, as ‘‘a strategy adopted by chairs of different working subgroups
when there was an impasse and consensus could not be reached.’’ Brazil played an active part in many of these
meetings, especially at the regional level, she said: ‘‘The objective was to start sowing regional consensus before the
INB negotiations to speed up the process. We organised the first meeting for the Americas region.’’. At the same time, CSO activity
was organised through the Framework Convention Alliance (FCA), a worldwide coalition of nongovernmental organizations and
interested parties, which played an important contributory role in FCTC negotiations, ratification, and implementation [18]. As
Alcazar writes, ‘‘[d]ifferent groups in civil society come together as an interested party in the process of implementing an
international treaty. It is as if civil society, as an interested party—and certainly an unstructured one—becomes a player on the
international stage’’ [13]. Brazilian Leadership in Global Negotiations A strategically important decision by the WHO TFI was the
appointment of Celso Nunes Amorim, then Brazil’s Permanent Representative to the United Nations and other international
organizations in Geneva, as INB Chair. Amorim was recognised as a skilled and experienced diplomat, particularly during his tenure
as negotiator in UN talks on disarmament, trade, and security. The US delegation described him as ‘‘a steady hand and [providing]
good leadership’’ [19]. When Amorim became Ambassador to the United Kingdom in 2002, he was succeeded as INB Chair by
another experienced diplomat, Luiz Felipe de Seixas Correa. Along with skilful diplomats, Brazil was enabled by the strong support
of the Minister of Health, Jose´ Serra, who recognized that the international negotiating process had direct effects on Brazilian
national tobacco control efforts and public health, according to Vera Luiza da Costa e Silva. As an emerging economy,
Brazilian support for the FCTC was important for countering industry-led arguments that
tobacco control was a ‘‘first world issue.’’ Despite epidemiological evidence to the contrary [20], the industry claimed
that the first world, Anglo-Saxon and English speaking political economies, ... are fuelling the debate and in many cases driving the
political agenda within the WHO. Most third world countries have other priorities but are not able to resist the pace, drive and
political dynamics which are moving the FCTC forward. [21] To counter such claims, the TFI sought to build support within the
developing world. The six deputy chairs of the INB to lead specific working groups—the US, Australia, Iran, India, South Africa, and
Turkey—were carefully selected to ensure both developed and developing country representation and to encourage regional
activism. The Southeast Asia Tobacco Control Alliance (SEATCA), formed in 2001, played a similar role. In Latin America,
regional meetings were held to build consensus within such groups as the Group of Latin
America and Caribbean Countries (GRULAC) and Mercosur (Mercado Comu´n del Sur): Group meetings of this
nature happen regularly in Geneva and are opportunities to discuss a diversity of themes, which are discussed in a diplomatic
context. As Brazil was chairing the treaty negotiations, it had a privileged forum to amplify the
relevance and importance of what the WHO was proposing. (Translated from Portuguese) [Interview with
Vera Luiza da Costa e Silva] Brazil then used its diplomatic channels to build linkages across regions :
They not only performed their role during the meetings, but also took advantage of meetings with representatives of other countries
and regions at their respective permanent missions in Geneva to disseminate information about the contents and scope of the treaty,
especially about the necessity of countries to give priority to this public health subject in parallel with the ‘‘great star’’ in the city
which was the World Trade Organization. (Translated from Portuguese) [Interview with Vera Luiza da Costa e Silva] The result
of this effort was effective expanded participation by developing countries in the negotiations:
Those developing countries, which were under assault by massive tobacco industry marketing and political pressure campaigns,
have fought back in Geneva, and the strengthening of the treaty during this last round of negotiations is
tribute to their courage and persistence in resisting the efforts by the United States, Germany and
Japan to weaken the treaty and water down crucial clauses. Developing countries formed a strong alliance with NGOs and
championed our positions during the negotiations. [22] Conclusions Brazil’s leadership in global health diplomacy
a
must be understood as part of the country’s political and economic ascendance in international
relations. As the world’s tenth largest economy, and an integrated member of the world trading system, the country’s
influence over a wide range of global health issues is likely to grow in coming decades. Brazil has
recognised that traditional practices of hard power can be inappropriate in a globalized world. Its understanding of soft
power, in the form of normative leadership and the use of ‘‘opinion-shaping instruments’’ [23],
suggests that a new kind of diplomacy is emerging to achieve collective action on shared challenges
such as global health. Through its principled stance on ARVs, and its domestic commitment to strong and effective tobacco
control, Brazil has earned widespread credibility as a diplomatic leader. This, in turn, has helped to
reinforce domestic policy on tobacco control. Brazil’s remarkable example also suggests that engagement in health
diplomacy is increasingly seen as a core component of what it means to be a global citizen [24].
Smoking will kill a billion people
Rebecca D. Pentz and Carla J. Berg, 10 - Ph.D., Emory University School of Medicine,
AND, (“Smoking and Ethics: What Are the Duties of Oncologists?” August 24th, 2010, The
Oncologist September 2010 vol. 15 no. 9 987-993, Google Scholar)//HAL
THE TOBACCO EPIDEMIC The World Health Organization (WHO)’s 2009 report on the world’s
tobacco epidemic continues the alarming story, now much too familiar. In the last century, tobacco
killed one hundred million people, and without intervention, it will kill one billion in this century.
Tobacco-related deaths kill more people than AIDS, tuberculosis, and malaria together. China alone
has 320 million smokers and is the major cigarette consumer in the world, accounting for 37% of demand [1]. Today, 70% of
tobacco-related deaths occur in under-resourced countries, and this percentage will rise to 80% by 2030 [2]. Northern Africa,
Western Asia, Southeast Asia, and South and Central America are predicted to have a 75%–100% increase in cancer deaths from
2000 to 2020 if the widespread use of tobacco continues at the current rate and if infections like the human papillomavirus and
hepatitis B and C are not contained [3]. And there is no sign that tobacco consumption is declining in the
under-resourced world; this year, the under-resourced world will consume 71% of all tobacco
products [4]. Tobacco is not just killing smokers. About 200,000 workers die each year because of
smoke-filled workplaces. Half of the countries in the world, representing two thirds of the world’s population, allow
smoking in the workplace [4]. Inhaling secondhand smoke increases the risk for lung cancer in
nonsmokers by 30% [5]. Nearly half the world’s children—700 million— breathe tobacco smoke,
often in their own homes. Furthermore, adolescents who grow up in smoking homes are more likely to smoke themselves [6, 7]. In
short, “Tobacco use is the most preventable cause of death. Halving tobacco consumption now would prevent 20
–30 million people from dying before 2025 and 170 –180 million people from dying before 2050 from all tobaccorelated diseases
including cancer” [3]
Brazil DA – Soft Power Impact
Brailian hegemony key to global cooperation, energy and agriculture
White, 10 – PhD in Political Studies from the University of Cape Town, independent
researcher and consultant specialising in political economy issues in Africa, Asia and Latin
America, Gordon Institute of Business Science, University of Pretoria, South Africa (Lyal,
“Understanding Brazil’s new drive for Africa,” South African Journal of International Affairs,
http://www.tandfonline.com.ezp1.lib.umn.edu/doi/abs/10.1080/10220461.2010.494345#.Uc3
45zsqZsk)//HAL
The rise of Brazil as an emerging power Long described as ‘the country of the future — and always will be’,
16 Brazil’s astonishing ascent in the last decade has silenced its critics who doubted it would ever
realise its true potential. Such potential, based on the country’s vast territory, population and economic size and dominance
in South America and its array of natural resources, has eluded Brazil since the country was first vaunted as an emerging power in
the 1950s. Instead, the promise of a prosperous future was replaced by political instability and successive economic failures that
culminated in a myriad of social problems that made Brazil one of the most violent and unequal countries in the world throughout
the 1980s and 1990s. Economic stagnation in the 1980s — known as the ‘lost decade’ — and lack-lustre performance in the 1990s
further deepened inequality and poverty levels. In the early 1990s inflation stood at approximately 70% per month, which marked
the peak of a 40 year period where inflation outpaced annual gross domestic product (GDP) growth.17 In recent years the story of
Brazil has changed. Since 2000 sustained economic growth and falling social inequality has — for the first
time in decades — followed Brazilian political stability, which was entrenched in the mid-1990s by former president
Fernando Hernique Cardoso. Between 2003 and 2008 Brazil enjoyed its best economic performance in more than 25 years, with
economic growth averaging 5% per annum. Foreign investment reached record levels of $45 billion in 2008
and a favourable trade balance, with exports exceeding $700 billion, is driving Brazil’s export-led growth.18
All this has translated into greater global influence, projecting the Brazilian voice beyond Latin
America and the traditional developing South into a new league of leading global powers alongside China,
India and the United States. After years of underperformance and dashed expectations, Brazil, it seems, has finally
arrived. Brazil’s emergence and recent economic success can be attributed to a fortuitous combination of factors and events.
These include political leadership and appropriate succession; the sequencing of tough reforms dating back to the early 1990s; well
formulated and executed social policies; the commodity boom; and a favourable international environment. On top of this, new oil
deposits were discovered off the coast of Rio de Janeiro which, once exploited, will convert Brazil from a net importer to a net
exporter of oil. Brazil is scheduled also to host the world’s two largest sporting events, the International Football Federation (Fifa)
World Cup football finals in 2014, and the Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro in 2016. All this has injected a wave of optimism and
enthusiasm in Brazil, which has instilled a new sense of confidence and global leadership in the country. Brazil finally seems
to be embracing its role as a global player that extends well beyond Latin America and
conventional multilateral actions, engaging directly on a political, commercial and
developmental level in regions across the globe.19 Brazil’s global emergence has been characterised by not only a
rise in inward investment flows, but also an increase in outward investment (predominantly in the developing world) and with that a
provider of development assistance. In 2006 outward bound foreign direct investment (FDI) flows for the first time matched
inbound FDI. In that year inbound FDI stock reached in excess of $328.5 billion, while outbound FDI stock totalled $129.8 billion,
which is exceptionally high considering Brazilian investors are still relatively new players in foreign markets. It is also indicative of
Brazil’s coming of age.20 It is this new found outward orientation of the Brazilian economy that distinguishes Brazil’s rise, as well as
the excitement around its economic potential, from past ‘miracle periods’. In the late 1960s and early 1970s, for instance, Brazil
enjoyed a 10% annual economic growth for seven consecutive years. This figure constituted one of the world’s highest growth rates
of that time. It is true that agricultural exports boomed during this period, but a lack of product and market diversity made it
extremely vulnerable to both internal and external shocks, and Brazil soon fell victim to economic crises in the early 1980s. Today
Brazil is no longer simply exporting commodities. True, Brazil’s commodity mix — from soy beans, beef and orange juice to iron ore
— has been a fundamental contributor to its recent wealth accumulation, as booming markets from the United States to China
demand food and raw materials. But it is more the choice of policies and the sequencing of long term structural reforms (which have
finally settled after a long period of adjustment) that have enabled Brazil to capitalise on the commodity boom, while other countries
— like South Africa — have not.21 This is what distinguishes Brazil from other commodity exporters. The Brookings Institute, in a
recent publication, describes Brazil as ‘reaping the benefits of its legacy of policies’. 22 Ironically, it has been those very same
protectionist policies from the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s that were designed to make Brazil self-sufficient and to empower the state
through a large and controlling public sector that have created internationally competitive and technologically superior Brazilian
multinational corporations (MNCs) and development agencies today. In the 1990s, before Brazil’s privatisation drive, 38 of Brazils
100 largest firms were still government owned. Government-controlled Petrobras is still widely regarded as the largest company
headquartered in the southern hemisphere.23 While a large body of literature24 describes the state-led development
policies adopted by Brazil decades ago as ‘costly and counterproductive’, the legacy of these policies is paradoxically, it
seems, the foundation for Brazil’s outward-looking business and political leaders. These policies
helped develop a competitive advantage in sectors like agribusiness, biofuels (bioethanol in particular)
and resource extraction, the underlying services and expertise for development of which are now being exported around the
world. Such prolonged autonomy from international markets in Brazil also helped develop skilled technocrats, bureaucrats and
systems geared toward innovative social programmes and broad-based development. Lessons in social development (especially in
areas such as HIV/AIDS awareness) have long been instructive for African countries. But certain programmes around conditional
cash transfers, incentivebased education, commercial farming and renewable energy (to name a few) are now actively being exported
to African countries in what Brazilians call a transfer of ‘social technology’. 25 This is a dimension of Brazilian
internationalisation that transcends various sectors relevant to both social and commercial
development, and which has become an important component of Brazilian foreign policy in both
Latin America and Africa. This dimension receives further attention below. Ultimately, Brazil’s protectionist
policies from the 1960s to 1980s have unintentionally given it a competitive advantage in a range of
commercial and social sectors particularly relevant in the developing world. This has not only helped
position it more steadfastly as an emerging power, but has provided tangible areas of foreign engagement
beyond traditional trade and political relations, revealing new drivers of Brazilian foreign policy
in the form of investment, development cooperation, technology transfer, energy and agriculture
— all of which are interconnected and relevant to Africa.
That solves inevitable nuclear proliferation– Brazilian influence is uniquely key
Rothkopf, 12 (David, visiting scholar at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace,
chair of the Carnegie Economic Strategy Roundtable, President and CEO of Garten Rothkopf,
Editor-at-Large of Foreign Policy, “Brazil's New Swagger,” Foreign Policy, 2/28/12,
http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2012/02/28/brazil_s_new_swagger)
Nonetheless, after over a year in office, despite facing great domestic and international challenges, Rousseff has already earned a
higher popularity rating than did Lula at a similar point in his tenure. And Patriota is quietly and, in the eyes of close
observers, with great deftness, building on Amorim's groundbreaking work to establish Brazil
as a leader among
powers. "We have a great advantage," notes Patriota. "We have no real enemies, no battles on our
borders, no great historical or contemporary rivals among the ranks of the other important powers … and long-standing ties
with many of the world's emerging and developed nations." This is a status enjoyed by none of the
other BRICs -- China, India, and Russia -- nor, for that matter, by any of the world's traditional major powers. This unusual
the world's major
position is strengthened further by the fact that Brazil is not investing as heavily as other rising powers in military capabilities.
Indeed, as Tom Shannon, the U.S. ambassador to Brazil, has noted, the country is one of the few to effectively stake
its future on the wise application of soft power -- diplomacy, economic leverage, common interests. It's surely no
coincidence that, in areas from climate change to trade, from nonproliferation to development, Brazil under Lula and
Amorim and under Rousseff and Patriota has been gaining strength by translating steady growth at home and
active diplomacy abroad into effective international networks.
Proliferation causes global nuclear war
Muller, 8 – director of the Peace Research Institute Frankfurt in Germany and a professor of
international relations at Frankfurt University [Harald, “The Future of Nuclear Weapons in an
Interdependent World,” Spring 08, The Washington Quarterly • 31:2 pp. 63–75]
A world populated by many nuclear-weapon states poses grave dangers.
Regional conflicts could escalate to the nuclear level. The optimistic expectation
of a universal law according to which nuclear deterrence prevents all wars15
rests on scant historical evidence and is dangerously naive. Nuclear uses in one part of
the world could trigger “catalytic war” between greater powers, drawing them into
smaller regional conflicts, particularly if tensions are high. This was always a fear during the
Cold War, and it motivated nonproliferation policy in the first place. Moreover, the more states that possess
nuclear weapons and related facilities, the more points of access are available to
terrorists.
Brazil DA – Warming Impact
US Unilateralism prevents Brazilian leadership that solves global warming
Hochstetler and Viola, 12 – CIGI Chair of Governance in the Americas in the Balsillie
School of International Affairs and Professor of Political Science at the University of Waterloo,
AND, PhD in Political Science from the University of Sao Paulo, Full Professor at the Institute
of International Relations, University of Brasilia (Kathryn and Eduardo, “Brazil and the politics
of climate change: beyond the global commons,” July 24th, 2012,
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/09644016.2012.698884)//HAL
As normally understood, climate change is a classic ‘commons’ problem, which no individual actor can
solve. Since reducing emissions is costly, doing so unilaterally would mean accepting a
comparatively disadvantaged position with minimal benefit for the environment. Unilateral
action to address climate change is thus irrational, and an actor’s best option is to shirk, doing
nothing while others address the problem (Esty 1999, Sunstein 2007, pp. 2–3, Keohane and Victor 2011, p. 13). A
state that wants to address climate change should seek formal international cooperation, as it
should want to see other states bound by institutions that ‘help states achieve their objectives through reducing contracting costs,
providing focal points, enhancing information and therefore credibility, monitoring compliance, and assisting in sanctioning
deviant behavior’ (Keohane and Victor 2011, p. 8). For a decade, the largest emitter, the United States, framed its
unwillingness to sign onto a global climate protocol in these terms,
complaining that existing texts did not
bind free-riding large emerging countries to reduce their emissions (Engel and Saleska 2005, pp. 192–193, Roberts and Parks
2007). Now Brazil and South Africa have pledged to reduce their emissions while China and India will lower their emissions
intensity, but the four have cooperated in resisting doing so in ways that bind them internationally, a stance which makes it
politically difficult for them to demand that from others (Dimitrov 2010). Given the costliness of emissions reductions, these
choices require explanation as they do not follow a commons logic. Our analysis is guided by the work of a few authors who have
suggested that the commons analogy does not hold for some particularly large countries. Engel and Saleska use game theoretic
analysis to demonstrate that the classic commons model of climate change assumes a situation where participants are
approximately equal, while some emitters are actually large enough that they can affect outcomes on their own or in small
groupings. This gives them different interests, including ‘an incentive to reduce emissions even in the absence of an international
agreement’ (Engel and Saleska 2005, pp. 209, 205). Mancur Olson’s classic work on ‘oligopolies’ in public goods provision concurs
(Olson 1965). Large emitters have often done less to reduce their climate impact than this incentive
for unilateralism would suggest, however. In such
cases they appear to be responding to pressures from disadvantaged
domestic interest groups (Engel and Saleska 2005, p. 214). While large emitters may have particular domestic benefits to gain from
unilateral action, debate over such action inevitably opens the door to questions about particular domestic costs. Thus domestic
cost–benefit calculations determine the behaviour of large emitters, a claim supported by the US experience (Sunstein 2007, p. 5).
The argument we develop here is that the choices of the emerging
powers offer additional support for this
‘uncommon’ view of climate politics. In large emitters, we contend, debates about costs and benefits at
the domestic level are particularly important for determining the timing and extent of
commitments to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. This means looking at an array of actors: ‘parties,
social classes, interest groups (both economic and noneconomic), legislators, and even public opinion and elections, not simply
executive officials and institutional arrangements’ (Putnam 1988, p. 432). We therefore begin by examining the
debate around climate action in Brazil. We trace its new willingness to make voluntary
commitments abroad primarily to changes at the nation-state level and below, finding that
Brazil’s negotiating positions responded to new national configurations of actors and
preferences. In broad terms, the new policies respond to a domestic coalition of ‘Baptists and bootleggers’ (DeSombre 2000,
pp. 40–43) that emerged in the late 2000s, when principled actors found common ground with self-interested ones to promote
policy change. Once Brazil had decided to take action on climate change, it still needed to decide
how to engage in the international negotiations. Since 2009 it has done so in coordination with
other emerging powers in the BASIC coalition. The BASIC countries stress their affinity with the G77 of developing
countries, but they occupy an increasingly distinct position, somewhere outside the North– South framing that has traditionally
divided climate politics (Roberts and Park 2007). In the second empirical section of our article, we discuss this uneasy alliance,
whose members’ domestically grounded positions on international action have brought points of both coordination and conflict. As
should be clear, we are not developing a general explanation of why countries join international accords. Instead, we are making a
specific argument about why a small set of countries – unusual in their size, economic profile, political
weight, and contribution to both a global problem and its potential solution – have taken
particular stances in negotiations over international responses to climate change. For these emerging
powers domestic political debates are especially important for determining when they decide to take on commitments to action.
After a brief survey of global climate negotiations, we move to the case study of Brazil, and show how evolving domestic positions
led its politicians in 2009 to virtually simultaneously pass domestic climate legislation and accept greater participation in global
climate action. With all the BASIC countries reaching the point of considering some possibility of global action after 2007, the
following section on the BASIC coalition shows how coordination with each other helped to establish just how those commitments
would be made internationally. Alternative explanations Our argument fits with past works that stress the importance of domestic
sources of international action, especially those that see a multiplicity of actorsand interests in competition with each other to shape
national foreign policies (e.g. Putnam 1988, Moravcsik 1997). We do not address other potential explanations in detail, but several
prominent alternatives are difficult to reconcile with basic elements of the global climate negotiations. One major set of
explanations of international cooperation focuses on the role of hegemonic powers (e.g. Keohane
1984). These large and powerful countries are seen to compel international agreements through some combination of coercion,
side-payments, and leadership. In the climate regime, the obvious candidate for hegemony, the United States, has yet to
make its own treaty commitment to climate action: it signed, but did not ratify, the
Kyoto Protocol, and since
withdrew from it. It has tried to insist on legal obligations for the emerging powers, making that a condition of its own participation
as early as 1997, but has not been willing or able to compel them to join. Another set of internationally grounded explanations of
cooperation proposes that international cooperation may come as norms pass through a tipping point when ‘a critical mass of
relevant state actors adopt the norm’, setting off a ‘norm cascade’ (Finnemore and Sikkink 1998, p. 895). Not all norms pass
through such a tipping point, however, and the norm of taking on climate action obligations arguably has not. In fact, while the
BASIC countries began to take on voluntary climate action obligations after 2009, many of the
most
committed norms holders – Europeans, environmental activists – saw them as actually abrogating the most important elements of a
global climate agreement, commitments to legally binding and verifiable action (Dimitrov 2010). Finally, it is possible to interpret
the outcomes of interest here as a two-level game, where leaders make choices facing both domestic and international arenas
(Putnam 1988). Nonetheless, we retain our domestic focus since the domestic win-sets that would allow climate action for these
countries have been quite small and restrictive. We show for the Brazilian case that the changes enlarging
that win-set were primarily domestic (albeit sometimes in response to
international developments outside the formal
negotiations) and briefly survey supporting evidence for the other countries. The BASIC countries’ decreasing ability to find
common win-sets even among the four after 2009 also endorses focusing on domestic constraints. Emerging powers in the
historical global climate regime complex The existing climate regime is fragmented, with weak interstate
negotiations at the core of a diverse set of activities, actors, and institutions (Engel and Saleska
2005,
Depledge 2006, Dimitrov 2010, Keohane and Victor 2011). The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change
(UNFCCC) of 1992 has just one protocol, the 1997 Kyoto Protocol. It sets emissions reduction targets for the industrialised and
post-Soviet (‘Annex 1’) countries, at levels that followed political rather than environmental logics. The Kyoto Protocol follows the
UNFCCC’s principle of ‘common but differentiated responsibilities’, splitting the world into developed and developing parts. Since
Kyoto, the emerging powers have occupied an awkward position in this divide, and negotiations over post-Kyoto arrangements
have struggled over their role. At the start of international climate negotiations, China and India of the BASIC countries already
made significant aggregate contributions to global GHG emissions. By 2010, the approximate shares of global climate emissions
(carbon dioxide, methane, and nitrous oxide) had risen to a 24% share for China (6 tons of CO2 equivalent per capita), with India at
7% (2 tons per capita), Brazil 4% (9 tons per capita), and South Africa 1.5% (12 tons per capita) (Viola 2010). Despite their
emissions levels, no one would have identified the BASIC countries as ‘emerging powers’ in 1990. All were undergoing political
upheaval. Economically, their combined gross domestic product (GDP) (PPP) was just 11% of the global total in 1992, although it
doubled to 22% in 2009. Their average GDP/capita is still just 73% of the global mean. Most of the gains came in the 2000s.1 Thus
in the initial decade of climate negotiations, their weight in global emissions was clearly offset by their continuing status as poor
economies. Correspondingly, the eventual emerging powers were unconflicted about their position
in the 1990s agreements: they were part of the developing world. They insisted on Northern
countries’ historic responsibility for GHG emissions and the North’s much greater ability to address the problem
(Roberts and Park 2007). The emerging powers continued to negotiate alongside smaller and poorer countries in the G77/China
bloc through most of the 2000s even as they began to grow rapidly and garner attention. Until 2007, they were unwilling to make
any commitments internationally to reduce their emissions, and then only general commitments to the Bali roadmap, which called
for a second set of Kyoto-based obligations and some form of action by countries not bound by the Kyoto Protocol (Friberg 2009, p.
399). The 2011 Durban agreement reiterated this plan. It is still the case that no part of the existing global climate regime complex
requires the BASIC countries to limit their emissions of GHG, but they all specified public voluntary commitments to do so at the
end of 2009, and formally presented commitments to the United Nations at the beginning of 2010 in response to the (unadopted)
Copenhagen Accord.2 In Cancu´n in 2010, these became officially recognised as ‘nationally appropriate mitigation actions’. Some
80 developed and developing countries made similar commitments, including all the major emitters. There is a unilateral quality to
these commitments in that each country has simply announced its own voluntary targets, chosen its own timeframe, and will
undertake its own preferred means for achieving the target. Brazil promised a set of actions to reduce 2020
emissions by 36.1–38.9% below what they would otherwise have been, while South Africa promised a
similar 34% reduction. China and India have committed to reduce their emission intensity, with China
aiming to lower its carbon dioxide emissions per unit of GDP by 40–45% below 2005 levels by 2020, and India promising a drop of
20–25% in the same time frame. In Cancu´n, they agreed to the possibility of monitoring, oversight, and verification as well as
international consultation and analysis, although the details still have to be negotiated. In the next section, we trace the changes
that pushed Brazil to make its unprecedented commitment to climate action. Baptists and bootleggers: the domestic politics of
climate policy in Brazil Brazil occupies a unique position in the global carbon cycle. Unlike its fellow BASIC
countries, carbon
emissions from the modern sector of the economy – industry, energy, and
transportation – are already quite low in Brazil. An energy sector strongly grounded in
renewable energies like hydropower and biofuels accounts for this outcome. Instead, land use and land
use change, especially deforestation, accounted for 61% of Brazil’s GHG emissions in the Second National Emissions Inventory
Communication of 2005, while agriculture contributed another 19% (Brazil 2010a). Between Brazil’s first GHG inventory in 1994
and the second in 2005, annual emissions from deforestation grew 55%, from 800 million tons of CO2 to 1.25 billion (Brazil 2004,
2010a). These features form a backdrop for Brazil’s evolving climate stances. Brazil has always
had some actors with strong principled commitments to national climate action – those DeSombre
(2000) would call ‘Baptists’. Through most of Brazil’s participation in global climate negotiations, they failed to influence national
representatives who preferred to stress the historical responsibility of developed countries to act first. In this section, we survey
Brazil’s initial climate positions. We then trace the multiple domestic changes after the mid-2000s that
eventually culminated in new international negotiating positions at the end of that decade. These
included surprising new success at controlling deforestation, the new prominence of actors who supported climate action for
instrumental reasons (‘bootleggers’), and public support for climate action that even spilled into the 2010 presidential election.
Brazil in the Kyoto negotiations – the starting position In the initial years of climate negotiations, the Foreign Ministry and the
Ministry of Science and Technology led Brazilian delegations to climate meetings. In the Kyoto negotiation process
(1996–2001), they
were guided by a definition of Brazil’s national interest that tracked closely with
its broader foreign policy (Burges 2009). This affirmed the right to development as a fundamental component of
world order, and asserted a leadership role for Brazil commensurate with the growth in its international
stature during the Cardoso administrations (1995–2002). Unlike its stance in the 1972 Stockholm Conference, Brazil also
affirmed a vision of development with environmental sustainability, but asked that developed
countries provide funding for climate mitigation in developing countries (Viola 2002, 2004). Brazil also
argued strongly in the Kyoto negotiations that national shares of carbon emissions should be calculated on the basis of their
historical accumulation since the mid-nineteenth century, reflecting carbon dioxide’s persistence in the atmosphere (Roberts and
Park 2007, p. 146). In 1997, Brazil suggested a financial mechanism that would provide compensation
for developing countries that voluntarily undertook GHG mitigation. As these positions suggest,
Brazilians were not climate ‘deniers’, but believed that developed countries bore the
responsibility for binding international obligations to address climate change (Lahsen 2004). The G77
supported this position (Williams 2005). While Annex 1 countries rejected rationales of historic responsibility, Brazil worked
closely with the United States to develop what became the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) in the Kyoto Protocol (Friberg
2009, p. 398). Already in the 1990s, ‘Baptists’ argued for principled reasons that Brazil should adopt a stronger and more active
position in favour of national climate action. Environmental non-governmental organisations (NGOs) often agreed that developed
countries had a special historical responsibility for climate change, but they still thought their national representatives drew too
much on ‘mindsets characterized by zero-sum thinking and national economic interests’ (Lahsen 2004, pp. 155–157).
Environmentalists had many allies in the Ministry of Environment (Hochstetler and Keck 2007), but it did not play a major role in
international negotiations at this time. In Cardoso’s second administration, Brazil supported the final stages of negotiation of the
Kyoto Protocol with its division between the responsibilities of developed and developing states, especially after the United States
withdrew from the Protocol in 2001. Brazil helped pull together the alliance between the European Union, Japan, and emerging
countries that made the final agreements possible. After the push to approve the Kyoto protocol, climate politics again took a back
seat in Brazil, with new president Lula da Silva’s administration after 2003 showing the familiar divisions and sporadic attention to
climate change of his predecessor. The political debate focused on economic growth at home and
reassertion of Brazil’s claims to sovereignty and global leadership abroad, especially in the
South (Burges 2009). Just a few years later, however, the domestic developments that broadened the coalition in favour of
climate action began to unfold. The domestic politics of improving deforestation control Between 2005 and 2011, Brazil
broke with its historic trends by dramatically lowering Amazonian deforestation from an annual
average of almost 21,000 km2 in 2000–2004 to 7000 km2 in 2009. This reduced its total GHG emissions by about 30% (Brazil
2010b). Annual deforestation rates have always varied in Brazil, with some rough correlation with national economic growth (see
Figure 1). What is unusual about the recent drop in deforestation is that it coincided with a sustained period of
strong economic growth that included a commodity export boom. Deforestation is still high, but the figures
suggest that Brazil might be gaining leverage on one of its most persistent environmental problems
(Nepstad et al. 2009, Macedo et al. 2012).
A number of gradual changes have enhanced the legal architecture in the Amazon (still far from complete), in effect
trading clearer ownership of land and forests for greater public oversight of the use made of them. A legal modification in 1996 began the process by reforming the Forest Code
to raise the required set-aside forest areas from 50 to 80% of individual Amazonian plots. Between 2000 and 2006, significant areas were transferred to protected status,
totalling 51% of remaining Amazon forest area (Nepstad et al. 2009, p. 1350). Amendments to the National Forest Code in 2006 also allowed forests in federal public lands to
be transferred to private agents for sustainable management and commercial use; the amendments established a Forest Service. A Federal Executive Order in 2009 (458/2009)
issued land titles in the Amazon, legalising to different degrees past land appropriations and deforestation. The environmental movement heavily resisted the decree, but other
analysts argue that the new law could create private property obligations as well as rights for a vast coalition of legal landowners. Further Forest Code revisions developing in
2012 would weaken sustainable forest management, e.g. by allowing deforestation along rivers, but are unlikely to reverse the gains in controlling large scale deforestation. The
large and powerful agricultural coalition in Congress passed the bill over President Dilma Rousseff’s objections in an April vote. Brazil has long had trouble implementing
conservation in its protected areas (Hochstetler and Keck 2007, p. 2), but stronger institutional capacity and more effective law enforcement since 2003 have improved
outcomes. These changes were developed during Marina Silva’s tenure as Minister of Environment (2003–2008) and deepened under her successors. Silva, who grew up as a
rubber tapper in the Amazon region, began the process of slowly drawing Amazonian state authorities into cooperation with the federal government. She required states to
develop plans to reduce deforestation and the federal government did real-time monitoring of the results. Raids resulted in jail terms for some federal and state agency
employees (Macedo et al. 2012, p. 4). Governmental efforts were supported by national and international NGOs, who raised public awareness and helped pressure the beef and
soy industries to keep Amazon deforesters out of their supply chains (Nepstad et al. 2009, p. 1350, Macedo et al. 2012). Other components of recent forest policy aim to
provide positive incentives for conservation. In 2007, a pilot programme called the ‘Forest Protection Payment’ transferred a small amount of cash to local residents for their
contribution to maintaining the integrity of forests. In 2008, President Lula established the Amazonian Fund by executive order, with the express purpose of capturing
donations designated for prevention, monitoring, and combat of deforestation. The Fund is administered by the Brazilian National Development Bank (BNDES), which has
already approved funding for projects totalling some $120 million. In 2009, BNDES announced the most important donation agreements to date, with Norway’s Foreign Affairs
Ministry promising as much as $ 1 billion if progress containing deforestation is maintained (Nepstad et al. 2009). Evolving forest related negotiation positions As long as
Brazilian deforestation was high, the Brazilian Foreign Ministry resisted extending the CDM to carbon sinks and forests. In doing so, it allied with the European Union against
other forest countries, blocking an important potential line of development of the international agreements. Despite having some of the most important biodiversity and carbon
stocks in forest in the world, Brazilian negotiators worried that making them part of global agreements would eventually open Brazil to international liability for the high rates
of deforestation in the Amazon that the Brazilian government evidently could not control. This position was strongly supported by rural agricultural and timber elites,
dominant in state-level politics in the Amazon and with a strong bloc in the National Congress (Viola 2004). The ‘Baptists’ of the Ministry of Environment, the governments of
some Amazonian states, and NGOs all argued against Brazil’s opposition to extending the CDM to forests, but they lost until recently (Viola and Franchini 2012). As
deforestation rates started dropping sharply in 2005, Brazil almost immediately changed its international negotiating proposals. Brazil deviated from its historic position to
propose the creation of a global fund for forest conservation already at the 12th Conference of the Parties of the UNFCCC inNairobi in December 2006. According to the
Brazilian proposal, Annex 1 countries and corporations would contribute to a fund that would distribute financial resources according to the performance of countries in
voluntarily reducing deforestation rates. This was the first time that Brazil accepted linking deforestation rates to global financial tools. Despite this proposal, Brazilian
negotiators retained their traditional objection to carbon markets for forests until 2009. Interest calculations subsequently brought the first ‘bootlegger’ into the climate action
coalition. When the Kyoto Protocol was activated in February 2005, Brazil had the first CDM project registered (Friberg 2009, p. 404). The CDM projects promised new
investment flows and possibly new technologies. Yet Brazil’s carbon profile meant that it had comparatively few CDM investment opportunities, and China and India gained
much larger shares. This outcome was especially galling to governors and mayors in the Amazonian states, which lag far behind the modern parts of the country in wealth and
investment. They joined environmental NGOs in strongly criticising their governments for blocking a similar global mechanism that would bring them investments for forest
conservation, especially after they had begun to reduce deforestation. The Amazonian governors created a coalition in 2009 to actively push for a change of government
strategy (Nepstad et al. 2009). Following these developments, the Ministry of the Environment finally overcame the entrenched opposition among the Foreign Ministry’s
diplomats and actively contributed to the development of a new forest instrument (REDDþ, Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation) in Copenhagen.
Climate action as good business Another ‘bootlegger’ ally emerged following Barack Obama’s election in the United States in 2008. Brazilian reformist forces were already
trying to convince the federal authorities to assume a leadership role in the global climate negotiations, which they now expected to move forward rapidly. The US House of
Representatives in fact passed the Waxman-Markey Climate Bill in June of 2009. It created the United States’ first legal framework for national climate action and included a
border tax adjustment for products coming from countries that did not have similar emissions controls (Zhang 2010). The bill died in the Senate, but the evident shape of
eventual US action galvanised a proactive response from Brazilian industry. Three corporate coalitions launched documents in September 2009 asking the government to
modify Brazil’s climate stances both domestically and internationally (Viola 2010). Most of the firms involved in the coalitions were exporters to developed markets and
believed that the US law would pass the Senate and quickly be followed by similar legislation in all developed countries. The firms believed that, since Brazil had already
reduced deforestation and carbon emissions and exporting firms were mostly in low carbon sectors, Brazil should adopt a new responsible climate policy. They hoped the
country would thus avoid the border tax adjustments and even gain a competitive advantage over China, India, and other higher carbon emerging economies. The first
coalition – ‘Open letter to Brazil about climate change’ – included 22 large national corporations from middle to high carbon intensive sectors. It was led by Brazilian
multinational Vale, the second largest iron ore producer in the world. This coalition demanded a clear Brazilian commitment, including a steeper decline in deforestation and a
reduction in the growth curve of emissions from energy and cattle raising. The second coalition – ‘Alliance of Corporations in Favor of the Climate’ – was formed by
agribusiness corporations, and made only vague proposals, with some emphasis on deforestation control. This was the least reform-oriented coalition because it is extremely
heterogeneous, ranging from climate friendly ethanol producers to climate conservative meatpacking firms. National and transnational corporations that have a long-term
climate vision formed the third coalition, led by utilities and energy corporations. This coalition – ‘The Coalition of Corporations for Climate’ – proposed more ambitious goals
than the others, including setting a peak date for Brazilian emissions between 2015 and 2020 and mandatory emissions reductions (Viola and Franchini 2012). Public
Public support for climate action is high in Brazil, providing another
reason for politicians to take action. Brazilians have had the highest levels of concern about
global environmental problems in a set of diverse countries surveyed regularly through the 2000s by Globescan Radar.3
opinion and electoral politics
Their concern accelerated across the decade, with 92% of respondents saying in 2010 that they believed global environmental
problems were very serious. The local media contributed to their concern. The ‘Globo Network’, one of the world’s
largest media conglomerates, is particularly concerned about climate change issues. This is an
anomaly in the Latin American public sphere. Since it has around 80% of the non-cable
audience and an even larger share in cable television, its effect on public opinion is high and
proponents of climate action garner a large audience for their proposals.
Runaway warming causes extinction
Deibel 7, Professor of IR @ National War College (Terry L., 2007l “Foreign Affairs Strategy:
Logic for American Statecraft”, Conclusion: American Foreign Affairs Strategy Today)
Finally, there is one major existential threat to American security (as well as prosperity) of a nonviolent nature, which, though far in
the future, demands urgent action. It is the threat of global warming to the stability of the climate upon
which all earthly life depends. Scientists worldwide have been observing the gathering of this threat for three decades
now, and what was once a mere possibility has passed through probability to near certainty. Indeed not one of more than 900
articles on climate change published in refereed scientific journals from 1993 to 2003 doubted that anthropogenic warming
is occurring. “In legitimate scientific circles,” writes Elizabeth Kolbert, “it is virtually impossible to find evidence
of disagreement over the fundamentals of global warming.” Evidence from a vast international scientific monitoring effort
accumulates almost weekly, as this sample of newspaper reports shows: an international panel predicts “brutal droughts, floods and
violent storms across the planet over the next century”; climate change could “literally alter ocean currents, wipe away huge portions
of Alpine Snowcaps and aid the spread of cholera and malaria”; “glaciers in the Antarctic and in Greenland are melting much faster
than expected, and…worldwide, plants are blooming several days earlier than a decade ago”; “rising sea temperatures have been
accompanied by a significant global increase in the most destructive hurricanes”; “NASA scientists have concluded from direct
temperature measurements that 2005 was the hottest year on record, with 1998 a close second”; “Earth’s warming climate
is estimated to contribute to more than 150,000 deaths and 5 million illnesses each year” as disease
spreads; “widespread bleaching from Texas to Trinidad…killed broad swaths of corals” due to a 2-degree rise in sea temperatures.
“The world is slowly disintegrating,” concluded Inuit hunter Noah Metuq, who lives 30 miles from the Arctic Circle. “They call it
climate change…but we just call it breaking up.” From the founding of the first cities some 6,000 years ago until the beginning of the
industrial revolution, carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere remained relatively constant at about 280 parts per million (ppm). At
present they are accelerating toward 400 ppm, and by 2050 they will reach 500 ppm, about double pre-industrial levels.
Unfortunately, atmospheric CO2 lasts about a century, so there is no way immediately to reduce levels, only to slow their increase,
we are thus in for significant global warming; the only debate is how much and how serous the effects will be. As the newspaper
stories quoted above show, we
are already experiencing the effects of 1-2 degree warming in more
violent storms, spread of disease, mass die offs of plants and animals, species extinction, and
threatened inundation of low-lying countries like the Pacific nation of Kiribati and the Netherlands at a warming of 5 degrees or less
the Greenland and West Antarctic ice sheets could disintegrate, leading to a sea level of rise of 20 feet that would cover North
Carolina’s outer banks, swamp the southern third of Florida, and inundate Manhattan up to the middle of Greenwich Village.
Another catastrophic effect would be the collapse of the Atlantic thermohaline circulation that
keeps the winter weather in Europe far warmer than its latitude would otherwise allow.
Economist William Cline once estimated the damage to the United States alone from moderate
levels of warming at 1-6 percent of GDP annually; severe warming could cost 13-26 percent of
GDP. But the most frightening scenario is runaway greenhouse warming, based on positive feedback from the buildup of water
vapor in the atmosphere that is both caused by and causes hotter surface temperatures. Past ice age transitions, associated with only
5-10 degree changes in average global temperatures, took place in just decades, even though no one was then pouring everincreasing amounts of carbon into the atmosphere. Faced with this specter, the best one can conclude is that “humankind’s
continuing enhancement of the natural greenhouse effect is akin to playing Russian roulette with the earth’s climate and humanity’s
life support system. At worst, says physics professor Marty Hoffert of New York University, “we’re just going to burn everything up;
we’re going to heat the atmosphere to the temperature it was in the Cretaceous when there were crocodiles at the poles, and then
everything will collapse.” During the Cold War, astronomer Carl Sagan popularized a theory of nuclear winter to describe how a
thermonuclear war between the Untied States and the Soviet Union would not only destroy both countries but possibly end life on
this planet. Global warming is the post-Cold War era’s equivalent of nuclear winter at least as
serious and considerably better supported scientifically. Over the long run it puts dangers form terrorism and
traditional military challenges to shame. It is a threat not only to the security and prosperity to the United
States, but potentially to the continued existence of life on this planet.
Brazil DA – AT: Hegemony Turn
Brazilian leadership doesn’t kill US hegemony
Malamud, 11 – research fellow at the Institute of Social Sciences (ICS) of the University of
Lisbon. PhD in Political Science from the European University Institute (EUI) in Florence.
(Andres, “A Leader Without Followers? The Growing Divergence Between the Regional and
Global Performance of Brazilian Foreign Policy,” LATIN AMERICAN POLITICS AND SOCIETY,
© 2011 University of Miami, MALAMUD: BRAZIL’S FOREIGN POLICY,
http://americo.usal.es/iberoame/sites/default/files/malamud_brasil_leader_without_follower
s.pdf)//HAL
To be sure, Brazil has not become indifferent to the region. However, its ambitions are increasingly defensive
rather than offensive. The main goal is no longer to integrate South America into a regional bloc with a single voice but
to limit damages that could spill over its borders or stain its international image as regional
pacifier. Now, it seems sufficient to stabilize the region and prevent political instability, economic
turmoil, and border conflicts. The name of the game is to keep quiet rather than lead the
neighborhood, since preventing trouble in its backyard seems to be a necessary condition for Brazil to consolidate its global
gains. Given that Brazil is not a revisionist power that intends to upset the system but rather a
reformist one that wishes to enter it, damage control has become its central task. This has turned a
would-be leader into a fireman or, as Carlos Quenan once paraphrased from economics jargon, a leader of last resort. Thus, as The
Economist (2008b) aptly remarked, “it may be the rising power in the Americas but Brazil is finding that diplomatic ambition can
prompt resentment.” By trying to mitigate this resentment, the country may find itself closer to the category of a traditional rather
than an emerging middle power. In other words, it can aspire to a leading role on the global stage as long as it goes it alone.
Brazil key to multipolarity
Bodman and Wolfensohn, 11 - U.S. secretary of energy from 2005 to 2009, a BS from
Cornell University and a PhD from MIT, where he was also associate professor of chemical
engineering, James D. Wolfensohn is chairman of Wolfensohn & Company, LLC,
chairman of Citigroup’s international advisory board, and adviser to Citigroup’s senior
management on global strategy and on international matters, He is a honorary trustee of the
Brookings Institution, a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, Master of Business
Administration (MBA) degree at Harvard Business School, (“Global Brazil and
U.S.-Brazil Relations,” Independent Task Force Report No. 66, Council on Foreign Relations,
July 12th, 2011, http://www.cfr.org/brazil/global-brazil-us-brazil-relations/p25407)//HAL
Brazil is and will remain an integral force in the evolution of a multipolar world. It ranks as the world’s
fifth-largest landmass, fifth-largest population, and eighth-largest economy. Brazil, which may become the world’s fifth-largest
economy by 2016, is the B in the BRICs (along with Russia, India, and China*), a grouping of growth markets that accounted
for 23 percent of global gross domestic product (GDP) in 2010 and will collectively reach $25 trillion to
overtake the U.S. economy within the next decade. Brazil’s economic prowess places it in a
leadership position in Latin America and in the world and boosts the region’s strategic
importance globally, especially for the United States.
Brazil DA – AT: Relations Turn
Relations resilient
WWICS, 7 (The Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, 1/24/07, “The Future of
U.S.-Brazilian Relations”,
http://www.wilsoncenter.org/index.cfm?topic_id=1419&fuseaction=topics.event_summary&ev
ent_id=213989)
Not a single action taken or decision made by the United States in the last three years has
negatively affected Brazilian interests, claimed Ambassador Roberto Abdenur, before a packed
conference room in what was his last public appearance as Brazil’s ambassador in Washington. When he took the position in 2004,
Brazilian indignation with Iraq and over onerous visa procedures and poor treatment of visiting nationals had caused a temporary
strain in the relationship. Other potential obstacles to strengthening the relationship that were
successfully avoided include possible trade sanctions against Brazil over intellectual piracy,
Brazil’s refusal to exempt U.S. troops and officials from the jurisdiction of the International
Criminal Court, mutual charges of dumping, and U.S. threat to removes its General System of
Preferences for Brazil(which would have negatively affected approximately four billion dollars of Brazilian exports to the
United States). Despite these challenges, Abdenur argued that the bilateral relationship has reached
an unprecedented level of mutual understanding and deference to the other country’s positions
and opinions, facilitated in no small part by President Lula’s pragmatism.
Despite the existence of differences, Brazil-U.S. relations are on a productive platform to foster
positive developments in the future. Lula has put aside his misgivings about some U.S. policies and embraced
the fact that it is in Brazil’s best interests to foster strong relations with the United States, argued
Abdenur. Much to the disdain of Brazil, the United States has mistakenly withdrawn from certain international discussions and
scenarios and erroneously engaged in others, such as climate change and the Middle East. Additionally, Latin America is overlooked
by its Northern neighbor. However, if and when the United States decides to refocus its energies upon the region, Abdenur is
assured that Brazil would be its natural ally in such an endeavor. Brazil has good relations with all of its neighbors and strategically
occupies a moderate space between the region’s divergent interests and trajectories, as illustrated by its leading role in the current
international efforts to stabilize Haiti and by its contribution to the resolution of the conflict between Peru and Ecuador in the
1990s—in both cases in close cooperation with the United States. Abdenur argued that the United States is not the only actor that
must take decisive steps towards a convergence of interests between the two countries: Brazil must stop fearing the United States
and instead embrace it as a partner.
Democracy DA – 1NC
U.S. leadership over Latin America necessitates the promotion of democracy
Matheny, 13 (Adam, “Wilson Center Hosts Discussion on Democracy in Latin America,”
Council for a Community of Democracies, 3/27/13,
http://www.ccd21.org/news/americas/latin_america_democratization.html, Tashma)
In order to explain these trends, Mainwaring’s team performed extensive quantitative analyses, which
focused on the main actors involved, such as politicians, militaries, international organizations and the United
States. The results provide a novel and often counterintuitive explanation for regime change and the
quality of democracy in Latin America. According to Mainwaring, the main drivers behind
democratic regime change in Latin America are not the economic factors highlighted by modernization theory,
such as GDP or income inequality. Instead, Mainwaring argues that the main explanations for democratizing regime change are the
normative preferences of the actors involved and the regional political environment. If a state’s key actors – ranging
from civil society to the military – believed that democracy was the best form of government, the shift from authoritarianism to
democracy was much more likely. Mainwaring’s findings also stress the importance of neighboring
democracies. The presence of democracies in the immediate environment was found to be a
main factor in democratization, which offers an explanation to the waves of regime change in
the region. Mainwaring’s findings suggest that these two factors have played a large part in democratic breakdowns as well. Like
democratization, the normative preferences of key actors and the regime type of neighboring countries played an
important part in the often violent transitions from democracy to authoritarianism that plagued
Latin America throughout much of the 20th century. In the case of authoritarian regime change, Mainwaring
also added two more important factors: the degree of radicalism and US foreign policy. A high degree of radicalism, from both the
left and from the right, often preceded democratic breakdowns in the region. Moreover, US influence was so great
in Latin America that US support for, or even orchestration of, military coups consistently led to
authoritarian regime change.
That backfires and causes a shift away from democracy
Carothers, 6 (Thomas, vice president for studies at the Carnegie Endowment for International
Peace, where he founded and currently directs the Democracy and Rule of Law Program, former
proferssor at Central European University, the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International
Studies, and Nuffield College, and Oxford, “The Backlash Against Democracy Promotion,”
Foreign Affairs, Volume 85, Issue 2, March/April 2006, pg. 55-68, Tashma)
The law is also a sign of an equally disturbing and much broader trend. After two decades of the steady expansion of
democracy-building programs around the world, a growing number of governments are starting
to crack down on such activities within their borders. Strongmen -- some of them elected officials -- have
begun to publicly denounce Western democracy assistance as illegitimate political meddling.
They have started expelling or harassing Western NGOs and prohibiting local groups from taking foreign funds -- or have started
punishing them for doing so. This growing backlash has yet to coalesce into a formal or organized movement. But its proponents are
clearly learning from and feeding off of one another. The recent "color revolutions" in Georgia, Ukraine, and Kyrgyzstan and the
widespread suspicion that U.S. groups such as the National Democratic Institute (NDI), the International Republican Institute (IRI),
Freedom House, and the Open Society Institute played a key behind-the-scenes role in fomenting these upheavals have clearly
helped trigger the backlash. Politicians from China to Zimbabwe have publicly cited concerns about such events spreading to their
own shores as justification for new restrictions on Western aid to NGOs and opposition groups. Yet there is something broader at
work than just a fear of orange (Ukraine's revolution came to be known as the Orange Revolution). The way that President George
W. Bush is making democracy promotion a central theme of his foreign policy has clearly contributed to the unease such efforts (and
the idea of democracy promotion itself) are creating around the world. Some autocratic governments have won substantial public
sympathy by arguing that opposition to Western democracy promotion is resistance not to
democracy itself, but to American interventionism. Moreover, the damage that the Bush administration has done
to the global image of the United States as a symbol of democracy and human rights by repeatedly violating the rule of
law at home and abroad has further weakened the legitimacy of the democracy-promotion
cause. Just as the sources of the backlash have been multilayered, so too must be the response. To remain as effective in the next
decade as they have been in the last, groups that promote democracy must come to grips with how the international context for their
work has changed. This will mean rethinking some of their methods. The Bush administration, meanwhile, must also face some
unpleasant realities, specifically about how the president's "freedom agenda" is perceived around the world, and must engage
seriously an effort to build credibility for its democracy endeavor. JUST SAYING NO The most systematic and forceful resistance to
Western democracy aid has come from Russia under Putin. The NGO law is just one of a series of recent actions Moscow has taken
to constrain or challenge democracy-promotion groups. The Kremlin has also attacked the Organization for Security and
Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) for its election-monitoring work in Russia and neighboring countries. Several U.S. democracypromotion groups have experienced minor but pointed harassment from Russian authorities. Putin's government has criticized
Russian NGOs working on human rights or other politically sensitive issues for accepting outside funds, and senior Russian officials
have denounced external democracy aid as subversive and anti-Russian. President Putin has also taken to warning fellow autocrats
in surrounding countries of the dangers of allowing such aid, and Russia has started building its own capacity to provide parallel
forms of assistance, through election monitors and political consultants. Putin's supporters have cast his campaign against prodemocracy groups as a security imperative, asserting that the United States is trying to encircle Russia with pro-Western
governments and subvert its political order. Russia is not the only country pushing back against Western democracy assistance; the
resistance has become a widespread post-Soviet pastime. Uzbek President Islam Karimov is currently in the
process of shutting down most of the Western democracy programs in his country, as well as most of the domestic NGOs that work
on democracy issues: in 2005, more than 60 percent of Uzbekistan's active NGOs were put out of business. Articles in the statecontrolled media have accused the United States of trying to undermine Uzbek sovereignty through the Trojan horse of
democratization. Meanwhile, in Belarus, President Aleksandr Lukashenko has also forbidden most external political aid and has
relentlessly stamped out political challengers and independent civil society. After first putting all foreign funding destined for local
NGOs under state control, in 2003, Lukashenko banned foreign funding of any political or educational activities in the country. The
Tajik government announced new regulations in April 2005 requiring foreign embassies and foreign organizations working in the
country to give the authorities notice before making any contact with local political parties, NGOs, or media organizations.
Government-controlled newspapers in Tajikistan have accused the United States of criminality in its support for Ukrainian and
Kyrgyz activists and have praised Belarus for its resistance to Western interference. Nearby in Kazakhstan, President Nursultan
Nazarbayev has enacted similarly tight restrictions on cooperation between foreign entities and Kazakh political parties. In a speech
last September, he added his voice to the regional chorus warning foreign NGOs not to try to destabilize former Soviet states. The
backlash against democracy aid has also started to spread outside the former Soviet Union. One enthusiastic participant is China.
Last April, an article in the People's Daily condemned the United States' "democratic offensive" in the former Soviet Union and
elsewhere as self-serving, coercive, and immoral. The following month, the Chinese Communist Party reportedly mapped out a
strategy for resisting U.S. and European efforts to promote color revolutions in China and its neighborhood. Beijing has delayed the
passage of a new law that would liberalize the rules on NGOs in the country and has cracked down on various local groups that
receive foreign funding, including a human rights group supported by the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), a private
foundation funded by the U.S. government devoted to supporting democracy worldwide. Beijing is also tightening restrictions on
foreign media by stepping up measures to scramble external radio broadcasts and reversing an earlier decision to allow the local
publication of foreign newspapers. Elsewhere in Asia, governments have enacted similar restrictions: in Nepal, for example, after 15
years of relative openness to Western democracy programs, the government recently issued new regulations sharply restricting such
activities. The backlash is spreading to Africa as well. Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe has driven out Western NGOs and
forced the closure of many local groups that get external support, claiming that they are fronts through which Western "colonial
masters" subvert the government. In December 2004, Zimbabwe's parliament passed legislation prohibiting local NGOs from
receiving any outside aid. Mugabe has not yet signed the bill but has kept up his rhetorical attacks on alleged Western meddling.
Further north, Ethiopia expelled the IRI, the NDI, and IFES (formerly the International Foundation for Election Systems) prior to
national elections last May. Prime Minister Meles Zenawi stated on Ethiopian television that "there is not going to be a 'Rose
Revolution' or a 'Green Revolution' or any color revolution in Ethiopia after the election." And in Eritrea, the government enacted a
new law last year forbidding local NGOs from engaging in any work other than relief activities and blocking them from receiving
external support. In August, Asmara asked the U.S. Agency for International Development to cease operations in the country, stating
that it was uncomfortable with the agency's activities, which include promoting citizen participation in economic and political life.
In South America, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez regularly blasts U.S. democracy promotion as
being part of a Bush administration campaign to oust him. Chavez has accused groups such as the NED and the IRI of
supporting the Venezuelan opposition and has intimidated many local NGOs that receive outside funding. And like Putin, Chavez
is not content just to block U.S. aid at home. He has allegedly used his petrodollars to support anti-American
parties and candidates in Bolivia, Ecuador, Peru, and elsewhere, in the hope of spreading what he
calls his "Bolivarian Revolution." Although Chavez remains an extreme case, wariness of U.S. democracy
promotion is rising in the region, which is rife with anti-Americanism and increasingly
dominated by left-leaning governments. The rejection last year by the Organization of American States
of a U.S. proposal to establish a new regional mechanism to monitor governmental compliance with democratic
norms reflected this growing skepticism. SEEING ORANGE What exactly explains this global backlash against
democracy promotion? The recent revolutions in Georgia, Ukraine, and Kyrgyzstan were clearly important events. The dramatic
upheavals in these countries showed what huge numbers of ordinary citizens can do when they rally bravely for democracy. But as
accounts multiplied of U.S. support for key civic and political groups in these countries, the color revolutions also spread the idea
that the United States was the shadowy guiding force behind these events. Although fear of democracy aid as a tool of the United
States may have spiked with the color revolutions, it is best understood as the culmination of a longer trend. When democracy
promotion first flourished, during the rapid democratic expansion of the late 1980s and early 1990s, activists usually had to work in
one of two contexts: in authoritarian societies, where the door to democracy promotion remained firmly shut, or in newly
democratizing countries, where the door to such activities was generally wide open. As time passed, many of the newly
democratizing countries evolved into another, intermediate type: the semiauthoritarian state, which proliferated in the former
Soviet Union, the Balkans, sub-Saharan Africa, and the Middle East. Such regimes typically attempt an artful political balancing act.
Their leaders allow enough political freedoms to gain themselves some credit and legitimacy as reformers. Typically, this means
holding regular elections and permitting the creation of a few opposition parties, a scattering of independent civic groups, and an
independent newspaper or two. But these regimes also maintain a strong enough hold on the levers of power to ensure that no
serious threats to their rule emerge. At first, many pro-democracy organizations found themselves stymied by such
semiauthoritarian arrangements. Over time, however, the more experienced groups (such as the NDI, the IRI, IFES, and Freedom
House) settled on a more effective approach. Drawing on lessons some of these groups had learned during earlier successes, such as
their support for the opposition to General Augusto Pinochet in the Chilean plebiscite of 1988 and for the opposition to Sandinista
rule in the Nicaraguan elections of 1990, the approach consisted of providing technical and financial aid to a broad range of local
civic and political groups working together to challenge the government through elections. The aid focused on improving local
capacity in several, mutually reinforcing ways. First, Western groups helped locals gain the ability to do independent election
monitoring, including the capacity to hold parallel vote counts, in order to ensure that citizens could at least learn the real results of
elections. Second, they provided backing to independent civic groups, often including dynamic new student organizations, that could
foster broad civic engagement in the electoral process. Third, they trained and sometimes provided equipment or other material
assistance to opposition parties to help them campaign effectively. And they encouraged these parties to work together and build
broad coalitions. At the end of the 1990s, this approach was brought to bear -- first, in an incomplete form, against Prime Minister
Vladimir Meciar of Slovakia and President Franjo Tudjman of Croatia, and then, more fully, against President Slobodan Milosevic of
Serbia. U.S. and European pro-democracy groups mounted a well-coordinated and well-funded (to the tune of $60 million to $100
million) aid campaign to help Serbian civic and political groups mount an electoral challenge to Milosevic, who was already under
pressure from Western economic sanctions and punitive diplomatic measures. As the 2000 elections unfolded, all the pieces fell into
place: with Western help, Serbian civic groups convinced large numbers of ordinary citizens to bet on change and engage in the
electoral process; the opposition parties performed better than they had in the past; and independent monitoring efforts laid bare
Milosevic's effort to override the results. The outcome was the autocrat's ouster in a largely peaceful "electoral revolution." Since
then, Western groups have applied similar strategies -- although never as amply funded or as strongly backed by diplomatic pressure
-- in Azerbaijan, Belarus, Georgia, Kyrgyzstan, and Ukraine, and have frequently been met with accusations of illegitimate political
meddling. The groups usually respond by pointing out that they work openly, not in secret, and by arguing that their goals are not to
achieve specific electoral outcomes, but just to ensure reasonably free and fair elections. Outside aid is necessary, they argue, to level
electoral playing fields and create safeguards against the manipulation of the process by regimes. The truth, however, is that
although most external democracy activists may indeed be primarily interested in achieving free and fair elections, they also
frequently hope that their efforts will increase the likelihood that autocrats will lose office. The motives of U.S. government agencies
that fund (but do not specifically direct) many of the democracy groups are similarly complicated, ranging from the principled to the
instrumental, depending on the country in question and the officials in charge. Not surprisingly, these subtleties are generally lost on
the targets of democracy-promotion drives, who tend to view such efforts as concerted campaigns to oust them, instigated or at least
backed by powerful Western governments, especially the United States. Although autocratic leaders regularly cite concerns about
outside influence and the threat of instability as their motivations for resisting pro-democracy efforts, a question naturally arises:
Are they genuinely afraid that relatively modest Western democracy-training programs and financial aid for often weak civic and
political groups will undermine their hold on power, or is this fear just a convenient justification for repressive measures they would
take anyway? The answer varies, depending on the country. In some places, especially larger countries such as Russia and China, the
latter explanation probably holds. The Russian and Chinese governments enjoy a strong grip on power and face no significant
challengers. Putin's offensive against Western democracy aid appears to be a way for him to portray his authoritarian project to
Russians as a defense of the country's national security. The Kremlin may have been somewhat rattled by the 2004 Orange
Revolution in Ukraine, but it worried more about the influence it would lose in neighboring states than it did about a political
uprising at home. Moreover, denigrating the Orange Revolution as the result of U.S. machinations helped Putin put a positive spin
on what was one of his most glaring foreign policy failures: namely, his support for the losing side in the Ukrainian elections.
Similarly, the Chinese government's recent invocations of the color revolutions appear to be nothing more than the presentation of a
convenient rationale for broadening the antiliberalization campaign it has been conducting for several years. In other cases,
especially in smaller, weaker countries, some genuine fear seems to be at work. The specter of clever U.S. political operatives quietly
fomenting local revolutions does seem to have spooked some strongmen, even though in actuality Western democracy aid is not so
powerful. Although Washington may spend more than $1 billion on pro-democracy programs this year, the money is spread over
more than 50 countries and goes to a wide range of efforts, including court-management programs and assistance for government
decentralization efforts. Like all types of external assistance promoting political, economic, or social change, this aid is far from
being a magic elixir. It can help boost existing civic groups and opposition parties. But it cannot create them where they do not exist
or strengthen them when they are fundamentally weak. Even in the case of Serbia -- a high-water mark in terms of pro-democracy
programs' assertiveness and scale -- outside aid played only a supporting role for the courageous and skillful local activists who led
the way. And the very same types of assistance have so far proved far less effective in countries such as Belarus, where the political
opposition and civil society are relatively weak and the regime is very powerful. And yet, many people around the world - not just autocrats feeling the heat -- view
external democracy assistance skeptically. They assume that if the
United States decides to shape political outcomes in relatively weak countries, it can do so. In many places, the current wave
of assertive democracy aid conjures up memories of covert U.S. actions during the Cold War,
when Washington did try, and sometimes succeeded in, swinging elections or overthrowing legitimate
governments. To make matters worse, some Western NGOs, whether propelled by hubris or the desire to convince funders of
their importance, have a tendency to claim substantial credit for political events in which they played only a very minor role.
Occasional stories in the Western media that portray U.S. democracy-promotion programs as having been the crucial factor in
certain countries' transitions to democracy also contribute to the misperceptions. A (DIM) LIGHT UNTO THE NATIONS The
backlash against democracy aid can be understood as a reaction by nondemocratic governments to the
increasingly assertive provision of such aid. But it is also linked to and gains force from another source: the broader public
unease with the very idea of democracy promotion, a feeling that has spread widely in the past
several years throughout the former Soviet Union, western Europe, Latin America, the Middle East, and elsewhere.
President Bush, by embracing democracy promotion in the way he has, is largely responsible for this discomfort.
Latin America is key to global democracy
Lowenthal 94 (Abraham Lowenthal – Professor at the School of International Relations at the
University of Southern California and President of the Pacific Council on International Policy
(PCIP), “Americans Must Accept International Cooperation” – February 14th, 1994,
http://lanic.utexas.edu/la/region/news/arc/lasnet/1994/0127.html) SM
A third significance of Latin America today is as a prime arena - together with the former Soviet Union and the countries
of Eastern and Central Europe- for the core U.S. values of democratic governance and free-market economics. As both
democracy and capitalism are severely challenged in the former Communist countries, the worldwide appeal
and credibility of these ideas may depend importantly on whether our nearest neighbors can make
them work.
Democracy is key to solve for extinction
Muravchik 1 – Resident Scholar at American Enterprise Institute Joshua, “Democracy and
nuclear peace,” Jul 11, http://www.npec-web.org/syllabi/muravchik.htm
The greatest impetus for world peace -- and perforce of nuclear peace -- is the spread of
democracy. In a famous article, and subsequent book, Francis Fukuyama argued that democracy's extension was leading to "the
end of history." By this he meant the conclusion of man's quest for the right social order, but he also meant the "diminution of the
likelihood of large-scale conflict between states." (1) Fukuyama's phrase was intentionally provocative, even tongue-in-cheek, but he
was pointing to two down-to-earth historical observations: that democracies are more peaceful than other kinds of government and
that the world is growing more democratic. Neither point has gone unchallenged. Only a few decades ago, as distinguished an
observer of international relations as George Kennan made a claim quite contrary to the first of these assertions. Democracies,
he said, were slow to anger, but once aroused "a democracy . . . . fights in anger . . . . to the bitter
end." (2) Kennan's view was strongly influenced by the policy of "unconditional surrender"
pursued in World War II. But subsequent experience, such as the negotiated settlements
America sought in Korea and Vietnam proved him wrong. Democracies are not only slow to
anger but also quick to compromise. And to forgive. Notwithstanding the insistence on unconditional surrender,
America treated Japan and that part of Germany that it occupied with extraordinary generosity. In recent years a burgeoning
literature has discussed the peacefulness of democracies. Indeed the proposition that democracies do not go to
war with one another has been described by one political scientist as being "as close as anything
we have to an empirical law in international relations." (3) Some of those who find enthusiasm for democracy
off-putting have challenged this proposition, but their challenges have only served as empirical tests that have confirmed its
robustness. For example, the academic Paul Gottfried and the columnist-turned-politician Patrick J. Buchanan have both instanced
democratic England's declaration of war against democratic Finland during World War II. (4) In fact, after much procrastination,
England did accede to the pressure of its Soviet ally to declare war against Finland which was allied with Germany. But the
declaration was purely formal: no fighting ensued between England and Finland. Surely this is an exception that proves the rule. The
strongest exception I can think of is the war between the nascent state of Israel and the Arabs in 1948. Israel was an embryonic
democracy and Lebanon, one of the Arab belligerents, was also democratic within the confines of its peculiar confessional division of
power. Lebanon, however, was a reluctant party to the fight. Within the councils of the Arab League, it opposed the war but went
along with its larger confreres when they opted to attack. Even so, Lebanon did little fighting and soon sued for peace. Thus, in the
case of Lebanon against Israel, as in the case of England against Finland, democracies nominally went to war against democracies
when they were dragged into conflicts by authoritarian allies. The political scientist Bruce Russett offers a different challenge to the
notion that democracies are more peaceful. "That democracies are in general, in dealing with all kinds of
states, more peaceful than are authoritarian or other nondemocratically constituted states . . . .is a
much more controversial proposition than 'merely' that democracies are peaceful in their dealings with each other, and one for
which there is little systematic evidence," he says. (5) Russett cites his own and other statistical explorations which show that while
democracies rarely fight one another they often fight against others. The trouble with such studies, however, is that they rarely
examine the question of who started or caused a war. To reduce the data to a form that is quantitatively measurable, it is easier to
determine whether a conflict has occurred between two states than whose fault it was. But the latter question is all important.
Democracies may often go to war against dictatorships because the dictators see them as prey or
underestimate their resolve. Indeed, such examples abound. Germany might have behaved more cautiously in the
summer of 1914 had it realized that England would fight to vindicate Belgian neutrality and to support France. Later, Hitler was
emboldened by his notorious contempt for the flabbiness of the democracies. North Korea almost surely discounted the likelihood of
an American military response to its invasion of the South after Secretary of State Dean Acheson publicly defined America's defense
perimeter to exclude the Korean peninsula (a declaration which merely confirmed existing U.S. policy). In 1990, Saddam Hussein's
decision to swallow Kuwait was probably encouraged by the inference he must have taken from the statements and actions of
American officials that Washington would offer no forceful resistance. Russett says that those who claim democracies are in general
more peaceful "would have us believe that the United States was regularly on the defensive, rarely on the offensive, during the Cold
War." But that is not quite right: the word "regularly" distorts the issue. A victim can sometimes turn the tables on an aggressor, but
that does not make the victim equally bellicose. None would dispute that Napoleon was responsible for the Napoleonic wars or
Hitler for World War II in Europe, but after a time their victims seized the offensive. So in the Cold War, the United States may have
initiated some skirmishes (although in fact it rarely did), but the struggle as a whole was driven one-sidedly. The Soviet policy was
"class warfare"; the American policy was "containment." The so-called revisionist historians argued that America bore an equal or
larger share of responsibility for the conflict. But Mikhail Gorbachev made nonsense of their theories when, in the name of glasnost
and perestroika, he turned the Soviet Union away from its historic course. The Cold War ended almost instantly--as he no doubt
knew it would. "We would have been able to avoid many . . . difficulties if the democratic process had developed normally in our
country," he wrote. (7) To render judgment about the relative peacefulness of states or systems, we must ask not only who started a
war but why. In particular we should consider what in Catholic Just War doctrine is called "right intention," which means roughly:
what did they hope to get out of it? In the few cases in recent times in which wars were initiated by democracies, there were often
motives other than aggrandizement, for example, when America invaded Grenada. To be sure, Washington was impelled by selfinterest more than altruism, primarily its concern for the well-being of American nationals and its desire to remove a chip, however
tiny, from the Soviet game board. But America had no designs upon Grenada, and the invaders were greeted with joy by the
Grenadan citizenry. After organizing an election, America pulled out. In other cases, democracies have turned to
war in the face of provocation, such as Israel's invasion of Lebanon in 1982 to root out an enemy sworn to its destruction
or Turkey's invasion of Cyprus to rebuff a power-grab by Greek nationalists. In contrast, the wars launched by dictators, such as
Iraq's invasion of Kuwait, North Korea's of South Korea, the Soviet Union's of Hungary and Afghanistan, often have aimed at
conquest or subjugation. The big exception to this rule is colonialism. The European powers conquered most of Africa and Asia, and
continued to hold their prizes as Europe democratized. No doubt many of the instances of democracies at war that enter into the
statistical calculations of researchers like Russett stem from the colonial era. But colonialism was a legacy of Europe's predemocratic times, and it was abandoned after World War II. Since then, I know of no case where a democracy has initiated warfare
without significant provocation or for reasons of sheer aggrandizement, but there are several cases where dictators have done so.
One interesting piece of Russett's research should help to point him away from his doubts that democracies are more peaceful in
general. He aimed to explain why democracies are more peaceful toward each other. Immanuel Kant was the first to observe, or
rather to forecast, the pacific inclination of democracies. He reasoned that "citizens . . . will have a great hesitation in . . . . calling
down on themselves all the miseries of war." (8) But this valid insight is incomplete. There is a deeper explanation. Democracy
is not just a mechanism; it entails a spirit of compromise and self-restraint. At bottom,
democracy is the willingness to resolve civil disputes without recourse to violence. Nations that
embrace this ethos in the conduct of their domestic affairs are naturally more predisposed to
embrace it in their dealings with other nations. Russett aimed to explain why democracies are more peaceful
toward one another. To do this, he constructed two models. One hypothesized that the cause lay in the mechanics of democratic
decision-making (the "structural/institutional model"), the other that it lay in the democratic ethos (the "cultural/normative
model"). His statistical assessments led him to conclude that: "almost always the cultural/normative
model shows a consistent effect on conflict occurrence and war. The structural/institutional
model sometimes provides a significant relationship but often does not." (9) If it is the ethos that makes
democratic states more peaceful toward each other, would not that ethos also make them more peaceful in general? Russett implies
that the answer is no, because to his mind a critical element in the peaceful behavior of democracies toward other democracies is
their anticipation of a conciliatory attitude by their counterpart. But this is too pat. The attitude of live-and-let-live cannot be turned
on and off like a spigot. The citizens and officials of democracies recognize that other states, however governed, have legitimate
interests, and they are disposed to try to accommodate those interests except when the other party's behavior seems threatening or
outrageous. A different kind of challenge to the thesis that democracies are more peaceful has been posed by the political scientists
Edward G. Mansfield and Jack Snyder. They claim statistical support for the proposition that while fully fledged democracies may be
pacific, Ain th[e] transitional phase of democratization, countries become more aggressive and war-prone, not less." (10) However,
like others, they measure a state's likelihood of becoming involved in a war but do not report attempting to determine the cause or
fault. Moreover, they acknowledge that their research revealed not only an increased likelihood for a state to become involved in a
war when it was growing more democratic, but an almost equal increase for states growing less democratic. This raises the
possibility that the effects they were observing were caused simply by political change per se, rather than by democratization.
Finally, they implicitly acknowledge that the relationship of democratization and peacefulness may change over historical periods.
There is no reason to suppose that any such relationship is governed by an immutable law. Since their empirical base reaches back to
1811, any effect they report, even if accurately interpreted, may not hold in the contemporary world. They note that "in [some] recent
cases, in contrast to some of our historical results, the rule seems to be: go fully democratic, or don't go at all." But according to
Freedom House, some 62.5 percent of extant governments were chosen in legitimate elections. (12) (This is a much larger
proportion than are adjudged by Freedom House to be "free states," a more demanding criterion, and it includes many weakly
democratic states.) Of the remaining 37.5 percent, a large number are experiencing some degree of democratization or heavy
pressure in that direction. So the choice "don't go at all" (11) is rarely realistic in the contemporary world. These statistics also
contain the answer to those who doubt the second proposition behind Fukuyama's forecast, namely, that the world is growing more
democratic. Skeptics have drawn upon Samuel Huntington's fine book, The Third Wave: Democratization in the Late Twentieth
Century. Huntington says that the democratization trend that began in the mid-1970s in Portugal, Greece and Spain is the third such
episode. The first "wave" of democratization began with the American revolution and lasted through the aftermath of World War I,
coming to an end in the interwar years when much of Europe regressed back to fascist or military dictatorship. The second wave, in
this telling, followed World War II when wholesale decolonization gave rise to a raft of new democracies. Most of these, notably in
Africa, collapsed into dictatorship by the 1960s, bringing the second wave to its end. Those who follow Huntington's argument may
take the failure of democracy in several of the former Soviet republics and some other instances of backsliding since 1989 to signal
the end of the third wave. Such an impression, however, would be misleading. One unsatisfying thing about Huntington's "waves" is
their unevenness. The first lasted about 150 years, the second about 20. How long should we expect the third to endure? If it is like
the second, it will ebb any day now, but if it is like the first, it will run until the around the year 2125. And by then--who knows?-perhaps mankind will have incinerated itself, moved to another planet, or even devised a better political system. Further,
Huntington's metaphor implies a lack of overall progress or direction. Waves rise and fall. But each of the reverses that followed
Huntington's two waves was brief, and each new wave raised the number of democracies higher than before. Huntington does,
however, present a statistic that seems to weigh heavily against any unidirectional interpretation of democratic progress. The
proportion of states that were democratic in 1990 (45%), he says, was identical to the proportion in 1922. (13) But there are two
answers to this. In 1922 there were only 64 states; in 1990 there were 165. But the number of peoples had not grown appreciably.
The difference was that in 1922 most peoples lived in colonies, and they were not counted as states. The 64 states of that time were
mostly the advanced countries. Of those, two thirds had become democratic by 1990, which was a significant gain. The additional
101 states counted in 1990 were mostly former colonies. Only a minority, albeit a substantial one, were democratic in 1990, but since
virtually none of those were democratic in 1922, that was also a significant gain. In short, there was progress all around, but this was
obscured by asking what percentage of states were democratic. Asking the question this way means that a people who were subjected
to a domestic dictator counted as a non-democracy, but a people who were subjected to a foreign dictator did not count at all.
Moreover, while the criteria for judging a state democratic vary, the statistic that 45 percent of states were democratic in 1990
corresponds with Freedom House's count of "democratic" polities (as opposed to its smaller count of "free" countries, a more
demanding criterion). But by this same count, Freedom House now says that the proportion of democracies has grown to 62.5
percent. In other words, the "third wave" has not abated. That Freedom House could count 120 freely elected governments by early
2001 (out of a total of 192 independent states) bespeaks a vast transformation in human governance within the span of 225 years. In
1775, the number of democracies was zero. In 1776, the birth of the United States of America brought the total up to one. Since then,
democracy has spread at an accelerating pace, most of the growth having occurred within the twentieth century, with greatest
momentum since 1974. That this momentum has slackened somewhat since its pinnacle in 1989, destined to be remembered as one
of the most revolutionary years in all history, was inevitable. So many peoples were swept up in the democratic tide that there was
certain to be some backsliding. Most countries' democratic evolution has included some fits and starts rather than a smooth
progression. So it must be for the world as a whole. Nonetheless, the overall trend remains powerful and clear. Despite the
backsliding, the number and proportion of democracies stands higher today than ever before. This progress offers a source of hope
for enduring nuclear peace. The danger of nuclear war was radically reduced almost overnight when Russia abandoned Communism
and turned to democracy. For other ominous corners of the world, we may be in a kind of race between the emergence or growth of
nuclear arsenals and the advent of democratization. If this is so, the greatest cause for worry may rest with the Moslem Middle East
where nuclear arsenals do not yet exist but where the prospects for democracy may be still more remote.
Democracy DA – Yes Democracy Promotion
Promoting democratic regimes is a major part of U.S. policy toward Latin America
– only possible with continued hegemonic influence
Azpuru, 10 (Dinorah, assistant professor in the Political Science Department at Wichita State
University, and Carolyn M. Shaw, associate professor in the Political Science Department at
Wichita State University, “The United States and the Promotion of Democracy in Latin America:
Then, Now and Tomorrow,” published on behalf of the Foreign Policy Research Institute, Spring
2010,
http://webs.wichita.edu/depttools/depttoolsmemberfiles/carolynshaw/2010%20Orbis.pdf,
Tashma)
Since the end of the Cold War, important changes have taken place in U.S. foreign policy
towards Latin America. Instead of a meager support for democracy in the region—and sometimes questionable actions that
actually undermined democracy—the post-Cold War U.S. policy toward Latin America has become one of
overtly promoting , establishing, and maintaining liberal democracy. This new policy has been
implemented since the 1990s through multilateral and bilateral actions of different kinds. The purpose of
this article is to analyze the main U.S. actions to promote democracy in the Latin American region1 since the 1990s, the challenges it
faces at the current time, and possible scenarios that lie ahead. The promotion of democracy has become an
important part of the foreign policy of advanced industrial democracies since the end of the Cold War,
which coincided with the rise in democracy around the world. Peter Burnell identifies three different approaches to
promoting democracy, all of which have been employed by the United States to some degree:
conditionalities, democracy assistance, and use of force. Although force has been largely discredited, the other
two approaches have been used in a variety of cases with varying degrees of success. Applying conditions and granting
trade concessions can bring about some improved democratic practices, but is largely ineffective when a determined
regime or strong leader is in place. The provision of technical, financial, material and symbolic support for democracy programs can
have a stronger impact (although long term sustainability is still problematic).2 Fostering democracy has been part of
the rhetoric of foreign policy toward the Latin American region since the days of Woodrow Wilson,3 but
has only become a priority and a praxis for the United States relatively recently. Throughout most of the twentieth
century, particularly during the Cold War, security and economic concerns frequently took precedence over liberal U.S. principles.
U.S. support for anti-communist military dictators and regimes often worked against democratic development in the Third World,
including the Western Hemisphere.
Democracy DA – Democracy Promotion Bad
Retrenchment key to Latin American democracy- heg kills credibility of
democratic ideals
Crandall 2011 (Russell Crandall – associate professor of International Politics at Davison
College -- Principal Director for the Western Hemisphere at the U.S. Department of Defense in
2009 and Director for Andean Affairs at the National Security Council in 2010-11, The PostAmerican Hemisphere Subtitle: Power and Politics in an Autonomous Latin America, Foreign
Affairs, May/June, Lexis) SM
Ironically, moreover, Latin America's entry into a "post-hegemonic" era, a product of its own advancements, could undermine its
past progress. As the balance of power in the region is redistributed, unexpected alliances and enmities could arise. Many
observers have assumed that less U.S. involvement would be an inherently positive
development, but that may be too optimistic. No one should underestimate the capacity of the
Venezuela-led bloc of quasi-authoritarian leftist governments to stop the regional trend toward
greater openness and democracy -- values that the bloc sees as representing a capitulation to the U.S.controlled global system. Nonetheless, Latin America's emerging democratic consensus seems inevitable, and as its
strategic posture finally matures, the region will be more directly responsible for its own successes and
failures. Long Latin America's master, the United States must adapt to the new realities of this
post-hegemonic era, lest it see its influence diminish even further. It must demonstrate an
ability to quietly engage and lead when appropriate -- an approach that will allow Washington to remain actively
involved in the region's affairs without acting as though it is trying to maintain its legacy of hegemony.
Given how accustomed the United States is to dominating the region, this project will be harder than it sounds
U.S. democracy promotion inevitably fails – it’s perceived as imperialist
propaganda
Poppe, 10 (Annika E., “Whither to, Obama? U.S. democracy promotion after the Cold War,”
Peace Research Institute Frankfurt, No. 96,
http://edoc.vifapol.de/opus/volltexte/2011/3201/pdf/prif96.pdf, Tashma)
Many authors emphatically argue that the divide between idealism and realism has finally been crossed by the foreign policy concept
of democracy promotion (Carothers 2000b, Holsti 2000). In Carothers’ words: “The end of the cold war gave rise to the appealing
notion that the traditional tension in U.S. foreign policy between realpolitik security interests and Wilsonian moral interests was
over” (Carothers 1999: 4-5, his emphasis). Spreading democracy around the world, now that it appeared more feasible than under
the restrictions of the Cold War’s bipolar confrontation, seemed after all to offer a multitude of ‘hard’ and ‘soft’ benefits: it satisfied
the assumed societal demands for an idealistic policy in line with the American self-image while at the same time pacifying the world
and thereby enhancing U.S. security and economic opportunities. The security logic of democracy promotion in particular can only
be appreciated when one moves beyond the realism/idealism dichotomy (Nau 2000: 127). Whereas the theoretical debate has been
productive in this regard, putting democracy into practice in non-democratic countries and reaping its
benefits has been, not surprisingly, more complicated and less successful. Whether American democracy
promotion has been effective or not is another field of debate in which the cautionary have obtained the upper hand. Several
studies on democracy promotion in Latin America have shown that past attempts had little
enduring success (Lowenthal 1991). A study on the democracy-building effects of USAID assistance from 1990 to 2003
concludes that it has had a “moderate but consistent worldwide effect” but its authors emphasize a number of qualificatory
observations (Finkel/PérezLiñán/Seligson 2007: 436).8 Recently, the emerging literature discussing the global
backlash against democracy and democracy promotion has added to the impression that
external democratization is not performing well and is even fueling a countermovement (Carothers
2006; NED 2006). According to Carothers, effects often fail to materialize because a lot of well-meaning
aides confuse American democracy with liberal democracy itself. The two main
misunderstandings which lead to failure, he points out, are the assumption that democracy is a
formal set of procedures which can be imposed on any kind of system regardless of prior democratic
experience and norms on the one hand, and the premise that the democracy to be promoted needs a ‘made
in the United States’ label in order to function on the other (Carothers 2000a). Lowenthal adds that “efforts to
nurture it [democracy, AEP] must be restrained, respectful, sensitive, and patient. These are not qualities for which U.S. foreign
policy is generally noted, but they are needed to promote democracy abroad” (Lowenthal 1991: 402). The area in which this kind of
restraint, sensitivity and patience is probably least present is the one in which democracy has been promoted through military
means. This is important to note as there has been a shift towards militarily imposed democracy since the American invasion of
Afghanistan in 2001. Muravchik is convinced that during the Cold War “military occupation and covert action have been highly
effective means of spreading democracy” (Muravchik 1991: 222-23). To the contrary, as a study covering the time period from 1946
to 1996 has shown, most
interventions by liberal states have failed to lead to successful
democratization in target countries; only supportive interventions by United Nations blue helmet troops seem to have
limited effectiveness (Pickering/Peceny 2006). As will be shown in the following chapter, the attempt to promote democracy by
force is a characteristic the Bush administration has become known – and strongly criticized – for.
Anti-Americanism caused by hegemony undermines Latin American democracy
Foer 6 (Franklin Foer – editor of the New Republic “The talented Mr. Chavez: a Castro-loving,
Bolivar-worshipping, onetime baseball-player wannabe, Venezuela's Hugo Chavez is perhaps
the world's most openly anti-American head of state. With Latin America in the midst of a
leftward swing, how dangerous is he?” The Atlantic Monthly, May 2006, Lexis) SM
How far left will the region swing in reaction? Teodoro Petkoff, the editor of the Caracas paper Tal Cual and one of
Chavez's prime adversaries, has written a book called Dos Izquierdas ("Two Lefts"). Under his taxonomy, Brazilian President Luiz
Inacio "Lula" da Silva represents one of these lefts, which pays lip service to Castro but adopts a more pragmatic attitude toward
economics and remains committed to liberal democracy. Like European social democracy, it ultimately seeks to humanize
capitalism, not destroy it--a political program that could help Latin America correct the excesses of its neoliberal experiment without
entirely undermining its core economic contributions. Chavez, on the other hand, represents a more retrograde form of socialism.
His belief in strong leaders over strong institutions, his preference for patronage over careful policy, and his mistrust of some of the
basic elements of the capitalist system add up to disaster for government transparency, democracy, and development. Which of the
two lefts will eventually win out is unclear. Most residents of Latin America still believe that market capitalism is the only system
that can lead to development, and Lula is more popular than Chavez overall. But there's no doubt that Chavez's approach is
winning adherents. Chavez may soon have close friends running Nicaragua, Mexico, and Peru.
Argentina's Kirchner seems the junior partner in his relationship with Chavez, despite his country's bigger economy andmilitary.
Chavez's protege Evo Morales has already won the Bolivian presidency, in part by following Chavez's own model of anti-American
rhetoric and populist appeals. Morales has promised to decriminalize coca production and redistribute land and plans to rewrite
Bolivia's constitution this summer. Even Alvaro Uribe, the president of Colombia and America's staunchest ally in South America,
has appeared with Chavez in front of Simon Bolivar's home and bashed American "meddling." Chavez's performance last November
at the Summit of the Americas, held in the Argentine resort of Mar del Plata, reveals why his appeals to the leaders and citizens of
Latin America have been so successful. He skipped away from the awkward group photos with his fellow heads of state, and
addressed a crowd of 25,000 anti-globalization activists gathered for a "counter-summit" in a soccer stadium. He wrapped his arm
around Diego Maradona, one of the greatest soccer players of all time, who's probably more admired than any politician at the
official proceedings. "I think we came here to bury FTAA [the Free Trade Area of the Americas]," Chavez intoned. "I brought my
shovel." He was playing a clever inside-outside game: at the same time thathe huddled with leaders like Lula and Kirchner, he used
the media togo over their heads and speak directly to their radical political bases. This tactic works well because most Latin
American leaders stilldepend on support from their own radical parties. Their activist bases still genuflect toward Havana, and
constantly lament that their presidents lack Chavez's gumption. "They live in fear of Chavez turningagainst them, because they worry
that their people might not take their side," one U.S. State Department official told me. This dynamic has given Chavez the run of the
Southern Hemisphere. The United States hasn't shown much deftness in tilting this fight between the
two lefts toward pragmatists like Lula. Instead of acknowledging the shortcomings of Latin America's recent neoliberal
experiment, it has insisted on pushing forward with the FTAA--an agreement that has little chance in the current political
environment. Where Chavez constantly announces new plans to distribute cash around the region, the United States continues to cut
back on its aid packages. And while the Bush administration isn't about to confront Chavez seriously, it often gives the impression
that such a policy is in the works, allowing Chavez to bait the United States into verbal duels—battles that reinforce Chavez's
mythological version of himself. This hardly makes him the second coming of Simon Bolivar. Nonetheless, there are unavoidable
similarities between the two--including some that Chavez might not care to acknowledge. Chavez claims that his favorite book is
Garcia Marquez's historical novel about Bolivar's last days, The General in His Labyrint. If this is true, he must know that Bolivar
ended his life distraught and depressed. During his final years, Bolivar devolved from radical democrat to dictator. He both praised
democracy as "the most sacred source" of power and proclaimed that "necessity recognizes no laws." When Gran Colombia failed
after eleven years of struggle, during which Bolivar himself came to embody many of the oppressive qualities he'd originally
campaigned against, he dismissed the continent as ungovernable and descended into a bitter senescence. He died and was buried in
Colombia; Venezuela, whose populace had eventually turned on him, had made him an exile in his final years. Chavez, despite his
love of poetry, never seems to utter one of Bolivar's most poignant fines: "Those who serve the revolution plow the sea." Historically,
Latin American revolution has proved to be just as futile as Bolivar imagined. Because of its peculiar political temperament, the
region has swung back and forth on a dialectical rope between socialism and authoritarianism, occasionally stopping, mid-swing, on
governments that combine the worst attributes of both. But in recent decades, the region looked like it might finally transcend this
pattern of manic change. Widespread adoption of liberal-democratic governance and an embrace of
market capitalism seemed to bring relative prosperity and genuine stability within grasp. Chavez
has the potential to disrupt this progress and revive Latin America's old political habits . According
to a recent poll, only about half of the region's citizens--including minorities in Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, and
Brazil--now believe that democracy is always the best form of government. Latin America is
vulnerable, and Chavez has provided a blueprint not just for harnessing anti-Americanism but
for the slow consolidation of power. Along the way, he may succeed in baiting the United States
into a rhetorical fight that it can't win, and impeding its international leadership. But ultimately, the
United States will not be the biggest loser in the battle Chavez is waging. It will never suffer nearly as much as the people of the
continent he dreams of liberating.
Democracy is key to solve for extinction
Muravchik 1 – Resident Scholar at American Enterprise Institute Joshua, “Democracy and
nuclear peace,” Jul 11, http://www.npec-web.org/syllabi/muravchik.htm
The greatest impetus for world peace -- and perforce of nuclear peace -- is the spread of
democracy. In a famous article, and subsequent book, Francis Fukuyama argued that democracy's extension was leading to "the
end of history." By this he meant the conclusion of man's quest for the right social order, but he also meant the "diminution of the
likelihood of large-scale conflict between states." (1) Fukuyama's phrase was intentionally provocative, even tongue-in-cheek, but he
was pointing to two down-to-earth historical observations: that democracies are more peaceful than other kinds of government and
that the world is growing more democratic. Neither point has gone unchallenged. Only a few decades ago, as distinguished an
observer of international relations as George Kennan made a claim quite contrary to the first of these assertions. Democracies,
he said, were slow to anger, but once aroused "a democracy . . . . fights in anger . . . . to the bitter
end." (2) Kennan's view was strongly influenced by the policy of "unconditional surrender"
pursued in World War II. But subsequent experience, such as the negotiated settlements
America sought in Korea and Vietnam proved him wrong. Democracies are not only slow to
anger but also quick to compromise. And to forgive. Notwithstanding the insistence on unconditional surrender,
America treated Japan and that part of Germany that it occupied with extraordinary generosity. In recent years a burgeoning
literature has discussed the peacefulness of democracies. Indeed the proposition that democracies do not go to
war with one another has been described by one political scientist as being "as close as anything
we have to an empirical law in international relations." (3) Some of those who find enthusiasm for democracy
off-putting have challenged this proposition, but their challenges have only served as empirical tests that have confirmed its
robustness. For example, the academic Paul Gottfried and the columnist-turned-politician Patrick J. Buchanan have both instanced
democratic England's declaration of war against democratic Finland during World War II. (4) In fact, after much procrastination,
England did accede to the pressure of its Soviet ally to declare war against Finland which was allied with Germany. But the
declaration was purely formal: no fighting ensued between England and Finland. Surely this is an exception that proves the rule. The
strongest exception I can think of is the war between the nascent state of Israel and the Arabs in 1948. Israel was an embryonic
democracy and Lebanon, one of the Arab belligerents, was also democratic within the confines of its peculiar confessional division of
power. Lebanon, however, was a reluctant party to the fight. Within the councils of the Arab League, it opposed the war but went
along with its larger confreres when they opted to attack. Even so, Lebanon did little fighting and soon sued for peace. Thus, in the
case of Lebanon against Israel, as in the case of England against Finland, democracies nominally went to war against democracies
when they were dragged into conflicts by authoritarian allies. The political scientist Bruce Russett offers a different challenge to the
notion that democracies are more peaceful. "That democracies are in general, in dealing with all kinds of
states, more peaceful than are authoritarian or other nondemocratically constituted states . . . .is a
much more controversial proposition than 'merely' that democracies are peaceful in their dealings with each other, and one for
which there is little systematic evidence," he says. (5) Russett cites his own and other statistical explorations which show that while
democracies rarely fight one another they often fight against others. The trouble with such studies, however, is that they rarely
examine the question of who started or caused a war. To reduce the data to a form that is quantitatively measurable, it is easier to
determine whether a conflict has occurred between two states than whose fault it was. But the latter question is all important.
Democracies may often go to war against dictatorships because the dictators see them as prey or
underestimate their resolve. Indeed, such examples abound. Germany might have behaved more cautiously in the
summer of 1914 had it realized that England would fight to vindicate Belgian neutrality and to support France. Later, Hitler was
emboldened by his notorious contempt for the flabbiness of the democracies. North Korea almost surely discounted the likelihood of
an American military response to its invasion of the South after Secretary of State Dean Acheson publicly defined America's defense
perimeter to exclude the Korean peninsula (a declaration which merely confirmed existing U.S. policy). In 1990, Saddam Hussein's
decision to swallow Kuwait was probably encouraged by the inference he must have taken from the statements and actions of
American officials that Washington would offer no forceful resistance. Russett says that those who claim democracies are in general
more peaceful "would have us believe that the United States was regularly on the defensive, rarely on the offensive, during the Cold
War." But that is not quite right: the word "regularly" distorts the issue. A victim can sometimes turn the tables on an aggressor, but
that does not make the victim equally bellicose. None would dispute that Napoleon was responsible for the Napoleonic wars or
Hitler for World War II in Europe, but after a time their victims seized the offensive. So in the Cold War, the United States may have
initiated some skirmishes (although in fact it rarely did), but the struggle as a whole was driven one-sidedly. The Soviet policy was
"class warfare"; the American policy was "containment." The so-called revisionist historians argued that America bore an equal or
larger share of responsibility for the conflict. But Mikhail Gorbachev made nonsense of their theories when, in the name of glasnost
and perestroika, he turned the Soviet Union away from its historic course. The Cold War ended almost instantly--as he no doubt
knew it would. "We would have been able to avoid many . . . difficulties if the democratic process had developed normally in our
country," he wrote. (7) To render judgment about the relative peacefulness of states or systems, we must ask not only who started a
war but why. In particular we should consider what in Catholic Just War doctrine is called "right intention," which means roughly:
what did they hope to get out of it? In the few cases in recent times in which wars were initiated by democracies, there were often
motives other than aggrandizement, for example, when America invaded Grenada. To be sure, Washington was impelled by selfinterest more than altruism, primarily its concern for the well-being of American nationals and its desire to remove a chip, however
tiny, from the Soviet game board. But America had no designs upon Grenada, and the invaders were greeted with joy by the
Grenadan citizenry. After organizing an election, America pulled out. In other cases, democracies have turned to
war in the face of provocation, such as Israel's invasion of Lebanon in 1982 to root out an enemy sworn to its destruction
or Turkey's invasion of Cyprus to rebuff a power-grab by Greek nationalists. In contrast, the wars launched by dictators, such as
Iraq's invasion of Kuwait, North Korea's of South Korea, the Soviet Union's of Hungary and Afghanistan, often have aimed at
conquest or subjugation. The big exception to this rule is colonialism. The European powers conquered most of Africa and Asia, and
continued to hold their prizes as Europe democratized. No doubt many of the instances of democracies at war that enter into the
statistical calculations of researchers like Russett stem from the colonial era. But colonialism was a legacy of Europe's predemocratic times, and it was abandoned after World War II. Since then, I know of no case where a democracy has initiated warfare
without significant provocation or for reasons of sheer aggrandizement, but there are several cases where dictators have done so.
One interesting piece of Russett's research should help to point him away from his doubts that democracies are more peaceful in
general. He aimed to explain why democracies are more peaceful toward each other. Immanuel Kant was the first to observe, or
rather to forecast, the pacific inclination of democracies. He reasoned that "citizens . . . will have a great hesitation in . . . . calling
down on themselves all the miseries of war." (8) But this valid insight is incomplete. There is a deeper explanation. Democracy
is not just a mechanism; it entails a spirit of compromise and self-restraint. At bottom,
democracy is the willingness to resolve civil disputes without recourse to violence. Nations that
embrace this ethos in the conduct of their domestic affairs are naturally more predisposed to
embrace it in their dealings with other nations. Russett aimed to explain why democracies are more peaceful
toward one another. To do this, he constructed two models. One hypothesized that the cause lay in the mechanics of democratic
decision-making (the "structural/institutional model"), the other that it lay in the democratic ethos (the "cultural/normative
model"). His statistical assessments led him to conclude that: "almost always the cultural/normative
model shows a consistent effect on conflict occurrence and war. The structural/institutional
model sometimes provides a significant relationship but often does not." (9) If it is the ethos that makes
democratic states more peaceful toward each other, would not that ethos also make them more peaceful in general? Russett implies
that the answer is no, because to his mind a critical element in the peaceful behavior of democracies toward other democracies is
their anticipation of a conciliatory attitude by their counterpart. But this is too pat. The attitude of live-and-let-live cannot be turned
on and off like a spigot. The citizens and officials of democracies recognize that other states, however governed, have legitimate
interests, and they are disposed to try to accommodate those interests except when the other party's behavior seems threatening or
outrageous. A different kind of challenge to the thesis that democracies are more peaceful has been posed by the political scientists
Edward G. Mansfield and Jack Snyder. They claim statistical support for the proposition that while fully fledged democracies may be
pacific, Ain th[e] transitional phase of democratization, countries become more aggressive and war-prone, not less." (10) However,
like others, they measure a state's likelihood of becoming involved in a war but do not report attempting to determine the cause or
fault. Moreover, they acknowledge that their research revealed not only an increased likelihood for a state to become involved in a
war when it was growing more democratic, but an almost equal increase for states growing less democratic. This raises the
possibility that the effects they were observing were caused simply by political change per se, rather than by democratization.
Finally, they implicitly acknowledge that the relationship of democratization and peacefulness may change over historical periods.
There is no reason to suppose that any such relationship is governed by an immutable law. Since their empirical base reaches back to
1811, any effect they report, even if accurately interpreted, may not hold in the contemporary world. They note that "in [some] recent
cases, in contrast to some of our historical results, the rule seems to be: go fully democratic, or don't go at all." But according to
Freedom House, some 62.5 percent of extant governments were chosen in legitimate elections. (12) (This is a much larger
proportion than are adjudged by Freedom House to be "free states," a more demanding criterion, and it includes many weakly
democratic states.) Of the remaining 37.5 percent, a large number are experiencing some degree of democratization or heavy
pressure in that direction. So the choice "don't go at all" (11) is rarely realistic in the contemporary world. These statistics also
contain the answer to those who doubt the second proposition behind Fukuyama's forecast, namely, that the world is growing more
democratic. Skeptics have drawn upon Samuel Huntington's fine book, The Third Wave: Democratization in the Late Twentieth
Century. Huntington says that the democratization trend that began in the mid-1970s in Portugal, Greece and Spain is the third such
episode. The first "wave" of democratization began with the American revolution and lasted through the aftermath of World War I,
coming to an end in the interwar years when much of Europe regressed back to fascist or military dictatorship. The second wave, in
this telling, followed World War II when wholesale decolonization gave rise to a raft of new democracies. Most of these, notably in
Africa, collapsed into dictatorship by the 1960s, bringing the second wave to its end. Those who follow Huntington's argument may
take the failure of democracy in several of the former Soviet republics and some other instances of backsliding since 1989 to signal
the end of the third wave. Such an impression, however, would be misleading. One unsatisfying thing about Huntington's "waves" is
their unevenness. The first lasted about 150 years, the second about 20. How long should we expect the third to endure? If it is like
the second, it will ebb any day now, but if it is like the first, it will run until the around the year 2125. And by then--who knows?-perhaps mankind will have incinerated itself, moved to another planet, or even devised a better political system. Further,
Huntington's metaphor implies a lack of overall progress or direction. Waves rise and fall. But each of the reverses that followed
Huntington's two waves was brief, and each new wave raised the number of democracies higher than before. Huntington does,
however, present a statistic that seems to weigh heavily against any unidirectional interpretation of democratic progress. The
proportion of states that were democratic in 1990 (45%), he says, was identical to the proportion in 1922. (13) But there are two
answers to this. In 1922 there were only 64 states; in 1990 there were 165. But the number of peoples had not grown appreciably.
The difference was that in 1922 most peoples lived in colonies, and they were not counted as states. The 64 states of that time were
mostly the advanced countries. Of those, two thirds had become democratic by 1990, which was a significant gain. The additional
101 states counted in 1990 were mostly former colonies. Only a minority, albeit a substantial one, were democratic in 1990, but since
virtually none of those were democratic in 1922, that was also a significant gain. In short, there was progress all around, but this was
obscured by asking what percentage of states were democratic. Asking the question this way means that a people who were subjected
to a domestic dictator counted as a non-democracy, but a people who were subjected to a foreign dictator did not count at all.
Moreover, while the criteria for judging a state democratic vary, the statistic that 45 percent of states were democratic in 1990
corresponds with Freedom House's count of "democratic" polities (as opposed to its smaller count of "free" countries, a more
demanding criterion). But by this same count, Freedom House now says that the proportion of democracies has grown to 62.5
percent. In other words, the "third wave" has not abated. That Freedom House could count 120 freely elected governments by early
2001 (out of a total of 192 independent states) bespeaks a vast transformation in human governance within the span of 225 years. In
1775, the number of democracies was zero. In 1776, the birth of the United States of America brought the total up to one. Since then,
democracy has spread at an accelerating pace, most of the growth having occurred within the twentieth century, with greatest
momentum since 1974. That this momentum has slackened somewhat since its pinnacle in 1989, destined to be remembered as one
of the most revolutionary years in all history, was inevitable. So many peoples were swept up in the democratic tide that there was
certain to be some backsliding. Most countries' democratic evolution has included some fits and starts rather than a smooth
progression. So it must be for the world as a whole. Nonetheless, the overall trend remains powerful and clear. Despite the
backsliding, the number and proportion of democracies stands higher today than ever before. This progress offers a source of hope
for enduring nuclear peace. The danger of nuclear war was radically reduced almost overnight when Russia abandoned Communism
and turned to democracy. For other ominous corners of the world, we may be in a kind of race between the emergence or growth of
nuclear arsenals and the advent of democratization. If this is so, the greatest cause for worry may rest with the Moslem Middle East
where nuclear arsenals do not yet exist but where the prospects for democracy may be still more remote.
Dollar Bad DA – 1NC
LA is replacing the dollar now—US engagement in Latin America destroys reverses
that
Tessman, 12 - Ph.D. Political Science, University of Colorado, assistant professor of
International Affairs and associate director of the Center for the Study of Global Issues (Globis)
at the University of Georgia (Brock F., “System Structure and State Strategy: Adding Hedging to
the Menu,” May 22nd, 2012, Taylor and Francis Online)//HAL
Brazil’s approach to mediation is epitomized by its ability to prioritize the long-term goal of integration over short-term policy
victories. For example, Brasilia has continually refrained from punishing Argentina for trade violations in wake of its 2001
economic crisis and has also maintained—despite the increasingly jarring rhetoric from Hugo Chavez—rather warm relations with
Venezuela. Perhaps the clearest example of Type B strategic hedging is found in Brazil’s efforts to
build regional economic organizations that can function independently of the United States ,
western financial institutions, and the US dollar. In the summer of 2011, UNASUR finance and foreign affairs ministers held
a series of meetings in order to develop a plan that would insulate the region from future
economic crises in Europe and the United States.78 In particular, the UNASUR countries were seeking a strategy
that would successfully reduce their reliance on American-dominated financial institutions like the International Monetary Fund
(IMF) and World Bank, while also allowing the region to move away from the use of US dollars as the dominant currency for
regional trade. As Argentina’s Deputy Economy minister Roberto Feletti explained, “What was approved by the meeting of ministers
as an action plan is to advance in the design of a multilateral payments system which tends to use local currencies. The
tendency is to gradually replace the U.S. dollar in regional trade.”79 Because Brazil is a heavy exporter and
is also the target of more and more foreign investment, regional dependence on the US dollar is threatening
because the country’s growing reserves are subject to significant depreciation as the dollar falls
in relation to the Brazilian real. While the accumulation of US dollars was at one point seen as a desirable consequence
of a positive trade balance and growing foreign investment, the erosion of the dollar has led Brazilian leaders to
push for the use of local currencies in regional trade and investment.80 Brazilian leaders have
also sought to establish a Latin American Reserves Fund Council (FLAR). The FLAR would
supervise a regional reserve bank (Banco del Sur) that would come to the aid of states that were
experiencing balance of payments problems.81 The FLAR would serve as a regional equivalent of
the IMF and would reduce regional dependence on that American-led institution. Like the Asian
Monetary Fund that emerged in the wake of the financial crisis of 1997 and 1998, a Banco del Sur would not be seen
as a tool for confronting western financial institutions, but rather a way to reduce regional
dependence on them. For Brazil, the bank would be a stabilizing force in the region; countries with
the highest potential for balance of payments problems—Venezuela, Bolivia, and Ecuador—are also those
that would have the hardest time obtaining conditional loans from the IMF. 82 Brazil’s military,
diplomatic, and economic approaches to regional leadership in South America are designed to
replace public goods that havehistorically been provided by the United States.
US dollar causes currency wars—goes global
Rathbone, 13 - the Financial Times’ Latin American editor, worked as an economist and a
journalist at the World Bank, graduate of Oxford and Columbia Universities (John Paul,
February 12th, 2013, “Currency fears spread in Latin America,” Financial Times,
http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/c765ec1a-721b-11e2-89fb00144feab49a.html#axzz2Y17JdFTY)//HAL
Latin America is going Brazilian. Previously, it was only Brazil, the region’s biggest economy, that
complained about the competitive devaluations generated by money-printing in the west, the so-called
currency wars. Now, however, as Japan joins the rush to print money and devalue, the more orthodox and free-trading
Latin economies – investor darlings such as Mexico, Chile, Colombia and Peru – also fear catching a bullet. The
issue may well dominate this week’s G20 meeting in Moscow, given that Asian exporters such as South Korea are also worried about
currency appreciation. “Not all Latin American policy makers have used the term currency war,” says Luis Oganes, head of Latin
America research at JPMorgan. But they “are expressing increasing concern and reacting to it”. Last week,
Felipe Larraín, Chile’s finance minister, lamented that competitive devaluations of global currencies from
quantitative easing, or QE, could lead “to new forms of trade protectionism”. Agustín Carstens, the head of
Mexico’s central bank, warned the following day that massive cross-border capital flows could lead to a “perfect storm” of economic
problems. He added that “concerns of asset-price bubbles fed by credit booms are starting to reappear”. Symptomatic of this was a
tweet last Tuesday by Bill Gross, the co-chief investment officer of Pimco, the bond fund, which praised the Mexican peso as a “great
currency” and that led an almost 1 percentage point jump in the currency. Such concerns are the opposite of those in more
mismanaged Latin economies, such as Venezuela, which devalued on Friday, or Argentina, both of which are suffering capital
outflows. What makes this round of currency war complaints different from when Brazil coined the phrase in 2010, is that after
years of orthodox policy making the Mexican, Colombian, Peruvian and Chilean economies, which have a combined economic
output of $2.1tn, enjoy lower inflation and interest rates, and smaller budget deficits. And yet they are still suffering. “The term
‘currency wars’ is often used as a scapegoat by policy makers,” says Michael Henderson, Latin America economist at Capital
Economics, a consultancy. “The fact that people such as Mexico’s Carstens are picking up on the idea lends it more credence.”
Certainly, the evidence seems clear. The Mexican, Chilean, Colombian and Peruvian currencies all
appreciated by about 10 per cent against the dollar last year. The average of their inflation-adjusted, trade
weighted currencies is now also 8 per cent above the 10-year average. This has prompted howls of protest from
local exporters, and increased pressure on politicians to “do something” to help. “We firmly criticise
the monetary policies of developed economies which are generating excessive international liquidity and overvaluing currencies such
as ours,” Mauricio Cárdenas, Colombia’s finance minister, told the Financial Times.
Dollar Bad DA – Inflation Impact
LA is moving away from the dollar—dollar collapses the global economy and
causes massive inflation
Guzman, 13 - researcher and writer with a focus on political, economic, media and
historical spheres, graduate of Hunter College in New York City (Timothy Alexander, “Investing
in Silver, Moving out of the Dollar: The Roman Denarius, the American dollar and the Return of
Silver?” Global Research, February 04, 2013, http://www.globalresearch.ca/investing-in-silverweakness-of-the-dollar-the-roman-denarius-the-american-dollar-and-the-return-ofsilver/5321610)//HAL
If the US dollar collapses, it will have a dramatic impact on the world economy because the dollar is the standard unit of currency for
commodity markets, especially gold and oil. The U.S. dollar is still the world’s reserve currency, but the reality is that it can lead the
world into an economic depression. Nations with large external debts will not be able to trade sufficiently to earn the needed income
to service their debts. They will slide into bankruptcy. However, countries such as Russia and China are taking
necessary steps to avoid an economic tsunami caused by a collapse of the US dollar by
announcing in 2010 that they will use their own currencies which is the Russian Ruble and the Chinese Yuan
for bilateral trade. Iran and India decided to trade gold for oil due to US sanctions on Iran because of its nuclear program. Japan and
China announced that they will also trade in their own currencies despite diplomatic problems involving the Diaoyu Islands in the
East China Sea. One thing is certain, the world is slowly but surely moving away from the US dollar . The
cost of living among people who deal with the US dollar on a daily basis especially by those who
live within the United States will see a rapid decline in the standards of living due to Federal
Reserve Bank’s debasement of the dollar by printing unlimited amounts of money through Quantitative easing (QE).
The Federal Reserve’s action will cause food, clothing and energy prices to soar, which will hurt
the average family. As the US Federal Reserve Bank continues to print dollars, the result will be inflation. It will
cause panic on the world markets and civil unrest among the people who realize that the US dollars they depend on would no longer
be able to buy their basic necessities. What can be done around the world to avoid such a scenario when the collapse of the dollar is
inevitable? History proves that silver can become an alternative currency that can replace the dollar, although many countries
are purchasing large amounts of gold such as Russia and China with other countries in Latin
America and Asia following in the same footsteps. However, silver will still be a good option. At least you have a
choice in which precious metals you can invest in. Silver has been used for thousands of years as a monetary system for the
economies of past civilizations.
Inflation kills the economy – destruction of middle class and political instability
Zakaria 9—Editor of Newsweek, BA from Yale, PhD in pol sci, Harvard. He serves on the
board of Yale University, The Council on Foreign Relations, The Trilateral Commission, and
Shakespeare and Company. Named "one of the 21 most important people of the 21st Century"
(Fareed, The Secrets of Stability, 12 December 2009,
http://www.fareedzakaria.com/articles/articles.html)
The second force for stability is the victory—after a decades-long struggle—over the cancer of
inflation. Thirty-five years ago, much of the world was plagued by high inflation, with deep
social and political consequences. Severe inflation can be far more disruptive than a recession,
because while recessions rob you of better jobs and wages that you might have had in the future,
inflation robs you of what you have now by destroying your savings. In many countries in the
1970s, hyperinflation led to the destruction of the middle class, which was the background
condition for many of the political dramas of the era—coups in Latin America, the suspension of
democracy in India, the overthrow of the shah in Iran. But then in 1979, the tide began to turn
when Paul Volcker took over the U.S. Federal Reserve and waged war against inflation. Over two
decades, central banks managed to decisively beat down the beast. At this point, only one
country in the world suffers from -hyperinflation: Zimbabwe. Low inflation allows people,
businesses, and governments to plan for the future, a key precondition for stability.
Extinction
Mead, 98 – Senior Fellow Council on Foreign Relations
LA Times, 8-23
Even with stock markets tottering around the world, the president and the Congress seem determined to spend the next six months
arguing about dress stains. Too bad. The United States and the world are facing what could grow into the greatest threat to world
peace in 60 years. Forget suicide car bombers and Afghan fanatics. It's the financial markets, not the terrorist training camps
that pose the biggest immediate threat to world peace. How can this be? Think about the mother of all global
meltdowns: the Great Depression that started in 1929. U.S. stocks began to collapse in October, staged a rally, then the market
headed south big time. At the bottom, the Dow Jones industrial average had lost 90% of its value. Wages plummeted, thousands of
banks and brokerages went bankrupt, millions of people lost their jobs. There were similar horror stories worldwide. But the
biggest impact of the Depression on the United States--and on world history--wasn't money. It was blood:
World War II, to be exact. The Depression brought Adolf Hitler to power in Germany, undermined the ability of moderates to
oppose Joseph Stalin's power in Russia, and convinced the Japanese military that the country had no choice but to build an Asian
empire, even if that meant war with the United States and Britain. That's the thing about depressions. They aren't just bad for your
401(k). Let the world economy crash far enough, and the rules change. We stop playing "The
Price is Right" and start up a new round of "Saving Private Ryan."
Free Trade DA – 1NC
US hegemony in Latin America devastates free trade
Weintraub 3 (Sidney Weintraub -- Emeritus William E. Simon Chair in Political Economy at
the Center for Strategy and International Studies "The Cost of Divisions Within Latin America"
in Issues in International Political Economy August 2003, Number 44 -csis.org/files/media/csis/pubs/issues200308.pdf) SM
***Note: LAC is Latin American and Caribbean Countries
I have been asking myself why the trade route to greater LAC unity of purpose is not getting much traction.
There are the obvious reasons: nationalistic desires to protect domestic interests; distrust among the
countries, as exemplified by the disunity discussed earlier; political competition among them, say, as between Mexico and
Brazil; and the disparities among the LAC countries in size, trade prowess, and feasible hemispheric
ambitions. There are reasons that do not immediately jump to the surface. Brazil is not sure it wants to share its
hegemonic status in South America with the United States—the biggest hegemon of them all—should there be
a comprehensive FTAA. There is considerable antiAmericanism in Latin America at the moment and this may
be impeding the ardor for free trade in some LAC countries. Yet, having said all this, one would think
that LAC countries would do whatever they could to assure improved access to the U.S. market.
This was Chile’s position, and it led to Chile’s free trade agreement with the United States. It is the position of Central America, the
Dominican Republic, Colombia, Peru, and others. Cooperative proposals in trade matters would not compromise the sovereignties of
the LAC countries. While such cooperation could lead to greater political cooperation, this is not a
necessary or foreordained outcome. In any event, the situation seems to be more of each country for itself rather than
unity of purpose in the achievement of what could be a most important agreement for most LAC countries
Trade eliminates the only rational incentives for war—proves sustainability
Gartzke 11 Erik Gartzke is an associate Professor of political science at the University of California, San Diego PhD from Iowa
and B.A. from UCSF "SECURITY IN AN INSECURE WORLD" www.cato-unbound.org/2011/02/09/erik-gartzke/security-in-aninsecure-world/
Almost as informative as the decline in warfare has been where this decline is occurring. Traditionally, nations were
constrained by opportunity. Most nations did not fight most others because they could not
physically do so. Powerful nations, in contrast, tended to fight more often, and particularly to fight with other powerful states.
Modern “zones of peace” are dominated by powerful, militarily capable countries. These
countries could fight each other, but are not inclined to do so. At the same time, weaker developing nations
that continue to exercise force in traditional ways are incapable of projecting power against the developed world, with the exception
of unconventional methods, such as terrorism. The world is thus divided between those who could use force but prefer not to (at
least not against each other) and those who would be willing to fight but lack the material means to fight far from home. Warfare in
the modern world has thus become an activity involving weak (usually neighboring) nations, with intervention by powerful
(geographically distant) states in a policing capacity. So, the riddle of peace boils down to why capable nations
are not fighting each other. There are several explanations, as Mack has pointed out. The easiest, and I think the best,
explanation has to do with an absence of motive. Modern states find little incentive to bicker
over tangible property, since armies are expensive and the goods that can be looted are no
longer of considerable value. Ironically, this is exactly the explanation that Norman Angell famously supplied before the
World Wars. Yet, today the evidence is abundant that the most prosperous, capable nations prefer to
buy rather than take. Decolonization, for example, divested European powers of territories that
were increasingly expensive to administer and which contained tangible assets of limited value.
Of comparable importance is the move to substantial consensus among powerful nations about how international affairs should be
conducted. The great rivalries of the twentieth century were ideological rather than territorial. These have been substantially
resolved, as Francis Fukuyama has pointed out. The fact that remaining differences are moderate, while the benefits of acting in
concert are large (due to economic interdependence in particular) means that nations prefer to deliberate rather than fight.
Differences remain, but for the most part the capable countries of the world have been in consensus, while the disgruntled
developing world is incapable of acting on respective nations’ dissatisfaction. While this version of events explains the partial peace
bestowed on the developed world, it also poses challenges in terms of the future. The rising nations of Asia in particular have not
been equal beneficiaries in the world political system. These nations have benefited from economic integration, and this has proved
sufficient in the past to pacify them. The question for the future is whether the benefits of tangible
resources through markets are sufficient to compensate the rising powers for their lack of
influence in the policy sphere. The danger is that established powers may be slow to accommodate or give way to the
demands of rising powers from Asia and elsewhere, leading to divisions over the intangible domain of policy and politics. Optimists
argue that at the same time that these nations are rising in power, their domestic situations are evolving in a way that makes their
interests more similar to the West. Consumerism, democracy, and a market orientation all help to draw the rising powers in as
fellow travelers in an expanding zone of peace among the developed nations. Pessimists argue instead that capabilities among the
rising powers are growing faster than their affinity for western values, or even that fundamental differences exist among the interests
of first- and second-wave powers that cannot be bridged by the presence of market mechanisms or McDonald’s restaurants. If the
peace observed among western, developed nations is to prove durable, it must be because warfare proves futile as nations transition
to prosperity. Whether this will happen depends on the rate of change in interests and capabilities, a difficult thing to judge. We
must hope that the optimistic view is correct, that what ended war in Europe can be exported
globally. Prosperity has made war expensive, while the fruits of conflict, both in terms of
tangible and intangible spoils have declined in value. These forces are not guaranteed to prevail
indefinitely. Already, research on robotic warfare promises to lower the cost of conquest. If in
addition, fundamental differences among capable communities arise, then warfare over ideology
or policy can also be resurrected. We must all hope that the consolidating forces of prosperity
prevail, that war becomes a durable anachronism.
Genocide DA – 1NC
US influence in Latin America causes genocide
Marcia Esparza, Henry R. Huttenbach, and Daniel Feierstein, 10 - (Esparza) PhD
in Sociology at the University at Albany, (Huttenbach) Professor in the History Department of
the City College of the City University of New York, and (Feierstein) Director of the Centre for
Genocide Studies at the National University of Tres de Febrero, Argentina (“State Violence and
Genocide in Latin America: The Cold War Years,”
https://catalyst.library.jhu.edu/catalog/bib_3508587, Print)//HAL
Yet. beyond these differences, there was coordination in the war against subversion,” most significantly spearheaded by Operation
Condor, which was launched by then Colonel Manuel Contreras of the DINA. Chile’s state security agency. While preparing such a
move, Contreras traveled to the LIS to ask for training, and subsequently the Chileans benefited from US military advisors in
counterintelligence. Secluded from the public eye, Operation Condor was designed to coordinate the exchange of intelligence and the
launching of combined operations against political activists in exile, many of whom were abducted, assassinated, or transferred for
interrogation and later disappeared, with the most complete secrecy and lack of accountability. It may he claimed that, in the short
term, some top US officials and agencies welcomed the initiative of Chile and its partners in Operation
Condor, overlooking
the genocidal policies adopted, at least before its agents struck in Washington. DC,
assassinating former Chilean Foreign Minister, Orlando Letelier and his secretary Ronni Moffitt,
a US citizen. Yet, in the view of several Latin American high officers, the IJS was passive and not
aggressive enough in the flight against communism during the Cold War I would accordingly claim that, even
taking into account the training and support of the US, one should look for a no less fundamental source of
conviction of the military commands in their shared, albeit nuanced, belief in doctrines of
national security. Doctrines of national security These societies, which in the I 960s and I 970s had experienced
processes of massive popular mobilization and increased (disordered and almost "anarchical") participation, were forcefully
demobilized under military rule. In many cases, political parties were banned or their activities frozen by decree;
educational systems were regimented and disciplined after major military interventions in the universities and school programs
were reshaped according to the new ideological parameters' heavy censorship was imposed upon the media and cultural expression
was "purified” of any leftist orientations: trade unions were attacked, with many of their activists jailed and assassinated:
professional and entrepreneurial associations were co-opted, “cleansed” of hostile elements; and self—censorship crystallized as the
result of a highly repressive situation. Policies of annihilation of the radical Left and its supporters were
carried out both domestically and beyond the national borders. Because of their functional role, their
formation, and their professional training, the military saw themselves as guardians of the nation’s values and traditions, especially
in times of crisis. The National Security Doctrines, shared by the military establishments of the Latin American countries in the
framework of the Cold War, posited a link between the concepts of nation and state, and the central role of the armed forces in
connection to both. Military leadership considered itself the most qualified and perhaps the only capable institutional actor for
achieving the defense and promotion of national interests. Under the political and institutional challenges posed by the generation
dreaming of accomplishing a Socialist Revolution, with groups of armed radical leftist guerrillas using violent means to bring about a
revolution, the armed forces believed they had the right and obligation to redefine and organize
their nations according to the guidelines of the doctrines of national security. According to that
doctrine, the basic values of a nation are anchored organically within Western civilization
(interpreted in terms of Christian values), the defense of private property and initiative, and opposition to
communist and Marxist ideas. As Manuel Antonio Garretón indicated, national unity was sought and interpreted in
terms of a tradition or “soul,” consisting of “freezing certain historical facts or universalizing particular features that are defined
outside the freely expressed collective will.” The military leaders thought they were most qualified to channel the “true” national
spirit through the state machinery, safeguarding the nation. Paradoxically enough, this state-centric vision that centralized the role
of the state in shaping the direction of society was also shared by the revolutionary Left. The organic conception of the nation
implied a binary view of the world that resembled the categories of’ the Cold War. Eliminating the enemy was the only
option since these individuals were considered to be beyond redemption due to their irreparable
ideological and flawed political views (a concept denoted in Spanish as Irrecuperabilidad). By exterminating
these “contaminated’ cells or organs. Both physically and ideologically, society could manage to retail its
basic parameters of national values and traditions. If necessary, the armed forces would extirpate the threat, following
the ideological visions they incorporated from the French theorists of counterinsurgencies developed in the Algerian war and
reinforced by the strong anti-communist visions taught in the School of the Americas and other US training centers of anti-guerrilla
warfare attended by Latin American officers. The local idioms of organicism gave further credibility to the doctrines of national
security that stressed the primacy of national well—being over individual rights. According to this logic, individual rights, including
the most basic human rights, should be subordinate to national aims and goals whenever necessary. In Argentina, this vision
was a guideline for eliminating the enemies of the Nation; the terms used were organic in nature and projected
a medical discourse that demanded the ‘extirpation of ill tissues’ from the national body This hinted at the genocidal
practices adopted to decimate a generation and its dreams of radical olitical change. as indicated b’
writer Ricardo Piglia.’ On the basis of the doctrines of national security, the top commanders of the
arnied forces thought their society vas penetrated by a secluded enemy that aimed at destroying
the moral values of the nation. It is precisely from these doctrines that confrontation arose that
made use of genocidal practices and a systematic technology of terror and repression aimed not
only at physical destruction but also at eradicating its memory from the annals of the nation.
This led to the dehumanization of those detained or abducted. These individuals were denied the most basic
needs and brutally tortured, with thousands summarily executed and ‘disappcared. In almost contradictory terms, the
enemy was defined in ambiguous terms that could he elastically broadened to include not only
active supporters hut even remote sympathizers or citizens apathetic enough not to Support the policies of the
military governments, as in the famous threat launched by the then military governor of the province of Buenos Aires in Argentina
during the first junta regime. Ebénco Saint-Jean: “First we kill the sub versives then we kill their collahorators then their
svmpathizers. then those who remain indifferent and finally we kill the timid. In a binary world such as the one envisioned by the
military, there was no room for indecision or lack of full commitment32 In such a binary and e>treme definition of the situation, all
means ere deemed legitimate in the tight against subversion. Flagrant human rights violations were ignored. while the armed forces
claimed to have saved their counUies from being destroyed from within. ‘ The genocidal turn and US influence The
confrontation with communism and with the vernacular forms of radical socialism generated
policies that condoned genocidal practices whenever they could he justified in terms of saving
the national soul and Structure of society As a result, this confrontational vision, supported by the
National Security Doctrine and its related countennsurgencv methodologies led to the denial of individual
rights and the killing of thousands of individuals includmg many completely unrelated to any armed movement
but only concerned with improving life condi tions or attempting to promote social justice. agrarian reform. healthcare, educa tion.
or fair working conditions. In Argentina 30.000 persons were abducted and later vanished without a trace. Chile has officially
recogrnzed a death toll of over 3.000 as the result of state and politically motivated violence. Other countries in the Southern Cone
made ase of long-term imprisonment, torture, and forced exile as was typical of Uruguay and Brazil. In Nicaragua the National
Chiard was responsible for some 40.000—50.000 murders before the fall of Somoza Due to the mounting pressure in international
and transnational fora in Europe and North America. the actions of the military governments were under scrutiny staffing in 1976
and became increasingly so under the Caner administration Yet. the pendulum shifted again to counterinsurgency support when
President Ronald Reagan came to office in 1981. With communist Cuba just to the south. and the recent triumph of the Sandinista
revolution in Nicaragua in 1979. the new administration envisioned a Soviet—Cuban campaign aimed at generating a domino effect
throughout Central America and the Caribbean The Reagan administration began combating the perceived threat by developing
inten’en tionist policies, which claimed to be promoting democracy in Central America. The primary focus of these policies was the
destabilization of the Sandinista government in Nicaragua and the consolidation of anti-communist political new constitution
devised by Pinochet’s legal advisors, which created a series of authoritarian mechanisms that ensured the irreversibility of some of
the main institutional and structural transformations established under the rnihtarv regime Moreover, US pressure had its own
limitations: as William Sater stresses. General Pinochet proved to be capable of sidestepping Carter’s human rights stance.
Moreover. Washington’s efforts to isolate Chile achieved its goals in antagonizing (ìencral Pinochet. After a while, the Pinochet
regime criticized Washington for “not taking the lead in a world crusade against communism. “ Under Reagan. many of Carter’s
actions were annulled, as Reagan advocated a quiet diplomacy toward Chile. 13v the late l9XOs. the domestic and interna tional
pressure against Pinochet contributed to the acceleration of the protracted vet planned transition hack to democracy, vet under the
constitutional terms of the I 9X0 charter that secured authoritarian enclaves and the maintenance of the economic model in the
democratic period starting in 1990. In the case of Argentina. the pressures of the Carter administration in the 1970s only marginally
impacted the junta’s genocidal practices. First. Kissinger gave his support for the goals and methods of the “dirty war,” without
criticizmg its repressive methods, at the very same time that the US administration was praising the economic direction of the de
facto government. Second. the military junta moved to project a false international image of respect l’or human rights in Argentina,
in the belief that they could overcome its critics, that Cold War optics would prevail, and that Carter meant only a temporary shill in
US policy. Third. while Argentina supported the US on disarmament issues, it reinforced interna- tional relationships with Cuba.
Yugoslavia. and other non—aligned states. The Cubans claimed to understand the need for military intervention in Argentina and
the Soviets did not put pressure on Argentina due to their own human rights record. A series of miscalculations — the last of which
was the Malvinas/Falk lands war — served to undemiine the capacity of the Argentine regime to institu tionalize itself on lines
resembling the Chilean success storv It is. however, unclear whether the end of military training programs in Argentina in 1977 and
of sales of military equipment 1w the US had a serious impact on human rights policies Although the figures of vanished individuals
declined 1w 1978. it was also clear 1w then that the radical Leu had been annihilated and the Argentinean junta continued to pursue
its repressive policies, including the mission of mili— tarv advisors training counterinsurgency forces in El Salvador and Central
America hctvecn 1978 and I 982, Equally important to consider is the training received by Latin
American high officers and soldiers at the School of (lie Americas. or SOA. The School was originally established in the
Panama Canal Zone by the tJS in 1946. catering since 1949 to Latin American students. The US opened the door to Latin
American alliances by modernizing outdated military equipment and offering courses on US
weaponry. In this way, Latin American militaries became dependent on replacing and purchasing
weapons from the US. guaranteeing Latin American allies and also an increased market for the US
weaponry industry. After the Cuban revolulion, (lie School changed into the School of the Americas. which opened in 1963. It
moved to Fort Henning, Georgia. in 19X4 and operated there until its replacement by the Western I lemisphere Institute for Security
Coopera tion in 2001. The ohiective of the SOA included the discouragement of any type of leftist power in Latin America.
particularly power inspired by the Soviets or the Cubans. Iiicreasinglv. the SUA launched witch-hunts to expel and punish leftleaning civilians who were supposed communist threats. Accordingly. the curnculum of the SUA centered on countennsilrgencv
operations. Officially, the school was attempting to “create professional soldiers,” while encouraging Latin Americans to learn from
the modem, professional liS forces. Similarly, the SUA taught courses that encouraged values such as a free democracy and a stable
economy in a “well organized society.”40 In practice. the SUA indoctrinated the military studying there to repress left-leaning
civilians who were supposed com munist threats. Accordingly, the cumculum of the SUA centered on counter— insurgency
operations. A review of training manuals prepared 1w the US military and used between 19X7 and 1991 Ibr intelligence training
courses in Latin America and at the SUA reveals, according to a first-hand analysis, that they advocated: tactics such as executing
guerrillas. hlaclmail, false imprisonment. physical ahuse, use of truth serum to obtain information and payment of bounties for
enenn dead, Countermielligence agents ai-e jwerej advised that one of their functions is “recommending targets for neutralizatïon,” a
terni which is defined in one manual as “detaining or discrediting” hut which “was corn— monly used at the time as a euphemism
for esecution or destruction,” according to a Pentagon official (Washington Post. September 21 . 1 996). What is not included in
these escerpts. however, is the larger contest The seven arm manuals trainjedj Latin American militaries to infiltrate and spy upon
civilians, including student groups, unions, charitable organizations and political pai1ies to confuse armed insurgencies with legal
political opposition and to disregard or get around any laws regarding due process, arrest and detention.11 The training
manuals did not differentiate between guerilla insurgents and peaceful civilian protestors.
Ambiguity was ensconced in the SOA training manuals, according to which a target was “someone that could be hostile or not.”
Further more. there was explicit instruction on the art ot “wheedling,” the SOA term for an
inhumane set of interrogation techniques. Other torture mechanisms recommended by the manuals were
“prolonged constraint, prolonged esertion. estremes of heat, cold, or moisture, deprivation of food or sleep. disrupting rou tines.
solitary confinement, threats of pain, deprivation of sensor stimuli. hvp— nosis. and use of drugs or placebos. “e Graduates of the
SOA have been implicated in massive human rights viola tions. In El Salvador, more than half of all officers cited flr human rights
viola tions iii a major massacre, including 83 percent ol’ those implicated in the massacre of El Mozote. were graduates of SOA, The
UN Truth Commission report of March 1993 found that two of the three assassins of Archbishop Oscar Romero — also implicated
in other human rights ahuses, including the organiza- lion of death squads — had been graduates of the SOA In Nicaragua. Father
Fer nando Cardenal indicted 26 members of the Nicaraguan Guardia with human rights violations including torture. the use of
electric shock, and rape. Of the 26 accused, 25 were graduates of the SOA. Among renowned graduates of SOA were General I lugo
llanzer who ruled Bolivia between 197 1 and I 97X. Colom bian General llernán José Guzmán Rodriguez. about whom it is claimed
that he rrotected and aided a paramilitary death squad. MAS, between 19X7 and 1990. responsible for the deaths of nearly ISO
individuals; Omar Torrijos and Manuel Noriega of Panama. Rafael Videla, Roberto Viola and Leopoldo (ialtieri of Argentina. 1himberto Regalado Hernández of Honduras. and Manuel Antonio Callejas of (ìuatemala. Some of these graduates and others were
inscribed in the Hall of Fame of SOA, leading critics ol the school to claim that 1f the SOA held an alumni meeting, it would bring
together some of the most unsavory thugs in the hemisphere.4’ Members of the Latin American armed forces were attracted to the
SOA for various reasons. Many considered traveling abroad a valued perk or attendance at the School a sine quci non for rising in
the ratks once back in the home country. Students did not attend S()A because of their desire to further human rights or promote
democracy in their home nation. In fact, students had a poor understanding and lack of regard for human rights, considering it a
nuisance or focus of jokes due to the sharing of experiences with fellow military officers. the mutual reinforcement ol attitudes
predicating the use of violent means was probably reinforced. One should conclude that the SOA experience probably increased the
likelihood of human rights violations being followed by its gradu ates as part of the campaign against the radical Left and its
supporters. Conclusion: Students of international relations have observed with perplexity that during the Cold War
period, US leaders were ‘trying to reconcile the irreconcilable by embracing repressive and corrupt elites while
simultaneously attempting to foster democracy and social justice.” This was not a story of deceit. It rather
reflected a crucial contradiction in US policy during the Cold War. Interested in curtailing the advance of
the revolutionary Left and radical insurgency in the Americas, the US interest was to find allies interested in
supporting the same liberal democratic principles dear to American citizens, starting with the rule of law and
individual rights. However, US policies of backing. training, and strengthening the armed forces in
Latin America encouraged the forceful takeover of power and the adoption of counterinsurgency
methods that tore apart these societies, undermined the rule of law, and produced some of the
most atrocious records of crimes against humanity.
The impact to genocide transcends mass death---it deprives life of meaning and
requires an ethical response
Card '3 - prof. of philo, Ph.D from Harvard, Sr. Fellow @ the Institute for Research in the
Humanities [Claudia, Winter 2003, Hypatia, "Genocide and Social Death,", vol. 18 # 1]
Genocide is not simply unjust (although it certainly is unjust); it is also evil. It characteristically includes
the one-sided killing of defenseless civilians— babies, children, the elderly, the sick, the disabled, and the injured of
both genders along with their usually female caretakers—simply on the basis of their national, religious, ethnic, or other
political identity. It targets people on the basis of who they are rather than on the basis of what
they have done, what they might do, even what they are capable of doing. (One commentator says genocide kills people
on the basis of what they are, not even who they are). Genocide is a paradigm of what Israeli philosopher Avishai Margalit (1996)
calls "indecent" in that it not only destroys victims but first humiliates them by deliberately inflicting an "utter loss of freedom and
control over one's vital interests" (115). Vital interests can be transgenerational and thus survive one's death. Before death,
genocide victims are ordinarily deprived of control over vital transgenerational interests and
more immediate vital interests. They may be literally stripped naked, robbed of their last
possessions, lied to about the most vital matters, witness to the murder of family, friends, and
neighbors, made to participate in their own murder, and if female, they are likely to be also violated sexually.7
Victims of genocide are commonly killed with no regard for lingering suffering or exposure. They,
and their corpses, are routinely treated with utter disrespect. These historical facts, not simply
mass murder, account for much of the moral opprobrium attaching to the concept of genocide.
Yet such atrocities, it may be argued, are already war crimes, if conducted during wartime, and they can otherwise or also be
prosecuted as crimes against humanity. Why, then, add the specific crime of genocide? What, if anything, is not already captured by
laws that prohibit such things as the rape, enslavement, torture, forced deportation, and the degradation of individuals? Is any
ethically distinct harm done to members of the targeted group that would not have been done had they been targeted simply as
individuals rather than because of their group membership? This is the question that I find central in arguing that genocide is
not simply reducible to mass death, to any of the other war crimes, or to the crimes against
humanity just enumerated. I believe the answer is affirmative: the harm is ethically distinct, although on the
question of whether it is worse, I wish only to question the assumption that it is not. Specific to genocide is the harm
inflicted on its victims' social vitality. It is not just that one's group membership is the occasion for harms that are
definable independently of one's identity as a member of the group. When a group with its own cultural identity is
destroyed, its survivors lose their cultural heritage and may even lose their intergenerational
connections. To use Orlando Patterson's terminology, in that event, they may become "socially dead" and their descendants
"natally alienated," no longer able to pass along and build upon the traditions, cultural developments (including languages), and
projects of earlier generations (1982, 5–9). The harm of social death is not necessarily less extreme than that
of physical death. Social death can even aggravate physical death by making it indecent,
removing all respectful and caring ritual, social connections, and social contexts that are capable
of making dying bearable and even of making one's death meaningful. In my view, the special evil of genocide
lies in its infliction of not just physical death (when it does that) but social death, producing a
consequent meaninglessness of one's life and even of its termination.
Global Instability DA – 1NC
Trying to take control of Latin America threatens US primacy and global stability
Klarevas 9 (Louis Klarevas – professor at the Center for Global Affairs at New York University
– “Securing American Primacy While Tackling Climate Change: Toward a National Strategy of
Greengemony” – December 15th, 2009 http://www.huffingtonpost.com/louisklarevas/securing-american-primacy_b_393223.html) SM
With the impending systemic crisis of global warming on the horizon, the U.S. again finds itself in a position to
address a transnational problem in a way that will benefit both the international community collectively and the U.S. selfishly.
The current problem is two-fold. First, the competition for oil is fueling animosities between the major
powers. The geopolitics of oil has already emboldened Russia in its 'near abroad' and China in far-off places like Africa
and Latin America. As oil is a limited natural resource, a nasty zero-sum contest could be looming
on the horizon for the U.S. and its major power rivals - a contest which threatens American
primacy and global stability. Second, converting fossil fuels like oil to run national economies is producing irreversible
harm in the form of carbon dioxide emissions. So long as the global economy remains oil-dependent, greenhouse gases will continue
to rise. Experts are predicting as much as a 60% increase in carbon dioxide emissions in the next twenty-five years. That likely
means more devastating water shortages, droughts, forest fires, floods, and storms. In other words, if global competition
for access to energy resources does not undermine international security, global warming will.
And in either case, oil will be a culprit for the instability.
Anti-Americanism and Chavez ascendancy caused by heg accesses every impactshatters stability globally and causes independent great power war
Coronel 7 (Gustavo Coronel -- public policy expert, previous member of Venezuelan Congress,
advisor of Petroleumworld, September 18th, 2007 “A possible political scenario for Latin
America” http://muevete.wordpress.com/ 2007/09/18/a-possible- political-scenario-for-latinamerica-2007-2012/.) SM
Still, there is no doubt that there are strong efforts being made by some Latin American political leaders
to harass the United States. If these efforts intensify and take root, Latin America could become
a geopolitical hot spot in the mid-term. The starting point of the anti-U.S. Alliance. Essentially the current threats against
U.S. national security originated about nine years ago with the political alliance between Fidel Castro, the Cuban dictator and Hugo
Chavez, the Venezuelan strongman. This is a symbiotic relationship that has been providing Fidel Castro with money and Hugo
Chavez with brains. The strategy chosen by this alliance is based on two facts and one very partial truth. The two facts are: extreme
poverty and extreme inequality in the region. The very partial truth is that these two afflictions are the result of U.S. exploitation of
the region’s natural resources aided by the systematic political intervention of this country in the internal affairs of the countries of
the hemisphere. To blame our own misfortunes and inadequacies on someone else has been an old and proven method to gain
adepts and to stir hate and xenophobia among Latin American societies. This is what Fidel Castro has done for the last forty years
and this is what he has recommended to Hugo Chavez , a line of action that the Venezuelan strongman has embraced with
enthusiasm. Hugo Chavez’s strategies. To do this he has been aided by significant amounts of money derived from oil exports.
During the last nine years about $220 billion of oil money have entered the Venezuelan national treasury while national debt has
tripled to about $65 billion. This amount of money has been mostly spent in three areas: (a), social programs of a temporary nature,
really handouts, to the Venezuelan poor; (b), the acquisition of weapons; and (c), subsidies, donations and promises to Latin
American countries in order to consolidate political alliances and establish political IOU’s. At least $40 billion have gone into the
third category, an amount roughly equivalent to 2-3% of Venezuela’s yearly GDP during the last nine years. As a result of these
strategies the Fidel Castro/Hugo Chavez axis has been able to make some progress in its political objectives of eroding the political
standing of the United States in the hemisphere and, even, of gaining supporters in the U.S. political scene. By financing the
presidential campaigns in several countries they have been able to help Evo Morales, Daniel Ortega and Rafael Correa win the
presidencies of Bolivia, Nicaragua and Ecuador. At the same time they saw their favored candidates Ollanta Humala, in Peru, and
Andres Lopez Obrador, in Mexico lose close elections while remaining politically strong, especially Lopez Obrador. In parallel Hugo
Chavez’s major injection of money into Argentina has helped President Nestor Kirchner to join the anti-U.S. club, a move for which
he did not need strong incentives. This is all well known although generally perceived with indifference, sympathy, and tolerance or,
even, amusement, in hemispheric political circles. Many celebrate secretly the harassment of such a strong power by smaller, weaker
countries. Others are sitting on the political fence, receiving political and material benefits by playing one side against the other. Still
others have a weak spot in their ideological hearts for authoritarian regimes and resent the hard sale of democracy being done by the
U.S. all over the world. A few even laugh at the colorful antics of President Chavez and have a hard time taking him seriously.
However, political harassment of the United States represents just one aspect in a possible wider plan. Later stages might include
actual economic aggression and, even, physical action against the northern “empire”. For the time being the main efforts are directed
towards the consolidation of the alliance. To do this: • Chavez is providing money to members of the Armed Forces of Bolivia and to
city mayors, in order to increase political control over these important Bolivian sectors (2); • Chavez could be funneling money into
Argentina to promote the candidacy of Mrs. Cristina Kirchner (3); • The aid given by Chavez to Nicaragua already amounts to about
$500 million and, if he follows through in his promise, will include the financing of a $2 billion refinery; • The economic ties of
Venezuela and Ecuador are increasing via the oil industry, although President Correa’s ideology already includes a significant
component of resentment against the United States. • Chavez is conducting a strategy of alignment with political sectors in the
United States that oppose the current government policies. For some of these sectors the desire to erode the current administration
has proven greater than their love for democracy. The enemy of their enemy has become their friend (4). Almost all of these strategic
initiatives by the Castro/Chavez alliance show an alternative, unfavorable outcome. • Bolivia is in the threshold of a major political
crisis, due to the reluctance of important sectors of the country to roll over and play dead to Morales’s pretensions to impose the
Venezuelan Constituent Assembly model that ended with the Venezuelan democracy becoming an authoritarian regime. • Mrs.
Kirchner, even if she won, as it seems to be the case, might decide to go her separate ways. She has already given some indications
that Argentina should not become a simple pawn of Castro/ Chavez in the struggle for hemispheric political leadership. Recent
events have convinced her that Chavez’s support probably represents a kiss of death for her political future. • In Ecuador, Correa is
already looking at the Bolivian political turmoil with caution, as he does not want to repeat Morales’s errors and realizes that
Chavez’s success in Venezuela has been due to his deep pockets rather than his charisma. Correa does not have the money or the
charisma of Chavez. • In the United States the individuals and groups that support Chavez are doing so out of personal material or
political interest and have been largely rejected by public opinion. It seems improbable that the alliance of these countries, almost
entirely based on money and resentment against the United States, could last for long. What if this alliance falters? The main
motors of the anti-U. S alliance, Castro and Chavez, understand that this strategy of progressive
political harassment of the United States might not succeed. The defeat of Lopez Obrador in Mexico
robbed them of a major ally in this strategy. In power Lopez Obrador would have promoted illegal immigration into
the U.S. creating numerous points of social and political conflict along the weak U.S.- Mexican border. As it stands today The United
States has several ways to weaken Castro/Chavez strategies. In fact, the imminent death of Fidel Castro has practically eliminated
much of the brain component of this axis. Hugo Chavez is in need of an alternative plan. The alternative is an alliance with
fundamentalist groups or countries that share Hugo Chavez’s resentment against the United States. This explains the approximation
of Hugo Chavez to Iranian President Ahmadinejad. Both leaders have an anti-U.S. global alliance as one of their main objectives.
Their main weapon is oil or, rather, what they can do to the international oil market, in case they decided to suspend exports of this
resource. Some 4 million barrels of oil per day would be out of the supply system, causing a major disruption in the world’s
economy. They figure that in such a situation they have less to lose than the United States and its industrialized allies. But oil is
not their only weapon. They also have a political weapon to resort to. It has to do with the
concerted action of terrorist groups such as Hezbollah and FARC, assisted by violent indigenous
groups such as those in Bolivia, Peru and Ecuador and socially turbulent groups like the illegal immigrants already living in the
United States. By promoting the action of these groups against the United States and its Latin
American and European allies these groups can do much harm to global political stability. In this
scenario one the main promoters of this action would not be located in the Middle East or in the Far East but in Latin America. This
would be the first time in history, as far as we can tell, that a
threat to world stability.
Latin American political leader becomes a major
LA Instability DA – 1NC
Latin American stability now solely because the United States has left the region
Crandall 11 – Associate Professor of International Politics at Davidson College and the
author of The United States and Latin America After the Cold War. He was Principal Director
for the Western Hemisphere at the U.S. Department of Defense in 2009 and Director for
Andean Affairs at the National Security Council in 2010-11 (Russell, “Post-American
Hemisphere: Power and Politics in an Autonomous Latin America,” Foreign Affairs. 90.3 (MayJune 2011): p83,
http://heinonline.org/HOL/Page?handle=hein.journals/fora90&div=49&g_sent=1)//HAL
For much of the twentieth century, there was a disconnect between Washington's lofty rhetoric of democracy and regional harmony and its
demonstrated willingness to jettison these principles when its economic or geopolitical interests were at stake. Even after the Cold War, the United
States was accused of peddling its "Washington consensus" of laissez-faire economic policies, such as the privatization of state-owned assets and freetrade agreements, as a sort of neoimperialism. Instead of U.S. marines or CIA agents, blame for doing the empire's bidding was now pinned on the
"technocratic imperialists" from the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund, and the U.S. Treasury Department. Yet over the past decade or so,
the United States' willingness and ability to exert control in the region have diminished. This has occurred in part because more important issues,
including the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, have forced Latin America down the policymaking food chain. But there is also the indisputable reality that
the region itself is now more confident acting on its own. For the most part, this was inevitable, given the end of external and local communist
challenges and the shift to an increasingly multilateral world that had room for new powers. Latin
both a cause and a result of decreased U.S. influence.
America's greater autonomy is
The United States' relationship with Bolivia provides one example
of Washington's declining power in the region. Believing that it was time to pay back the Americans for their years of backing his political opponents,
Bolivian President Evo Morales expelled the U.S. ambassador and the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration in 2008 and suspended U.S.-funded
democracy programs the following year. A decade or so ago, when Bolivia was a faithful client of the United States, it would have been unimaginable
for a Bolivian government to even consider such acts, given the diplomatic and financial consequences of provoking Washington's ire. Yet even the
ostensibly hard-line George W. Bush administration responded to Morales' repeated diplomatic insults largely with silence. Morales had gone eyeball
to eyeball with Washington and lived to tell about it. In the late 1980s and 1990s, after decades of rule by military dictatorships, the countries of Latin
America became part of the "third wave" of democratization that was then washing across the globe. Yet the region struggled to convert democratic
practices, such as open elections, into lasting democratic institutions, such as independent judiciaries. Meanwhile, economic instability, including
chronic bouts of hyperinflation, made many Latin Americans wonder if they had not been better off under the relatively enlightened mano dura (strong
hand) regimes of the past. Even in the 1990s, when Latin America finally began to slay inflation and replace it with impressive macroeconomic
stability, countries had difficulty translating this into lasting social gains for the entire population. At times, Latin Americans used their newfound
electoral power to elect "democratic populists," such as Venezuela's Chavez and Peru's Alberto Fujimori, who often governed in autocratic ways. In
recent years, however, Latin
America's growth has begun to translate into more prosperous and
developed societies. In countries as disparate as Brazil, Mexico, and Peru, the benefits of democracy and open markets are now finally
beginning to trickle down to a citizenry that had lost faith in elected governments. This socioeconomic prosperity, in turn, is legitimizing the
democratic system--a sort of virtuous cycle in a region more accustomed to vicious ones. Despite what the fiery rhetoric of leaders such as Chavez
might indicate, in today's climate, Latin Americans want results, not blame. Armed revolution is now dead in the region that was once its cradle. In its
stead, the region now has a new brand of leaders who have taken office through the ballot box and have striven to provide education, security, and
opportunities for their constituents. Human capital and economic competitiveness, not rote anticapitalist slogans, are what occupy the thoughts of
these politicians. They point proudly to the fact that 40 million Latin Americans were lifted out of poverty between 2002 and 2008, a feat
accomplished largely through innovative and homegrown social programs. It has long been said that when the United States catches a cold, Latin
America catches the flu. This has certainly been true in the economic realm, where jitters in the U.S. economy could quickly undermine Latin
during the recent global economic crisis, Latin
America remained relatively unscathed. At the time, many predicted that Latin American governments -especially leftist ones
America's chronically weak financial and fiscal fundamentals. But
suspected of being more predisposed to fiscal profligacy--would turn to the seductive tonic of populism. But leftist governments in Brazil, Chile, and
Uruguay, to name a few, responded to the crisis with prudence. They refused to abandon market-friendly policies such as flexible exchange rates,
independent central banks, and fiscal restraint. Some countries, such as Brazil and Peru, even continued to grow at almost China-like rates. In the
past, when Latin America was in economic trouble, outsiders prescribed bitter medicine, such as severe fiscal austerity measures. In the last several
years, however, the
region has shown that it can address its own problems, even exporting its
solutions globally. There is no greater example of the region's autonomy in economic policymaking than Brazil's Bolsa Familia or
Mexico's
Oportunidades, conditional cash-transfer programs that give money to poor families if they meet certain requirements, such as enrolling their children
in school. As the World Bank has noted, Bolsa Familia targets the 12 million Brazilians who desperately need the assistance; most of the money is used
to buy food, school supplies, and clothes for children. The program is also credited with helping reduce Brazil's notoriously high income inequality. The
Brazilian and Mexican efforts have been widely emulated outside the region, including in the United States. Another example is Chile's creation of a
rainy-day fund, filled with national savings from the country's copper production. This $12.8 billion account gave Chile a level of policy flexibility
during the recent global economic downturn that the United States and many other industrial economies could only envy. As Latin America's
achievements suggest, the
region is growing up fast. POWER PLAYS Latin America's economic growth and
political stability are driving an unprecedented power shift within the region. Countries are reassessing
their interests and alliances, and the more confident among them are flexing their muscles. Instead of looking to Washington for
guidance, Latin American countries are increasingly working among themselves to conduct
diplomacy, pursue shared objectives, and, at times, even spark new rivalries. Brazil's emergence as a serious power is a direct result of the
increasing absence of U.S. influence in the region. Sensing an opportunity to gain the regional stature that has long eluded it, the country has begun to
act more assertively. But complicating Brazil's power play is the reaction from its fellow Latin American nations. Colombian, Mexican, and Peruvian
officials, among others, talk privately about their dislike of Brazil's arrogant diplomacy. In some quarters, Brazil's responses to developments such as
Chavez's ongoing assault on Venezuela's democracy and even the 2009 coup in Honduras have undermined its credibility as a serious leader.
(Brasilia's reluctance to speak out for hemispheric democracy is particularly inexcusable for a government that includes many officials who suffered
under the successive military regimes of the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s.)
US heg forces coups which destablizes all of Latin America
Thyne, 10 – Professor in the Department of Political Science, University of Kentucky, Ph.D.,
Political Science, University of Iowa, 2007 (Clayton L., Journal of Peace Research, “Supporter of
stability or agent of agitation? The effect of US foreign policy on coups in Latin America, 1960–
99,” http://jpr.sagepub.com/content/47/4/449)//HAL
Introduction¶ On 3 November 1970, Chile’s Salvador Allende became the¶ first democratically elected Marxist head of state in the
history¶ of Latin America. Fearing a spread of Left-leaning leadership¶ across the continent, President Nixon tapped Henry
Kissinger¶ to lead a concentrated effort to oust Allende from power by¶ supplying anti-Allende politicians and media with covert¶
funds, building alliances with military officers, applying¶ diplomatic pressure, and working to deny Chile international¶ financial
assistance (Kornbluh, 1999). In more graphic terms,¶ recently released CIA documents confirm that Nixon ordered¶ the CIA to ‘make
the economy scream’ in order to unseat the¶ democratically elected president (CIA, 1970). After three years¶ of intense pressure, the
Allende government was overthrown¶ in a coup in September 1973, bringing General Pinochet’s¶ bloody dictatorship to power.¶
While today’s efforts are perhaps less obvious, plenty of¶ evidence indicates that the USA
continues to a play a key role¶ in governmental stability in Latin America. For example,¶ President Hugo
Chavez recently blamed the USA for attempting¶ to foment a coup in Venezuela: ‘I know I am condemned....¶ I’m sure in Washington
they are planning my death.... If they¶ manage to kill me there will only be one person in this world to¶ blame: the president of the
United States’ (Markey, 2005). The¶ rise of other Left-leaning leaders, such as Cristina Kirchener in¶ Argentina and
Evo Morales in Bolivia, reflects
the same basis for¶ the USA’s Cold War efforts to foment coups in the
region.1¶ Thus, it appears that coups continue to be relevant in Latin¶ America, and we can expect
the United States to continue to play¶ a key role in these events.¶ This article takes a two-step approach to
improve our¶ understanding of how relations with the USA affect coups in¶ Latin America. The qualitative literature on this subject
reveals¶ a ‘conventional wisdom’, suggesting that the USA plays an¶ integral role in (de)stabilizing executives in
Latin America. This is not to say that the general rise of Leftist governments will¶ automatically draw the ire of the USA. Many
newly elected Leftist leaders,¶ including Presidents Bachelet (Chile), Va´¶ zquez (Uruguay), and Lula (Brazil)¶ have forged strong ties
with the USA (Hakim, 2003; Castaneda, 2006).This work includes rich detail of US efforts to overthrow both
dictators and¶ democratically elected regimes (LaFeber, 1993), and analyses of recently declassified documents
uncovering covert operations during the Cold War era¶ (Kornbluh, 1999). The volume of work discussing the US
involvement in the¶ coup to overthrow Allende alone is impressive, not to mention the entire¶
shelves of books discussing dozens of other well-known coups in the region.¶ See Zimmermann (1983)
for an excellent (albeit dated) review of the literature¶ considering the effect of outside actors on coups in Latin America. While
many countries have likely played a role in affecting coups in Latin America, the historical
dominance of the USA in the region make it reasonable to focus exclusively on signals sent from
the USA. Beginning with the Monroe Doctrine (1823), the USA made clear its intent to keep European powers out of the region.
This policy was reinforced with the ‘Roosevelt Corollary’ (1904), which provided justification for direct US involvement based on
Roosevelt’s view that the USA had a ‘moral mandate’ to enforce proper behavior in Latin America. This evidence suggests
that the USA has played a unique role regarding the security of Latin American states, providing
a focal point for this study. Relations between the USA and Latin American states have two primary effects on the
probability of a coup. First, case evidence shows that the USA has played a key role in inciting coups by
sending forces and supplies to coup plotters, which serve as hostile signals that increase their
perceived probability of successfully overthrowing the government. One of the most famous examples is the
CIA-inspired overthrow of Guatemalan President Jacobo A´ rbenz Guzma´n (1954) following the implementation of Left-leaning
land redistribution policies (including the expropriation of land owned by the US-based United Fruit Company). In this case, the
CIA used economic, paramilitary, psychological and diplomatic actions to destabilize the leader and put anti-communist elements in
power. The efforts culminated in a coup attempt by Colonel Carlos Castillo in 1954 (Aybar de Soto, 1978; Cullather, 1999). The
extensive hostile signals sent from the USA to the A´ rbenz government indicated that even Castillo’s meager force could successfully
attain and sustain power with US support. More generally, hostile signals channeled from the USA should
increase coup plotters’ perceived probability of staging a successful coup (right on the x-axis) because
they give the plotters an advantage over the government in solidifying power once the coup is
attempted, and deplete the resources available to the government to deter coup attempts by
blocking foreign aid or international investment. While the examples support the discussion to this point, it is
unlikely that lumping all hostile foreign policy signals into one group will provide satisfactory findings for either scholars or
policymakers. What is needed is a more detailed understanding of how variations in hostile signals might affect the likelihood of
coups in the region. One way that we can break down signals is by considering the factors that would be most important to a coup
plotter. Namely, a leader must be convinced that the signals are credible before taking the risky decision to stage a coup. If a signal
lacks credibility, then the signal is likely dismissed as noise. Scholars in the international relations literature have long considered
the credibility of signals, generally concluding that credibility is derived from the costs incurred in sending the signal (Powell, 1990;
Fearon, 1997).
That causes global warfare
Rochlin, 94 [James Francis, Professor of Political Science at Okanagan U. College,
Discovering the Americas: The Evolution of Canadian Foreign Policy Towards Latin America,
130-131, Wake Early Bird File]
While there were economic motivations for Canadian policy in Central America, security considerations were perhaps more
important. Canada possessed an interest in promoting stability in the face of a potential decline of U.S. hegemony in the
Americas. Perceptions of declining U.S. influence in the region – which had some credibility in 1979-1984 due to
the wildly inequitable divisions of wealth in some U.S. client states in Latin America, in addition to political repression, underdevelopment, mounting external debt, anti-American sentiment produced by decades of subjugation to U.S. strategic and
economic interests, and so on – were linked to the prospect of explosive events occurring in the
hemisphere. Hence, the Central American imbroglio was viewed as a fuse which could ignite a cataclysmic process throughout
the region. Analysts at the time worried that in a worstcase scenario, instability created by a regional war,
beginning in Central America and spreading elsewhere in
Latin America, might preoccupy Washington to
the extent that the United States would be unable to perform adequately its important
hegemonic role in the international arena – a concern expressed by the director of research for Canada’s
Standing Committee Report on Central America. It was feared that such a predicament could generate
increased global instability and perhaps even a hegemonic war . This is one of the motivations which led
Canada to become involved in efforts at regional conflict resolution, such as Contadora, as will be discussed in the next chapter.
Mexican Relations DA – 1NC
US hegemony in Latin America devastates any relation with Mexico
Falcoff 4 (Mark Falcoff -- professional staff member of the Senate Foreign Relations and senior
constultant to the National Bipartisan Comission on Central America, "US-Latin American
Relations, August 1st, 2004 www.aei.org/outlook/foreign-and-defense-policy/regional/latinamerica/us-latin-american-relations-outlook/) SM
This series began more than a dozen years ago with an essay titled “U.S.-Latin American Relations: Where Are We
Now?” Since this is the last issue of Latin American Outlook, it seems worthwhile to pose the question again. The answer is bound
to be less optimistic than when it was first asked. For one thing, in the intervening years many Latin Americans have
become disillusioned with economic reform, privatization, and “neo-liberalism”--as they call it—and
are looking once again to the state to solve all their problems. For another, corruption and jobbery have
discredited much of the political class at all levels. The most recent, lurid example has been a spate of lynchings of small-town
officials in Guatemala, Peru, and Bolivia. For yet another, the “Washington consensus”--the commitment to
more open, freer economies—is now regarded as an unfortunate episode forced upon the region
by a selfish, grasping, and unfeeling United States. The project for a Free Trade Area of the
Americas (FTAA) sponsored by the first Bush and Clinton administrations is often depicted as a conspiracy to
exploit and subjugate Latin economies. In its place many now look to the creation of regional trade blocs as a
better alternative. At the same time, there is a deep resentment against the Bush administration for allegedly ignoring the region and
its problems. To be sure, not all of notions above are accurate, or even coherent. What is true is that Latin America is
not the most important region for U.S. policymakers and is not likely to be at any time in the
foreseeable future. It would be quite amazing if it were. Partly due to the 9/11 terrorist attacks, partly as the result of the
emergence of a rogue nuclear state in North Korea, U.S. security concerns have decisively shifted to the Middle East and North Asia.
Even our relations with Western Europe have lost some of their salience. Even so, this does not mean that Latin America will
disappear entirely from the U.S. national agenda, or even that it has done so during the course of the present administration. It is
worth recalling that last year a free trade agreement with Chile was concluded after nearly a decade of postponements by the
previous administration, and there is significant movement toward a similar agreement with the Central American republics.
Immigration issues will remain important, particularly in the U.S. relationship with Mexico. Given the weak economic performance
in most of the region--as well as a fractious political environment in Venezuela and Cuba’s problematic future--we can expect the
U.S.-based diasporas of all the republics to grow in size. Views from Abroad The whole notion of “Latin America” is something of a
geographical abstraction. What we have south of the United States are a series of societies, many of them--in spite of superficial
similarities--surprisingly different from one another. Likewise, attitudes toward the United States vary, according to historical
experience and cultural predisposition. The classic case of a “love-hate” relationship is Mexico, which
admires, envies, and attempts to replicate the United States. But it also resents it--deeply.
Mexicans have never forgotten the loss of nearly half of their territory to the United States in 1848
or the intervention of U.S. military forces during the Revolution of 1910. At the same time, the very proximity
of the United States--a far more successful society--acts as a permanent wound to Mexican selfesteem. Quite apart from their history and because their consumer culture has been so heavily influenced by the United States,
particularly since the NAFTA agreements, Mexicans feel the periodic need to reassert their independence. This explains, for
example, Mexico’s reluctance to support efforts to invoke the Inter-American Treaty of Reciprocal Assistance (the so-called Rio
Treaty) after the attack on the World Trade Center, as well as its refusal last year to support the United States at the UN Security
Council on Iraq.[1] Mexican ambivalence toward the United States is buttressed by the inconvenient fact that some 8 million or
more of its nationals live and work here, and their remittances to their families back home constitute a safety net crucial to the
nation’s stability. Indeed, President Vicente Fox has publicly stated more than once that the prosperity of Mexico is dependent upon
continued U.S. economic expansion. Even Mexican attitudes toward the United States as a society are
complicated. The U.S. media made much of a soccer game last year at which Mexican crowds
cheered for Osama bin Laden, but a recent survey reveals ordinary citizens of that country
divided right down the middle in their attitudes toward their northern neighbor--as many with
positive as negative views. This is all the more remarkable because the major Mexican media does all it can to depict this
country in the darkest tones, particularly with regard to the treatment of racial and national minorities. Apparently its
representations are not wholly persuasive, to judge by the number of Mexicans who wish to come to this country and are turned
away at the border every day.
Relations solve – drugs and terrorism
Storrs 6 (K. Larry Storrs, Specialist in Latin American Affairs, Foreign Affairs, Defense, and
Trade Division of CRS, 1/18/2006 “Mexico’s Importance and Multiple
Relationships with the United States”, http://assets.opencrs.com/rpts/RL33244_20060118.pdf,
// JG)
Sharing a 2,000-mile border and extensive interconnections through the Gulf of¶ Mexico,
the United States and Mexico are so intricately linked together in an¶ enormous
multiplicity of ways that President George W. Bush and other U.S.¶ officials have stated
that no country is more important to the United States than¶ Mexico. At the same time,
Mexican President Vicente Fox (2000-2006), the first¶ president to be elected from an
opposition party in 71 years, has sought to strengthen¶ the relationship with the United
States through what some have called a “grand¶ bargain.” Under this proposed bargain, the
United States would regularize the status¶ of undocumented Mexican workers in the
United States and economically assist the¶ less developed partner in the North American
Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA),¶ while Mexico would be more cooperative in efforts to
control the illegal traffic of¶ drugs, people, and goods into the United States.¶ The southern
neighbor is linked with the United States through trade and¶ investment, migration and
tourism, environment and health concerns, and family and¶ cultural relationships. It is the
second most important trading partner of the United¶ States, and this trade is critical to
many U.S. industries and border communities. It¶ is a major source of undocumented
migrants and illicit drugs and a possible avenue¶ for the entry of terrorists into the United
States. As a result, cooperation with Mexico¶ is essential to deal effectively with
migration, drug trafficking , and border, terrorism ,¶ health, environment, and energy
issues.
Terrorism leads to great power warfare ----- only scenario for escalation
Ayson, 10 [Robert Ayson, Professor of Strategic Studies and Director of the Centre for Strategic
Studies: New Zealand at the Victoria University of Wellington,“After a Terrorist Nuclear Attack:
Envisaging Catalytic Effects,” Studies in Conflict & Terrorism , Volume 33, Issue 7, July,
Available Online to Subscribing Institutions via InformaWorld]
A terrorist nuclear attack, and even the use of nuclear weapons in response by the country attacked in the first place, would not
necessarily represent the worst of the nuclear worlds imaginable. Indeed, there are reasons to wonder whether nuclear terrorism
should ever be regarded as belonging in the category of truly existential threats. A contrast can be drawn here with the global
catastrophe that would come from a massive nuclear exchange between two or more of the sovereign states that possess these
weapons in significant numbers. Even the worst terrorism that the twenty-first century might bring would fade into insignificance
alongside considerations of what a general nuclear war would have wrought in the Cold War period. And it must be admitted that as
long as the major nuclear weapons states have hundreds and even thousands of nuclear weapons at
their disposal, there is always the possibility of a truly awful nuclear exchange taking place
precipitated entirely by state possessors themselves. But these two nuclear worlds—a non-state actor nuclear attack
and a catastrophic interstate nuclear exchange—are not necessarily separable. It is just possible that
some sort of terrorist attack, and especially an act of nuclear terrorism, could precipitate a chain of events
leading to a massive exchange of nuclear weapons between two or more of the states that
possess them. In this context, today’s and tomorrow’s terrorist groups might assume the place allotted during the early
Cold War years to new state possessors of small nuclear arsenals who were seen as raising the risks of a catalytic nuclear
war between the superpowers started by third parties. These risks were considered in the late 1950s and early
1960s as concerns grew about nuclear proliferation, the so-called n+1 problem. It may require a considerable amount of imagination
to depict an especially plausible situation where an act of nuclear terrorism could lead to such a massive inter-state nuclear war. For
example, in the event of a terrorist nuclear attack on the United States, it might well be wondered
just how Russia and/or China could plausibly be brought into the picture, not least because they seem
unlikely to be fingered as the most obvious state sponsors or encouragers of terrorist groups. They would seem far too
responsible to be involved in supporting that sort of terrorist behavior that could just as easily threaten
them as well. Some possibilities, however remote, do suggest themselves. For example, how might the United States react if it was
thought or discovered that the fissile material used in the act of nuclear terrorism had come from Russian stocks,40 and if for some
reason Moscow denied any responsibility for nuclear laxity? The correct attribution of that nuclear material to a particular country
might not be a case of science fiction given the observation by Michael May et al. that while the debris resulting from a nuclear
explosion would be “spread over a wide area in tiny fragments, its radioactivity makes it detectable, identifiable and collectable, and
a wealth of information can be obtained from its analysis: the efficiency of the explosion, the materials used and, most important …
some indication of where the nuclear material came from.”41 Alternatively, if
the act of nuclear terrorism came as a
complete surprise, and American officials refused to believe that a terrorist group was fully responsible (or responsible at all)
suspicion would
shift immediately to state possessors. Ruling out Western ally countries like the United Kingdom
would be left with a very short list
consisting of North Korea, perhaps Iran if its program continues, and possibly Pakistan. But at what
stage would Russia and China be definitely ruled out in this high stakes game of nuclear Cluedo?
In particular, if the act of nuclear terrorism occurred against a backdrop of existing tension in
Washington’s relations with Russia and/or China, and at a time when threats had already been traded between
these major powers, would officials and political leaders not be tempted to assume the worst? Of course,
and France, and probably Israel and India as well, authorities in Washington
the chances of this occurring would only seem to increase if the United States was already involved in some sort of limited armed
conflict with Russia and/or China, or if they were confronting each other from a distance in a proxy war, as unlikely as these
developments may seem at the present time. The reverse might well apply too: should a nuclear terrorist attack occur in Russia or
China during a period of heightened tension or even limited conflict with the United States, could Moscow and Beijing resist the
pressures that might rise domestically to consider the United States as a possible perpetrator or encourager of the attack?
Washington’s early response to a terrorist nuclear attack on its own soil might also raise the
possibility of an unwanted (and nuclear aided) confrontation with Russia and/or China. For
example, in the noise and confusion during the immediate aftermath of the terrorist nuclear attack,
the U.S. president might be expected to place the country’s armed forces, including its nuclear arsenal, on
a higher stage of alert. In such a tense environment, when careful planning runs up against the friction of reality, it is
just possible that Moscow and/or China might mistakenly read this as a sign of U.S. intentions to
use force (and possibly nuclear force) against them. In that situation, the temptations to preempt such actions
might grow, although it must be admitted that any preemption would probably still meet with a devastating response. As part of
its initial response to the act of nuclear terrorism (as discussed earlier) Washington might decide to order a significant
conventional (or nuclear) retaliatory or disarming attack against the leadership of the terrorist group
and/or states seen to support that group. Depending on the identity and especially the location of these targets,
Russia and/or China might interpret such action as being far too close for their comfort, and
potentially as an infringement on their spheres of influence and even on their sovereignty. One farfetched but perhaps not impossible scenario might stem from a judgment in Washington that some of
the main aiders and abetters of the terrorist action resided somewhere such as Chechnya, perhaps in connection
with what Allison claims is the “Chechen insurgents’ … long-standing interest in all things nuclear.”42 American pressure on
that part of the world would almost certainly raise alarms in Moscow that might require a degree of advanced
consultation from Washington that the latter found itself unable or unwilling to provide. There is also the question of
how other nuclear-armed states respond to the act of nuclear terrorism on another member of
that special club. It could reasonably be expected that following a nuclear terrorist attack on the United States, both Russia
and China would extend immediate sympathy and support to Washington and would work
alongside the United States in the Security Council. But there is just a chance, albeit a slim one, where the
support of Russia and/or China is less automatic in some cases than in others. For example, what would
happen if the United States wished to discuss its right to retaliate against groups based in their territory? If, for
some reason, Washington found the responses of Russia and China deeply underwhelming, (neither
“for us or against us”) might it also suspect that they secretly were in cahoots with the group,
increasing (again perhaps ever so slightly) the chances of a major exchange. If the terrorist group had some
connections to groups in Russia and China, or existed in areas of the world over which Russia and China held sway, and if
Washington felt that Moscow or Beijing were placing a curiously modest level of pressure on them, what conclusions might it then
draw about their culpability? If Washington decided to use, or decided to threaten the use of, nuclear weapons,
the responses of Russia and China would be crucial to the chances of avoiding a more serious
nuclear exchange. They might surmise, for example, that while the act of nuclear terrorism was
especially heinous and demanded a strong response, the response simply had to remain below the nuclear
threshold. It would be one thing for a non-state actor to have broken the nuclear use taboo, but an entirely different thing for a
state actor, and indeed the leading state in the international system, to do so. If Russia and China felt sufficiently
strongly about that prospect, there is then the question of what options would lie open to them to dissuade the United
States from such action: and as has been seen over the last several decades, the central dissuader
of the use of nuclear weapons by states has been the threat of nuclear retaliation. If some readers find
this simply too fanciful, and perhaps even offensive to contemplate, it may be informative to reverse the tables. Russia, which
possesses an arsenal of thousands of nuclear warheads and that has been one of the two most
important trustees of the non-use taboo, is subjected to an attack of nuclear terrorism. In response,
Moscow places its nuclear forces very visibly on a higher state of alert and declares that it is considering the use of nuclear retaliation
against the group and any of its state supporters. How would Washington view such a possibility? Would it really be keen to support
Russia’s use of nuclear weapons, including outside Russia’s traditional sphere of influence? And if not, which seems quite plausible,
what options would Washington have to communicate that displeasure? If China had been the victim of the nuclear terrorism and
seemed likely to retaliate in kind, would the United States and Russia be happy to sit back and let this occur? In the charged
atmosphere immediately after a nuclear terrorist attack, how would the attacked country
respond to pressure from other major nuclear powers not to respond in kind? The phrase “how
dare they tell us what to do” immediately springs to mind. Some might even go so far as to
interpret this concern as a tacit form of sympathy or support for the terrorists. This might not
help the chances of nuclear restraint.
Venezuela Prolif DA – 1NC
Unipolarity risks Venezuelan proliferation
Weber 7 (Steven, Director of the Institute for International Studies at the University of
California -- Berkeley, Foreign Policy, Jan/Feb 2007 -- Page 48,
http://books.google.com/books?id=fA3Qs_Qq1DwC&pg=PA498&lpg=PA498&dq=22The+truly
+dangerous+places+are+the+points+where+the+subterranean+networks+touch+the+mainstr
eam+of+global+politics+and+economics.%22&source=bl&ots=SdXbliwJni&sig=eUmn7HhaoM
UKq7jDlnrDfbmYy9U&hl=en&sa=X&ei=SRcLUOKVE8qAqgHsuLG6Cg&ved=0CFYQ6AEwAA#
v=onepage&q=%22The%20truly%20dangerous%20places%20are%20the%20points%20where
%20the%20subterranean%20networks%20touch%20the%20mainstream%20of%20global%20
politics%20and%20economics.%22&f=false) SM
That's nice work if you can get it. But the United States almost certainly cannot. Not only because other
countries won't let it, but, more profoundly, because that line of thinking is faulty. The
predominance of American power has many benefits, but the management of globalization is not
one of them. The mobility of ideas, capital, technology, and people is hardly new. But the rapid advance of
globalization's evils is. Most of that advance has taken place since 1990. Why? Because what changed profoundly in the
1990s was the polarity of the international system. For the first time in modern history, globalization was
superimposed onto a world with a single superpower. What we have discovered in the past 15 years is that it
is a dangerous mixture. The negative effects of globalization since 1990 are not the result of globalization itself.
They are the dark side of American predominance. THE DANGERS OF UNIPOLARIT A straightforward piece
of logic from market economics helps explain why unipolarity and globalization don't mix.
Monopolies, regardless of who holds them, are almost always bad for both the market and the
monopolist. We propose three simple axioms of "globalization under unipolarity" that reveal these dangers. Axiom 1: Above a
certain threshold of power, the rate at which new global problems are generated will exceed the
rate at which old problems are fixed Power does two things in international politics: It enhances the
capability of a state to do things, but it also increases the number of things that a state must worry
about. At a certain point, the latter starts to overtake the former. It's the familiar law of diminishing
returns. Because powerful states have large spheres of influence and their security and economic interests touch
every region of the world, they are threatened by the risk of things going wrong-anywhere. That
is particularly true for the United States, which leverages its ability to go anywhere and do anything
through massive debt. No one knows exactly when the law of diminishing returns will kick in. But, historically, it
starts to happen long before a single great power dominates the entire globe, which is why large empires
from Byzantium to Rome have always reached a point of unsustainability. That may already be happening to the
United States today, on issues ranging from oil dependency and nuclear proliferation to pandemics
and global warming. What Axiom 1 tells you is that more U.S. power is not the answer ; it's actually part of the
problem. A multipolar world would almost certainly manage the globe's pressing problems more
effectively. The larger the number of great powers in the global system, the greater the chance that at
least one of them would exercise some control over a given combination of space, other actors, and problems.
Such reasoning doesn't rest on hopeful notions that the great powers will work together. They might do
so. But even if they don't, the result is distributed governance, where some great power is interested in most every
part of the world through productive competition Axiom 2: In an increasingly networked world, places that fall
between the networks are very dangerous places-and there will be more ungoverned zones when there is only one network
to join The second axiom acknowledges that highly connected networks can be efficient, robust, and resilient to shocks. But in a
highly connected world, the pieces that fall between the networks are increasingly shut off from the benefits of connectivity. These
problems fester in the form of failed states, mutate like pathogenic bacteria, and, in some cases,
reconnect in subterranean networks such as al Qaeda. The truly dangerous places are the points where the
subterranean networks touch the mainstream of global politics and economics. What made
Afghanistan so dangerous under the Taliban was not that it was a failed state. It wasn't. It was a partially failed and
partially connected state that worked the interstices of globalization through the drug trade,
counterfeiting, and terrorism Can any single superpower monitor all the seams and back alleys
of globalization? Hardly . In fact, a lone hegemon is unlikely to look closely at these problems,
because more pressing issues are happening elsewhere, in places where trade and technology are growing. By contrast, a world of
several great powers is a more interest-rich environment in which nations must look in less
obvious places to find new sources of advantage. In such a system, it's harder for troublemakers
to spring up, because the cracks and seams of globalization are held together by stronger ties Axiom 3:
Without a real chance to find useful allies to counter a superpower, opponents will try to neutralize power, by going underground,
going nuclear, or going "bad. Axiom 3 is a story about the preferred strategies of the weak. It's a basic insight of
international relations that states try to balance power. They protect themselves by joining
groups that can hold a hegemonic threat at bay. But what if there is no viable group to join? In today's
unipolar world, every nation from Venezuela to North Korea is looking for a way to constrain
American power . But in the unipolar world, it's harder for states to join together to do that. So they turn to other means. They
play a different game. Hamas, Iran, Somalia, North Korea, and Venezuela are not going to become allies anytime soon. Each is better
off finding
other ways to make life more difficult for Washington. Going nuclear is one way .
Counterfeiting U.S. currency is another. Raising uncertainty about oil supplies is perhaps the
most obvious method of all Here's the important downside of unipolar globalization. In a world with
multiple great powers, many of these threats would be less troublesome. The relatively weak states
would have a choice among potential partners with which to ally, enhancing their influence. Without
that more attractive choice, facilitating the dark side of globalization becomes the most effective means of constraining American
power The world is paying a heavy price for the instability created by the combination of
globalization and unipolarity, and the United States is bearing most of the burden. Consider the case
of nuclear proliferation. There's effectively a market out there for proliferation, with its own
supply (states willing to share nuclear technology) and demand (states that badly want a nuclear weapon). The overlap of
unipolarity with globalization ratchets up both the supply and demand, to the detriment of U.S.
national security .
Venezuelan proliferation causes extinction
MIT, 9 (Citing Licio da Silva, Astrophysicist at the Observatorio Nacional de Río de JaneiroBrasil, “The ABC's of Nuclear Disarmament in Latin America” ,
http://ocw.mit.edu/courses/political-science/17-951-nuclear-weapons-in-international-politicspast-present-and-future-spring-2009/projects/MIT17_951S09_abcs.pdf)
There are several resources that indicate that Latin American political scientists were worried about the
effect nuclear weapons would have on the region. Several theorists believed that the
introduction of even the hint of a weapons program would make the entire region paranoid and
further increase a state's incentive to produce a bomb. Other theorists view the development of
nuclear weapons in the region as a risk in that it draws attention from the rest of 2 "los conceptos de
equilibrio intrarregional y de confianza entre los países de la región (Portales 25)" 9 the world onto Latin America. This
unwanted attention could lead to disastrous affects for the region if any country was perceived
as a threat to any of the greater superpowers. Security perception motivates a country's weapons development.
Carlos Portales discusses how the introduction of a new weapon to the Latin American region has a
"contagious" effect; first one country has it and then the rest of them struggle to obtain it. If any
country is perceived to be looking or developing a new weapon, all countries will follow in order to keep the
balance of power within the region. The introduction of a new weapon limits any arms control treaties until all
countries possess the new weapon (Mercado Jarrín; Portales 27). In his article "Consequences of a Nuclear Conflict for the Climate
in South America," Licio da Silva3 describes the consequences to South America if there were to be a nuclear attack on North
America. He calls this the "Optimistic Hipothesis [sic]" for South America and calculates population death by smoke in the
atmosphere. His "Pessimistic Hipothesis [sic]" involves attacks on South American cities and the destruction that could be cause, he
even takes into account the possibility of the Amazon going up in flames. His article is quite alarming and one can see that he is truly
terrified at the possibilities. As a conclusion, he calls for countries to be prepared for the worse and for the region to try and avoid
international conflict by not obtaining nuclear weapons. da Silva states that if no South American country possesses a nuclear
weapon, then no nuclear weapon state should perceive South America as a threat. If a Latin American state were to
have a nuclear weapon, then that country could be perceived as a threat and thus could be
targeted in an international conflict if it is seen as taking sides: "When a country becomes the owner of a
nuclear arsenal, it also becomes a potential target (da Silva 56)." Therefore, da Silva calls for Latin American countries to remain
disarmed so as not to put the 3 Astrophysicist at the Observatorio Nacional de Río de Janeiro- Brasil10 region in peril. His directly
names Argentina and Brazil for their involvement in nuclear weapons programs and accuses them of putting the entire region at
risk: This shows the temerity of Argentine and Brazilian military who are in favour of the possession of nuclear weapons in their
respective countries; we believe that the price we would have to pay for the dubious pride of belonging to the small group of nations
in possession of nuclear technology for military purposes is too high. Here we see a sincere fear of the security risks that one country
can pose on an entire region. For da Silva, the destabilizing effect that nuclear weapons would have on South America alarm him
enough to single out the two countries and negatively describe their search for nuclear weapons as "dubious pride." He continues on
to ask for "the commitment not to install any nuclear arms in their [South American's] territory (da Silva 56)." The use of the word
"their" refers to a collective identity shared by those in South America. Military improvements of individual countries should not be
as important as the well being of the entire region. South Americans countries are lumped together and thus, must take into account
the entire region before pursuing precarious programs. An arms race in the region would affect all countries in
Latin America since such an arms race "contributes to increase both international tensions and the danger of armed
conflicts, in addition to diverting resources indispensable to the economic and social progress of
the peoples of the world. (Brazil and the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons 19)." One country's search for
nuclear weapons or even nuclear power, increases all the other countries' likelihood to obsess,
overreact or become hostile during the situation. Regions that are economically dependent on
each other, such as South America, would have a very hard time surviving if there existed no
trust between the nations.
Venezuela Prolif DA – Link Wall
Current US posture risks Venezuelan proliferation
Bolton 10 (Former US Diplomat to the United Nations "The Chavez Threat" September 16th,
2010 www.aei.org/article/foreign-and-defense-policy/regional/latin-america/the-chavezthreat/) SM
Venezuela's Sept. 26 national parliamentary elections present a major opportunity for strongman Hugo Chavez to cement his grip on
power. Despite a tradition of a free press and competitive politics, a cosmopolitan elite and extensive natural resources, Venezuela is
increasingly a case study in how to lose political and economic freedom. The stakes are especially high in light of evidence consistent
with an emerging Venezuelan nuclear weapons program. Ironically, Chavez's frequently clownish behavior protects him,
camouflaging the seriousness of his potential threat to U.S. security and to democratic societies throughout Latin America.
Washington, under Republican and Democratic administrations, has proved unable or unwilling to slow Chavez's descent into
authoritarianism. Unlike coups by prior caudillos in the Americas, the
situation in Venezuela today is like a slowmotion train wreck, which makes it all the more frustrating. A lack of international outrage is discouraging
pro-democracy Venezuelans across the ideological spectrum. They worry they have been forgotten, especially by an Obama
administration that finds foreign policy a distraction. Chavez's purchases of advanced-model Kalashnikov assault rifles, some
Venezuelan businessmen and former diplomats suggest, are meant to arm campesino "militias" that will rally to him if Venezuela's
military ever threatens his regime, or the weapons may be destined for revolutionary or terrorist groups. This month's elections,
therefore, may be a last chance for change before Chavez completes his takeover. He has advanced his agenda since taking office in
1999 by fragmenting his domestic opposition, manipulating election rules, closing down opposition news sources and expropriating
the considerable assets of businesses and entrepreneurs. He has materially impaired Venezuela's prosperous petroleum economy by
failing to make prudent investments and improvements, while using substantial oil revenues to consolidate his hold on power. Even
more disturbing are Chavez's international threats. While Latin American democracies have refrained from doing anything that
smacks of "interference" in Venezuela's internal affairs, Chavez has felt no similar compunction. For example, it's clear he has
sheltered, supplied and financed FARC guerrillas who seek to overthrow the government in neighboring, and still-democratic,
Colombia. In decades past, accusations that the United States was engaged in such tactics would have brought millions into the
streets shouting "Yanqui go home!" Last year, Chavez led the charge against those in Honduras trying to prevent its fragile
democracy (and one of the Western Hemisphere's poorest countries) from being subverted by Manuel Zelaya, a would-be caudillo.
Chavez has poured money--openly or through suspected clandestine channels--into elections in Peru, Bolivia, Nicaragua and
Ecuador to support leftist candidates of his ilk. To that same end, he questioned the legitimacy of President Felipe Calderon's
election in Mexico and purchased much of Argentina's sovereign debt. One can only imagine what he might be doing to support the
Mexican drug cartels, as with their cohorts in Colombia. For that reason, Venezuelan involvement in hemispheric drug trafficking
should be a top U.S. intelligence priority. On the world stage, Chavez's behavior is increasingly ominous. As Fidel Castro has aged
and Cuba's relations with Russia have faded, Chavez has stepped forward. He has engaged in extensive military cooperation with
Moscow, including major acquisitions of conventional weapons, from infantry rifles to sophisticated, high-end weapons well beyond
any conceivably legitimate requirements of Venezuela's military. Chavez's purchases of advanced-model Kalashnikov assault rifles,
some Venezuelan businessmen and former diplomats suggest, are meant to arm campesino "militias" that will rally to him if
Venezuela's military ever threatens his regime, or the weapons may be destined for revolutionary or terrorist groups. In either case,
the consequences would be profoundly negative. Beyond enhancing his own swaggering reputation, Chavez's growing closeness with
Russia and Iran on nuclear matters should be our greatest concern. For decades, after military governments fell in Brazil and
Argentina, Latin America prided itself on avoiding the dangers of nuclear proliferation. The 1967 Treaty
of Tlatelolco symbolized this perceived immunity, but the
region's nuclear-free status is today gravely
threatened. Now, Venezuela is openly helping Iran evade international sanctions imposed
because of Tehran's nuclear weapons program. Along with the refined petroleum products it supplies Tehran,
Chavez allows Iranian banks and other sanctioned enterprises to use Caracas as a base for
conducting business internationally and, reportedly, to facilitate Hezbollah's activity in the
hemisphere. Even more alarming, Venezuela claims Iran is helping develop its uranium
reserves, reportedly among the largest in the world. Indeed, the formal agreement between them signed two
years ago for cooperation in the nuclear field could easily result in a uranium-for-nuclearknowhow trade. In addition, Chavez has a deal with Russia to build a reactor in Venezuela. All of which may signal a
dangerous clandestine nuclear weapons effort, perhaps as a surrogate for Iran, as has been true elsewhere, such as in Syria.
President Obama and other freely elected Western Hemisphere leaders at a minimum need to
tell Chavez clearly that his disassembling of Venezuela's democracy is unacceptable. This is very
nearly the exact opposite of current White House policy, which attempts to appease Chavez,
Castro and other leftists, as it did by joining them against the democratic forces in Honduras.
Unfortunately, with our own elections approaching in November, it is hard to get Obama's
attention directed to Latin American affairs, or foreign policy generally. But make no mistake, if
Chavez can intimidate his domestic opposition, manipulate election laws and extend his
authoritarian control, Venezuela will increasingly be a global menace.
AT: Solves China War
No China war
Goldstein 11 - Professor and Director of the China Maritime Studies Institute @ US Naval War
College [Dr. Lyle J. Goldstein, “Resetting the US–China Security Relationship,” Survival | vol. 53
no. 2 | April–May 2011 | pp. 89–116
Weighed in the aggregate, China’s rise remains a peaceful process, and the record to date should
engender significant confidence . Beijing has not resorted to a significant use of force against another
state in more than three decades . Its deployments of troops as UN peacekeepers to hot spots such as
Lebanon and the Democratic Republic of the Congo have played a helpful role, as have the counter-piracy operations of its
fleet in the Gulf of Aden. When dealing with weak and occasionally unstable states on its borders, such as
Kyrgyzstan or Tajikistan, Beijing has not resorted to military intervention, nor even flexed its military
muscles to gain advantage. Chinese maritime claims, whether in the South or the East China
seas, are generally being enforced by unarmed patrol cutters , a clear signal that Beijing does not
seek escalation to a major crisis on these matters. Contrary to the perception that China’s senior
military officers are all irreconcilable hawks, one influential People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN)
admiral recently said in an interview, with reference to lessons learned from recent border negotiations on China’s periphery:
‘If there are never any concessions or compromises, there is simply no possibility of reaching a
breakthrough in border negotiations.’2 pg. 90
No war or escalation- nuclear primacy prevents
Ross ‘5 (Robert S., Staff Writer for the National Interest, Fall, Assessing the China Threat. The
National Interest. Lexis)
At the strategic level, after decades of research and testing, China is preparing to deploy solid-fuel ballistic missiles that can target
U.S. allies in East Asia and may be nearing completion of an intercontinental ballistic missile that can target the continental United
States. It is also making advances in development of its next-generation submarine-launched ballistic missiles. None of these
developments should come as a surprise; U.S. intelligence has been following these programs since their inception. Moreover,
these programs should not be considered a challenge to U.S. military superiority. Once these
weapons are fully operational, perhaps by the end of the decade, China will have a more credible minimal second-strike capability.
Despite recent Chinese bravado, not only is it hard to imagine a scenario in which China
would use nuclear weapons in response to conventional hostilities, but U.S. retaliatory
capabilities would make Chinese first-use suicidal. Continued modernization of its nuclear
forces and massive quantitative superiority over China give the U nited S tates a far more robust
deterrent posture vis-a -vis China than it ever possessed vis-a -vis the Soviet Union. Similarly, overwhelming
U.S. nuclear superiority provides greater strategic security for our East Asian allies than U.S.
nuclear capabilities ever provided for our European allies during the Cold War.
AT: Solves Credibility
No impact to credibility – allies won’t abandon us and adversaries can’t exploit it
Walt 11 (Stephen, Professor of International Relations – Harvard University, “Does the U.S.
still need to reassure its allies?” Foreign Policy, 12-5,
http://walt.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2011/12/05/us_credibility_is_not_our_problem, GDI
File)
A perennial preoccupation of U.S. diplomacy has been the perceived need to reassure allies of
our reliability. Throughout the Cold War, U.S. leaders worried that any loss of credibility might cause
dominoes to fall, lead key allies to "bandwagon" with the Soviet Union, or result in some form of
"Finlandization." Such concerns justified fighting so-called "credibility wars" (including Vietnam), where the main concern was not
the direct stakes of the contest but rather the need to retain a reputation for resolve and capability. Similar fears also led the United
States to deploy thousands of nuclear weapons in Europe, as a supposed counter to Soviet missiles targeted against our NATO allies.
The possibility that key allies would abandon us was almost always exaggerated, but U.S.
leaders remain overly sensitive to the possibility. So Vice President Joe Biden has been out on the road this past
week, telling various U.S. allies that "the United States isn't going anywhere." (He wasn't suggesting we're stuck in a
rut, of course, but saying that the imminent withdrawal from Iraq doesn't mean a retreat to isolationism or anything like that.)
There's nothing really wrong with offering up this sort of comforting rhetoric, but I've never really understood why
USS.S. leaders were so worried about the credibility of our commitments to others. For starters,
given our remarkably secure geopolitical position, whether U.S. pledges are credible is first and
foremost a problem for those who are dependent on U.S. help. We should therefore take our allies'
occasional hints about realignment or neutrality with some skepticism; they have every incentive to try to
make us worry about it, but in most cases little incentive to actually do it .
AT: Solves Economy
Latin America isn’t important to US economic primacy—
Brand et al 12, Alexander Brand is Lecturer and Post-Doc Researcher at the Department of
Political Science at the University of Mainz. Susan McEwen-Fial is Lecturer at the Department
of Political Science at the University of Mainz. Wolfgang Muno is Visiting Professor of Political
Science at the University of Erfurt. Andrea Ribeiro Hoffmann is Lecturer at the Willy Brandt
School of Public Policy, University of Erfurt. (04/2012, “BRICs and U.S. Hegemony: Theoretical
Reflections on Shifting Power Patterns and Empirical Evidence from Latin America”,Mainz
Papers on International and European Politics (MPIEP) Paper No. 4,
http://international.politics.uni-mainz.de/files/2012/10/mpiep04.pdf,jj)
In the economic dimension, the
U.S. still is very important for Latin America. What is more,¶ despite the activities of
traditional asymmetrically patterned relationship still continues to
Latin America on the whole is not the U.S.’s most important trading
BRIC states throughout the region, the
exist: While
partner, Latin American states are still by and large dependent on their¶ exports to the U.S.
market – either heavily (Mexico) or to still impressive degrees. The same¶ is true for the U.S. as the main source of FDI flows to
Latin America; although Brazilian and¶ Chinese activism is surging, it is still at a comparatively low level. Thus, the very phenomena¶
that have captured the attention of analysts recently – Chinese FDI targeted to resource and infrastructure projects, intensified
economic exchange between e.g. Brazil and China themselves,¶ the growth of trade volumes between China and LA as well as Brazil
and its regional neighbors¶ still do not, in essence and so far, signal a fundamental break with the established patterns of ¶
asymmetrical economic relations between the U.S. and Latin America and hence, the strong U.S.¶ influence in the region. In terms of
monetary and currency policy, the U.S. position in terms of¶ a dominance of the dollar throughout Latin
America remains intact so far as well. This means¶ that fiscal and monetary policies on behalf of the
United States still exert considerable influence¶ within the region, be they intentionally targeted
at achieving certain outcomes or not.
Economy is resilient
ZAKARIA 9 (Fareed, Ph.D. in Political Science – Harvard University and Editor – Newsweek
International, “The Secrets of Stability”, Newsweek, 12-21, Lexis)
One year ago, the world seemed as if it might be coming apart. The global financial system, which
had fueled a great expansion of capitalism and trade across the world, was crumbling. All the certainties of the age of -
globalization--about the virtues of free markets, trade, and technology--were being called into question. Faith in the American model
had collapsed. The financial industry had crumbled. Once-roaring emerging markets like China, India, and Brazil were sinking.
Worldwide trade was shrinking to a degree not seen since the 1930s. Pundits whose bearishness had been vindicated
predicted we were doomed to a long, painful bust, with cascading failures in sector after sector, country
after country. In a widely cited essay that appeared in The Atlantic this May, Simon Johnson, former chief economist of the
International Monetary Fund, wrote: "The conventional wisdom among the elite is still that the current slump 'cannot be as bad as
the Great Depression.' This view is wrong. What we face now could, in fact, be worse than the Great Depression." Others
predicted that these economic shocks would lead to political instability and violence in the worst-hit countries. At
his confirmation hearing in February, the new U.S. director of national intelligence, Adm. Dennis Blair, cautioned the Senate that
"the financial crisis and global recession are likely to produce a wave of economic crises in emerging-market nations over the next
year." Hillary Clinton endorsed this grim view. And she was hardly alone. Foreign Policy ran a cover story predicting serious unrest
in several emerging markets. Of one thing everyone was sure: nothing would ever be the same again. Not the financial industry, not
capitalism, not globalization. One year later, how much has the world really changed? Well, Wall Street is
home to two fewer investment banks (three, if you count Merrill Lynch). Some regional banks have gone bust. There was some
turmoil in Moldova and (entirely unrelated to the financial crisis) in Iran. Severe problems remain, like high unemployment in the
West, and we face new problems caused by responses to the crisis--soaring debt and fears of inflation. But overall, things look
nothing like they did in the 1930s. The predictions of economic and political collapse have not
materialized at all. A key measure of fear and fragility is the ability of poor and unstable countries to
borrow money on the debt markets. So consider this: the sovereign bonds of tottering Pakistan have
returned 168 percent so far this year. All this doesn't add up to a recovery yet, but it does reflect a return to
some level of normalcy. And that rebound has been so rapid that even the shrewdest observers remain puzzled. "The
question I have at the back of my head is 'Is that it?' " says Charles Kaye, the co-head of Warburg Pincus. "We had this huge crisis,
and now we're back to business as usual?" This revival did not happen because markets managed to stabilize themselves on their
own. Rather, governments, having learned the lessons of the Great Depression, were determined
not to repeat the same mistakes once this crisis hit. By massively expanding state support for the
economy--through central banks and national treasuries--they buffered the worst of the damage.
(Whether they made new mistakes in the process remains to be seen.) The extensive social safety nets that have been
established across the industrialized world also cushioned the pain felt by many. Times are still tough, but things
are nowhere near as bad as in the 1930s, when governments played a tiny role in national economies. It's true that the
massive state interventions of the past year may be fueling some new bubbles: the cheap cash and government guarantees provided
to banks, companies, and consumers have fueled some irrational exuberance in stock and bond markets. Yet these rallies also
demonstrate the return of confidence, and confidence is a very powerful economic force. When
John Maynard Keynes described his own prescriptions for economic growth, he believed government action could provide only a
temporary fix until the real motor of the economy started cranking again--the animal spirits of investors, consumers, and companies
seeking risk and profit. Beyond all this, though, I believe there's a fundamental reason why we have not faced
global collapse in the last year. It is the same reason that we weathered the stock-market crash of
1987, the recession of 1992, the Asian crisis of 1997, the Russian default of 1998, and the tech-bubble
collapse of 2000. The current global economic system is inherently more resilient than we think.
The world today is characterized by three major forces for stability, each reinforcing the other and
each historical in nature.
AT: Solves Environment
No extinction
Easterbrook, 3 [“We're All Gonna Die!”,
http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/11.07/doomsday.html?pg=1&topic=&topic_set=]
If we're talking about doomsday - the end of human civilization - many scenarios simply don't
measure up. A single nuclear bomb ignited by terrorists, for example, would be awful beyond words, but life would go on. People
and machines might converge in ways that you and I would find ghastly, but from the standpoint of the future, they would probably
represent an adaptation. Environmental collapse might make parts of the globe unpleasant, but
considering that the biosphere has survived ice ages, it wouldn't be the final curtain.
Depression, which has become 10 times more prevalent in Western nations in the postwar era, might grow so widespread that vast
numbers of people would refuse to get out of bed, a possibility that Petranek suggested in a doomsday talk at the Technology
Entertainment Design conference in 2002. But Marcel Proust, as miserable as he was, wrote Remembrance of Things Past while
lying in bed.
AT: Solves Global Hegemony
Latin America not key to US Hegemony
Walton 7 (Dale C. Walton — Lecturer in International Relations and Strategic Studies at the
University of Reading – “Geopolitics and Great Powers in the Twenty-First Century”, pg. 8
http://books.google.com/books?id=uvYKmyk7TbgC&pg=PA72&lpg=PA72&dq=Geopolitics+an
d+Great+Powers+in+the+Twenty-First+Century&source=bl&ots=xWWIOXb9q&sig=R4DxUC2LKpNmGr9RR2eJUl6wHY&hl=en&sa=X&ei=3T_LUZ2GAeiBywGt34DgBQ&ved=0CEEQ6AEwAg#
v=onepage&q=latin%20america&f=false) SM
Many of the countries in other regions of the world – sub-Saharan Africa, Latin America, Central America, Central Asia,
and the Middle East – contain important resources, straddle trade routes, or are otherwise
strategically note-worthy. However, none of these areas has the compelling combination of
wealth, population, and strategic geography that would make them likely arenas for great power
competition with higher stakes. Obviously, much of the world’s energy reserves are contained in the Middle East and
Central Asia, but great power competition in central Eurasia will be of a different character than on its eastern rim.
Heg doesn’t solve war.
Preble 10 – director of foreign policy studies at the Cato Institute (Christopher, “U.S. Military
Power: Preeminence for What Purpose?” August 2010, http://www.cato-at-liberty.org/u-smilitary-power-preeminence-for-what-purpose/)
Most in Washington still embraces the notion that America is, and forever will be, the world’s
indispensable nation. Some scholars, however, questioned the logic of hegemonic stability theory
from the very beginning. A number continue to do so today. They advance arguments diametrically at odds
with the primacist consensus. Trade routes need not be policed by a single dominant power; the
international economy is complex and resilient. Supply disruptions are likely to be temporary,
and the costs of mitigating their effects should be borne by those who stand to lose — or gain —
the most. Islamic extremists are scary, but hardly comparable to the threat posed by a globe-straddling Soviet Union armed with
thousands of nuclear weapons. It is frankly absurd that we spend more today to fight Osama bin Laden
and his tiny band of murderous thugs than we spent to face down Joseph Stalin and Chairman
Mao. Many factors have contributed to the dramatic decline in the number of wars between
nation-states; it is unrealistic to expect that a new spasm of global conflict would erupt if the
United States were to modestly refocus its efforts, draw down its military power, and call on other
countries to play a larger role in their own defense, and in the security of their respective
regions. But while there are credible alternatives to the United States serving in its current dual
role as world policeman / armed social worker, the foreign policy establishment in Washington
has no interest in exploring them. The people here have grown accustomed to living at the center of the earth, and
indeed, of the universe. The tangible benefits of all this military spending flow disproportionately to
this tiny corner of the United States while the schlubs in fly-over country pick up the tab.
AT: Solves Human Rights
There are tons of alternative causalities that will continue to undermine human
rights
Powell, 8 – Associate Professor of Law at Fordham Law School
(Catherine Powell, American Constitution Society for Law & Public Policy
“Human Rights at Home: A Domestic Policy Blueprint for the New Administration,” October
2008, http://www.acslaw.org/files/C%20Powell%20Blueprint.pdf)
Even so, there remains a gap between the human rights ideals that the United States professes and its actual domestic practice,
resulting in both a gap in credibility and a weakening of U.S. moral authority to lead by example. Human rights include
the
right to be free from torture or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment, and yet the United States
has committed such acts in the name of counterterrorism efforts. Human rights include the rights to
emergency shelter, food, and water, as well as security of person, and yet the United States failed to adequately
guarantee these rights in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. Human rights include the right to equality of
opportunity, and yet inequalities persist in access to housing, education, jobs, and health care. Human rights include the
right to equality in the application of law enforcement measures, and yet there are gross racial disparities in the
application of the death penalty, and racial and ethnic profiling has been used unfairly to target
African Americans, Latinos, and those who appear Arab, Muslim, South Asian, or immigrant (whether
through traffic stops, airport screening, or immigration raids). Human rights include the right to equal pay and gender equality, and
yet a pay gap persists between female and male workers. Certainly, the journey to fully realizing human rights is a work-in-progress,
but to make progress, we must work – through smart, principled policies that advance the ability of the United States to live up to its
own highest ideals.
AT: Solves Iran Expansionism
Iran not pursuing nuclear weapons
YNET 12, (“And while Iran continues to enrich uranium at low levels, US officials say they
have not seen evidence that has caused them to significantly revise that judgment”;
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4194307,00.html)
As the US and Israel prepare for the Obama-Netanyahu summit it appears that Washington is
trying to make it very clear: Tehran is not currently seeking to build a nuclear bomb. Or at least,
that is what a classified intelligence document mentioned in an LA Times report states.¶ ¶ A
highly classified US intelligence assessment circulated among policymakers early last year
largely affirms the view, originally made in 2007. Both reports, known as national intelligence
estimates, conclude that Iran halted efforts to develop and build a nuclear warhead in 2003.The
LA Times goes on to claim that the most recent report, which represents the consensus of 16 US
intelligence agencies, indicates that Iran is pursuing research that could put it in a position to
build a weapon, but that it has not sought to do so .¶ And while Iran continues to enrich
uranium at low levels, US officials say they have not seen evidence that has caused them to
significantly revise that judgment.
Iran wouldn’t be aggressive if they got nuclear weapons—
Pillar 11, Paul Pillar is a 28-year veteran of the Central Intelligence Agency, a visiting
professor at Georgetown University for security studies and a member of the Center for Peace
and Security Studies.(12/22/11, “Worst-Casing and Best-Casing Iran”;
http://nationalinterest.org/blog/paul-pillar/worst-casing-best-casing-iran-6307,jj)
Kroenig's article, like other war-promoting pieces, never provides any analysis to support the oft-repeated
notion, which Kroenig himself repeats, that possession of nuclear weapons would somehow lead to Iran
behaving more aggressively in its region even if it never actually fired the weapons. Walt notes that
nuclear weapons simply don't work that way. I have examined this particular question with
regard to Iran. Rather than analysis, the notion of greater Iranian aggressiveness is supported by
nothing more than a vague sense that somehow those nukes ought to make such a difference.
Kroenig imparts a patina of Cold War respectability to some of his assertions by stating that Iran and Israel lack many of the
“safeguards” that kept the United States and the USSR out of a nuclear exchange. But actually his piece ignores the rich
and extensive body of strategy and doctrine developed during the Cold War that explains things
like escalation dominance and that underlies Walt's correct observation about what nuclear
weapons can and cannot do. Herman Kahn, the Cold War's foremost guru of escalation, would be rolling over in his
sizable grave if he could see what passes for analysis in Kroenig's piece.
AT: Solves Nuclear Power
Their evidence is based in media bias and money—nuclear power
can’t actually solve
Grossman 08, Karl Grossman is a Professor of journalism at the State University of New
York College at Old Westbury (02/01/2008, “Money Is the Real Green Power:
The hoax of eco-friendly nuclear energy”; http://fair.org/extra-online-articles/money-is-thereal-green-power/, jj)
Nuclear advocates in government and the nuclear industry are engaged in a massive, heavily
financed drive to revive atomic power in the United States—with most of the mainstream media
either not questioning or actually assisting in the promotion.¶ “With a very few notable
exceptions, such as the Los Angeles Times, the U.S. media have turned the same sort of blind,
uncritical eye on the nuclear industry’s claims that led an earlier generation of Americans to
believe atomic energy would be too cheap to meter,” comments Michael Mariotte, executive
director of the Nuclear Information and Resource Service. “The nuclear industry’s public
relations effort has improved over the past 50 years, while the natural skepticism of reporters
toward corporate claims seems to have disappeared.Ӧ The New York Times continues to be, as it
was a half-century ago when nuclear technology was first advanced, a media leader in pushing
the technology, which collapsed in the U.S. with the 1979 Three Mile Island and 1986 Chernobyl
nuclear plant accidents. The Times has showered readers with a variety of pieces advocating a
nuclear revival, all marbled with omissions and untruths. A lead editorial headlined “The
Greening of Nuclear Power” (5/13/06) opened:¶ Not so many years ago, nuclear energy was a
hobgoblin to environmentalists, who feared the potential for catastrophic accidents and longterm radiation contamination. . . . But this is a new era, dominated by fears of tight energy
supplies and global warming. Suddenly nuclear power is looking better.
Nuclear power can’t solve global warming fast enough
Lean 04, staffwriter for the Independent (Geoffrey, 06/26/04, “Nuclear Power 'Can't Stop
Climate Change”; http://www.commondreams.org/headlines04/0626-05.htm,jj)
Nuclear power cannot solve global warming, the international body set up to promote atomic energy admits today.¶
The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), which exists to spread the peaceful use of the atom, reveals in a new report that
it could not grow fast enough over the next decades to slow climate change - even under the
most favorable circumstances.¶ The report - published to celebrate yesterday's 50th anniversary of nuclear power contradicts a recent surge of support for the atom as the answer to global warming.¶ That surge was
provoked by an article in The Independent last month by Professor James Lovelock - the creator of the Gaia theory - who said that
only a massive expansion of nuclear power as the world's main energy source could prevent climate change overwhelming the
globe.¶ Professor Lovelock, a long-time nuclear supporter, wrote: "Civilization is in imminent danger and has to use nuclear - the
one safe, available, energy source - now or suffer the pain soon to be inflicted by our outraged planet."¶ His comments were backed
by Sir Bernard Ingham, Lady Thatcher's former PR chief, and other commentators, but have now been rebutted by the most
authoritative organization on the matter.¶ Unlike fossil fuels, nuclear power emits no carbon dioxide, the main cause of climate
change. However, it has
long been in decline in the face of rising public opposition and increasing
reluctance of governments and utilities to finance its enormous construction costs.¶ No new
atomic power station has been ordered in the US for a quarter of a century, and only one is being built in
Western Europe - in Finland. Meanwhile, Germany, Belgium, the Netherlands and Sweden have all pledged to phase out existing
plants.¶ The IAEA report considers two scenarios. In the first, nuclear energy continues to decline, with no new stations built beyond
those already planned. Its share of world electricity - and thus its relative contribution to fighting global warming - drops from its
current 16 per cent to 12 per cent by 2030.¶ Surprisingly, it made an even smaller relative contribution to combating climate change
under the IAEA's most favorable scenario, seeing nuclear power grow by 70 per cent over the next 25 years. This is because the world
would have to be so prosperous to afford the expansions that traditional ways of generating electricity from fossil fuels would have
grown even faster. Climate change would doom the planet before nuclear power could save it.¶ Alan
McDonald, an IAEA nuclear energy analyst, told The Independent on Sunday last night: "Saying that nuclear power can solve global
warming by itself is way over the top." But he added that closing existing nuclear power stations would make tackling climate change
harder.¶
AT: Sustains Oil Dependence
Oil dependence causes extinction
Lendman, 7 (Stephen, renowned author and research associate at the Center for Research on
Globalization, “Resource Wars - Can We Survive Them?”, July 2007,
http://www.rense.com/general76/-resrouce.htm)
***This card edited to remove holocaust rhetoric which we do not endorse
With the world's energy supplies finite, the US heavily dependent on imports, and "peak oil" near or
approaching, "security" for America means assuring a sustainable supply of what we can't do without. It
includes waging wars to get it, protect it, and defend the maritime trade routes over which it travels.
That means energy's partnered with predatory New World Order globalization, militarism, wars,
ecological recklessness, and now an extremist US administration willing to risk Armageddon for world
dominance. Central to its plan is first controlling essential resources everywhere, at any cost,
starting with oil and where most of it is located in the Middle East and Central Asia. The New "Great Game" and Perils From It The
new "Great Game's" begun, but this time the stakes are greater than ever as explained above. The old one
lasted nearly 100 years pitting the British empire against Tsarist Russia when the issue wasn't oil. This time, it's the US with help
from Israel, Britain, the West, and satellite states like Japan, South Korea and Taiwan challenging Russia and China with today's
weapons and technology on both sides making earlier ones look like toys. At stake is more than oil. It's planet earth with
survival of all life on it issue number one twice over. Resources and wars for them means militarism is
increasing, peace declining, and the planet's ability to sustain life front and center, if anyone's paying attention. They'd
better be because beyond the point of no return, there's no second chance the way Einstein explained after the atom was
split. His famous quote on future wars was : "I know not with what weapons World War III will be fought, but World War IV will be
fought with sticks and stones." Under a worst case scenario, it's more dire than that. There may be nothing left but resilient
beetles and bacteria in the wake of a nuclear [catastrophe] meaning even a new stone age is way in the future, if at all.
The threat is real and once nearly happened during the Cuban Missile Crisis in October, 1962. We later learned a miracle saved us at
the 40th anniversary October, 2002 summit meeting in Havana attended by the US and Russia along with host country Cuba. For
the first time, we were told how close we came to nuclear Armageddon. Devastation was avoided only because Soviet submarine
captain Vasily Arkhipov countermanded his order to fire nuclear-tipped torpedos when Russian submarines were attacked by US
destroyers near Kennedy's "quarantine" line. Had he done it, only our imagination can speculate what might have followed and
whether planet earth, or at least a big part of it, would have survived.
AT: Solves Soft Power
United States soft power in Latin America empirically fails
Brand et al 12 (Brand, Alexander, Lecturer and Post-Doc Researcher at the Department of
Political Science at the University of Mainz, Susan McEwan-Fial, Lecturer at the Department of
Political Science at the University of Mainz, Wolfgang Muno, Visiting Professor of Political
Science at the University of Erfurt, and Andrea Ribeiro Hoffmann, Lecturer at the Willy Brandt
School of Public Policy, University of Erfurt, 2012. “BRICs and U.S. Hegemony: Theoretical
Reflections on Shifting Power Patterns and Empirical Evidence from Latin America.” Mainz
Papers on International and European Politics, 2012/04. Mainz: Chair of International
Relations, Johannes Gutenberg University, Google Scholar, https://international.politics.unimainz.de/files/2012/10/mpiep04.pdf)//HAL
Soft Power Dynamics “Soft power”, as described above, might be related to conscious public diplomacy
efforts as well as to an externally ascribed attractiveness. In terms of public diplomacy, the U.S. has not
prioritized its outreach to Latin America throughout the last decade. The first visit abroad by
then-President George W. Bush led him to Mexico, in February 2001, which was seen as a symbolic
visit showing high esteem for Latin America and was the first of several visits in the region (Crandall 2008). But
soon, interest faded and other problems and regions were of higher priority. Obama, besides
summit meetings in Guadalajara, Mexico (NAFTA) and Port of Spain and Cartagena (Summit of
the Americas) just visited Mexico in 2009 and Brazil, Chile and El Salvador in March 2011. His
“charm offensives” at the Summit 2009 in Port of Spain, where he declared a new era of “partnership among equals” was
widely esteemed in Latin America, but was only a temporary exception. Additionally, the U.S. is, to
say the least, not at the forefront of institutional innovation in the region, so it might be more
elucidating to look for the level of attractiveness ascribed to the U.S. in the eyes of Latin
American societies.
United States soft power terminally unsustainable—China and Brazilian soft
power has filled the gap
Brand et al 12 – Alexander, Lecturer and Post-Doc Researcher at the Department of Political
Science at the University of Mainz, Susan McEwan-Fial, Lecturer at the Department of Political
Science at the University of Mainz, Wolfgang Muno, Visiting Professor of Political Science at the
University of Erfurt, and Andrea Ribeiro Hoffmann, Lecturer at the Willy Brandt School of
Public Policy, University of Erfurt, 2012. (“BRICs and U.S. Hegemony: Theoretical Reflections
on Shifting Power Patterns and Empirical Evidence from Latin America.” Mainz Papers on
International and European Politics, 2012/04. Mainz: Chair of International Relations,
Johannes Gutenberg University, Google Scholar, https://international.politics.unimainz.de/files/2012/10/mpiep04.pdf)//HAL
Again, since U.S. “soft power” in the region today might not be directly related to U.S. foreign and
regional policies or resulting from such policies in the first place, it seems interesting to look for activities of
China and Brazil in this regard. Since Hu’s promotion of soft power in 2007, Chinese scholars and officials have debated the exact
definitions of soft power. 16 In line with an emerging strategy, Chinese leaders have expanded their ties
with Latin America. For example, Chinese leaders and their Latin American counterparts have
often exchanged visits during the past ten years. During his time in power, Hu Jintao has visited the continent four
times, while his assumed successor, Xi Jinping visited the region in 2009 and 2011. By 2008, Chinese leaders had visited
19 Latin American countries and 74 Latin American leaders had visited China (Jiang 2011: 43).
Aside from this, China is trying to build up its image through the establishment of language
institutes, Spanish-speaking television, the sponsoring of student exchange programs and its
general image of a successful developing country. All the same, China’s soft power in Latin America remains
limited despite China’s efforts to raise its cultural profile in Latin America due to language and distance issues. For example, by 2011,
China had established over 20 Confucius institutes throughout the region to promote the study of Chinese language and culture
(Hanban 2012). Moreover, in September 2011 China, in partnership with the OAS, began to offer scholarships for students to study
in China. In addition, the China Scholarship Council has recruiting offices throughout Latin America (Bliss 2009). It also funded the
OAS/CARICOM Electoral Observation in Haiti (CARICOM 2011). China has also established CCTV in Spanish, broadcasting
throughout the region. Furthermore, it has just established a new program out of Washington called Americas Now, which features
reports from throughout Latin America and the U.S. (FT 2012b). China has also made countries such as Cuba,
Argentina, Mexico, Brazil, Chile, Peru and Venezuela approved destinations for tourism (Bliss
2009). However, unlike the U.S., exchanges and immigration to and from Latin America remain limited for a number of reasons,
including distance and lack of historical connections. In terms of international education, neither China nor Latin America
constitute a top priority for students of these two regions. According to the China Scholarship Council, the top destinations for
Chinese students in 2009 were the U.S., Australia, the U.K., South Korea, Japan, Canada, Singapore, New Zealand, France and
Russia (IEE 2012). The main sources for foreign students in China in 2009 was South Korea, the U.S., Japan, Vietnam, Thailand,
Russia, India, Indonesia, Kazakhstan, and Pakistan (ibid.). Hence, no Latin American country appears on the list as a primary origin
for foreign students in China. Thus, in comparison to the outflow of Latin American students to the U.S., China still pales in
comparison. Where China has been more successful is the general perception that China will be a
great power. As Ellis argues, this pull of China’s potential gives the country another kind soft power that is harder to quantify
(Ellis 2011a: 85). In the Pew Global Attitudes Survey of 2011, 53% polled in Mexico saw China as either having replaced or will
replace the U.S. over as a global superpower. The percentage in Brazil was 37% (PEW 2011). However, despite China’s efforts to raise
its profile in Latin America, public perception is mixed. For example, disputes have arisen in countries such as Peru over
compensation and the environment (Bliss 2009: 61). The Pew survey demonstrates the range in attitudes concerning China with
Southern Cone countries like Brazil generally more favorable to China at 49% in 2011, down from 52% in 2010 (PEW 2011). A
country such as Mexico which does not benefit as much economically from the relationship only had a favorability rating towards
China of 39% in both 2010 and 2011 (ibid.). This lag in soft power has been acknowledged by Chinese Latin American experts (Sun
2010). It seems that so far, China has not been able to “charm” Latin America. Burges defines Brazilian activism as a
leadership project based on the concept of consensual hegemony, in which “the central idea is
the construction of a structural vision, or hegemony, 16 See Glaser/Murphy (2009) for a discussion on this
subject. The Chinese tend to fold public diplomacy into soft power (see Shambaugh 2011). However for the sake of analytical clarity,
this analysis will consider institutional power as separate from soft power. 17BRICs and U.S. Hegemony: Shifting Power Patterns
and Empirical Evidence from Latin America that specifically includes the nominally subordinate, engaging in a process of dialogue
and interaction that causes the subordinate parties to appropriate and absorb the substance and requisites of the hegemony as their
own”, without relying on force (Burges 2008: 65). The data presented in this paper is in line with the argument advanced by authors
working on Brazilian leadership that the country cannot perform the traditional, i.e. military and economic types of hegemony given
its relative capabilities limitations and the domestic instability derived from economic inequality and young democratic regime
(Lima/Hirst 2006; Malamud 2009; Vieira 2011). In this sense, the concept of consensual hegemony, which
corresponds to a large extent with the concept of soft power as defined in this paper, fulfills the
gap to understand Brazilian role in Latin America, or rather, South America. A combination of
mostly soft power with institutional activism seems to sustain the Brazilian claim for leadership .
Some leverage of military and economic power contributes to support that claim, but they are not enough to consolidate a
hegemonic role for Brazil in South America. If Brazil wanted to present itself as a rival to the U.S. or perhaps China in the future,
“soft power” is a central concept. The content of this soft power strategy does not include traditional cultural policies such as media
and the creation of cultural institutes abroad. This has been seen by some diplomats as a handicap, and proposals to explore it more
thoroughly are being currently discussed. The Brazilian diplomat Edgar Telles Ribeiro argues for a revision of the lack of a more
strategic cultural foreign policy, asking if “the international insertion of the country would not benefit from -as an additional
element, and in light of the experience of developed countries . . . , a cultural engagement abroad characterized by more substance,
continuity and comprehensiveness” (Ribeiro 2011: 88). As for state visits, the number is extremely high, especially in comparison
with the U.S. and China. South American presidents and lower ranks visit themselves regularly both bilaterally and multilaterally in
the context of Mercosur and UNASUR for instance. Academic exchange is also common both at the student and staff level. Brazilian
universities are no competitors to their U.S. counterparts for South American students, but there is a certain flow given better
structural conditions. The data for Latin American immigrants in Brazil show an increase from 1960 (63.474) to 1991 (118.606) to
2000 (144.528). According to Marques and Lima (2011), the expectation for the demographic census of 2012 is that of a further
increase. As for the nationalities, the pattern remained stable over the years, in 2000 the first group was of Argentinean origin
(21,4%), followed by Paraguayans (18,6%) and Uruguayans (16%). The soft power approach pursued by Brazil so
far has consisted rather in the very promotion of a debate on the legitimacy of the international
order and the demand for a more consensual, democratic, legitimate international order. To the
extent that the criticism of the contemporary status quo is based on the claim of the unfair, disproportional and asymmetric position
of Western powers in general, and the U.S. in particular, the Brazilian leadership project is based on a competition with the U.S. role
in the region. However, the substantive priorities of the Brazilian foreign policy are not that divergent from that of the U.S.; the
problem is distributive rather than substantive. As already mentioned, the central pillars of Brazilian foreign policy are a preference
of diplomatic settlement of disputes, the respect of international law, sovereignty, non-intervention and multilateralism. The
promotion of democracy and human rights has become a priority since democratization and
central to the present administration of Dilma Roussef. Except for Brazil’s resistance against
concepts regarding responsibility to protect and preventive intervention, these are actually quite
Western pillars and priorities. The contradiction between these aims might pose a challenge to Brazilian foreign policy
and its hegemonic bid (Santiso 2003; Ribeiro Hoffmann 2011), and this inconsistency might undermine the soft power approach,
but so far, it has contributed to the perceived legitimacy of its hegemony in South America.
U.S. legitimacy is resilient and will recover
Kagan, 06 (Robert, senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, The
Washington Post, 1/15,
http://www.carnegieendowment.org/publications/index.cfm?fa=view&id=17894&prog=zgp&pr
oj=zusr)
This does not mean the United States has not suffered a relative decline in that intangible but
important commodity: legitimacy. A combination of shifting geopolitical realities, difficult
circumstances and some inept policy has certainly damaged America's standing in the world.
Yet, despite everything, the American position in the world has not deteriorated as much as
people think. America still "stands alone as the world's indispensable nation," as Clinton so
humbly put it in 1997. It can resume an effective leadership role in the world in fairly short
order, even during the present administration and certainly after the 2008 election, regardless
of which party wins. That is a good thing, because given the growing dangers in the world, the
intelligent and effective exercise of America's benevolent global hegemony is as important as
ever.
AT: Solves Terrorism
US Heg in Latin America doesn't prevent terrorism and only trains dictators to kill
their own people in the name of supporting the US
Emerson, 10 – PhD from the ANU School of Social Sciences, studied Communication
Design in Melbourne, before moving to Canberra to study International Relations at the ANU in
2006, he has studied in Mexico and Chile, and is currently associated with the Australian
National Centre for Latin American Studies (ANCLAS), at the ANU (Guy, “Radical Neglect? The
“War on Terror” and Latin America,” LATIN AMERICAN POLITICS AND SOCIETY, Volume
52, Issue 1, pages 33–62, Spring 2010, March 8th, 2010, JSTOR)//HAL
After a brief drop in 2001, U.S. military spending in Latin America has increased significantly (figure 1).
Beginning in the period 2005–2007, 5 countries in the region were among the top 20 global recipients of
U.S. military assistance (Just the Facts 2007).10 In addition, between 2001 and 2005, 85,820 Latin American soldiers were
trained in the United States. This compares with the 61,000 soldiers and police trained by the infamous School of the Americas
between 1946 and 2000 (Tokatlian 2008). The justification for the increase in spending was made through
reference to the “War on Terror.” Southcom Commander General James Hill declared, “as with every other combatant
commander, the war on terrorism is my number one priority” (cited by Ciponline 2004, 3). Additionally, in his 2004 Posture
Statement, General Hill asserted that “terrorists throughout the Southern Command area of
responsibility bomb, murder, kidnap, traffic drugs, transfer arms, launder money, and smuggle
humans” (cited by Ciponline 2004, 3). These statements have had direct policy implications. Dubbed “effective
sovereignty,” the policy promoted by the Pentagon contends that U.S. national security is
threatened by Latin American governments’ failure to exercise control over the vast
“ungoverned spaces” within their borders. As General Hill explained in March 2003, “today’s foe is the terrorist, the
narcotrafficker, the arms trafficker, the document forger. . . . This threat is a weed that is planted, grown and nurtured in the fertile
ground of ungoverned spaces such as coastlines, rivers and unpopulated border areas” (Hill 2003). This policy position was
reinforced by then–secretary of defense Donald Rumsfeld. “Terrorists and transnational criminals,” he
remarked, “often find shelter in border regions or areas beyond the effective reach of
government. They watch, they probe, looking for areas of vulnerability, for weaknesses, and for
seams in our collective security arrangements that they can try to exploit” (cited by Isacson 2005).
These statements paint Latin America as a “soft underbelly” for the terrorist group Al-Qaeda to
mount attacks on the continental United States (Steinitz 2003). Viewed from a historical perspective, the policy of
“effective sovereignty” is the latest version of the “internal enemy” threat circulated during the Cold War. Part of the U.S.
national security doctrine to combat local communism in Latin America, defense against the
internal enemy had two intertwined components: military training and the teaching of the
national security doctrine (Wright 2007). In addition to a quantitative increase in operational training, the teaching of the
national security doctrine qualitatively reoriented military training by situating the internal enemy as the chief threat to national
security. This
new method of training had dangerous repercussions . Military dictatorships in
the region appropriated the language of the “internal enemy” and expanded it to include unions,
opposition party leaders, human rights defenders, journalists, authors, and leftist intellectuals,
and to justify the censure of democratic institutions (Tokatlian 2008; Isacson 2005). While this threat is less
apparent today, the policy of “effective sovereignty” sets a dangerous precedent in Latin America. At
its most fundamental, “effective sovereignty” establishes the ideological and physical tools
necessary for regional militaries to undermine civilian authorities (Lobe 2004; Isacson 2005). Central to
this danger is the risk of politicizing the armed forces by widening their responsibility to fight- ing crime or other roles that civilians
can perform. The monopoly the military develops on the use of force (or the threat of force) means
that when it disagrees with the civilian consensus there is a heightened possibility of violence
(Ciponline 2004). This line has further blurred as Southcom, traditionally a trainer of defense personnel, has envisaged a greater
role for itself in the training of regional police forces (Ciponline 2008).11 The application of the “War on Terror”
paradigm through “effective sovereignty” strengthens the military, security, and intelligence
forces that have historically posed a danger to democracy while also weakening civilian and
democratic institutions (Diamint 2004). Far from acting as a new paradigm, however, the invocation of “effective
sovereignty” and the repoliticization of the “internal enemy” reflect a continuity of logic between
the “War on Terror” and previous Cold War approaches. Just as the “internal enemy” historically provided a
justification for continued U.S. involvement in military and political bodies throughout Latin America, so does “effective
sovereignty” today. This continuity is illustrated in reference to the War on Drugs and Plan Colombia, in which the purported new
security discourse associated with the “War on Terror” appears to be based firmly in an old threat analysis.
Zero risk of nuclear terrorism
Chapman 12 5/22, *Stephen Chapman is a columnist and editorial writer for the Chicago Tribune, “CHAPMAN: Nuclear
terrorism unlikely,” http://www.oaoa.com/articles/chapman-87719-nuclear-terrorism.html, AJ
Ever since Sept. 11, 2001, Americans have had to live with the knowledge that
the next time the
terrorists strike, it could be not with airplanes capable of killing thousands but atomic bombs
capable of killing hundreds of thousands. The prospect has created a sense of profound
vulnerability. It has shaped our view of government policies aimed at combating terrorism (filtered through Jack Bauer). It
helped mobilize support for the Iraq war. Why are we worried? Bomb designs can be found on the Internet. Fissile
material may be smuggled out of Russia. Iran, a longtime sponsor of terrorist groups, is trying to acquire nuclear weapons. A
layperson may figure it’s only a matter of time before the unimaginable comes to pass. Harvard’s Graham Allison, in his book
“Nuclear Terrorism,” concludes, “On the current course, nuclear terrorism is inevitable.” But remember: After Sept. 11, 2001,
we all thought more attacks were a certainty. Yet al-Qaida and its ideological kin have proved
unable to mount a second strike. Given their inability to do something simple — say, shoot
up a shopping mall or set off a truck bomb — it’s reasonable to ask whether they have a chance
at something much more ambitious. Far from being plausible, argued Ohio State University professor
John Mueller in a presentation at the University of Chicago, “the likelihood that a terrorist group will
come up with an atomic bomb seems to be vanishingly small.” The events required to
make that happen comprise a multitude of Herculean tasks. First, a terrorist group has to get a
bomb or fissile material, perhaps from Russia’s inventory of decommissioned warheads. If that
were easy, one would have already gone missing. Besides, those devices are probably no longer a
danger, since weapons that are not maintained quickly become what one expert calls
“radioactive scrap metal.” If terrorists were able to steal a Pakistani bomb, they would still have
to defeat the arming codes and other safeguards designed to prevent unauthorized use. As for
Iran, no nuclear state has ever given a bomb to an ally — for reasons even the Iranians can
grasp. Stealing some 100 pounds of bomb fuel would require help from rogue individuals inside
some government who are prepared to jeopardize their own lives. Then comes the task of
building a bomb. It’s not something you can gin up with spare parts and power tools in your
garage. It requires millions of dollars, a safe haven and advanced equipment — plus people with
specialized skills, lots of time and a willingness to die for the cause. Assuming the jihadists vault
over those Himalayas, they would have to deliver the weapon onto American soil. Sure, drug
smugglers bring in contraband all the time — but seeking their help would confront the plotters
with possible exposure or extortion. This, like every other step in the entire process, means
expanding the circle of people who know what’s going on, multiplying the chance someone will
blab, back out or screw up. That has heartening implications. If al-Qaida embarks on the
project, it has only a minuscule chance of seeing it bear fruit. Given the formidable odds, it
probably won’t bother. None of this means we should stop trying to minimize the risk by securing nuclear stockpiles,
monitoring terrorist communications and improving port screening. But it offers good reason to think that in this
war, it appears, the worst eventuality is one that will never happen.
*** LA HEG GOOD
Sustainable – 2AC
Maintaining hegemonic influence in Latin America is still possible – indicators of
decline are exaggerated
Duddy, 13 (Patrick, U.S. ambassador to Venezuela from 2007 until 2010 and is currently
visiting senior lecturer at Duke University, and Frank O. Mora, incoming director of the Latin
American and Caribbean Center, Florida International University, and former deputy assistant
secretary of Defense, Western Hemisphere, “Latin America: Is U.S. influence waning?;
WESTERN HEMISPHERE,” The Miami Herald, 5/1/13, lexis, Tashma)
As President Obama travels to Mexico and Costa Rica, it’s likely the pundits will once again underscore what some
perceive to be the eroding influence of the United States in the Western Hemisphere. Some will point to
the decline in foreign aid or the absence of an overarching policy with an inspiring moniker like “Alliance for Progress” or
“Enterprise Area of the Americas” as evidence that the United States is failing to embrace the opportunities of a region that is more
important to this country than ever. The reality is a lot more complicated. Forty-two percent of all U.S.
exports flow to the Western Hemisphere. In many ways, U.S. engagement in the Americas is
more pervasive than ever , even if more diffused. That is in part because the peoples of the Western Hemisphere are
not waiting for governments to choreograph their interactions. A more-nuanced assessment inevitably will highlight the complex,
multidimensional ties between the United States and the rest of the hemisphere. In fact, it may be that we need to change the way we
think and talk about the countries of Latin America and the Caribbean. We also need to resist the temptation to embrace overly
reductive yardsticks for judging our standing in the hemisphere. As Moises Naim notes in his recent book, The End of Power, there
has been an important change in power distribution in the world away from states toward an expanding and increasingly mobile set
of actors that are dramatically shaping the nature and scope of global relationships. In Latin America, many of the most substantive
and dynamic forms of engagement are occurring in a web of cross-national relationships involving small and large companies,
people-to-people contact through student exchanges and social media, travel and migration. Trade and investment
remain the most enduring and measurable dimensions of U.S. relations with the region. It is certainly the
case that our economic interests alone would justify more U.S. attention to the region. Many observers who worry about
declining U.S. influence in this area point to the rise of trade with China and the presence of European
companies and investors. While it is true that other countries are important to the economies of Latin America and the
Caribbean, it is also still true that the United States is by far the largest and most important economic
partner of the region and trade is growing even with those countries with which we do not have free trade agreements. An
area of immense importance to regional economies that we often overlook is the exponential growth in travel, tourism and
migration. It is commonplace to note the enormous presence of foreign students in the United States but in 2011, according to the
Institute of International Education, after Europe, Latin America was the second most popular destination for U.S. university
students. Hundreds of thousands of U.S. tourists travel every year to Latin America and the Caribbean helping to support thousands
of jobs. From 2006-2011 U.S. non-government organizations, such as churches, think tanks and universities increased
the number of partnerships with their regional cohorts by a factor of four. Remittances to Latin
America and the Caribbean from the United States totaled $64 billion in 2012. Particularly for the smaller
economies of Central America and the Caribbean these flows can sometimes constitute more than 10 percent of gross domestic
product. Finally, one
should not underestimate the resiliency of U.S. soft power in the region. The
reputation, popular culture, values and institutions continues to contribute to
U.S. influence in ways that are difficult to measure and impossible to quantify. Example: Despite 14 years of
power of national
strident anti-American rhetoric during the Chávez government, tens of thousand of Venezuelans apply for U.S. nonimmigrant visas
every year, including many thousands of Chávez loyalists.
The U.S. can maintain hegemonic influence in Latin America if it plays its cards
right – immediate action is key
Valencia, 11 (Robert, COHA Research Fellow, “After Bin Laden’s Demise, Are U.S.-Latin
American Relations At Bay Again?,” Council on Hemispheric Affairs, 5/20/11,
http://www.coha.org/after-bin-ladens-demise-are-u-s-latin-american-relations-at-bay-again/,
Tashma)
Nevertheless, President Obama attempted to warm relations with Latin America in the early months of
his administration. Case in point: Sixty days after being sworn in, he attended the fifth Summit of the Americas in Trinidad
and Tobago, stating that the meeting offered “the opportunity of a new beginning” for the Americas, even expressing opposition to
the military coup in Honduras. Most recently, Obama eased travel restrictions to Cuba and planned a trip to South America,
traveling to Brazil, Chile, and El Salvador—even in the midst of the Libyan crisis—leading some to believe that he might continue
forward with his regional initiatives. However, U.S.
commitment to Latin America will hardly face the
burden of proof in the years to come. The Obama administration must choose wisely in their replacement of Arturo
Valenzuela, who recently stepped down as the U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for Western Hemisphere Affairs after a somewhat
lackluster tenure in that position. In addition, U.S. trade deals with permanently violent Colombia and eternally corrupt Panama will
be voted on by Congress and the Obama administration in August. This will result in a long overdue endorsement that will, for many
Colombians, seal a pledge to Washington’s most strategic ally in South America. Some of the administration’s critics argue that,
almost conspiratorially, the U.S. is far more interested in sweeping Bogotá’s human rights ­­­derelictions under the rug in order to
get ahead with its free trade wishes with Colombia. It seems as though America’s economic interests trump its desire to carry out a
good faith examination of Colombia’s chronically spotty human rights performance in order to resolve the matter honestly. Also, the
most urgent issue for the United States, when it comes to Mexico, Central America, and Colombia, is the war on drugs. In addition to
the long-running Plan Colombia funding, the U.S. has pledged the disbursement of the Merida Initiative budget, allocated for USD
1.6 billion, to Mexican and Central American authorities attempting to control drug smuggling into the United States . In this
post-bin Laden era, President Obama must not only mend fences with the Middle East and capitalize global efforts
with current and emerging powers, but must also overcome the stigma that correlates Latin America with a
long-broken fixture swinging in the United States’ perennial “backyard.” He can begin to do so by
extending a brand of prosperity and security that is more false than true, which will in turn
continue to distress the United States with socioeconomic strife along the immediate borders of the
region.
Sustainable – Economic Influence
The U.S. still has economic dominance over the region – China is a small
challenger
Sabatini, 13 (Christopher, Editor in Chief of Americas Quarterly and Senior Director of Policy
at the Americas Society and the Council of the Americas, “WILL LATIN AMERICA MISS U.S.
HEGEMONY?,” Journal of International Affairs, Volume 66, Issue 2, Spring 2013, pg. 1-XVI,
Proquest, Tashma)
If the economic influence of the United States has declined in the region, however, its long-term
power - economic and political - remains. The attention on China's historic economic
presence in the hemisphere has overlooked the United States' continued economic dominance
in the region, both in terms of its trade and the value of its market. In 2011, trade between the United States,
Latin America, and the Caribbean totaled $800 billion, and the volume of overall Latin
American trade with the United States is still greater than with China - and much of that is in manufactured
goods.13 The goods China consumes from Latin America are primarily commodities - with little value added. At the same time,
Chinese manufactured exports - many of them made with the commodities produced by the region - compete directly on the global
market with higher end goods produced by Brazil and other emerging economies in the region.14
Sustainable – Military Power
US hardpower in Latin America is high-basing and regional security
agreements
Brand et al 12, Alexander Brand is Lecturer and Post-Doc Researcher at the Department of
Political Science at the University of Mainz.Susan McEwen-Fial is Lecturer at the Department of
Political Science at the University of Mainz. Wolfgang Muno is Visiting Professor of Political
Science at the University of Erfurt. Andrea Ribeiro Hoffmann is Lecturer at the Willy Brandt
School of Public Policy, University of Erfurt. (04/2012, “BRICs and U.S. Hegemony: Theoretical
Reflections on Shifting Power Patterns and Empirical Evidence from Latin America”,Mainz
Papers on International and European Politics (MPIEP) Paper No. 4,
http://international.politics.uni-mainz.de/files/2012/10/mpiep04.pdf,jj)
Additionally, the
United States is the only non-regional country with a permanent military¶ presence in
Latin America. According to official Pentagon data, there is active military personnel in every Latin
American country, in sum about 2.000 soldiers (USDOD 2012). The most¶ important bases are Guantánamo in Cuba and
Soto Cano Air Base in Honduras. Until recently,¶ Manta Air Base in Ecuador was very important, too. In 1999, the U.S. signed an
agreement¶ with Ecuador for a ten-year-lease of facilities at Manta airport. The leftwing government under¶ Corrales did not extend
this lease, so it ran out in 2009. Currently, a new air base in Colombia,¶ Palanquero, serves as a substitute for
Manta. Six
more bases are planned in Colombia. Additionally, so-called “forward operations locations”
in El¶ Salvador, Puerto Rico, Peru, Costa Rica, Aruba and Curaçao
(see Lemoine 2010; Salazar 2011).¶ Another important military asset is the reestablishment of the Fourth
Fleet in 2008 after 58¶ years, seated in Miami and responsible in particular for the Caribbean Sea.¶ The military presence
is complemented by several security treaties and initiatives like the¶ Plan Colombia, the Andean
Regional Initiative, the Mérida Initiative and the Central American¶ Security Initiative (see
Kurz/Muno 2005; Hoffmann 2008). These security initiatives secured¶ military influence through financial
military aid. Colombia received about $ 5 billion during¶ the 10 years of Plan Colombia from 1999 until 2009. $ 1.6 billion were
(which is a euphemism for base) exist
authorized by the U.S.¶ Congress for the first three years of the Mérida Initiative for Mexico, Central America, Haiti and¶ the
Dominican Republic.¶ For decades, the legitimation of the military presence in Latin America had been the fight¶ against
communism. After the breakdown of communism and the end of the Cold War, the¶ War on Drugs has
replaced anti-communism as the main rationale of U.S. security policy in¶ the region (see Crandall
2008). Three sub-regional units can be differentiated in the War on¶ Drugs: the source-countries producing cocaine in the Andes,
especially Colombia and Bolivia,¶ the transit countries in the Caribbean, Central America, and Mexico (including Venezuela), and ¶
the remote countries in the Southern Cone and Brazil, which are less affected.¶ To sum up, the U.S. is the only non-Latin
American country with a permanent military presence in the region. This military presence gives
the United States the capabilities to intervene at¶ any time in any Latin American country, at
least through air strikes. The most important security¶ issue is the War on Drugs. The transit countries near the U.S.-border
and the source countries¶ in the Andes are the main targets and/or cooperation partners, the more southern countries are¶ less
affected.
Sustainable – Soft Power
U.S. soft power is on the rise and sustainable in Latin America
Sabatini, 13 (Christopher, Editor in Chief of Americas Quarterly and Senior Director of Policy
at the Americas Society and the Council of the Americas, “WILL LATIN AMERICA MISS U.S.
HEGEMONY?,” Journal of International Affairs, Volume 66, Issue 2, Spring 2013, pg. 1-XVI,
Proquest, Tashma)
Here, we turn to the last two provocative sources of soft power: moral leadership and aspirational leadership. While the United
States may have cloaked national interests in the rhetoric of shared principles, there have been
times - such as those discussed earlier - when its actions have helped to ensure positive political change
and the reinforcement of human rights norms and standards in the region. The call of a common
history, of democratic independence, and of a shared commitment to government by the people, while hard to quantify,
remains powerful. Even those who have established themselves as opposed to U.S. influence and
democracy, such as Presidents Chavez and Morales, defined their movements and governments as
expressions of democratic participation and inclusion in the region. And as the United States
advances its own processes of democratic inclusion - in areas of race, gender, or sexual orientation - its efforts
remain an inspiration and source of support for citizens in these countries. U.S. leadership on
issues of civil rights, gender equality, and more recently lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) rights
have helped to give voice to once-discriminated groups and have pressured governments directly and indirectly
into addressing those concerns. Similarly, the aspirational aspect of U.S. power remains strong.
Whether it is the desire to immigrate to seek work or to pursue higher education in the United States, the ineffable allure of
the "colossus of the north" remains important. And, as personal ties between the United States and
Latin America grow - through immigration, culture, education, and integration - so too will the
importance of people's sense of personal and cultural connection to the United States. However, neither
democracy nor the personal or educational ties should be goals of U.S. foreign policy. Too often, these ties have obscured the real
interests of the United States that have led to moments of false unity and optimism, which have skewed U.S. policy. The problem is
that the U.S. government often refers to ideas of democratic government, educational quality, and inclusion as goals of foreign
policy. They are not. Rather, the values and examples of the United States are tools of diplomacy;
today they
are undervalued in the public discussion of the U.S. role in the region, but they remain strong.
Sustainable – AT: Chinese Influence
US heg isn’t threatened in Latin America-China is only pursuing
peaceful ventures
Hilton 13, a London-based writer and broadcaster. She was ¶ formerly Latin America editor
of The Independent newspaper and ¶ is editor of www.chinadialogue.net, a non-profit
Chinese/English ¶ platform for environmental and climate change news and analysis. ¶ Set up in
2006, chinadialogue promotes just and equitable solutions ¶ to shared problems through highquality, reliable information (Isabel,”China in Latin America: Hegemonic challenge?”;
http://www.peacebuilding.no/var/ezflow_site/storage/original/application/26ff1a0cc3c0b6d5
692c8afbc054aad9.pdf)
The United States is Latin America’s traditional hegemonic power, but China’s influence in the ¶ region is large and growing. How far
does China’s presence in the U.S. backyard represent a ¶ hegemonic challenge? China is important in the region as a buyer of Latin
American resources, ¶ primarily from four countries, an important investor and an exporter of manufactured goods. ¶ The impact of
China’s activities varies in degree from country to country. In several countries ¶ local manufacturing has suffered from cheaper
Chinese imports; several countries have benefited from Chinese demand for resources, others from large investments, and China is
having ¶ an important impact on the region’s infrastructure. The risks to the region include resource ¶ curse, distorted development
and environmental degradation due to a lowering of environmental and social standards. Despite its significant economic presence,
China has been careful ¶ to keep a low political and diplomatic profile to avoid antagonising the
U.S. and to maintain a ¶ benign environment for its economic activities. Chinese support, however, has been
important ¶ for partners, such as Cuba and Venezuela, that do not enjoy good relations with the U.S. So far ¶ the two powers
have sought cooperation rather than confrontation, but rising tensions with U.S. ¶ allies Japan and Vietnam could
have repercussions in Latin America if China feels the U.S. is ¶ becoming too assertive in its own East Asian backyard.¶ Introduction¶
Ever since President James Monroe’s 1823 declaration that ¶ European powers must respect the western hemisphere as ¶ the
U.S. sphere of influence, the
United States has been the ¶ dominant economic, political and military
power in Latin America. As such, it has faced a series of challengers, from ¶ Nazi Germany to the Soviet Union and Japan.
In the last ¶ two decades, the rise of the People’s Republic of China ¶ (PRC) has been reshaping the politics and economics of the ¶
region. How far has the PRC become the new hegemonic ¶ challenger?¶ China has not sought a strategic
confrontation with the United States in Latin America, as the USSR did in the Cold ¶ War. However, against the
background of U.S.–China rivalry ¶ and potential confrontation over such issues as Taiwan, ¶ this could change in the future. In the
meantime, China’s economic weight offers its Latin American partners a new ¶ freedom to defy U.S. interests, should they choose to.
China can’t fully challenge U.S. influence in the region – several developments
make hegemonic control over Latin America sustainable
Purcell, 11 (Susan Kaufman, director of the Center for Hemispheric Policy at the University of
Miami, “What Hugo Chávez’s illness means for U.S., China; LATIN AMERICA,” The Miami
Herald, 12/13/11, lexis, Tashma)
China had expected to continue increasing its influence in Latin America at the expense of that of
the United States. Chávez also regarded the United States as a declining power in the Western
Hemisphere and China, as a rising power. He believed that U.S. weakness would facilitate his efforts to become the
dominant force in an increasingly anti-American region. Instead, Chávez’s illness has caused his ideological allies,
most of whom belong to the Chávez-led ALBA group of countries, to begin hedging their bets by improving their
damaged relationship with the United States. Furthermore, the United States has begun to promote a
Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), which would ultimately link the Pacific Coast countries of the
Western Hemisphere with those of the Asia-Pacific in order to increase Pacific Basin trade and security and help
offset China’s influence in Asia and Latin America. Prior to falling ill, the Venezuelan president had used his oil
wealth to help elect and sustain a number of leftist presidents who had happily joined Chávez in challenging U.S. involvement in the
region while supporting China’s growing influence there. Bolivia and Ecuador, as well as Venezuela itself, expelled their U.S.
ambassadors. Ecuador also refused to renew the U.S. base in Manta, and Venezuela and Bolivia expelled U.S. drug enforcement
agents from their countries. To varying degrees, they also pursued policies that challenged U.S. private investments in the region.
Chávez’s announcement that he had cancer caused his allies to conclude that if Chávez were to die, the chances were good that they
would lose the economic aid they were receiving from him, as well as his protection, since it was unlikely that “chavismo” without
Chávez would survive. It is not surprising, therefore, that as rumors of Chávez’s deteriorating health increased, Bolivia and Ecuador
decided to once again exchange ambassadors with the United States. Even if the rumors of Chávez’s rapidly declining health prove to
be exaggerated, it is unlikely that the ALBA presidents will follow his lead as eagerly as they did before his illness. As a result, the
potential for a more cooperative relationship between these countries and the United States is considerably better than it was before
Chávez’s illness. Washington
also restored some of its lost influence in Latin America by finally
approving the free-trade agreements with Colombia and Panama. A free-trade agreement with South Korea was also
part of the package and constituted an important step in President Obama’s goal of expanding U.S. trade links with the Asia Pacific.
The South Korean agreement was followed shortly thereafter by President Obama’s eight-day trip around the Pacific Rim aimed at
sending the message that the United States is a Pacific power that wants to expand its engagement with the countries of the region.
Washington’s interest involves both economic and security concerns. It wants to expand U.S. trade with the region, as well as signal
to China that it has to play fairly in the global economy. Washington also wants to send a message of reassurance to the Asian
countries that the United States will not reduce its military presence in the Pacific during a period when China is flexing its military
muscles. Washington’s ultimate goal is to join and help expand the incipient Trans-Pacific Partnership. To date, the TPP includes
Chile, New Zealand, Brunei, Singapore, the United States, Australia, Malaysia, Vietnam and Peru. Mexico, Canada, Japan and
Colombia have expressed interest in joining. These recent U.S. efforts to increase trade among countries on both sides of the Pacific
Basin present Latin America’s Pacific coast countries with new opportunities to grow their economies, provided they take the
necessary domestic steps to make their countries more economically competitive. The decision of Chile, Peru, Colombia and Mexico
to create the Alliance of the Pacific, which could become the largest economic bloc in the region, is a good step in this direction.
Finally, both the Latin American and U.S. efforts represent a welcome attempt by North and South America’s Pacific
coast countries to
level the economic playing field with China, to the benefit of the Western Hemisphere as a whole.
China will back down if US wants control of Latin America
Coronel 11 (Gustavo Coronel for the Cato Institute -- Venezuelan representative to
Transparency International from 1996 to 2000. In 1994, he founded Pro Calidad de Vida, an
NGO promoting anti-corruption techniques in government and civic education for children in
Venezuela, Panama, Paraguay, Mexico and Nicaragua -- "Has Venezuela's Chavez Become a
Chinese Puppet in Latin America?" October 10th, 2011 -www.cato.org/publications/commentary/has-venezuelas-chavez-become-chinese-puppet-latinamerica) SM
The main threat to this Chi-Cha link is represented by a change in government in Venezuela, something that seems not only possible
but also probable in the short term. For a new, democratic, government some of the characteristics of the China-Chavez relationship
are clearly not in the national interest and, even, unconstitutional. A new government could denounce this association, endangering
China’s money and objectives in Venezuela. Another obstacle could be the posture of the U.S. regarding the
relationship. In case of strong U.S. objections China might have to downsize it or abandon it
altogether, since the U.S. is clearly more important to China than Venezuela in a geopolitical
sense.
No china takeover
Hilton 13, a London-based writer and broadcaster. She was ¶ formerly Latin America editor of
The Independent newspaper and ¶ is editor of www.chinadialogue.net, a non-profit
Chinese/English ¶ platform for environmental and climate change news and analysis. ¶ Set up in
2006, chinadialogue promotes just and equitable solutions ¶ to shared problems through highquality, reliable information (Isabel,”China in Latin America: Hegemonic challenge?”;
http://www.peacebuilding.no/var/ezflow_site/storage/original/application/26ff1a0cc3c0b6d5
692c8afbc054aad9.pdf)
The United States is Latin America’s traditional hegemonic power, but China’s influence in the ¶ region is large and growing. How far
does China’s presence in the U.S. backyard represent a ¶ hegemonic challenge? China is important in the region as a buyer of Latin
American resources, ¶ primarily from four countries, an important investor and an exporter of manufactured goods. ¶ The impact of
China’s activities varies in degree from country to country. In several countries ¶ local manufacturing has suffered from cheaper
Chinese imports; several countries have benefited from Chinese demand for resources, others from large investments, and China is
having ¶ an important impact on the region’s infrastructure. The risks to the region include resource ¶ curse, distorted development
and environmental degradation due to a lowering of environmental and social standards. Despite its significant economic presence,
China has been careful ¶ to keep a low political and diplomatic profile to avoid antagonising the
U.S. and to maintain a ¶ benign environment for its economic activities. Chinese support, however, has been
important ¶ for partners, such as Cuba and Venezuela, that do not enjoy good relations with the U.S. So far ¶ the two powers
have sought cooperation rather than confrontation, but rising tensions with U.S. ¶ allies Japan and Vietnam could
have repercussions in Latin America if China feels the U.S. is ¶ becoming too assertive in its own East Asian backyard.¶ Introduction¶
Ever since President James Monroe’s 1823 declaration that ¶ European powers must respect the western hemisphere as ¶ the
U.S. sphere of influence, the
United States has been the ¶ dominant economic, political and military
power in Latin America. As such, it has faced a series of challengers, from ¶ Nazi Germany to the Soviet Union and Japan.
In the last ¶ two decades, the rise of the People’s Republic of China ¶ (PRC) has been reshaping the politics and economics of the ¶
region. How far has the PRC become the new hegemonic ¶ challenger?¶ China has not sought a strategic
confrontation with the United States in Latin America, as the USSR did in the Cold ¶ War. However, against the
background of U.S.–China rivalry ¶ and potential confrontation over such issues as Taiwan, ¶ this could change in the future. In the
meantime, China’s economic weight offers its Latin American partners a new ¶ freedom to defy U.S. interests, should they choose to.
No impact to Chinese draw-in Latin America—China is interested in
counter-terrorism and humanitarian aid
Brand et al 12, Alexander Brand is Lecturer and Post-Doc Researcher at the Department of
Political Science at the University of Mainz. Susan McEwen-Fial is Lecturer at the Department
of Political Science at the University of Mainz. Wolfgang Muno is Visiting Professor of Political
Science at the University of Erfurt. Andrea Ribeiro Hoffmann is Lecturer at the Willy Brandt
School of Public Policy, University of Erfurt. (04/2012, “BRICs and U.S. Hegemony: Theoretical
Reflections on Shifting Power Patterns and Empirical Evidence from Latin America”,Mainz
Papers on International and European Politics (MPIEP) Paper No. 4,
http://international.politics.uni-mainz.de/files/2012/10/mpiep04.pdf,jj)
China’s military buildup, including its recent display of its first aircraft carrier, has been¶ subject to great debate among U.S. foreign
policymakers regarding China’s objectives. In the¶ “U.S. backyard” of Latin America China’s military activity has
been relatively limited, although¶ relations have expanded in recent years. China’s White Paper on Latin
America targeted growth¶ in military ties as one of its objectives for the region. 8¶ China has no confirmed physical
military presence in Latin America, although some America¶ security specialists suspect that the Chinese might have
established at least one listening post¶ in Cuba (Horta 2008; Ellis 2011). Furthermore, defense analysts such as Evan Ellis argue
that¶ China will refrain from taking overtly provocative military activities such as establishing
bases¶ in Latin America in order not to appear threatening to the United States (Ellis 2011: 10). On the¶
other hand, it has increased its military exchanges of officers with 18 Latin American countries,¶ including traditional U.S. allies such
as Colombia and Mexico (ibid.: 14). This more personal¶ approach to the military relationship is part of the people to people focus
emphasis on China’s¶ soft power announced by Hu Jintao in 2007. Senior level ministerial visits including visits at¶ the Ministry of
Defense or Chief of Staff levels also increased during 2010 (ibid.: 11). The¶ People’s Liberation Army (PLA) also held joint
counter terrorism exercises with Brazil and a¶ humanitarian exercise with Peru (USDOD 2011).¶ In
terms of sales of military equipment, China has been limited due to quality control issues.¶
Nevertheless, China has sold military weapons to countries such as Venezuela, Ecuador and Bolivia, including K-8 and MA-60
aircraft and radar equipment. It has also sold non-lethal goods¶ such as gloves and winter hats to the Colombian army and tents and
uniforms to countries like¶ Guyana and Jamaica (Ellis 2011: 30). In total, military sales to Latin America comprised approximately
9% of China’s military weapons sales in 2010.9 China has also donated equipment¶ and sent military doctors and personnel to the
region. Thus, China’s military strategy in Latin¶ America follows its low-key attempts to establish
deeper personal and commercial relations as¶ a strategic ally. One area that should be mentioned is the
overlap between military and commercial interests. For example, China is cooperating with Brazil in satellite technology, which can
have¶ dual-use application (Flanagan 2011: 54-55). Furthermore, it is interesting to note the huge¶ presence of telecommunication
companies such as Huawei in Latin America. Suspected to be an¶ arm of the Chinese defense industry and banned from mergers in
the U.S. for national security¶ reasons, Huawei has been particularly successful in winning contracts especially for supplying ¶ cheap
equipment and technology to rural areas in Latin America (Koleski 2011; Kirchgaessner¶ 2011). The success of companies such as
Huawei reflect the interweaving of state and business¶ interests that characterizes China’s development model as the China
Development Bank (CDB),¶ a government policy bank, has extended loans to Huawei in order for the company to offer very ¶ low
credit to its customers (Koleski 2011:12).¶ In conclusion, China’s military footprint has been relatively light,
although increased exchanges of personnel and increased military sales create opportunity for the Chinese military ¶ and the
corresponding defense industry to broaden their reach. It is an area in which relations¶ will undoubtedly continue to expand in the
near future. The Chinese continue to balance their¶ interests in establishing deeper military relationships with the
region with
their interest in a¶ stable relationship with the U.S.
Chinese influence won’t expand --- their economy is just about done growing
Fenby, 11 (Jonathan, China director of the research service Trusted Sources, “China can't - and
won't - save the world,” The Daily Telegraph, 8/6/11, lexis, Tashma)
As the West contemplates a new bout of financial meltdown, the second biggest economy on
Earth might appear to be well placed to ride above the angst ripping through the markets - or even
use its wealth to come to the rescue of the richer world. On the surface, China seems to have many reasons to smile. In the first half
of this year, it registered growth of 9.5 per cent, with exports 24 per cent higher than in the same period of 2010. It sits on a $3
trillion mountain of foreign reserves, and has become the lender of last resort to the US administration. Foreign governments,
meanwhile, have muted criticism of its human rights record: as Hillary Clinton has remarked, "How do you talk tough to your
banker?" The idea of a country in which hundreds of millions are relatively poor riding to the rescue of the West seems paradoxical.
But China's rise has fanned expectations that it is ready to become a "responsible stakeholder", in
the words of World Bank President Robert Zoellick, and play its full role in helping to steer the world economy to safety. Certainly,
China's leaders, in their immaculate business suits, have made clear their disapproval of Western profligacy, shaking their luxuriant
heads of glossy black hair at the failure of the Obama administration and European governments to put their houses in order. And
they have been only too willing to highlight the way in which the People's Republic restored strong growth after the economy
suffered a short-term dip at the end of 2008. Yet the
depressing truth is that China finds itself in a series of
binds which limit its ability - or its willingness - to play the global role that should go with its
economic weight. To some extent, this is due to the nature of the world around it. For instance,
Beijing would like to reduce its dollar holdings, given the greenback's dismal performance. But the Chinese
are far from impressed by the financial management of the eurozone - and there is no other currency
market which can absorb the sums involved. The money is clearly there: indeed, it has been calculated that the monetary reserves of
the People's Republic are big enough for it to buy Italy outright. Moreover, Beijing's leaders have made soothing noises on recent
European visits about buying bonds from beleaguered Mediterranean nations. But the amounts they have put on the table have been
small. China's
investments in Europe remain marginal compared with the sums it spends in
commodity-rich Africa, Latin America and Australia. There is also the question of what China would get out of
intervening. The country surely wants the international financial system to be reformed - but it is far
from clear about what exactly China would like to see in its place. Instead, it contents itself with denouncing
the present set-up as "American hegemony". It has also begun to encourage the use of its own currency, the yuan, in international
trade - but the only result of that, so long as it continues to register a trade surplus and to control the value of its currency, will be to
increase its dollar reserves even further. Equally importantly, China has its own problems to contend with.
Since they pulled themselves out of an economic hole in 2008-9 with a £1.3 trillion programme of credit expansion and
infrastructure spending, the bureaucrats in Beijing have had two great fears. The first is that the effects of that programme,
combined with pressure on food supplies and rising wages, would spawn rampant inflation. The second was that demand for China's
exports would fall as the West went into a doubledip recession. Inflation has, indeed, risen - from the 2 per cent average of
much of the past decade to more than 6 percent this summer. As the Communist Party approaches a wholesale change
in its senior leadership in the autumn of 2012, bringing inflation down to around 4 per cent and staving off popular anger in the
process remains a major target of the government. That means getting a firm handle on the supply of money, which roared out of
control in 2009, with new lending by state banks of $1 trillion. Beijing
also needs to see a decline in the cost of
the raw materials imported to feed its industrial machine. Both goals are undermined by the
quantitative easing pursued by the Federal Reserve in the US, since the result is to boost the
global money supply, some of which feeds into investments in commodities. The snag is that the opposite approach -
austerity à la George Osborne - brings the threat of declining demand for China's exports. And without exports, the Party can't
maintain the growth that has been its main claim to rule since ideology was packed off to the mausoleum with Mao Tse-tung. So
China is caught between a rock and a hard place. It wants to ward off inflation, both for economic reasons and to maintain social
stability. But it needs export markets to stay vibrant at a time when its import bill is at the mercy of commodity prices. There is
also a deeper contradiction at work. What China's rulers want, above all, is to be left alone - to be
able to get on with the job of creating a "moderately prosperous society" by the application of
"scientific socialism" in a one-party state. This means engineering a transition from an economy that depends too
much on exports and on investment in infrastructure and property to one where consumers play a much greater role. Yet China's
entanglement with the rest of the world has been crucial to its expansion since Deng Xiaoping let the market genie out of the Maoist
bottle in the late 1970s. The world's most heavily populated nation needs the rest of the world as a
source of raw materials and a destination for its goods. A serious downturn in the West would
shoot a big hole in the Communist Party's triumphant story in the sensitive run-up to the leadership transition in
2012. The idea that China already rules the world, or is inevitably destined to, has its devotees: a new global poll found that 65 per
cent of Britons believe the People's Republic is set to become the leading superpower, if it has not already done so; the proportion in
the US was 46 per cent and in China 63 per cent. Yet the truth is that, for the past three decades, the country
has had quite an easy ride, overawing foreigners with the sheer speed and scale of its growth while
being welcomed into the global economy because it provided cheap, inflation-curbing goods. That
success story, however, masked China's failure to craft a coherent political or economic global
policy , beyond a few basic core interests such as retaining an open trading system, winning access to commodities, keeping its
currency undervalued and rebuffing critics of its policy in Tibet or Taiwan. The current crisis is likely to highlight the limitations of
this blinkered approach - and the fact that China's leaders will almost certainly prefer to watch the messy game disapprovingly from
the stands, rather than charging on to the pitch and trying to put things right.
Sustainable – AT: New Challengers
US heg unchallenged in Latin America-China and Brazil lack the
material power to counter the US
Brand et al 12, Alexander Brand is Lecturer and Post-Doc Researcher at the Department of
Political Science at the University of Mainz. Susan McEwen-Fial is Lecturer at the Department
of Political Science at the University of Mainz. Wolfgang Muno is Visiting Professor of Political
Science at the University of Erfurt. Andrea Ribeiro Hoffmann is Lecturer at the Willy Brandt
School of Public Policy, University of Erfurt. (04/2012, “BRICs and U.S. Hegemony: Theoretical
Reflections on Shifting Power Patterns and Empirical Evidence from Latin America”,Mainz
Papers on International and European Politics (MPIEP) Paper No. 4,
http://international.politics.uni-mainz.de/files/2012/10/mpiep04.pdf,jj)
China has expanded its regional resource base in economic terms and it has used institutional as well as soft
power instruments to smooth its way towards enhanced economic exchange. In terms of hegemony, however, it
seems to lack most of the ingredients to act as a¶ regional hegemon, especially since most
activities are both modest in size and strictly tied to either narrow economic or narrow
diplomatic goals17; Chinese hegemonic aspirations can hardly¶ be detected in the Latin American
region. Brazil has especially fostered institutional cooperation and presented itself as an alternative to the U.S.; it thus has
signaled at least rhetorically¶ a will to balance U.S. hegemony. However, it lacks the material power base and quite
often –¶ given a lot of similar policy objectives – a de facto will to challenge the U.S. in Latin America as¶ a
whole.
Sustainable – AT: New Organizations
Soft power in Latin America has declined, but it isn’t extinct – new organizations
aren’t functional
Sabatini, 13 (Christopher, Editor in Chief of Americas Quarterly and Senior Director of Policy
at the Americas Society and the Council of the Americas, “WILL LATIN AMERICA MISS U.S.
HEGEMONY?,” Journal of International Affairs, Volume 66, Issue 2, Spring 2013, pg. 1-XVI,
Proquest, Tashma)
Diplomatically, the region has become more contentious for the United States, but a greater willingness to
challenge U.S. positions on drug policy or question the wisdom of its Cuba policy should not be mistaken for broad-based opposition
to the United States. These are legitimate points of debate - as was seen at the 2012 SOA in Cartagena, Colombia. They may require
more diplomatic footwork but they are discussions largely among allies. At the same time, the emergence of the new
subregional groupings such as the Union of South American Nations (UNASUR) and the Community of Latin
American and Caribbean States (CELAC) that pointedly exclude the United States, manifest a desire for the
region to resolve intra-regional issues - including security and human rights - independently of the United
States. But are they up to the task? While ALBA remains a thorn in the side of the United States, even before the
death of Chavez, the Bolivarian Republic's petroleum fueled vote buying had already started to
weaken - especially as countries confronted their own internal challenges. And while UNASUR and
CELAC are ambitious diplomatic initiatives, both remain for now just a roving series of
presidential summits, with no institutional or normative basis or infrastructure.
Impact – China War – 2AC
Failure to force China out of the region destroys U.S. international legitimacy --makes a Taiwan conflict inevitable
Vega, 5 (Juan, J.D. candidate at the University of Minnesota Law School, M.B.A at the
University of Florida, “China's Economic and Political Clout Grows in Latin America at the
Expense of U.S. Interests,” 14 Minn. J. Global Trade 377, Summer 2005, lexis, Tashma)
5. Potential Loss of Political and Logistical Support in the Event of a U.S. Confrontation With China China has made
military moves and arms deals that should raise warning signs in the United States. China has sold
missile technology to Iran and delivered military equipment to Cuba. 170 It also appears that China has set up a permanent
electronic surveillance post in Cuba, just ninety miles from the United States. 171 These actions may be considered political
jockeying. For example, China's sale of military equipment to Cuba may be in retaliation to the United States selling arms to Taiwan.
172 Its electronic surveillance outpost may be a political response to the United States's monitoring of Chinese communications from
its spy planes. A more realistic confrontation may occur in the event of a forceful reunification with Taiwan. China will
continue using its economic power to accomplish [*403] its own political goals. For several decades,
the United States has had treaty obligations to protect Taiwan from mainland aggression. 173 China
prefers a peaceful resolution but says it will use force if necessary to bring back this "renegade province."
174 If the United States decides to stand firm, it may need the backing of Latin American countries
in order to obtain international legitimacy at the United Nations, where China is the only communist country on
the Security Council. It is also likely that China will not be seen as an aggressor and regarded instead as merely reeling in its own
Taiwanese citizens who could be considered outlaws for pushing for secession. The United States, on the other hand, may be
seen as an aggressor meddling in the internal affairs of a sovereign nation, a sovereign nation whose
economic trade is imperative to continued economic growth in Latin America. While a lack of
Latin American political support may hurt the United States, the region's logistical cooperation with China may
prove fatal in the event of a military confrontation with the United States. China may sabotage U.S.
trade in Latin America during a military confrontation and may even pressure Latin American countries
to stop trading in goods that "further" the military efforts of the United States. China has controlled the
flow of goods between the Atlantic and the Pacific Ocean since Hutchinson Whampoa Ltd., a Chinese company, was given control of
both the Atlantic and Pacific ports of the Panama Canal in 1997. 175 Although the United States has the right to protect the canal
pursuant to the treaty it signed with Panama, Panamanian legislators may create laws eliminating such rights. It is conceivable that
Panamanian legislators may request that the Chinese military move into U.S. built bases in order to "protect" the canal; after all, the
Chinese have filled the void left in Cuba when the former Soviet Union pulled out. [*404] As China's need for oil and as its
obsession with reining in Taiwan grows, China's control over the Panama Canal becomes more
important. The Chinese military recently published a book entitled "Liberating Taiwan," detailing a plan to use Chinese
warships to impose oil embargoes on Taiwan, Japan, and on the United States. 176 In the event of such a confrontation the loss of oil
from Latin American countries may prove lethal to the United States. It is with this sense of urgency that the
United States should counter China's growing influence by offering favorable bilateral trade agreements
and reconsidering the wisdom of its agricultural subsidies.
Global nuclear war
Hunkovic 9 – American Military University (Lee J., “The Chinese-Taiwanese Conflict: Possible
Futures of a Confrontation between China, Taiwan and the United States of America,”
http://www.lamp-method.org/eCommons/Hunkovic.pdf)
A war between China, Taiwan and the U nited S tates has the potential to escalate into a nuclear conflict
and a third world war, therefore, many countries other than the primary actors could be affected by such a conflict,
including Japan, both Koreas, Russia, Australia, India and Great Britain, if they were drawn into
the war, as well as all other countries in the world that participate in the global economy, in which
the United States and China are the two most dominant members.
Impact – Democracy – 2AC
Chinese takeover leads to a transition away from democracy in Latin America
Vega, 5 (Juan, J.D. candidate at the University of Minnesota Law School, M.B.A at the
University of Florida, “China's Economic and Political Clout Grows in Latin America at the
Expense of U.S. Interests,” 14 Minn. J. Global Trade 377, Summer 2005, lexis, Tashma)
3. Promotion of Democracy in Latin America One major U.S. interest is the promotion of democracy
throughout Latin America. China is a communist country that considers democracy an
impediment to progress. Some regional and economic experts believe that China will evolve from an authoritarian regime
to a successful democratic society, as did South Korea and Japan. 115 However, the Communist Party is tightening its
grip on Chinese society and it is doubtful that China will truly welcome democratic policies. 116
China had a chance to show the world that it would move towards democracy [*394] when it took control of Hong Kong in 1999, but
instead it chose to curtail democracy by prohibiting elections for certain government positions in Hong Kong. 117 Many Latin
Americans do not want to let the free forces of the market dictate, nor have they seen the
benefits of democracy. 118 Many of them are willing to take their chances with an authoritarian
government. 119 Latin American presidents are frequently forced to resign and are replaced by leftist groups that oppose
globalization. 120 Yet, U.S. administrations have not given enough attention to this disturbing and
growing sentiment. 121
Democracy is key to solve for extinction
Muravchik 1 – Resident Scholar at American Enterprise Institute Joshua, “Democracy and
nuclear peace,” Jul 11, http://www.npec-web.org/syllabi/muravchik.htm
The greatest impetus for world peace -- and perforce of nuclear peace -- is the spread of
democracy. In a famous article, and subsequent book, Francis Fukuyama argued that democracy's extension was leading to "the
end of history." By this he meant the conclusion of man's quest for the right social order, but he also meant the "diminution of the
likelihood of large-scale conflict between states." (1) Fukuyama's phrase was intentionally provocative, even tongue-in-cheek, but he
was pointing to two down-to-earth historical observations: that democracies are more peaceful than other kinds of government and
that the world is growing more democratic. Neither point has gone unchallenged. Only a few decades ago, as distinguished an
observer of international relations as George Kennan made a claim quite contrary to the first of these assertions. Democracies,
he said, were slow to anger, but once aroused "a democracy . . . . fights in anger . . . . to the bitter
end." (2) Kennan's view was strongly influenced by the policy of "unconditional surrender"
pursued in World War II. But subsequent experience, such as the negotiated settlements
America sought in Korea and Vietnam proved him wrong. Democracies are not only slow to
anger but also quick to compromise. And to forgive. Notwithstanding the insistence on unconditional surrender,
America treated Japan and that part of Germany that it occupied with extraordinary generosity. In recent years a burgeoning
literature has discussed the peacefulness of democracies. Indeed the proposition that democracies do not go to
war with one another has been described by one political scientist as being "as close as anything
we have to an empirical law in international relations." (3) Some of those who find enthusiasm for democracy
off-putting have challenged this proposition, but their challenges have only served as empirical tests that have confirmed its
robustness. For example, the academic Paul Gottfried and the columnist-turned-politician Patrick J. Buchanan have both instanced
democratic England's declaration of war against democratic Finland during World War II. (4) In fact, after much procrastination,
England did accede to the pressure of its Soviet ally to declare war against Finland which was allied with Germany. But the
declaration was purely formal: no fighting ensued between England and Finland. Surely this is an exception that proves the rule. The
strongest exception I can think of is the war between the nascent state of Israel and the Arabs in 1948. Israel was an embryonic
democracy and Lebanon, one of the Arab belligerents, was also democratic within the confines of its peculiar confessional division of
power. Lebanon, however, was a reluctant party to the fight. Within the councils of the Arab League, it opposed the war but went
along with its larger confreres when they opted to attack. Even so, Lebanon did little fighting and soon sued for peace. Thus, in the
case of Lebanon against Israel, as in the case of England against Finland, democracies nominally went to war against democracies
when they were dragged into conflicts by authoritarian allies. The political scientist Bruce Russett offers a different challenge to the
notion that democracies are more peaceful. "That democracies are in general, in dealing with all kinds of
states, more peaceful than are authoritarian or other nondemocratically constituted states . . . .is a
much more controversial proposition than 'merely' that democracies are peaceful in their dealings with each other, and one for
which there is little systematic evidence," he says. (5) Russett cites his own and other statistical explorations which show that while
democracies rarely fight one another they often fight against others. The trouble with such studies, however, is that they rarely
examine the question of who started or caused a war. To reduce the data to a form that is quantitatively measurable, it is easier to
determine whether a conflict has occurred between two states than whose fault it was. But the latter question is all important.
Democracies may often go to war against dictatorships because the dictators see them as prey or
underestimate their resolve. Indeed, such examples abound. Germany might have behaved more cautiously in the
summer of 1914 had it realized that England would fight to vindicate Belgian neutrality and to support France. Later, Hitler was
emboldened by his notorious contempt for the flabbiness of the democracies. North Korea almost surely discounted the likelihood of
an American military response to its invasion of the South after Secretary of State Dean Acheson publicly defined America's defense
perimeter to exclude the Korean peninsula (a declaration which merely confirmed existing U.S. policy). In 1990, Saddam Hussein's
decision to swallow Kuwait was probably encouraged by the inference he must have taken from the statements and actions of
American officials that Washington would offer no forceful resistance. Russett says that those who claim democracies are in general
more peaceful "would have us believe that the United States was regularly on the defensive, rarely on the offensive, during the Cold
War." But that is not quite right: the word "regularly" distorts the issue. A victim can sometimes turn the tables on an aggressor, but
that does not make the victim equally bellicose. None would dispute that Napoleon was responsible for the Napoleonic wars or
Hitler for World War II in Europe, but after a time their victims seized the offensive. So in the Cold War, the United States may have
initiated some skirmishes (although in fact it rarely did), but the struggle as a whole was driven one-sidedly. The Soviet policy was
"class warfare"; the American policy was "containment." The so-called revisionist historians argued that America bore an equal or
larger share of responsibility for the conflict. But Mikhail Gorbachev made nonsense of their theories when, in the name of glasnost
and perestroika, he turned the Soviet Union away from its historic course. The Cold War ended almost instantly--as he no doubt
knew it would. "We would have been able to avoid many . . . difficulties if the democratic process had developed normally in our
country," he wrote. (7) To render judgment about the relative peacefulness of states or systems, we must ask not only who started a
war but why. In particular we should consider what in Catholic Just War doctrine is called "right intention," which means roughly:
what did they hope to get out of it? In the few cases in recent times in which wars were initiated by democracies, there were often
motives other than aggrandizement, for example, when America invaded Grenada. To be sure, Washington was impelled by selfinterest more than altruism, primarily its concern for the well-being of American nationals and its desire to remove a chip, however
tiny, from the Soviet game board. But America had no designs upon Grenada, and the invaders were greeted with joy by the
Grenadan citizenry. After organizing an election, America pulled out. In other cases, democracies have turned to
war in the face of provocation, such as Israel's invasion of Lebanon in 1982 to root out an enemy sworn to its destruction
or Turkey's invasion of Cyprus to rebuff a power-grab by Greek nationalists. In contrast, the wars launched by dictators, such as
Iraq's invasion of Kuwait, North Korea's of South Korea, the Soviet Union's of Hungary and Afghanistan, often have aimed at
conquest or subjugation. The big exception to this rule is colonialism. The European powers conquered most of Africa and Asia, and
continued to hold their prizes as Europe democratized. No doubt many of the instances of democracies at war that enter into the
statistical calculations of researchers like Russett stem from the colonial era. But colonialism was a legacy of Europe's predemocratic times, and it was abandoned after World War II. Since then, I know of no case where a democracy has initiated warfare
without significant provocation or for reasons of sheer aggrandizement, but there are several cases where dictators have done so.
One interesting piece of Russett's research should help to point him away from his doubts that democracies are more peaceful in
general. He aimed to explain why democracies are more peaceful toward each other. Immanuel Kant was the first to observe, or
rather to forecast, the pacific inclination of democracies. He reasoned that "citizens . . . will have a great hesitation in . . . . calling
down on themselves all the miseries of war." (8) But this valid insight is incomplete. There is a deeper explanation. Democracy
is not just a mechanism; it entails a spirit of compromise and self-restraint. At bottom,
democracy is the willingness to resolve civil disputes without recourse to violence. Nations that
embrace this ethos in the conduct of their domestic affairs are naturally more predisposed to
embrace it in their dealings with other nations. Russett aimed to explain why democracies are more peaceful
toward one another. To do this, he constructed two models. One hypothesized that the cause lay in the mechanics of democratic
decision-making (the "structural/institutional model"), the other that it lay in the democratic ethos (the "cultural/normative
model"). His statistical assessments led him to conclude that: "almost always the cultural/normative
model shows a consistent effect on conflict occurrence and war. The structural/institutional
model sometimes provides a significant relationship but often does not." (9) If it is the ethos that makes
democratic states more peaceful toward each other, would not that ethos also make them more peaceful in general? Russett implies
that the answer is no, because to his mind a critical element in the peaceful behavior of democracies toward other democracies is
their anticipation of a conciliatory attitude by their counterpart. But this is too pat. The attitude of live-and-let-live cannot be turned
on and off like a spigot. The citizens and officials of democracies recognize that other states, however governed, have legitimate
interests, and they are disposed to try to accommodate those interests except when the other party's behavior seems threatening or
outrageous. A different kind of challenge to the thesis that democracies are more peaceful has been posed by the political scientists
Edward G. Mansfield and Jack Snyder. They claim statistical support for the proposition that while fully fledged democracies may be
pacific, Ain th[e] transitional phase of democratization, countries become more aggressive and war-prone, not less." (10) However,
like others, they measure a state's likelihood of becoming involved in a war but do not report attempting to determine the cause or
fault. Moreover, they acknowledge that their research revealed not only an increased likelihood for a state to become involved in a
war when it was growing more democratic, but an almost equal increase for states growing less democratic. This raises the
possibility that the effects they were observing were caused simply by political change per se, rather than by democratization.
Finally, they implicitly acknowledge that the relationship of democratization and peacefulness may change over historical periods.
There is no reason to suppose that any such relationship is governed by an immutable law. Since their empirical base reaches back to
1811, any effect they report, even if accurately interpreted, may not hold in the contemporary world. They note that "in [some] recent
cases, in contrast to some of our historical results, the rule seems to be: go fully democratic, or don't go at all." But according to
Freedom House, some 62.5 percent of extant governments were chosen in legitimate elections. (12) (This is a much larger
proportion than are adjudged by Freedom House to be "free states," a more demanding criterion, and it includes many weakly
democratic states.) Of the remaining 37.5 percent, a large number are experiencing some degree of democratization or heavy
pressure in that direction. So the choice "don't go at all" (11) is rarely realistic in the contemporary world. These statistics also
contain the answer to those who doubt the second proposition behind Fukuyama's forecast, namely, that the world is growing more
democratic. Skeptics have drawn upon Samuel Huntington's fine book, The Third Wave: Democratization in the Late Twentieth
Century. Huntington says that the democratization trend that began in the mid-1970s in Portugal, Greece and Spain is the third such
episode. The first "wave" of democratization began with the American revolution and lasted through the aftermath of World War I,
coming to an end in the interwar years when much of Europe regressed back to fascist or military dictatorship. The second wave, in
this telling, followed World War II when wholesale decolonization gave rise to a raft of new democracies. Most of these, notably in
Africa, collapsed into dictatorship by the 1960s, bringing the second wave to its end. Those who follow Huntington's argument may
take the failure of democracy in several of the former Soviet republics and some other instances of backsliding since 1989 to signal
the end of the third wave. Such an impression, however, would be misleading. One unsatisfying thing about Huntington's "waves" is
their unevenness. The first lasted about 150 years, the second about 20. How long should we expect the third to endure? If it is like
the second, it will ebb any day now, but if it is like the first, it will run until the around the year 2125. And by then--who knows?-perhaps mankind will have incinerated itself, moved to another planet, or even devised a better political system. Further,
Huntington's metaphor implies a lack of overall progress or direction. Waves rise and fall. But each of the reverses that followed
Huntington's two waves was brief, and each new wave raised the number of democracies higher than before. Huntington does,
however, present a statistic that seems to weigh heavily against any unidirectional interpretation of democratic progress. The
proportion of states that were democratic in 1990 (45%), he says, was identical to the proportion in 1922. (13) But there are two
answers to this. In 1922 there were only 64 states; in 1990 there were 165. But the number of peoples had not grown appreciably.
The difference was that in 1922 most peoples lived in colonies, and they were not counted as states. The 64 states of that time were
mostly the advanced countries. Of those, two thirds had become democratic by 1990, which was a significant gain. The additional
101 states counted in 1990 were mostly former colonies. Only a minority, albeit a substantial one, were democratic in 1990, but since
virtually none of those were democratic in 1922, that was also a significant gain. In short, there was progress all around, but this was
obscured by asking what percentage of states were democratic. Asking the question this way means that a people who were subjected
to a domestic dictator counted as a non-democracy, but a people who were subjected to a foreign dictator did not count at all.
Moreover, while the criteria for judging a state democratic vary, the statistic that 45 percent of states were democratic in 1990
corresponds with Freedom House's count of "democratic" polities (as opposed to its smaller count of "free" countries, a more
demanding criterion). But by this same count, Freedom House now says that the proportion of democracies has grown to 62.5
percent. In other words, the "third wave" has not abated. That Freedom House could count 120 freely elected governments by early
2001 (out of a total of 192 independent states) bespeaks a vast transformation in human governance within the span of 225 years. In
1775, the number of democracies was zero. In 1776, the birth of the United States of America brought the total up to one. Since then,
democracy has spread at an accelerating pace, most of the growth having occurred within the twentieth century, with greatest
momentum since 1974. That this momentum has slackened somewhat since its pinnacle in 1989, destined to be remembered as one
of the most revolutionary years in all history, was inevitable. So many peoples were swept up in the democratic tide that there was
certain to be some backsliding. Most countries' democratic evolution has included some fits and starts rather than a smooth
progression. So it must be for the world as a whole. Nonetheless, the overall trend remains powerful and clear. Despite the
backsliding, the number and proportion of democracies stands higher today than ever before. This progress offers a source of hope
for enduring nuclear peace. The danger of nuclear war was radically reduced almost overnight when Russia abandoned Communism
and turned to democracy. For other ominous corners of the world, we may be in a kind of race between the emergence or growth of
nuclear arsenals and the advent of democratization. If this is so, the greatest cause for worry may rest with the Moslem Middle East
where nuclear arsenals do not yet exist but where the prospects for democracy may be still more remote.
Impact – Environment – 2AC
Chinese hegemonic control over the region degrades the environment --- they’ll
take over Latin American economies and ignore environmental standards
Vega, 5 (Juan, J.D. candidate at the University of Minnesota Law School, M.B.A at the
University of Florida, “China's Economic and Political Clout Grows in Latin America at the
Expense of U.S. Interests,” 14 Minn. J. Global Trade 377, Summer 2005, lexis, Tashma)
4. Environmental Standards, Market Share, and an Economic Alternative While the United States has provisions for
environmental standards in its trade agreements, it is doubtful that China will let
environmental concerns slow its economic progress in Latin America. 122 China has
experienced economic growth at the expense of its environment, containing nine of the world's
ten most polluted cities. 123 Chronic respiratory disease has become the [*395] leading cause of death in the country. 124
Chinese manufacturers have been gaining market share in industries where Mexico lost market share. 125 By mid-2003, China
surpassed Mexico as the second-largest supplier of goods to the United States. 126 China has erased many of Mexico's economic
advantages that the United States and Mexico had worked hard for years to obtain under NAFTA. 127 China may be able to develop
greater clout relative to the United States with small countries that depend on the textile industry. As China imports great
quantities of raw materials and exports labor-intensive manufactured goods, it drives down the
price of its exports and it increases the price of raw materials that it imports. 128 Poor countries
that depend on the textile industry will earn lower prices for their exports and will have to pay higher
prices for their raw materials. 129 China has an important bargaining chip with these countries
that the United States does not.
Environmental destruction causes extinction
Warner, 94 (Paul Warner, American University, Dept of International Politics and Foreign
Policy, August, Politics and Life Sciences, 1994, p 177)
Massive extinction of species is dangerous, then, because one cannot predict which species are expendable to the system as a
whole. As Philip Hoose remarks, "Plants and animals cannot tell us what they mean to each other." One can never be
sure which species holds up fundamental biological relationships in the
planetary ecosystem. And, because removing species is an irreversible act, it
may be too late to save the system after the extinction of key plants or animals. According to the U.S.
National Research Council, "The ramifications of an ecological change of this magnitude [vast extinction of species] are so far
reaching that no one on earth will escape them." Trifling with the "lives" of species is like playing
Russian roulette, with our collective future as the stakes.
Impact – Global Hegemony – 2AC
Dominance in Latin America is key to sustaining heg in the rest of the
world
Sanchez and Sholar 12, Peter Sanchez(PhD) is a Professor & Graduate Program Director
(GPD) @ Loyola University in Chicago. Megan Sholar is a PhD @ Loyola University in Chicago.
(“Power and Principle: A New US Policy for Latin America”; International Journal of
Humanities and Social Science Vol. 2 No. 23; December 2012;
http://www.ijhssnet.com/journals/Vol_2_No_23_December_2012/3.pdf, jj)
Moving beyond criticism, we then propose several concrete changes to US policy that would enhance America’s ¶ ethical stance
toward Latin America, thereby enhancing US hegemony. In essence we provide a prescription that ¶ shows how a Great Power’s
policies should change once it becomes a hegemonic power. These modest policy ¶ recommendations, if enacted, would preserve US
interests by improving America’s image, an also result in ¶ enhanced security, democracy, and prosperity in the western hemisphere.
Taking these steps is important for the ¶ United States because Latin America remains a vital
region for US strategic, geopolitical, and economic interests ¶ (Hsiang, 2003, 59-60). If
Washington cannot secure its key interests and be perceived positively in the Western ¶
Hemisphere, then attaining goals in the rest of the world will be a pipe dream.
US primacy prevents global conflict – diminishing power creates a vacuum that
causes transition wars in multiple places
Brooks et al 13 [Stephen G. Brooks is Associate Professor of Government at Dartmouth
College.G. John Ikenberry is the Albert G. Milbank Professor of Politics and International
Affairs at Princeton University in the Department of Politics and the Woodrow Wilson School of
Public and International Affairs. He is also a Global Eminence Scholar at Kyung Hee
University.William C. Wohlforth is the Daniel Webster Professor in the Department of
Government at Dartmouth College. “Don't Come Home, America: The Case against
Retrenchment”, Winter 2013, Vol. 37, No. 3, Pages 751,http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/abs/10.1162/ISEC_a_00107, GDI File]
A core premise of deep engagement is that it prevents the emergence of a far more dangerous global security
environment. For one thing, as noted above, the United States’ overseas presence gives it the leverage to
restrain partners from taking provocative action. Perhaps more important, its core alliance commitments also deter states with
aspirations to regional hegemony from contemplating expansion and make its partners more secure, reducing their incentive to adopt solutions to their security problems that
threaten others and thus stoke security dilemmas. The contention that engaged U.S. power dampens the baleful effects of anarchy is consistent with influential variants of realist
theory. Indeed, arguably the scariest portrayal of the war-prone world that would emerge absent the “American Pacifier” is provided in the works of John Mearsheimer,
who forecasts dangerous multipolar regions replete with security competition, arms races, nuclear proliferation and associated preventive wartemptations, regional rivalries,
and even runs at regional hegemony and full-scale great power war. 72 How do retrenchment advocates, the bulk of whom are realists, discount this benefit? Their arguments
are complicated, but two capture most of the variation: (1) U.S. security guarantees are not necessary to prevent dangerous rivalries and conflict in Eurasia; or (2) prevention of
rivalry and conflict in Eurasia is not a U.S. interest. Each response is connected to a different theory or set of theories, which makes sense given that the whole debate hinges on a
complex future counterfactual (what would happen to Eurasia’s security setting if the United States truly disengaged?). Although a certain answer is impossible, each of these
responses is nonetheless a weaker argument for retrenchment than advocates acknowledge. The first response flows from defensive realism as well as other international
relations theories that discount the conflict-generating potential of anarchy under contemporary conditions. 73 Defensive realists maintain that the high expected costs of
territorial conquest, defense dominance, and an array of policies and practices that can be used credibly to signal benign intent, mean that Eurasia’s major states could manage
regional multipolarity peacefully without theAmerican pacifier. Retrenchment would be a bet on this scholarship, particularly in regions where the kinds of stabilizers that
nonrealist theories point to—such as democratic governance or dense institutional linkages—are either absent or weakly present. There are three other major bodies of
scholarship, however, that might give decisionmakers pause before making this bet. First is regional expertise. Needless to say, there is no consensus on the net security effects of
U.S. withdrawal. Regarding each region, there are optimists and pessimists. Few experts expect a return of intense great power competition in a post-American Europe, but
many doubt European governments will pay the political costs of increased EU defense cooperation and the budgetary costs of increasing military outlays. 74 The result might be
Europe that is incapable of securing itself from various threats that could be destabilizing
within the region and beyond (e.g., a regional conflict akin to the 1990s Balkan wars), lacks capacity for global security missions in which U.S. leaders
might want European participation, and is vulnerable to the influence of outside rising powers. What about the other parts of Eurasia
where the United States has a substantial military presence? Regarding the Middle East, the
balance begins toswing toward pessimists concerned that states currently backed by
Washington— notably Israel, Egypt, and Saudi Arabia—might take actions upon U.S. retrenchment
that would intensify security dilemmas. And concerning East Asia, pessimismregarding the region’s
prospects without the American pacifier is pronounced. Arguably the principal concern expressed by area experts is
that Japan and South Korea are likely to obtain a nuclear capacity and increase their military commitments,
a
which could
stoke a destabilizing reaction from China . It is notable that during the Cold War, both South Korea and Taiwan moved
to obtain a nuclear weapons capacity and were only constrained from doing so by astill-engaged United States. 75 The second body of scholarship casting doubt on the bet on
defensive realism’s sanguine portrayal is all of the research that undermines its conception of state preferences. Defensive realism’s optimism about what would happen if the
United States retrenched is very much dependent on itsparticular—and highly restrictive—assumption about state preferences; once we relax this assumption, then much of its
basis for optimism vanishes. Specifically, the prediction of post-American tranquility throughout Eurasia rests on the assumption that security is the only relevant state
preference, with security defined narrowly in terms of protection from violent external attacks on the homeland. Under that assumption, the security problem is largely solved as
research across the social and
other sciences, however,undermines that core assumption: states have preferences not only for security but
also for prestige, status, and other aims, and theyengage in trade-offs among the various objectives. 76 In addition, they define
security not just in terms of territorial protection but in view of many and varied milieu goals. It follows that even states that
are relatively secure may nevertheless engage in highly competitive behavior. Empirical studies show that this
is indeed sometimes the case. 77 In sum, a bet on a benign postretrenchment Eurasia is a bet that leaders of major countries will never allow these nonsecurity
preferences to influence their strategic choices. To the degree that these bodies of scholarly knowledge have predictive leverage, U.S. retrenchment would
result in a significant deterioration in the security environment in at least some of the world’s key regions. We
have already mentioned the third, even more alarming body of scholarship. Offensive realism predicts thatthe withdrawal of the American
pacifier will yield either a competitive regional multipolarity complete with associated insecurity,
arms racing, crisis instability, nuclear proliferation, and the like, or bids for regional hegemony, which may be beyond
the capacity of local great powers to contain (and which in any case would generate intensely competitive behavior,
possibly including regional great power war).
soon as offense and defense are clearly distinguishable, and offense is extremely expensive relative to defense. Burgeoning
China is overtaking U.S. influence in Latin America --- destroys global hegemony
Vega, 5 (Juan, J.D. candidate at the University of Minnesota Law School, M.B.A at the
University of Florida, “China's Economic and Political Clout Grows in Latin America at the
Expense of U.S. Interests,” 14 Minn. J. Global Trade 377, Summer 2005, lexis, Tashma)
For many years during the Cold War, the Third World was a battleground for two superpowers?the United States and the former
Soviet Union. These two nations fought to exert their influence throughout Latin America in order to gain political, economic, and
military clout. When the Soviet Union fell, the United States lost interest in its relationship with Latin American countries. During
the past five years, China has stepped into the void left by these two retreating superpowers. 1 As China increases and
solidifies economic ties to the region and secures oil, minerals, and other commodities from this
region, it gains economic and political influence at the expense of U.S. interests. If Chinese
economic power surpasses that of the United States, Latin American countries may no longer feel
the need to cooperate with U.S. initiatives in trade, human rights, antinarcotics, environmental
safeguards, and U.S. national security. In [*378] China, Latin America is likely to find
an attractive alternative to economic trade that is not contingent upon U.S. interests.
The Monroe Doctrine proclaimed that the Western Hemisphere is "America's backyard." 2 The United States helped Latin American
countries gain their independence from Spain and later in the twentieth century, assisted them in the process of democratization. 3
Stable democracies in Latin America reduce regional crises and increase cooperation. Today, the United States needs a stable Latin
America in order to assure itself an important source of regional oil. 4
Increased Chinese influence destroys U.S. hegemony --- U.S. couldn’t oppose
China
Vega, 5 (Juan, J.D. candidate at the University of Minnesota Law School, M.B.A at the
University of Florida, “China's Economic and Political Clout Grows in Latin America at the
Expense of U.S. Interests,” 14 Minn. J. Global Trade 377, Summer 2005, lexis, Tashma)
D. Chinese Leverage With China's growing sphere of influence and economic clout comes leverage
that it may use to frustrate U.S. interests and to gain support for diplomatic, political, and perhaps
military [*397] initiatives. 137 Much like the former Soviet Union's powerful control over its
"member" countries, communist China may have similar leverage over Latin American countries. If
China reaches this level of influence and if the United States confronts China on an economic, political, or military
matter, no Latin American country could economically afford to oppose China. 138 Moreover, the
United States itself may not be in a position to oppose China. The trade disparity between the United
States and China is the greatest of any country pair in the world: China exports $ 114 billion worth of goods to the United States and
imports only $ 20 billion from the United States. 139 U.S. manufacturers have opened factories in China, predicting that in the next
five years technology manufacturing will be centered there. 140 In the event of a confrontation, the United States may lose 100,000
export-oriented jobs. 141 The
United States must realize that the Chinese threat is real and it must
examine its own policies towards Latin America before China's leverage can no longer be
countered.
Impact – Human Rights – 2AC
Chinese hegemony in Latin America destroys regional democracies --- that
specifically correlates to widespread human rights abuses
Vega, 5 (Juan, J.D. candidate at the University of Minnesota Law School, M.B.A at the
University of Florida, “China's Economic and Political Clout Grows in Latin America at the
Expense of U.S. Interests,” 14 Minn. J. Global Trade 377, Summer 2005, lexis, Tashma)
2. Democracy and Human Rights In a democratic country, elected leaders are held accountable by their
constituents. In an authoritarian or communist country, there are no such checks and balances.
While some dictators or communist leaders are benign, there is no political safeguard that will prevent future,
malevolent leaders from taking aggressive action against their own people or other countries. In
the event that citizens protest, non-democratic leaders will quickly silence dissidents and continue to act
with impunity. 149 The safest way to ensure peace and cooperation is to promote democracy and
respect for human rights. China's growing influence in Latin America represents a
risk to unstable democracies in the region. If unchecked, China's economic prominence
will cause fragile democracies in Latin America to think twice about the supposed benefits of
democracy, capitalism, and globalization. 150 There is a common misconception that, since Latin
American countries are democracies [*400] (with the exception of Cuba), democracy is permanent. 151 Based on the
reversing trends of the past four years, it is evident that regional democracy is unstable. 152 As
more socialist presidents are elected throughout Latin America and faith in the benefits of democracy and capitalism diminish,
Latin Americans may begin to favor authoritarian regimes. 153 As China invests heavily in the
region, bringing jobs and providing access to Latin American producers for over one-and-a-half billion Chinese consumers,
Latin American voters may begin to believe that communism can really work. Communist China offers
Latin American countries an opportunity to see the economic benefits of such a system. The vices of communism have been evident
throughout the twentieth century. Unlike Karl Marx's stateless, classless, communist nation, "communist" countries have actually
been ruthless in their pursuit of party loyalty and obedience. 154 Unlike the moderate, evolutionary, and law-abiding outlook that
intellectuals had for communism in the beginning of the twentieth century, history has proven that the dictatorship
of the proletariat has in fact suppressed expression, human rights, and other freedoms that people
hold dear. 155 While the United States often offers trade incentives as a reward for adherence to
principles of human rights, China is likely to disregard such requirements. 156
Extinction
HRW, 94 (Human Rights Web, 1994, “An Introduction to the Human Rights Movement”, 7-20,
http://www.hrweb.org/intro.html)
The United Nations Charter, Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and UN Human Rights convenants were written and
implemented in the aftermath of the Holocaust, revelations coming from the Nuremberg war crimes trials, the Bataan Death March,
the atomic bomb, and other horrors smaller in magnitude but not in impact on the individuals they affected. A whole lot of people in
a number of countries had a crisis of conscience and found they could no longer look the other way while tyrants jailed, tortured, and
killed their neighbors. Many also realized that advances in technology and changes in social structures had rendered war a threat to
the continued existence of the human race. Large numbers of people in many countries lived under the control
of tyrants,
having no recourse but war to relieve often intolerable living conditions. Unless some way
was found to relieve the lot of these people, they could revolt and become the catalyst for another wide-scale
and possibly nuclear war. For perhaps the first time, representatives from the majority of governments in the world came to the
conclusion that basic human rights must be protected, not only for the sake of the individuals and countries involved,
but to preserve the human race.
Impact – Human Rights – 1AR
It’s zero-sum --- failure to reverse Chinese influence in the region renders U.S.
efforts to curtail human rights abuses useless
Vega, 5 (Juan, J.D. candidate at the University of Minnesota Law School, M.B.A at the
University of Florida, “China's Economic and Political Clout Grows in Latin America at the
Expense of U.S. Interests,” 14 Minn. J. Global Trade 377, Summer 2005, lexis, Tashma)
2. Human Right and Narcotics Trafficking For years the United States has worked to promote human rights
throughout Latin America. In contrast, on June 4, 1989 in Tiananmen Square, Beijing, hundreds of
student demonstrators who were advocating for greater freedom were killed by soldiers in the
Chinese army. 110 Fifteen years later, some of the surviving students remain in prison as do many political prisoners. 111 In the
meantime, democratic countries in Latin America and Europe have been willing to overlook
China's violations of human rights. 112 On the global scale, China's economic investments in
other countries, like the Sudan, have frustrated U.S. efforts to promote human rights. 113
Impact – Iran Expansionism – 2AC
Iran expanding influence now in LA to challenge US power
Warrick, 12 - Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist, The Washington Post Head Writer
specializing in the Middle East, diplomacy and national security (Joby, “Iran seeks closer ties in
Latin America,” January 2nd, 2012, LexisNexis)//HAL
Iran is quietly seeking to expand its ties with Latin America in what U.S. officials and regional
experts say is an effort to circumvent economic sanctions and gain access to much-needed
markets and raw materials. The new diplomatic offensive, which comes amid rising tensions with
Washington and European powers, includes a four-nation swing through South and Central America this month
by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. His government has vowed to increase its economic,
political and military influence in the United States' back yard. The visit reinforces recent
commitments by Iran to invest millions of dollars in economic development projects for the
region, from a mining joint venture in Ecuador to factories for petrochemicals and small-arms ammunition in Venezuela. Iran
has also dramatically expanded its diplomatic missions throughout the hemisphere and
dispatched members of its elite Quds Force - the military unit U.S. officials in October linked to
afoiled assassination plot in Washington - to serve in its embassies, U.S. officials and Iran experts say. The
importance of Ahmadinejad's visit was underscored last weekby Iran's state-owned Press TV, which said promotion of "all-out
cooperation with Latin American countries is among the top priorities of the Islamic Republic's foreign policy." Iran has dispatched
a stream of lower-ranking officials to the region in recent months. Ahmadinejad granted a live interview Dec. 13 with Venezuela's
state-owned broadcaster TeleSUR in which he hailed the close ties between the two countries and boasted of Iran's advances in
military technology, including unmanned drones. "No one dares attack Iran," Ahmadinejad said in the interview. With its
latest outreach, Iran appears
to be seeking to woo back Latin American countries that have grown
wary of doing business with Tehran. Iran's closest ally in the region, Venezuela, had its largest
petroleum company hit with U.S. sanctions last year over its ties with Iran. Smaller countries such as
Nicaragua and Bolivia have seen little of the millions of dollars in aid promised by Iranian officials over the past decade. But with
Western nations threatening to boycott Iranian oil, the country's leaders are scrambling to find
willing foreign partners who can soften the blow of sanctions and provide diplomatic cover for
Iran's nuclear ambitions, current and former U.S. officials say. "Iran has been actively working for years to
expand its ties and influence in the Western Hemisphere, and it has found willing partners in
the region's anti-American despots," said Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-Fla.), chairman of the House Foreign Affairs
Committee. Ros-Lehtinen said she was disturbed by Ahmadinejad's plans for what she called a "tour of tyrants," saying it would
bring "the Iranian threat closer to our shores." The visit is expected to include Venezuela, Ecuador, Cuba and Nicaragua, where the
Iranian president will be a guest at the inauguration of newly reelected leader Daniel Ortega. Yet Iran's efforts in the region also have
yielded disappointments. Its Latin American partners do far more business with the United States and other Western nations than
with Iran, and most have been reluctant to fully back the Islamic republic in disputes over sanctions or curbs on Iran's nuclear
program. Some would-be allies also have been disappointed when Iran failed to deliver on promised development projects and joint
ventures, such a proposed $350 million deep-water port for Nicaragua. A report released in November by the Center for Strategic
and International Studies, a Washington think tank, questioned whether Iran ever could succeed at building an effective support
network in the region, even if it managed to make good on its grandiose commitments. "While Iran's overtures to peripheral states
have the potential to weaken U.S. attempts to contain and isolate Iran, Tehran's web is fragile and possibly illusory," the CSIS report
said. Iran's ambitions in the region date back at least two decades, and Tehran was linked in the 1990s to two bombings of Jewish
centers, including Argentina's worst-ever terrorist attack in 1994. Relations between Iran and Latin
America began to warm shortly after the 2005 election of Ahmadinejad, who made the region a
diplomatic priority. Iran has since opened six new missions there - in Colombia, Nicaragua, Chile, Ecuador,
Uruguay and Bolivia - and has expanded embassies in Cuba, Argentina, Brazil, Mexico and Venezuela. Former
U.S. intelligence officials say the presence of Quds Force officers and other military personnel in diplomatic missions enhances
Iran's ability to carry out covert activities, sometimes in conjunction with members of the Iran-backed Hezbollah militant group that
operates extensive networks in Latin America and maintains ties with drug cartels. U.S. officials say the Quds Force was behind the
alleged plot to hire Mexican drug gangs to assassinate a Saudi diplomat in Washington. " For Iran to be so active in
Venezuela and for the Quds Force to be there can only suggest Iran is serious about
asymmetrical force projection into our neck of the woods. If Israel bombs Iran, we may well see
retaliatory strikes aimed at U.S. interests coming from these Quds Force guys in South America,"
said Art Keller, a former case officer with the CIA's counterproliferation division. As diplomatic relations have grown
between Iran and Latin America, trade has soared. Iran recently surpassed Russia as the biggest importer of beef
from Brazil, a country that saw its exports to Iran surge seven-fold over the past decade to an annual level of $2.12 billion.
Commerce with Argentina has climbed nearly as rapidly. Trade with Ecuador leaped from $6 million to $168 million in a single year,
from 2007 to 2008. Analysts argue that an expanded foothold in Latin America also could provide Iran
with strategic advantages in its protracted struggle with Western powers. In Venezuela, where President
Hugo Chavez is an avowed supporter of Tehran's nuclear ambitions, Iran has opened bank branches and
transportation companies that U.S. officials say enable Iran to circumvent sanctions. One Iranian-
owned bank drew special scrutiny in a study commissioned by the Pentagon's Defense Threat Reduction Agency. The study, released
in May, described Venezuela's Banco Internacional de Desarrollo as an "opaque" institution with an all-Iranian board of trustees.
The bank, which is now under U.S. sanctions for supporting terrorist networks, operates with only a single branch in Caracas and
appears immune from oversight by the country's regulators, according to the report's author, Douglas Farah, a senior fellow at the
International Assessment and Strategy Center. Such institutions "afford Iran and its proxy elements state cover and effective
immunity for its covert activities," Farah said in testimony in July to the House Homeland Security subcommittee on
counterterrorism and intelligence. Through them, Iran can achieve such goals as "unfettered access to global
banking facilities, ports and airports; mining of precursor elements for WMD and advanced
weapons systems fabrication; and a regional base for infiltration and contingency operations
aimed at undermining the United States and its interests," Farah said.
Iran expansionism kills US hegemony, builds Iran nuclear stockpile and causes
US-Iran war
Berman, 12 – Vice President of the American Foreign Policy Council in Washington, DC. An
expert on regional security in the Middle East, Central Asia, and the Russian Federation, he has
consulted for both the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency and the U.S. Department of Defense, and
provided assistance on foreign policy and national security issues to a range of governmental
agencies and congressional offices, a member of the Associated Faculty at Missouri State
University's Department of Defense and Strategic Studies, BA in Politics from Brandeis
University, an MA in International Politics from American University, and a JD
from Washington College of Law (Ilan, “Iran Courts Latin America,” Summer 2012, The Middle
Eastern Quarterly, VOLUME XIX: NUMBER 3, pp. 63-69,
http://www.meforum.org/3297/iran-latin-america#_ftnref30)//HAL
Outreach to Latin America is seen by the Iranian regime first and foremost as a means to lessen
its deepening international isolation. Since 2003, when its previously clandestine nuclear program became a pressing
international issue, Tehran has sought to mitigate the mounting political and economic restrictions
levied against it by the United States and its allies through intensified diplomatic outreach
abroad. Due to its favorable geopolitical climate—typified by vast ungoverned areas and
widespread anti-Americanism—Latin America has become an important focus of this effort. Over
the past decade, the regime has nearly doubled the number of embassies in the region (from six in 2005 to ten in 2010) and has
devoted considerable energy to forging economic bonds with sympathetic regional governments.[2] Far and away the most
prominent such partnership has been with Venezuela. Since Hugo Chavez became president in 1999, alignment with Tehran has
emerged as a cardinal tenet of Caracas's foreign policy. The subsequent election of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to the Iranian presidency
in 2005 kicked cooperation into high gear with dramatic results. Today, the two countries enjoy an extensive and vibrant strategic
partnership. Venezuela has emerged as an important source of material assistance for Tehran's
sprawling nuclear program as well as a vocal diplomatic backer of its right to atomic power.[3] The
Chavez regime also has become a safe haven and source of financial support for Hezbollah, Iran's most powerful terrorist proxy.[4]
In turn, Tehran's feared Revolutionary Guard has become involved in training Venezuela's secret services and police.[5] Economic
contacts between Caracas and Tehran likewise have exploded—expanding from virtually nil in the early 2000s to more than $20
billion in total trade and cooperation agreements today.[6] Just as significantly, Venezuela has served as Iran's
gateway for further economic and diplomatic expansion into the region. Aided by its partnership with
Caracas and bolstered by a shared anti-American outlook, Tehran has succeeded in forging significant strategic, economic, and
political links with the regime of Evo Morales in Bolivia and Rafael Correa in Ecuador. Even Iran's relations with Argentina, where
Iranian-supported terrorists carried out major bombings in 1992 and 1994, have improved in recent times, as the government of
President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner has hewed a more conciliatory line toward Tehran.[7] It would be a mistake, however, to
view these contacts as simply pragmatic—or strictly defensive. The Iranian regime's sustained systematic
outreach to regional states suggests that it sees the Western Hemisphere as a crucial strategic
theater for expanding its own influence and reducing that of the United States. Indeed, a 2009 dossier
prepared by Israel's Ministry of Foreign Affairs noted that "since Ahmadinejad's rise to power, Tehran has been
promoting an aggressive policy aimed at bolstering its ties with Latin American countries with
the declared goal of 'bringing America to its knees.'"[8] This view is increasingly shared by the U.S. military: In its
2010 report on Iranian military power, the Office of the Secretary of Defense noted that "Iran
seeks to increase its
stature by countering U.S. influence and expanding ties with regional actors" in Latin America.[9]
To this end, Tehran is ramping up its strategic messaging to the region. In late January, on the heels of Ahmadinejad's very public
four-country tour of Latin America, the Iranian regime formally launched HispanTV, a Spanish-language analogue to its Englishlanguage Press TV channel.[10] The television outlet has been depicted by Ahmadinejad as part of his government's efforts to "limit
the ground for supremacy of dominance seekers"—a thinly-veiled reference to U.S. influence in the Western Hemisphere.[11] As
Ahmadinejad's statement indicates, Tehran is pursuing a strategy that promotes its own ideology and
influence in Latin America at Washington's expense. In this endeavor, it has been greatly aided by Chavez, who
himself has worked diligently to diminish U.S. political and economic presence in the region under the banner of a new "Bolivarian"
revolution. Since the start of the international crisis over Iran's nuclear ambitions nearly nine years ago, it has become an accepted
belief that Tehran's atomic program is now largely self-sufficient and that its progress is, therefore, largely inexorable. This,
however, is far from the truth; in fact, the Iranian regime currently runs a considerable, and growing,
deficit of uranium ore, the critical raw material needed to fuel its atomic effort. According to
nonproliferation experts, Tehran's indigenous uranium ore reserves are known to be both "limited and
mostly of poor quality."[12] When Shah Mohammed Reza Pahlavi mapped out an ambitious national plan for nuclear power
in the 1970s, his government was forced to procure significant quantities of the mineral from South Africa. Nearly four decades later,
this aging stockpile has reportedly been mostly depleted.[13] As a result, in recent years, Tehran has embarked
on a widening quest to acquire uranium ore from abroad. In 2009, for example, it is known to have attempted
to purchase more than 1,000 tons of uranium ore from the Central Asian republic of Kazakhstan at a cost of nearly half-a-billion
dollars.[14] In that particular case, deft diplomacy on the part of Washington and its European allies helped stymie Tehran's
efforts—at least for the time being. The Iranian quest, however, has not abated. In February 2011, an intelligence summary from a
member state of the International Atomic Energy Agency reaffirmed the Islamic regime's continued search for new and stable
sources of uranium to fuel its nuclear program.[15] This effort has recently focused on two principal geographic areas. The first is
Africa where Tehran has made concerted efforts to engage a number of uranium producers such as Zimbabwe, Senegal, Nigeria, and
the Democratic People's Republic of Congo.[16] The second is Latin America where Tehran now is exploring and
developing a series of significant resource partnerships. The best known of these partnerships is with
Venezuela; cooperation on strategic resources has emerged as a defining feature of the alliance between the Islamic Republic and the
Chavez regime. The Iranian regime is currently known to be mining in the Roraima Basin, adjacent
to Venezuela's border with Guyana. Significantly, that geological area is believed to be analogous to Canada's Athabasca Basin,
the world's largest deposit of uranium.[17] Bolivia, too, is fast becoming a significant source of strategic resources for the Iranian
regime. With the sanction of the Morales government, Tehran is now believed to be extracting uranium from as many as eleven
different sites in Bolivia's east, proximate to the country's industrial capital of Santa Cruz.[18] Not coincidentally, it is rumored that
the now-infamous Tehran-Caracas air route operated jointly by Conviasa, Venezuela's national airline, and Iran's state carrier, Iran
Air, will be extended in the near future to Santa Cruz.[19] Additionally, a series of cooperation agreements concluded in 2010
between La Paz and Tehran have made Iran a "partner" in the mining and exploitation of Bolivia's lithium, a key strategic mineral
with applications for nuclear weapons development.[20] Iran even appears to be eyeing Ecuador's uranium deposits. A $30 million
joint mining deal concluded between Tehran and Quito back in 2009 has positioned the Correa regime to eventually become a
supplier for the Islamic Republic.[21] Regional experts note that Iran's mining and extraction efforts in Latin America are still
comparatively modest in nature, constrained by competition from larger countries such as Canada and China and by Tehran's own
available resources and know-how.[22] However, the region is unquestionably viewed as a target of opportunity
in Iran's widening quest for strategic resources—both because of its favorable political operating
environment and because states there (especially Bolivia) represent unknown quantities in terms of
resource wealth. This raises the possibility that Latin America could emerge in the near future as a
significant provider of strategic resources for the Iranian regime and a key source of sustenance
for Iran's expanding nuclear program. A Base for Attack? Conventional wisdom in Washington has long held that
Tehran's activism in the Americas is opportunistic—rather than operational. Yet Iran's growing
asymmetric capabilities throughout the region have the potential to be directed against the U.S.
homeland. This was hammered home by the foiled October 2011 plot, an attack which—had it
been successful—would potentially have killed scores of U.S. citizens in the nation's capital in the most
significant terrorist event since 9/11. The incident represents a seismic shift in Tehran's strategic
calculations. As Director of National Intelligence James Clapper observed in his January 2012 testimony before the
Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, in response to mounting international pressure and asymmetric
activity against Tehran's nuclear program, it appears that "Iranian officials—probably including
Supreme Leader Ali Khamene'i—have changed their calculus and are now willing to conduct an
attack in the United States."[29] Latin America figures prominently in this equation. The foiled
October 2011 plot suggests that Tehran increasingly deems the region an advantageous
operational theater. Moreover, as its influence and activities there intensify, the Iranian regime will
be able to field a progressively more robust operational presence in the Americas . Clapper concluded
his Senate testimony with an ominous warning: "The
Iranian regime has formed alliances with Chavez,
Ortega, Castro, and Correa that many believe can destabilize the hemisphere," he noted. "These
alliances can pose an immediate threat by giving Iran—directly through the IRGC, the Qods force, or its proxies
like Hezbollah—a platform in the region to carry out attacks against the United States, our interests,
and allies."[30]
Impact – Iran Expansionism – Hegemony
Iranian influence causes a cyberattack and kills US hegemony
Mahjar-Barducci, 11 – Moroccan-Italian researcher and author, based in Jerusalem, She
worked for European and Middle Eastern media. Her opinion pieces have been published in
Corriere della Sera (Italy), Al-Arabiya (UAE), Haaretz (Israel), Daily Star (Lebanon) and she has
appeared as a guest analyst also in African media. She has published several books including
"Italo-Marocchina" (Italy, 2009) and "Pakistan Express" (Italy, 2011), (Anna, “Iran Preparing
Serious Cyber Attack Against the U.S. from Latin America,” December 14th, 2011,
http://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/2662/iran-cyber-attack-against-us)//HAL
Univision, the largest TV broadcaster in Spanish of the United States, recently presented a report showing that Iran is actively preparing
an attack against the US to be carried out from bases in Latin America. The documentary, "La Amenaza Irani"
("The Iranian Threat"), illustrated, though undercover footage, how the growing economic, political and military ties Iran
has developed in South American countries are rapidly evolving into a tangible threat for the
security of the US. The documentary reveals exclusive findings, including secret video and audio recordings that provide information about a
planned Iranian-backed cyber attack against the United States from Mexico. The videos shown were part of a seven month investigation during which a
team of journalists tracked the expansion of Iranian interests in the Latin America – including money laundering and drug trafficking activities by
terrorist groups supported by Iran. In Venezuela, the team managed to infiltrate Iranian military training camps organized from Iranian-financed
mosques within the country. The documentary also confirms that Iran
is behind money laundering and drug trafficking
activities that are used to support Islamist networks and training camps in Venezuela and
elsewhere, with the ultimate goal of undermining American interests in Latin America and
inside the US. The team of journalist also infiltrated the diplomatic milieu in Mexico with the help of young university
students who posed as spies and offered their services to different officials from Iran, Venezuela and Cuba
for carrying out a cybernetic attack on sensitive American targets that would cripple U.S.
computer systems of command centers such as the White House, the Pentagon, the FBI, the CIA
and different US nuclear plants. One of the officials contacted was former Ambassador of Iran to
Mexico, Mohamad Hassan Ghadiri, who was videoed while accepting the help of the Mexican students for carrying out a major informatics
attack to the US. Univision reports that during his stay in Mexico, Ghadiri "embarked on a campaign to increase the presence of Iran in Mexico. His
plan even included a project to open a consulate in Tijuana." The TV channel also reported that Ghadiri tried to grant access into Mexico to Edgardo
Ruben Assad, an Islamic activist accused by Argentina of participating in the attacks on Jewish organizations in Buenos Aires in 1992 and 1994.
Ghadiri is shown in the documentary as accepting a plan to launch from Mexico a cyber war on
the U.S. Similar attitudes were found with Venezuelan and Cuban high officials, all very
interested in supporting an Iranian-sponsored plot against the US. The idea of the Iranian officials is to create a
network of people in South America. One Mexican student was invited to Iran to study Islam for two months. He was ordered to learn about the Islamic
religion and the Islamic revolution in order to be sent back to Mexico to preach Islam. While in Iran, the infiltrated Mexican met Muslims from
Venezuela, Ecuador, Argentina and Bolivia , all of whom had converted to Islam and were studying to open mosques back in Latin America. "One of the
Iranian sheiks, Ali Qomi, when I first gained his trust, told me that what they are now doing is waging an intellectual war; what they are planning to do
is prepare people with information so that they can attack the masses intellectually. This is what they are doing directly from Qom. Precisely in
Qom,"said the undercover student, who was risking his life in Iran. In a press release, Univision said that it had at its disposal "tens of hours of secret
recordings, and had conducted extensive interviews with people who participated in the meetings, including a former Iranian ambassador; and [that
they had] examined documents ranging from hand-written notes to internal federal reports, and obtained an unpublished video of a failed bomb attack
against New York's JFK airport." Univision's cry of alarm against Iranian activities in South America is not the first of its kind. Iran's ties with
Venezuela have been growing steadily during the presidency of Hugo Chavez. Iran
also enjoys excellent relations with
countries such as Bolivia, Ecuador, Nicaragua, not to mention the South American giants,
Argentina and Brazil. The improvement of these relations has gone hand in hand with the
expansion of Islamist groups in South America, in particular Hezbollah, which once were
relegated to the Tri-Border Area (Paraguay, Brazil and Argentina). Since then, they have been expanding their
zone of interest farther and farther north to reach Venezuela and Mexico, at the doorstep of the
US. The United Stated has constantly underestimated the danger coming from Iranian activities
both in Iran and in South America. In particular, the Obama administration has failed to confront the
Iranian threat with effective firmness. After his election, President Barack Obama declared that he was willing to talk to Iran
"without pre-conditions,",only to receive, in exchange, threats from the Iranian regime. "La Amenaza Irani" is a courageous testament to investigative
journalism. It warns of a genuine threat to be dealt with utmost urgency. Let us hope that its warning does not fall, once again, on deaf ears in
Washington.
US primacy prevents global conflict – diminishing power creates a vacuum that
causes transition wars in multiple places
Brooks et al 13 [Stephen G. Brooks is Associate Professor of Government at Dartmouth
College.G. John Ikenberry is the Albert G. Milbank Professor of Politics and International
Affairs at Princeton University in the Department of Politics and the Woodrow Wilson School of
Public and International Affairs. He is also a Global Eminence Scholar at Kyung Hee
University.William C. Wohlforth is the Daniel Webster Professor in the Department of
Government at Dartmouth College. “Don't Come Home, America: The Case against
Retrenchment”, Winter 2013, Vol. 37, No. 3, Pages 751,http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/abs/10.1162/ISEC_a_00107, GDI File]
A core premise of deep engagement is that it prevents the emergence of a far more dangerous global security
environment. For one thing, as noted above, the United States’ overseas presence gives it the leverage to
restrain partners from taking provocative action. Perhaps more important, its core alliance commitments also deter states with
aspirations to regional hegemony from contemplating expansion and make its partners more secure, reducing their incentive to adopt solutions to their security problems that
threaten others and thus stoke security dilemmas. The contention that engaged U.S. power dampens the baleful effects of anarchy is consistent with influential variants of realist
theory. Indeed, arguably the scariest portrayal of the war-prone world that would emerge absent the “American Pacifier” is provided in the works of John Mearsheimer,
who forecasts dangerous multipolar regions replete with security competition, arms races, nuclear proliferation and associated preventive wartemptations, regional rivalries,
and even runs at regional hegemony and full-scale great power war. 72 How do retrenchment advocates, the bulk of whom are realists, discount this benefit? Their arguments
are complicated, but two capture most of the variation: (1) U.S. security guarantees are not necessary to prevent dangerous rivalries and conflict in Eurasia; or (2) prevention of
rivalry and conflict in Eurasia is not a U.S. interest. Each response is connected to a different theory or set of theories, which makes sense given that the whole debate hinges on a
complex future counterfactual (what would happen to Eurasia’s security setting if the United States truly disengaged?). Although a certain answer is impossible, each of these
responses is nonetheless a weaker argument for retrenchment than advocates acknowledge. The first response flows from defensive realism as well as other international
relations theories that discount the conflict-generating potential of anarchy under contemporary conditions. 73 Defensive realists maintain that the high expected costs of
territorial conquest, defense dominance, and an array of policies and practices that can be used credibly to signal benign intent, mean that Eurasia’s major states could manage
regional multipolarity peacefully without theAmerican pacifier. Retrenchment would be a bet on this scholarship, particularly in regions where the kinds of stabilizers that
nonrealist theories point to—such as democratic governance or dense institutional linkages—are either absent or weakly present. There are three other major bodies of
scholarship, however, that might give decisionmakers pause before making this bet. First is regional expertise. Needless to say, there is no consensus on the net security effects of
U.S. withdrawal. Regarding each region, there are optimists and pessimists. Few experts expect a return of intense great power competition in a post-American Europe, but
many doubt European governments will pay the political costs of increased EU defense cooperation and the budgetary costs of increasing military outlays. 74 The result might be
Europe that is incapable of securing itself from various threats that could be destabilizing
within the region and beyond (e.g., a regional conflict akin to the 1990s Balkan wars), lacks capacity for global security missions in which U.S. leaders
might want European participation, and is vulnerable to the influence of outside rising powers. What about the other parts of Eurasia
where the United States has a substantial military presence? Regarding the Middle East, the
balance begins toswing toward pessimists concerned that states currently backed by
Washington— notably Israel, Egypt, and Saudi Arabia—might take actions upon U.S. retrenchment
that would intensify security dilemmas. And concerning East Asia, pessimismregarding the region’s
prospects without the American pacifier is pronounced. Arguably the principal concern expressed by area experts is
that Japan and South Korea are likely to obtain a nuclear capacity and increase their military commitments,
a
which could
stoke a destabilizing reaction from China . It is notable that during the Cold War, both South Korea and Taiwan moved
to obtain a nuclear weapons capacity and were only constrained from doing so by astill-engaged United States. 75 The second body of scholarship casting doubt on the bet on
defensive realism’s sanguine portrayal is all of the research that undermines its conception of state preferences. Defensive realism’s optimism about what would happen if the
United States retrenched is very much dependent on itsparticular—and highly restrictive—assumption about state preferences; once we relax this assumption, then much of its
basis for optimism vanishes. Specifically, the prediction of post-American tranquility throughout Eurasia rests on the assumption that security is the only relevant state
preference, with security defined narrowly in terms of protection from violent external attacks on the homeland. Under that assumption, the security problem is largely solved as
research across the social and
other sciences, however,undermines that core assumption: states have preferences not only for security but
also for prestige, status, and other aims, and theyengage in trade-offs among the various objectives. 76 In addition, they define
security not just in terms of territorial protection but in view of many and varied milieu goals. It follows that even states that
are relatively secure may nevertheless engage in highly competitive behavior. Empirical studies show that this
is indeed sometimes the case. 77 In sum, a bet on a benign postretrenchment Eurasia is a bet that leaders of major countries will never allow these nonsecurity
preferences to influence their strategic choices. To the degree that these bodies of scholarly knowledge have predictive leverage, U.S. retrenchment would
result in a significant deterioration in the security environment in at least some of the world’s key regions. We
have already mentioned the third, even more alarming body of scholarship. Offensive realism predicts that the withdrawal of the American
pacifier will yield either a competitive regional multipolarity complete with associated insecurity,
arms racing, crisis instability, nuclear proliferation, and the like, or bids for regional hegemony, which may be beyond
the capacity of local great powers to contain (and which in any case would generate intensely competitive behavior,
possibly including regional great power war).
soon as offense and defense are clearly distinguishable, and offense is extremely expensive relative to defense. Burgeoning
Impact – Iran Expansionism – Terrorism
Iran expansionism into Latin America leads to WMD terrorism—US engagement
solves
Foxman, 9 - National Director of the Anti-Defamation League, PhD in Jewish studies at the
Jewish Theological Seminary and in international economics at New York's New School for
Social Research (Abraham, “Iran Is Not a Good Partner For Latin America,” This article
originally appeared in Council of the Americas (Viewpoints Americas) on July 23, 2009,
http://www.adl.org/press-center/c/iran-is-not-a-good-partner-for-latin-america.html)//HAL
The fraudulent Iranian presidential election and its repressive aftermath put the focus on the Islamic regime's behavior in an
unprecedented manner. Even during the more than one year hostage crisis of 1979-1980, Iran had its defenders, based on criticism
of U.S. treatment of Iran going back to the U.S.-supported coup against Prime Minister Mohammad Mossadegh in 1953. Today,
Iran has been exposed. Efforts to blame the U.S., Israel, and Britain expectedly continue but have no impact. The
government has attacked its own people, has abandoned any pretense of respecting the voice of its citizens, and has come under
attack from some fairly conservative clerics. It has lost legitimacy and can't successfully conjure up the usual enemies to divert
attention from its abuses. As a result, internal and external actors are more willing to pay attention to Iran
as a destructive force in the world. Most importantly, this applies to the potential of a nuclear Iran
and its clear intention to develop nuclear arms. There is new opportunity to put the squeeze on Teheran. It also
applies, however, to another troubling area which has been the subject of far less attention: Iran's threatening
expansion in Latin America. Iran has seen Latin America as a region of opportunity at least for 20 years. Its planning
and implementation in the early 1990s of the terrorist attacks against the Israeli Embassy and the
Jewish Community Center in Buenos Aires (AMIA), and its use of its surrogate Hezbollah in those destructive operations signaled
that Iran believed it had a certain freedom to carry out terrorist attacks on Latin American
territory. Since then, a series of factors have come together to allow Iran to spread its influence on
the continent. Most important has been the coming to power in several countries of leaders and parties who are inimical to the
United States. This has translated into economic deals because of a key factor at work, Iran's oil wealth. Had Iran simply looked for
allies based on "the enemy of my enemy is my friend," that would have been one thing. But Iran has cut a series of deals
in the region that make tangible its influence. It is now the second-largest investor in Venezuela,
playing a substantial financial role in the further development of Venezuelan oil deposits and is funding housing projects for the
poor. In Bolivia, Iran has a cooperative arrangement worth over $1 billion to develop Bolivia's oil, gas, and industrial sectors. It has
set up health clinics and training programs for physicians. In Ecuador, Iran has signed a series of economic agreements in the last
year including one for energy production. In Nicaragua, Iran has promised millions in aid toward building a dam and a hydroelectric
power station, and donated $2 million for the construction of a hospital. In these projects, the Iranians are following the
prescription that Islamic extremist groups have been using for years to extend their influence in
Middle Eastern countries: build a reputation for social responsibility by providing services,
particularly to the needy. Hezbollah and Hamas have mastered this technique in an effort to win
public support and mask their extremist goals. Iran was looking for political support from these and other Latin
American countries at a time when the U.S. and Europe were trying to isolate Iran over the nuclear issue. Building hospitals
and housing for the poor, in addition to the large business investments, clearly was intended to
reinforce support from the bottom up. All of which is intended to serve the radical goals of the
regime that has suddenly drawn more attention because of its gross domestic repression. Included in these goals are
the spread of Iran's Islamic extremist ideology, the building of a political alliance to offset
international pressures, and sustaining a network of agents through Hezbollah to be able to
engage in terrorism in Latin America should the perceived need arise. Now that Iran has shown its true
colors, there is a unique opportunity to build international pressure—through publicity and
diplomatic, financial, and resource actions—not only against the regime's nuclear program but
its Latin American agenda. A regime that so blatantly denies the voice of its people by rigging an
election and violently suppressing public outrage cannot be trusted on the international scene.
Maybe a united outrage from the international community could make some of these Latin American leaders pause before engaging
with this illegitimate regime. Maybe they will realize that the future well-being of the people of Latin America
cannot be secured by the connection to the vicious extremists in charge in Tehran.
Results in WMD terrorism on the U.S.
Anderson, 08 (10/8/2008, Curt, AP, “US officials fear terrorist links with drug lords,”
http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/news/nation/2008-10-08-805146709_x.htm)
MIAMI — There
is real danger that Islamic extremist groups such as al-Qaida and Hezbollah could
form alliances with wealthy and powerful Latin American drug lords to launch new terrorist
attacks, U.S. officials said Wednesday. Extremist group operatives have already been identified in several
Latin American countries, mostly involved in fundraising and finding logistical support. But Charles
Allen, chief of intelligence analysis at the Homeland Security Department, said they could use well-established smuggling
routes and drug profits to bring people or even weapons of mass destruction to the U.S.
"The presence of these people in the region leaves open the possibility that they will attempt to
attack the U nited S tates," said Allen, a veteran CIA analyst. "The threats in this hemisphere are real.
We cannot ignore them." Added U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration operations chief Michael Braun: "It is not in our interest to let that potpourri of
scum to come together."
Extinction
Corsi ‘5 [Jerome. PhD in Poli Sci from Harvard, Expert in Politically-Motivated Violence. Atomic Iran, Pg 176-8//JVOSS]
The combination of horror and outrage that will surge upon the nation will demand that the
president retaliate for the incomprehensible damage done by the attack. The problem will be
that the president will not immediately know how to respond or against whom. The perpetrators will have
been incinerated by the explosion that destroyed New York City. Unlike 9-11, there will have been no interval during the attack when those hijacked
could make phone calls to loved ones telling them before they died that the hijackers were radical Islamic extremists. There will be no such phone calls
when the attack will not have been anticipated until the instant the terrorists detonate their improvised nuclear device inside the truck parked on a curb
Nor will there be any possibility of finding any clues, which either were
vaporized instantly or are now lying physically inaccessible under tons of radioactive rubble. Still,
the president, members of Congress, the military, and the public at large will suspect another attack by our
known enemy –Islamic terrorists. The first impulse will be to launch a nuclear strike on Mecca,
to destroy the whole religion of Islam. Medina could possibly be added to the target list just to make the point with crystal clarity.
Yet what would we gain? The moment Mecca and Medina were wiped off the map, the Islamic world – more than 1 billion human beings in
countless different nations – would feel attacked. Nothing would emerge intact after a war between the
United States and Islam. The apocalypse would be upon us. [CONTINUES} Or the president might decide simply to
at the Empire State Building.
launch a limited nuclear strike on Tehran itself. This might be the most rational option in the attempt to retaliate but still communicate restraint. The
problem is that a strike on Tehran would add more nuclear devastation to the world calculation. Muslims
around the world would
still see the retaliation as an attack on Islam, especially when the United States had no positive
proof that the destruction of New York City had been triggered by radical Islamic extremists with
assistance from Iran. But for the president not to retaliate might be unacceptable to the American people. So weakened by the loss of New
York, Americans would feel vulnerable in every city in the nation. "Who is going to be next?" would be the question on everyone's mind. For this there
would be no effective answer. That
the president might think politically at this instant seems almost petty,
yet every president is by nature a politician. The political party in power at the time of the attack
would be destroyed unless the president retaliated with a nuclear strike against somebody. The
American people would feel a price had to be paid while the country was still capable of exacting
revenge.
Impact – Iran Expansionism – LA Heg Solves
Increased engagement solves Iranian expansionism
Karpova, 12 – (Lisa, “US wary of Iranian influence in Latin America,” October 10th, 2012,
http://english.pravda.ru/hotspots/crimes/10-05-2012/121083US_wary_of_Iranian_influence-0/)//HAL
Iranian influence in Latin America gives rise to worry in United States. The Speaker of the House of
Representatives, Republican John Boehner, has expressed concern about the expansion of Iranian
influence in Latin America and claimed that Iran's presence in this region is a major and
significant threat. During a conference held Tuesday at the U.S. State Department, John Boehner said that a possible rift
between the U.S. and Latin America could threaten unity and democracy in the region, saying that,
"The U.S. government needs to intensify its cooperation with Latin America to stop Iranian
expansion." Referring to the last visit of Iranian President Mahmud Ahmadinejad to Latin American countries, he said that "the
visit of the Persian to the region reveals that Iran has plans to increase its influence in Latin
America." He noted also that the Iranian president's visit to Cuba and Venezuela stressed Iran's
interest in expanding its ties with the current governments in the Western Hemisphere. He warned
against "voices" of both the Democratic Party of President Barack Obama and Republican advocates of reducing cooperation with
the region to stop aid to countries like Colombia and Mexico. He urged U.S. authorities to increase their direct
cooperation policy with Latin American countries. Boehner, who welcomed the ratification in October in the U.S.
Congress of the free trade agreements with Colombia and Panama, said the goal now should be to achieve a
continent with "free market, free trade and free citizens" and thereby the U.S. can compromise
with Latin American countries. The increasing trend of public opinion in Latin America to the
progressive governments in the region has considerably declined U.S. influence, and thus the
government in Washington has lost many regional allies.
Impact – LA Instability – 2AC
Retaining U.S. leadership in Latin American is vital to stability
Sabatini, 13 (Christopher, Editor in Chief of Americas Quarterly and Senior Director of Policy
at the Americas Society and the Council of the Americas, “WILL LATIN AMERICA MISS U.S.
HEGEMONY?,” Journal of International Affairs, Volume 66, Issue 2, Spring 2013, pg. 1-XVI,
Proquest, Tashma)
From the cover of the September 2010 issue of The Economist to the pages of Foreign Affairs journalists and observers are
proclaiming the decline of U.S. power in Latin America.1 While some populist leaders, such as former President
Hugo Chavez of Venezuela, may celebrate what they call the end of U.S. dominance (and a number of U.S. academics as well), other
more sober governments such as Brazil and Chile are already calling for a rebalancing of power in the western hemisphere. The
standard framework for describing and understanding U.S.-Latin American relations these past
decades has been one where the United States stands as the primary hegemonic power - the "colossus of
the north."2 Since the Monroe Doctrine, that power has shaped a U.S. policy that has allowed it to intervene either
overtly or covertly at will to impose its national interests; support policy preferences and allies; and in some
cases, even overturn governments, often with bloody consequences. But while Latin America has long chafed over U.S.
military, economic, and political overwhelming predominance, is it possible that, if U.S. power south of its border has indeed waned,
Latin America will actually miss the reduced U.S. presence and even U.S. hegemony? The united States' reduced ability to
unilaterally get what it wants in the hemisphere is already shaping Latin American countries' calculations of domestic and foreign
policies and the formation of multilateral alliances. The last ten years have witnessed the emergence of regional and multilateral
powers seeking to assert regional diplomatic power, if not to specifically reduce the role of the United States in intra-regional
diplomacy. The most obvious and pointed example is the Bolivarian Alliance for the Peoples of our Americas (ALBA) formed by
former President of Venezuela Hugo Chavez, which includes Bolivia, Cuba, Ecuador, Nicaragua, and Venezuela among others in a
bloc vowed to oppose a now-defunct plan to establish a hemisphere-wide free-trade agreement. At the same time, as its economy
rebounded quickly and strongly from the 2007 global financial crisis until 2012, Brazil has sought a greater regional and even global
role, exerting its new-found diplomatic and economic muscle, often as an alternative to U.S. influence in matters as diverse as the
threat of political upheaval in Venezuela to the UN drive to sanction Iran for its nuclear ambitions.3 Yet, there may likely be
a down side to the retrenchment of U.S. leadership and prerogative in the region. While there
are multiple tragic examples of U.S. intervention and a long history of abuse by U.S. power that have thwarted the political and
economic development of countries such as Guatemala or Haiti, U.S.
leadership and power have also brought
benefits. For example, governments have long relied on U.S. leadership to champion specific causes, at times "passing the buck"
to have U.S. support serve as a foil for a general principle or policy that they support but do not want to lead publicly. Similarly,
recent cases of U.S. technical assistance and cooperation helped focus national attention and
energy on addressing violence and crime in countries like Colombia and Mexico. Moreover,
countries in the region have long benefited from the security provided by being in the U.S.
diplomatic and military sphere of influence. This security has helped states struggling with violence and
instability and contributed to intra-regional peace. Will a shift in U.S. power weaken these hemispheric public
goods?
That solves global warfare
Rochlin, 94 [James Francis, Professor of Political Science at Okanagan U. College,
Discovering the Americas: The Evolution of Canadian Foreign Policy Towards Latin America,
130-131, Wake Early Bird File]
While there were economic motivations for Canadian policy in Central America, security considerations were perhaps more
important. Canada possessed an interest in promoting stability in the face of a potential decline of U.S. hegemony in the
Americas. Perceptions of declining U.S. influence in the region – which had some credibility in 1979-1984 due to
the wildly inequitable divisions of wealth in some U.S. client states in Latin America, in addition to political repression, underdevelopment, mounting external debt, anti-American sentiment produced by decades of subjugation to U.S. strategic and
economic interests, and so on – were linked to the prospect of explosive events occurring in the
hemisphere. Hence, the Central American imbroglio was viewed as a fuse which could ignite a cataclysmic process throughout
the region. Analysts at the time worried that in a worstcase scenario, instability created by a regional war,
beginning in Central America and spreading elsewhere in
Latin America, might preoccupy Washington to
the extent that the United States would be unable to perform adequately its important
hegemonic role in the international arena – a concern expressed by the director of research for Canada’s
Standing Committee Report on Central America. It was feared that such
a predicament could generate
increased global instability and perhaps even a hegemonic war . This is one of the motivations which led
Canada to become involved in efforts at regional conflict resolution, such as Contadora, as will be discussed in the next chapter.
Impact – LA Instability – 1AR
US heg promotes stability in Latin America through free trade and
democracy
Sanchez and Sholar 12, Peter Sanchez(PhD) is a Professor & Graduate Program Director
(GPD) @ Loyola University in Chicago. Megan Sholar is a PhD @ Loyola University in Chicago.
(“Power and Principle: A New US Policy for Latin America”; International Journal of
Humanities and Social Science Vol. 2 No. 23; December 2012;
http://www.ijhssnet.com/journals/Vol_2_No_23_December_2012/3.pdf, jj)
Using “hegemony” more broadly, scholars who focus on security have pointed out that hegemonic
powers also ¶
promote stability and cooperation (See Gilpin, 1975; Krasner, 1976; Krasner, 1995). Hegemonic stability theory ¶
suggests that a hegemonic power will provide both peace and prosperity to the system at large,
meaning that the ¶ subordinate states will enjoy these collective goods by cooperating with the
hegemon (See Krasner and Webb, ¶ 1989). When looking at Latin America, we see a region that since political independence has
suffered almost no ¶ inter-state conflict. This sustained regional peace can be attributed to the presence of a
US preponderance of ¶ power. Peace of course is deemed a precondition for prosperity, so in addition to security,
hegemony is deemed to ¶ be more conducive to prosperity than is an anarchical, conflict-prone,
or non-liberal international system. We can ¶ argue then that weak states will come to accept the leadership of a
hegemonic power only as long as that hegemon ¶ offers important collective goods, mainly prosperity and peace. If not, as balance of
power theorists suggest, ¶ states will seek to challenge, or balance, the would-be hegemon at the first opportunity. Thus, while a ¶
preponderance of power is produced and maintained principally by force—realpolitik—hegemony constitutes a ¶ unique
power arrangement that requires more than realpolitik from the hegemonic power. ¶ As a free-
market, democratic hegemon, the United States through its ideological influence expects subordinate ¶ states in Latin America to
embrace democratic principles and institutions, as well as free-market policies. ¶ Consequently, democracy and self-
determination, in addition to peace and prosperity, are also values that ¶ subordinate states
expect as derivatives of American hegemony. After the Great Depression, the countries of Latin ¶ America began to
embrace economic policies that placed the state at the economic helm. These statist economic ¶ policies, principally import
substitution industrialization, were deemed by many nationalist leaders as the best ¶ route toward national development. However,
since the dominance of the Washington Consensus in the 1980s, ¶ which promoted neoliberal policies, the
countries of Latin America have eschewed statism and increasingly ¶ embraced free trade,
privatization, and laissez faire economics in general. Perhaps the most salient example is ¶ President
Fernando Enrique Cardoso of Brazil. Cardoso was a leading dependency theorist who argued that global ¶ capitalism keeps
poor countries from developing; however, when he became president of Brazil in 1995, Cardoso ¶ promoted neoliberal
economic policies.
Impact – Oil Dependence Good – 2AC
Failure to strength U.S. influence in Latin America sacrifices oil trade
Vega, 5 (Juan, J.D. candidate at the University of Minnesota Law School, M.B.A at the
University of Florida, “China's Economic and Political Clout Grows in Latin America at the
Expense of U.S. Interests,” 14 Minn. J. Global Trade 377, Summer 2005, lexis, Tashma)
C. Latin America and U.S. Interests 1. U.S. Oil Interests Roger Noriega, Assistant Secretary of State for Western Hemisphere Affairs,
has stated that President Bush's policy on Latin America "is based on promoting democracy through programs aimed at curbing
corruption and improving education, promoting trade, and fighting drug trafficking." 103 Latin America is also an
essential source of oil for the United States. 104 As China gains more clout in Latin America, the
United States may obtain less cooperation from Latin American countries with regard to securing
oil , promoting human rights, expanding antinarcotics programs, fighting terrorism, assuring U.S. national security, promoting
democracy and higher environmental standards, and reaching long-term trade agreements. 105 It is imperative for the
United States to secure future sources of oil from Latin America. Twenty percent of U.S. energy
originates in the Andean countries, which comprise Colombia, Bolivia, Peru, Ecuador, and Venezuela. 106 Fourteen of
that twenty percent originates in Venezuela. 107 Unrest in Venezuela and other oil-producing countries in Latin America as well as
rising anti-U.S. sentiment throughout the region may jeopardize the United States's access to
Latin American oil. 108 The election [*392] of leftist leaders to positions of power and a movement throughout Latin
America to nationalize the oil industry further add to this potential decrease in U.S. access to Latin American oil. 109
Receding oil dependence causes global collapse and creates multiple scenarios for
global warfare
Lawrence, 8 (Andrew Lawrence, Stanford, International Relations, “‘The Most Inconvenient
Truth:’ The Necessity of Good Governance in Oil-Exporters,” Stanford Journal of International
Relations, Fall/Winter 2008,
http://www.stanford.edu/group/sjir/pdf/Oil_Governance_REAL_final.pdf)
Yet because “oil wealth is robustly associated with more durable regimes” 9 that sometimes remain in power for
decades at a time, oil-dependent countries may lack a viable political alternative to the status quo should
the government collapse. In fact, even if the government exercises an autocratic, unpopular grip on power, opposition movements
remain largely untested and could prove equally inept. For example, as the rampant violence in the immediate aftermath of postSaddam Hussein Iraq demonstrated, any abrupt political change in an oil-exporter can lead to a power
vacuum and the dangerous revitalization of embedded social conflicts (i.e. sectarian violence).
Furthermore, with a military budget near $500 billion and a military stretched thin by simultaneous wars, the United
States cannot afford to shock the international oil regime by ceasing its expenditures on oil
without precipitating conflict – conflicts that would likely require foreign (most probably American) military
intervention. In addition, because expenditures on military and security forces as a percentage of revenues
are greater in oil-exporting countries than those of their importing counterparts, 10 a trauma to the international
oil system may allow for the proliferation of heavily-armed factions in otherwise lawless
environments. Especially with populations historically plagued by widespread poverty, the availability of weapons in
oil-exporting countries could potentially create insurgencies composed of poor citizens seeking to
address grievances against the prosperous political elites. The Niger Delta, for example, currently contains heavily-armed,
anti-government factions aggrieved by their exclusion from petroleum revenues. 11 As such, should the United States hastily
abandon the current oil regime and withdraw its military and political support from the oil export-dependent Nigerian
government, the long-oppressed yet oil-rich communities in the Delta region may seize upon the
opportunity to exact revenge for historical injustices. Nigeria is not the only country susceptible to conflict as oil revenues
diminish. Just as the oil market developed onto an international scale, so too did the resource curse symptoms that so often
accompany oil exporters proliferate from country to country. Russia, for instance, needs high oil prices to keep
its
economy afloat, as nearly 40 percent of export revenue derives from oil and gas. 12 Saudi Arabia – a country that
produced fifteen of the nineteen hijackers in the 9/11 terrorist attacks – depends on oil revenues for 44 percent of its
GDP. 13 Iran’s oil rents allow the government to subsidize food and gas at a rate that “accounted for 12 percent” of the
nation’s GDP. 14 Because oil wealth sustains the economies of so many oil-producing countries,
the collapse of oil prices that would surely accompany the US withdrawal from the international oil regime
could have profound and potentially devastating effects in these countries and, by extension, throughout the
world.
Impact – Nuclear Power Good – 2AC
US-Latin America relations are key to nuclear power implementation
Barshefsky et al 08, Charlene Barshefsky, James T. Hill, Shannon K. O’Neil, Julia E. Sweig. Task Force Chairs
(“U.S.-Latin America¶ Relations:¶ A New Direction for a¶ New Reality¶ Report of an¶ Independent Task Force”, Council on Foreign
Relations, www.cfr.org/content/publications/attachments/LatinAmerica_TF.pdf, jj)
Latin America has also seen resurgent interest in nuclear power. A¶ little over forty years ago, there appeared to be a
genuine risk of a¶ nuclear arms race in the region—a trend that was short-circuited by¶ the establishment of a
Nuclear Weapons Free Zone by the 1967 Treaty¶ of Tlatelolco. Since then, Argentina, Brazil, and Mexico have
built¶ seven nuclear power plants, although only Argentina has established a¶ strong technical capacity in this area—a capacity that
recently has been tapped by Venezuela to explore the possible development of a nuclear¶ energy program of its own. Today there is a
compelling argument for¶ the expansion of nuclear energy, which provides base power with zero¶
greenhouse gas emissions, as Brazil’s construction of new reactors and¶ use of nuclear-powered submarines attest. However, achieving
such¶ expansion will require that Latin America address the complex challenges ¶ of managing and disposing of uranium and nuclear waste and¶
meeting international standards (especially given concerns overCha´vez’s¶ desire for nuclear-enrichment capability and a relationship with Iran). ¶ The
Task Force finds that although biofuels will not displace oil and gas,¶ they can help diversify energy choices,
lower the energy
intensity of national¶ economies, decrease greenhouse gas emissions, and foster greater energy
security¶ for the entire hemisphere. While being mindful of the need to guarantee¶ food security, diversifying energy sources
could be an important driver¶ of economic development in Latin America as the region becomes an¶ important
technology, production, and research hub in the long-term¶ development of a global biofuels market. Expanding nuclear power¶
would further efforts at energy diversification. Cooperation on such¶ issues provides a unique
opportunity for the United States to reengage¶ Latin America proactively, with shared
environmental and energy concerns¶ deepening diplomatic relationships.54
Nuclear power key to solving global warming—new technologies make
fission safer and more efficient
Williams 13, Arthur Williams is a condensed-matter theorist, retired from IBM's Thomas J.
Watson Research Center after 30 years there. Watson is located near the Indian Point nuclearpower facility. Living and working near Indian Point continues to motivate him to learn about
the issues surrounding nuclear power. He is now a registered and practicing patent
agent.(04/08/13, “Nuclear power: The only available solution to global warming”;
http://www.physicstoday.org/daily_edition/points_of_view/nuclear_power_the_only_availab
le_solution_to_global_warming#bio, jj)
Global warming, energy independence, water scarcity and third-world economic growth are all
amenable to a common, safe, clean, cost-competitive and field-tested nuclear solution. Why isn’t this solution universally
embraced and implemented?¶ I suggest two reasons. First, we humans respond much more strongly to dramatic events, like
earthquakes, violent weather and terrorist acts, than we do to steady-state threats, such as auto accidents, medical errors and coal
particles. At a cost of $4 trillion, we started two wars in response to the terrorist attacks of 9/11 that killed 2996. The death tolls in
the US from auto accidents (30 000), medical errors (44 000–200 000), and coal dust (13 000) are not only higher, but also
perennial. The
gradual character of carbon dioxide emissions and global warming is elevating our
“boiling frog” tendencies to an entirely new scale of danger. Although the problem may not excite us, our
pot is warming so quickly that we must leap to survive. A measure of the magnitude and urgency of this
challenge can be found in Bill Gates’ summary of his wonderful TED lecture on this topic: Despite the time, effort and money he has
devoted to new vaccines and seeds, if he could be granted a single wish for the coming decades, it would be for a practical, CO2-free
energy source. That explicit prioritization reflects his awareness of an especially unfortunate feature of warming, that its burden falls
most heavily on the politically voiceless poor, and less heavily on those with the means to address the challenge. The disparity adds
to our inertia.¶ The second reason lies in deeply entrenched myths (which for my purposes I shall define as untruths breeding
complacency), rooted in unrealistically high expectations for renewable energy and unrealistically negative expectations for nuclear
power. Criticism of nuclear power focuses on history and ignores dramatic advances in fission
technology. This incomplete picture gives rise to myths that conflict directly with the assertions of Gates and of John
Parmentola, the US army's director of research and laboratory management: that nuclear fission is the only “practical” solution in
view.¶ The remainder of this essay comments on Gates’ criteria for “practicality,” and examines the factors of availability, reliability,
cost, scale, safety, proliferation and waste. The
good news is that new fission technologies make
fission clean, safe, competitively inexpensive, and resistant to terrorism . Moreover,
they solve the nuclear-waste challenge. One technology claims to reduce the high-level waste
output of a typical power plant from 20 tons per year to a few kilograms. American startups are pursuing
commercialization, but much of the action is in other countries, notably China and India.¶ Gates and Parmentola also emphasize the
urgency for halting CO2 emissions. In my view, the following six widespread and paralyzing myths must be addressed.¶ Myth #1:
Wind and solar can do it¶ Renewable sources, like wind, solar, and tide, emit no CO2, and that’s undeniably good. While the
discussion of renewables often focuses on cost, it is power density and intermittency that conspire with cost to prevent these
technologies from providing adequate solutions.¶ As Gates puts it, technologies for renewable energy represent energy farming.
Because the intrinsic power density of renewable sources is orders of magnitude lower than that
of hydrocarbons and nuclear processes, large tracts of land are required to reap even modest
quantities of power.¶ Even if large tracts of land, such as those in the Sahara or the American Southwest, are employed, the
electricity produced is inherently intermittent, and must be stored and transported. For example,
Gates estimates that all the world’s existing batteries can store only about 10 minutes of electricity consumption. Also, because land
is not available near population centers, transport such as high-tension towers must be provided.¶ While the relative cost of
renewable sources is improving, cost still represents a disadvantage of several hundred percent that has been compensated by
government subsidies. Subsidies might continue, but as Hargraves emphasizes in his extensively researched book, Thorium: Energy
Cheaper than Coal, the prospects for eliminating CO2 emissions are greatly improved if the alternative power source is cheaper than
hydrocarbons. The high energy density and availability of coal make it misleadingly attractive. Hargraves concludes that at least one
of the next-generation breed-and-burn fission technologies can produce electricity for about $0.03/kWh, making it costcompetitive, even with coal. The intrinsic safety and relative simplicity of the coming generation of
breed-and-burn fission reactors makes them significantly less expensive than those of the
present generation.¶ Myth #2: Nuclear is unsafe¶ There are two safety issues in the context of nuclear
power: meltdown and terrorism. Both are essentially eliminated by next-generation
fission technologies .¶ Concerns raised by incidents at Three Mile Island and Chernobyl were seriously aggravated by
recent events at Fukushima. Such dangers are not intrinsic to fission, but stem from military priorities
favoring fuel rods comprised of metal-clad ceramics. Ceramics conduct heat poorly, and active
cooling (powered externally) is required to prevent overheating, melting and rupture of the
cladding. Molten-salt reactors are qualitatively different. First, the exploiting the molten state leads to an inherently safe reactor
design, since no additional melting is possible. More specifically, the far superior thermal conductivity of molten
salt eliminates the need for active cooling. At any time and without any external power, the reactor can be
drained, by gravity, into a subterranean vessel in which passive cooling suffices. Such reactors
are termed “walk-away” safe. A molten-salt reactor ran successfully and without incident at Oak Ridge National
Laboratory for four years.¶ High-level wastes produced by fission are unavoidable, but they are only a tiny fraction of what we call
nuclear waste. The complete burning of nuclear fuel in molten-salt reactors provides all the benefits
of reprocessing, which has permitted France, for example, to produce about 80% of its
electricity from fission for decades, without theft of fissile material by terrorists, although Greenpeace did block a
plutonium shipment. Because next-generation reactors integrate breeding and burning into a single process, fissile material does not
exist outside the reactor, where it is both hot and diluted, thereby reducing the risk of theft significantly below even that of
reprocessing.¶ Myth #3: Nuclear waste remains an unsolved problem¶ As the term “breed-and-burn” suggests, next-generation
fission technologies are related to and provide the benefits of reprocessing. An independent benefit of molten-salt
technologies is that the fissile material can remain in the reactor until it is completely consumed,
thereby producing dramatically less waste. In today’s solid-fuel reactors the fuel is clad in metals that can tolerate
only a limited amount of neutron bombardment, necessitating removal of the fuel long before it is fully consumed. This distinction is
the basis of the claim by the MIT-based startup, Transatomic Power, that waste production can be reduced from tons to kilograms,
increasing by a factor of 30 the energy obtained from a given quantity of fuel. Refueling frequency is also reduced in
molten-salt reactors by the continuous removal of neutron-absorbing xenon, whose
accumulation in solid-fuel reactors also reduces the time that fuel can remain in the reactor.¶ A
bonus, but not a surprise, given the connection between breed-and-burn reactors and reprocessing, is that some new reactors can
consume existing nuclear waste—both depleted and spent fuel. In this way, next-generation fission can solve the
waste problem created by present-generation fission.¶ Myth #4: Fission may provide electricity, but it neither
fuels transportation nor provides clean water¶ Fission produces cheap heat, which is broadly useful. In the
present context, the cost-effective heat produced by fission is symbiotic with two highly developed technologies that
address two of our most critical challenges, CO2-free transportation and seawater desalination.¶ Transportation
consumes a large fraction of the energy budget. Its fractional share is approaching that of industry, which is about twice that of both
residential and commercial energy consumption. Since fission reactors are unlikely to be placed in cars and trucks, in what sense can
fission contribute to CO2-free transportation? The answer is the synthesis of ammonia. NH3 synthesis is among the most promising
exploitations of heat from fission. NH3 can be viewed as an especially effective medium for hydrogen storage and delivery. The
infrastructure for NH3 production and distribution is already widespread. NH3 has about half the energy content by weight of
gasoline, but its much lower cost gives it a price-performance advantage. Most importantly, NH3 burns to form air and water:¶
4NH3 + 3O2 = 2N2 + 6H2O¶ Fission also offers a choice between electrically powered reverse osmosis and traditional distillation as
means to produce potable water. Distillation can use fission-produced heat directly, whereas reverse osmosis is very energy
demanding, and can use fission-produced electricity. Either way, the value of potable water is rising rapidly, and will benefit directly
from cheap clean power.¶ Myth #5: Nuclear installations are large, expensive and problematic to site¶ The greater efficiency
of molten-salt reactors makes them smaller for a given capacity. More importantly, they operate at
atmospheric pressure, which eliminates both the threat of explosion and the need for a large containment structure, the visual
signature of today’s fission plants. In combination with the pervasive relative simplicity of molten-fuel reactors, elimination of the
containment structure renders molten-salt facilities relatively small and inexpensive. Such reactors also lend themselves to factory
manufacture, further reducing their cost. The original molten-fuel reactor was intended to power airplanes. In the present context,
the efficiency, reduced size, and guaranteed safety of next-generation fission plants combine to
reduce the NIMBY (not in my backyard) resistance to their siting.¶ Myth #6: Nuclear requires lengthy development
(new game changer needed)¶ Writing in the February 2013 issue of Physics Today, John Parmentola called for the invention of a
game-changing fission technology. Correspondingly, Gates calls for hundreds of startups pursuing different variations on the
common theme. Gates is involved with one such company, TerraPower, which will commercialize an innovative solid-fuel breedand-burn technology.¶ The call for startups and game changers reveals the great irony of this context:
that arguably the most promising of the breed-and-burn technologies is not at all new. As mentioned
above, the molten-salt thorium reactor was developed at Oak Ridge National Lab in the 1960s, where it ran successfully for four
years.¶ A measure of the significance of the Oak Ridge effort is the conviction and enthusiasm of the Oak Ridge lab director, Alvin
Weinberg. His zeal for the intrinsic safety and other virtues of the molten-salt reactor, now called LFTR (lithium-fluoride thorium
reactor), was not politically welcome, and led to his firing by President Nixon in 1973. Weinberg devoted the rest of his life to the
promotion of LFTR; the Weinberg Foundation continues his mission.¶ A contemporary proponent of LFTR, Kirk Sorensen, leads the
startup Flibe, which is focused on LFTR commercialization. The MIT-based startup Transatomic Power recently won an ARPA-E
competition as part of its efforts to commercialize a LFTR-related technology that will burn “spent” fuel or uranium, at least
initially.¶ Where the action is¶ As David Kramer reported in the November 2012 issue of Physics Today, enthusiasm for nuclear
power has waned in the US. The Fukushima events have led to similar declines in Japan and Germany. Fortunately for the world,
others are moving forward; consider fission facilities in China:¶ 14 operational¶ 27 under construction¶ 51 planned¶ 120 proposed¶
212 total¶ The central assertion here echoes that of both Gates and Parmentola:
nuclear fission is the only
known technology capable of bringing CO2 emissions under control . My hope is that
greater awareness of the benefits promised by coming fission technologies will debunk the myths currently stalling public and
private investment, and reverse the unfortunate trend in the US, Japan and Germany.
Runaway warming causes extinction
Deibel 7, Professor of IR @ National War College (Terry L., 2007l “Foreign Affairs Strategy:
Logic for American Statecraft”, Conclusion: American Foreign Affairs Strategy Today)
Finally, there is one major existential threat to American security (as well as prosperity) of a nonviolent nature, which, though far in
the future, demands urgent action. It is the threat of global warming to the stability of the climate upon
which all earthly life depends. Scientists worldwide have been observing the gathering of this threat for three decades
now, and what was once a mere possibility has passed through probability to near certainty. Indeed not one of more than 900
articles on climate change published in refereed scientific journals from 1993 to 2003 doubted that anthropogenic warming
is occurring. “In legitimate scientific circles,” writes Elizabeth Kolbert, “it is virtually impossible to find evidence
of disagreement over the fundamentals of global warming.” Evidence from a vast international scientific monitoring effort
accumulates almost weekly, as this sample of newspaper reports shows: an international panel predicts “brutal droughts, floods and
violent storms across the planet over the next century”; climate change could “literally alter ocean currents, wipe away huge portions
of Alpine Snowcaps and aid the spread of cholera and malaria”; “glaciers in the Antarctic and in Greenland are melting much faster
than expected, and…worldwide, plants are blooming several days earlier than a decade ago”; “rising sea temperatures have been
accompanied by a significant global increase in the most destructive hurricanes”; “NASA scientists have concluded from direct
temperature measurements that 2005 was the hottest year on record, with 1998 a close second”; “Earth’s warming climate
is estimated to contribute to more than 150,000 deaths and 5 million illnesses each year” as disease
spreads; “widespread bleaching from Texas to Trinidad…killed broad swaths of corals” due to a 2-degree rise in sea temperatures.
“The world is slowly disintegrating,” concluded Inuit hunter Noah Metuq, who lives 30 miles from the Arctic Circle. “They call it
climate change…but we just call it breaking up.” From the founding of the first cities some 6,000 years ago until the beginning of the
industrial revolution, carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere remained relatively constant at about 280 parts per million (ppm). At
present they are accelerating toward 400 ppm, and by 2050 they will reach 500 ppm, about double pre-industrial levels.
Unfortunately, atmospheric CO2 lasts about a century, so there is no way immediately to reduce levels, only to slow their increase,
we are thus in for significant global warming; the only debate is how much and how serous the effects will be. As the newspaper
stories quoted above show, we are already experiencing the effects of 1-2 degree warming in more
violent storms, spread of disease, mass die offs of plants and animals, species extinction, and
threatened inundation of low-lying countries like the Pacific nation of Kiribati and the Netherlands at a warming of 5 degrees or less
the Greenland and West Antarctic ice sheets could disintegrate, leading to a sea level of rise of 20 feet that would cover North
Carolina’s outer banks, swamp the southern third of Florida, and inundate Manhattan up to the middle of Greenwich Village.
Another catastrophic effect would be the collapse of the Atlantic thermohaline circulation that
keeps the winter weather in Europe far warmer than its latitude would otherwise allow.
Economist William Cline once estimated the damage to the United States alone from moderate
levels of warming at 1-6 percent of GDP annually; severe warming could cost 13-26 percent of
GDP. But the most frightening scenario is runaway greenhouse warming, based on positive feedback from the buildup of water
vapor in the atmosphere that is both caused by and causes hotter surface temperatures. Past ice age transitions, associated with only
5-10 degree changes in average global temperatures, took place in just decades, even though no one was then pouring everincreasing amounts of carbon into the atmosphere. Faced with this specter, the best one can conclude is that “humankind’s
continuing enhancement of the natural greenhouse effect is akin to playing Russian roulette with the earth’s climate and humanity’s
life support system. At worst, says physics professor Marty Hoffert of New York University, “we’re just going to burn everything up;
we’re going to heat the atmosphere to the temperature it was in the Cretaceous when there were crocodiles at the poles, and then
everything will collapse.” During the Cold War, astronomer Carl Sagan popularized a theory of nuclear winter to describe how a
thermonuclear war between the Untied States and the Soviet Union would not only destroy both countries but possibly end life on
this planet. Global warming is the post-Cold War era’s equivalent of nuclear winter at least as
serious and considerably better supported scientifically. Over the long run it puts dangers form terrorism and
traditional military challenges to shame. It is a threat not only to the security and prosperity to the United
States, but potentially to the continued existence of life on this planet.
Impact – Terrorism – 2AC
US influence stops the continued disconnect and presence spurs Latin American
policies to solve the War on Terror
Emerson, 10 – PhD from the ANU School of Social Sciences, studied Communication
Design in Melbourne, he has studied in Mexico and Chile, and is currently associated with the
Australian National Centre for Latin American Studies (ANCLAS), at the ANU (Guy, “Radical
Neglect? The “War on Terror” and Latin America,” LATIN AMERICAN POLITICS AND
SOCIETY, Volume 52, Issue 1, pages 33–62, Spring 2010, March 8th, 2010, JSTOR)//HAL
A Priori Shortcomings At first glance, the argument that the “War on Terror” explains the
diplomatic disconnect appears persuasive. Viewed through a geostrategic lens, U.S.
involvement in Iraq and Afghanistan, in addition to claims of hegemonic overreach, enables
Latin America to challenge its subordination in interamerican relations. U.S. preoccupation
beyond the hemisphere not only appears to offer Latin America the flexibility to generate policy
options according to its own interests, but also reduces the fear of possible retribution should
those interests contradict U.S. objectives. These interpretations of change are based on an understanding of
autonomy as “noninterference”; that is, an understanding of interamerican relations that emphasizes the importance of favorable
geopolitical factors largely beyond Latin America’s control. The hemispheric disconnect has occurred due to U.S.
withdrawal from the region and not through action in Latin America itself. The logical extension of this
view is that the ability of Latin American states to act independently expands and contracts irrespective of their action. A
change in hemispheric relations, it is argued, depends on the United States and its strategic
interest at any given time. The principal weakness of defining change according to a conjuncture of external factors is that
it fails to recognize Latin American states and their capacity to influence external factors. To overcome this weakness, it is
necessary to move beyond a restrictive view of autonomy as noninterference to the
aforementioned view that is mindful of Latin American agency. While analysis needs to recognize U.S.
interests, these interests are not absolute and should not overshadow events in Latin America. A multidimensional
approach acknowledging both U.S. and Latin American interests better explains the present
state of interamerican relations.
Terrorism leads to great power warfare ----- only scenario for escalation
Ayson, 10 [Robert Ayson, Professor of Strategic Studies and Director of the Centre for Strategic
Studies: New Zealand at the Victoria University of Wellington,“After a Terrorist Nuclear Attack:
Envisaging Catalytic Effects,” Studies in Conflict & Terrorism , Volume 33, Issue 7, July,
Available Online to Subscribing Institutions via InformaWorld]
A terrorist nuclear attack, and even the use of nuclear weapons in response by the country attacked in the first place, would not
necessarily represent the worst of the nuclear worlds imaginable. Indeed, there are reasons to wonder whether nuclear terrorism
should ever be regarded as belonging in the category of truly existential threats. A contrast can be drawn here with the global
catastrophe that would come from a massive nuclear exchange between two or more of the sovereign states that possess these
weapons in significant numbers. Even the worst terrorism that the twenty-first century might bring would fade into insignificance
alongside considerations of what a general nuclear war would have wrought in the Cold War period. And it must be admitted that as
long as the major nuclear weapons states have hundreds and even thousands of nuclear weapons at
their disposal, there is always the possibility of a truly awful nuclear exchange taking place
precipitated entirely by state possessors themselves. But these two nuclear worlds—a non-state actor nuclear attack
and a catastrophic interstate nuclear exchange—are not necessarily separable. It is just possible that
some sort of terrorist attack, and especially an act of nuclear terrorism, could precipitate a chain of events
leading to a massive exchange of nuclear weapons between two or more of the states that
possess them. In this context, today’s and tomorrow’s terrorist groups might assume the place allotted during the early
Cold War years to new state possessors of small nuclear arsenals who were seen as raising the risks of a catalytic nuclear
war between the superpowers started by third parties. These risks were considered in the late 1950s and early
1960s as concerns grew about nuclear proliferation, the so-called n+1 problem. It may require a considerable amount of imagination
to depict an especially plausible situation where an act of nuclear terrorism could lead to such a massive inter-state nuclear war. For
example, in
the event of a terrorist nuclear attack on the United States, it might well be wondered
just how Russia and/or China could plausibly be brought into the picture, not least because they seem
unlikely to be fingered as the most obvious state sponsors or encouragers of terrorist groups. They would seem far too
responsible to be involved in supporting that sort of terrorist behavior that could just as easily threaten
them as well. Some possibilities, however remote, do suggest themselves. For example, how might the United States react if it was
thought or discovered that the fissile material used in the act of nuclear terrorism had come from Russian stocks,40 and if for some
reason Moscow denied any responsibility for nuclear laxity? The correct attribution of that nuclear material to a particular country
might not be a case of science fiction given the observation by Michael May et al. that while the debris resulting from a nuclear
explosion would be “spread over a wide area in tiny fragments, its radioactivity makes it detectable, identifiable and collectable, and
a wealth of information can be obtained from its analysis: the efficiency of the explosion, the materials used and, most important …
some indication of where the nuclear material came from.”41 Alternatively, if the act of nuclear terrorism came as a
complete surprise, and American officials refused to believe that a terrorist group was fully responsible (or responsible at all)
suspicion would
shift immediately to state possessors. Ruling out Western ally countries like the United Kingdom
and France, and probably Israel and India as well, authorities in Washington would be left with a very short list
consisting of North Korea, perhaps Iran if its program continues, and possibly Pakistan. But at what
stage would Russia and China be definitely ruled out in this high stakes game of nuclear Cluedo?
In particular, if the act of nuclear terrorism occurred against a backdrop of existing tension in
Washington’s relations with Russia and/or China, and at a time when threats had already been traded between
these major powers, would officials and political leaders not be tempted to assume the worst? Of course,
the chances of this occurring would only seem to increase if the United States was already involved in some sort of limited armed
conflict with Russia and/or China, or if they were confronting each other from a distance in a proxy war, as unlikely as these
developments may seem at the present time. The reverse might well apply too: should a nuclear terrorist attack occur in Russia or
China during a period of heightened tension or even limited conflict with the United States, could Moscow and Beijing resist the
pressures that might rise domestically to consider the United States as a possible perpetrator or encourager of the attack?
Washington’s early response to a terrorist nuclear attack on its own soil might also raise the
possibility of an unwanted (and nuclear aided) confrontation with Russia and/or China. For
example, in the noise and confusion during the immediate aftermath of the terrorist nuclear attack,
the U.S. president might be expected to place the country’s armed forces, including its nuclear arsenal, on
a higher stage of alert. In such a tense environment, when careful planning runs up against the friction of reality, it is
just possible that Moscow and/or China might mistakenly read this as a sign of U.S. intentions to
use force (and possibly nuclear force) against them. In that situation, the temptations to preempt such actions
might grow, although it must be admitted that any preemption would probably still meet with a devastating response. As part of
its initial response to the act of nuclear terrorism (as discussed earlier) Washington might decide to order a significant
conventional (or nuclear) retaliatory or disarming attack against the leadership of the terrorist group
and/or states seen to support that group. Depending on the identity and especially the location of these targets,
Russia and/or China might interpret such action as being far too close for their comfort, and
potentially as an infringement on their spheres of influence and even on their sovereignty. One farfetched but perhaps not impossible scenario might stem from a judgment in Washington that some of
the main aiders and abetters of the terrorist action resided somewhere such as Chechnya, perhaps in connection
with what Allison claims is the “Chechen insurgents’ … long-standing interest in all things nuclear.”42 American pressure on
that part of the world would almost certainly raise alarms in Moscow that might require a degree of advanced
consultation from Washington that the latter found itself unable or unwilling to provide. There is also the question of
how other nuclear-armed states respond to the act of nuclear terrorism on another member of
that special club. It could reasonably be expected that following a nuclear terrorist attack on the United States, both Russia
and China would extend immediate sympathy and support to Washington and would work
alongside the United States in the Security Council. But there is just a chance, albeit a slim one, where the
support of Russia and/or China is less automatic in some cases than in others. For example, what would
happen if the United States wished to discuss its right to retaliate against groups based in their territory? If, for
some reason, Washington found the responses of Russia and China deeply underwhelming, (neither
“for us or against us”) might it also suspect that they secretly were in cahoots with the group,
increasing (again perhaps ever so slightly) the chances of a major exchange. If the terrorist group had some
connections to groups in Russia and China, or existed in areas of the world over which Russia and China held sway, and if
Washington felt that Moscow or Beijing were placing a curiously modest level of pressure on them, what conclusions might it then
draw about their culpability? If Washington decided to use, or decided to threaten the use of, nuclear weapons,
the responses of Russia and China would be crucial to the chances of avoiding a more serious
nuclear exchange. They might surmise, for example, that while the act of nuclear terrorism was
especially heinous and demanded a strong response, the response simply had to remain below the nuclear
threshold. It would be one thing for a non-state actor to have broken the nuclear use taboo, but an entirely different thing for a
state actor, and indeed the leading state in the international system, to do so. If Russia and China felt sufficiently
strongly about that prospect, there is then the question of what options would lie open to them to dissuade the United
States from such action: and as has been seen over the last several decades, the central dissuader
of the use of nuclear weapons by states has been the threat of nuclear retaliation. If some readers find
this simply too fanciful, and perhaps even offensive to contemplate, it may be informative to reverse the tables. Russia, which
possesses an arsenal of thousands of nuclear warheads and that has been one of the two most
important trustees of the non-use taboo, is subjected to an attack of nuclear terrorism. In response,
Moscow places its nuclear forces very visibly on a higher state of alert and declares that it is considering the use of nuclear retaliation
against the group and any of its state supporters. How would Washington view such a possibility? Would it really be keen to support
Russia’s use of nuclear weapons, including outside Russia’s traditional sphere of influence? And if not, which seems quite plausible,
what options would Washington have to communicate that displeasure? If China had been the victim of the nuclear terrorism and
seemed likely to retaliate in kind, would the United States and Russia be happy to sit back and let this occur? In the charged
atmosphere immediately after a nuclear terrorist attack, how would the attacked country
respond to pressure from other major nuclear powers not to respond in kind? The phrase “how
dare they tell us what to do” immediately springs to mind. Some might even go so far as to
interpret this concern as a tacit form of sympathy or support for the terrorists. This might not
help the chances of nuclear restraint.
Impact – Terrorism – 1AR
Lack of American hegemony catalyzes terrorism
Felzenberg and Gray 11 (Alvin S. Felzenberg – Lexturer at the University of Pennyslvania
and Yale University, Lecturer – University of Pennsylvania and Yale University and Alexander B.
Gray -- Ph.D. Candidate in International Affairs at the George Washington University, “The New
Isolationism”, The National Review, 1-3, http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/256150/newisolationism-alvin-s-felzenberg) SM
Messrs. Frank and Paul and their supporters have taken it into their minds that a reduced American
presence in world affairs, particularly where the military is involved, would be a good thing. They had better
think again: World politics, like nature, is hardly prone to respect vacuums. Iran and Venezuela remain as
bellicose and destabilizing as ever, in spite of two years of Obama “engagement.” Iran squats beside the Strait of
Hormuz, through which much of the world’s energy supply travels. Iran has also, the original Monroe Doctrine be damned, extended
its military cooperation with Hugo Chávez’s authoritarian regime. Evidence is strong that Venezuela is providing
sanctuary for Hezbollah terrorists in South America. The alliance of these two anti-American and increasingly
menacing states could pose a threat to the United States of a kind that would make us nostalgic for the Cuban
Missile Crisis.
AT: Alliance DA – 2AC
Turn-US hegemony in Latin America emboldens regional
organizations
Brand et al 12, Alexander Brand is Lecturer and Post-Doc Researcher at the Department of
Political Science at the University of Mainz. Susan McEwen-Fial is Lecturer at the Department
of Political Science at the University of Mainz. Wolfgang Muno is Visiting Professor of Political
Science at the University of Erfurt. Andrea Ribeiro Hoffmann is Lecturer at the Willy Brandt
School of Public Policy, University of Erfurt. (04/2012, “BRICs and U.S. Hegemony: Theoretical
Reflections on Shifting Power Patterns and Empirical Evidence from Latin America”,Mainz
Papers on International and European Politics (MPIEP) Paper No. 4,
http://international.politics.uni-mainz.de/files/2012/10/mpiep04.pdf,jj)
While China’s efforts primarily follow an economic rationale, Brazil’s activities in regional¶ institutional matters take a slightly
different shape. One of the reasons attributed to the creation¶ of the South American Common Market (Mercosur) is the
Brazilian attempt to balance the U.S.¶ economic hegemony in South America, and to
change the terms of the U.S.-led negotiations for¶ the creation of a free trade area in the
hemisphere, the Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA).¶ Part of this process was also the rapprochement
between Mercosur and the Andean Community¶ ( CAN ) promoted by the government of President Itamar Franco in
1993. The interregional¶ cooperation project evolved from a mere free trade agreement towards a
broader initiative,¶ which included the cooperation on infrastructure and political matters, and
culminated with¶ the creation of the Community of South American Countries (CASA) in 2004. In 2007, CASA
was¶ renamed as Union of South American Nations (UNASUR), and included new elements such as¶ cooperation
in security and defense (Briceno 2010).¶ UNASUR is therefore another example in which balancing
the U.S. was a main driving force¶ in the Brazilian foreign policy. Despite a range of disagreements between
Brazil and Venezuela,¶ and their own dispute for sub-regional hegemony in South America, both countries share the¶
discontentment with U.S.’s historical influence in Latin America, and also, in particular, with¶ its
militarized approach to the narcotraffic conflicts in Colombia. The inclusion of security in¶ UNASUR’s objectives,
and the creation of the South American Defence Council (SDC) under its¶ auspices, has been a novelty to South American practices
of multilateral cooperation. These developments have not only affected the bilateral relations between
the U.S. and South American¶ countries, but also the role of the OAS in the region. Its collective
defense component, the Interamerican Treaty of Reciprocal Assistance (TIAR) was discredited after the U.S. chose to support¶ Great
Britain and NATO over Argentina during the Falklands War in 1982, and practically dead¶ after Mexico renounced it in 2002
(Ribeiro-Hoffmann/Herz 2010).
AT: Alliance DA – ALBA – 2AC
Chavez’s passing was the death knell of ALBA
Rangel, 13 (Beatrice, member of the Advisor board and director of AMLA Consulting in Miami
Beach, “Who Would Take Hugo Chávez's Place at ALBA?,” Inter-American Dialogue’s Latin
America Advisor, 2/4/13, http://www.cepr.net/documents/CEPR_News/LAA130204.pdf,
Tashma)
A: Beatrice Rangel, member of the Advisor board and director of AMLA Consulting in Miami Beach:"It seems quite unlikely
that ALBA will transcend its founding figure. To be sure, President Chávez has been one of the defining political
leaders in Latin America's 21st century. His vocal defense of populism, along with his charisma and personal magnetism, redefined
Latin American political geography, establishing a clear divide between his standing, which has staunch followers, and those leaders
who have a market-oriented vision of economics. President Chávez's leadership has also sailed on the tail winds
of high energy prices, which allowed him to uphold a wholly subsidized domestic economy and
extend subsidies to other Latin American nations. But none of the leaders of ALBA nations have
President Chávez's political appeal or Venezuela's oil income. Thus ALBA might well become a
memory sooner rather than later."
Even if ALBA doesn’t fall apart, it’s now ineffective
Shifter, 13 (Michael, president of the Inter-American Dialogue, “Who Would Take Hugo
Chávez's Place at ALBA?,” Inter-American Dialogue’s Latin America Advisor, 2/4/13,
http://www.cepr.net/documents/CEPR_News/LAA130204.pdf, Tashma)
A: Michael Shifter, president of the Inter-American Dialogue: "Since its inception, ALBA, a bloc of ideologically like-minded
governments, has been largely driven and financed by Chávez. Without Chávez, ALBA will not disappear
but will probably lose some of its force , visibility, and stridency. Chávez was uniquely able to get ALBA
off the ground because of his money and enormous ambitions. He has long modeled himself after his idol
Simón Bolívar and, since coming to power in 1999, has been intent on fostering a cohesive anti-U.S. bloc of Latin American
governments. He has managed to bring in a handful of governments, but has failed to construct
the
region-wide solidarity that he envisioned. Some analysts have speculated that perhaps Ecuadorean president Rafael
Correa might be in a position to assume ALBA's leadership mantle. But like other ALBA leaders, Correa lacks Chávez's
resources and also appears content to perpetuate himself in power in his own country. To be sure,
Chávez has contributed and given shape to a number of regional organizations in recent years such as
UNASUR and CELAC, but at the same time he has been a polarizing figure who has helped accentuate
divisions among Latin American and Caribbean countries. The result is a notably fragmented
political landscape , marked by more regional groupings, but also considerable disunity on key economic
and political questions. To some degree, the exception may be Petrocaribe, through which Chávez has provided discounted
oil to a collection of poor countries, especially in Central America and the Caribbean, with the most generous subsidy going to Cuba."
ALBA has been eroding for years --- Chavez’s distractions kicked off the decline
Shifter, 12 (Michael, President of the Inter-American Dialogue, Adjunct Professor of Latin
American Studies at Georgetown University's School of Foreign Service, “The Shifting
Landscape of Latin American Regionalism,” Current History, Volume 111, Issue 742, February
2012, pg. 56-61, Proquest, Tashma)
THE ANTI-EMPIRE CLUB As a clear measure of how swiftly the region's institutional landscape has been transformed, just a
few years ago there were signs that ALBA, a notably more defiant bloc of countries, had considerable
momentum. ALBA, launched in 2004, was conceived, and has been mainly financed, by Chávez. It sought to offer a radical
alternative to the USbacked FTAA and to promote solidarity among a coalition of nations that stand up to Washington. Venezuela is
the unmistakable leader; other members include Cuba, Nicaragua, Bolivia, Ecuador, and several Caribbean nations. Honduras was
also an ALBA member before that country's June 2009 military coup, but has since withdrawn from the bloc. ALBA may have
reached its zenith at a Summit of the Americas gathering in Mar del Plata, Argentina, in 2005, where an acrimonious atmosphere
prevailed. That US president George W. Bush was so disliked in the region, and the Iraq War was so universally opposed, only
helped fuel the Chávez-led coalition. The organization seemed poised to expand in a region that offered fertile ground for more
leftist recipes to social and economic problems. But ALBA began losing much of its energy, chiefly because of
mounting problems in Venezuela, but also in other ALBA member states (for example, Bolivia). After 13
years in office, Chávez began to confront more serious challenges, including a very bad economy, a
sharply deteriorating security situation, and, finally, the cancer diagnosis. Such weaknesses have
significantly undercut his ability to play a more energetic regional role. They have also made it even more
difficult to undertake some of Chávez's more granthose schemes, such as the Bank of the South, a proposed alternative to traditional
multilateral lending institutions. At the same time, Brazil's rise - under Lula and now, especially, Rousseff - has mitigated
Chávez's more disruptive impact, as has Colombia's rapprochement with Venezuela. In 2009 Chávez
lost his favorite foil in George Bush, and in 2010, Uribe, his other main antagonist.
AT: Alliance DA – ALBA – Democracy Turn – 2AC
ALBA destroys democracy --- it results in free elections that dissolve into
authoritarian regimes --- spreading now
Kaufman, 11 (Chuck, national coordinator of the Alliance for Global Justice, “Right-Wing
Unleashes Campaign Against Democracy in Latin America,” 6/3/11,
http://venezuelanalysis.com/analysis/6240, Tashma)
US Latin Americanist Cold Warriors and their far-right allies in the region kicked off a
propaganda campaign in May to influence Congress and US citizens against Venezuela and fellow
ALBA (Bolivarian Alliance for the Peoples of Our Americas) countries. With declining attention being paid to the wars in
Afghanistan and Iraq, neoconservatives and neoliberals want to turn our attention to rolling back
social and economic advances in Latin America. The campaign began with a Sunday, May 22, 2011, opinion piece
in the Miami Herald penned by Reagan administration chief propagandist Otto Reich and continued with a Congressional briefing
that he moderated on May 26. His premise in the Miami Herald article: “Dictatorships are being established in
Venezuela, Bolivia, Ecuador and Nicaragua by an alliance of self-avowed ‘21st-century socialist’
leaders who utilize free elections to reach power and then set about destroying the very
institutions of democracy that put them there.” He claimed that ALBA, which is a trade agreement based on
cooperation rather than competition, “has not only managed to survive as a retrograde movement in a modernizing hemisphere, but
is now
actively exporting its subversive model to neighboring countries.”
Democracy is key to solve for extinction
Muravchik 1 – Resident Scholar at American Enterprise Institute Joshua, “Democracy and
nuclear peace,” Jul 11, http://www.npec-web.org/syllabi/muravchik.htm
The greatest impetus for world peace -- and perforce of nuclear peace -- is the spread of
democracy. In a famous article, and subsequent book, Francis Fukuyama argued that democracy's extension was leading to "the
end of history." By this he meant the conclusion of man's quest for the right social order, but he also meant the "diminution of the
likelihood of large-scale conflict between states." (1) Fukuyama's phrase was intentionally provocative, even tongue-in-cheek, but he
was pointing to two down-to-earth historical observations: that democracies are more peaceful than other kinds of government and
that the world is growing more democratic. Neither point has gone unchallenged. Only a few decades ago, as distinguished an
observer of international relations as George Kennan made a claim quite contrary to the first of these assertions. Democracies,
he said, were slow to anger, but once aroused "a democracy . . . . fights in anger . . . . to the bitter
end." (2) Kennan's view was strongly influenced by the policy of "unconditional surrender"
pursued in World War II. But subsequent experience, such as the negotiated settlements
America sought in Korea and Vietnam proved him wrong. Democracies are not only slow to
anger but also quick to compromise. And to forgive. Notwithstanding the insistence on unconditional surrender,
America treated Japan and that part of Germany that it occupied with extraordinary generosity. In recent years a burgeoning
literature has discussed the peacefulness of democracies. Indeed the proposition that democracies do not go to
war with one another has been described by one political scientist as being "as close as anything
we have to an empirical law in international relations." (3) Some of those who find enthusiasm for democracy
off-putting have challenged this proposition, but their challenges have only served as empirical tests that have confirmed its
robustness. For example, the academic Paul Gottfried and the columnist-turned-politician Patrick J. Buchanan have both instanced
democratic England's declaration of war against democratic Finland during World War II. (4) In fact, after much procrastination,
England did accede to the pressure of its Soviet ally to declare war against Finland which was allied with Germany. But the
declaration was purely formal: no fighting ensued between England and Finland. Surely this is an exception that proves the rule. The
strongest exception I can think of is the war between the nascent state of Israel and the Arabs in 1948. Israel was an embryonic
democracy and Lebanon, one of the Arab belligerents, was also democratic within the confines of its peculiar confessional division of
power. Lebanon, however, was a reluctant party to the fight. Within the councils of the Arab League, it opposed the war but went
along with its larger confreres when they opted to attack. Even so, Lebanon did little fighting and soon sued for peace. Thus, in the
case of Lebanon against Israel, as in the case of England against Finland, democracies nominally went to war against democracies
when they were dragged into conflicts by authoritarian allies. The political scientist Bruce Russett offers a different challenge to the
notion that democracies are more peaceful. "That democracies are in general, in dealing with all kinds of
states, more peaceful than are authoritarian or other nondemocratically constituted states . . . .is a
much more controversial proposition than 'merely' that democracies are peaceful in their dealings with each other, and one for
which there is little systematic evidence," he says. (5) Russett cites his own and other statistical explorations which show that while
democracies rarely fight one another they often fight against others. The trouble with such studies, however, is that they rarely
examine the question of who started or caused a war. To reduce the data to a form that is quantitatively measurable, it is easier to
determine whether a conflict has occurred between two states than whose fault it was. But the latter question is all important.
Democracies may often go to war against dictatorships because the dictators see them as prey or
underestimate their resolve. Indeed, such examples abound. Germany might have behaved more cautiously in the
summer of 1914 had it realized that England would fight to vindicate Belgian neutrality and to support France. Later, Hitler was
emboldened by his notorious contempt for the flabbiness of the democracies. North Korea almost surely discounted the likelihood of
an American military response to its invasion of the South after Secretary of State Dean Acheson publicly defined America's defense
perimeter to exclude the Korean peninsula (a declaration which merely confirmed existing U.S. policy). In 1990, Saddam Hussein's
decision to swallow Kuwait was probably encouraged by the inference he must have taken from the statements and actions of
American officials that Washington would offer no forceful resistance. Russett says that those who claim democracies are in general
more peaceful "would have us believe that the United States was regularly on the defensive, rarely on the offensive, during the Cold
War." But that is not quite right: the word "regularly" distorts the issue. A victim can sometimes turn the tables on an aggressor, but
that does not make the victim equally bellicose. None would dispute that Napoleon was responsible for the Napoleonic wars or
Hitler for World War II in Europe, but after a time their victims seized the offensive. So in the Cold War, the United States may have
initiated some skirmishes (although in fact it rarely did), but the struggle as a whole was driven one-sidedly. The Soviet policy was
"class warfare"; the American policy was "containment." The so-called revisionist historians argued that America bore an equal or
larger share of responsibility for the conflict. But Mikhail Gorbachev made nonsense of their theories when, in the name of glasnost
and perestroika, he turned the Soviet Union away from its historic course. The Cold War ended almost instantly--as he no doubt
knew it would. "We would have been able to avoid many . . . difficulties if the democratic process had developed normally in our
country," he wrote. (7) To render judgment about the relative peacefulness of states or systems, we must ask not only who started a
war but why. In particular we should consider what in Catholic Just War doctrine is called "right intention," which means roughly:
what did they hope to get out of it? In the few cases in recent times in which wars were initiated by democracies, there were often
motives other than aggrandizement, for example, when America invaded Grenada. To be sure, Washington was impelled by selfinterest more than altruism, primarily its concern for the well-being of American nationals and its desire to remove a chip, however
tiny, from the Soviet game board. But America had no designs upon Grenada, and the invaders were greeted with joy by the
Grenadan citizenry. After organizing an election, America pulled out. In other cases, democracies have turned to
war in the face of provocation, such as Israel's invasion of Lebanon in 1982 to root out an enemy sworn to its destruction
or Turkey's invasion of Cyprus to rebuff a power-grab by Greek nationalists. In contrast, the wars launched by dictators, such as
Iraq's invasion of Kuwait, North Korea's of South Korea, the Soviet Union's of Hungary and Afghanistan, often have aimed at
conquest or subjugation. The big exception to this rule is colonialism. The European powers conquered most of Africa and Asia, and
continued to hold their prizes as Europe democratized. No doubt many of the instances of democracies at war that enter into the
statistical calculations of researchers like Russett stem from the colonial era. But colonialism was a legacy of Europe's predemocratic times, and it was abandoned after World War II. Since then, I know of no case where a democracy has initiated warfare
without significant provocation or for reasons of sheer aggrandizement, but there are several cases where dictators have done so.
One interesting piece of Russett's research should help to point him away from his doubts that democracies are more peaceful in
general. He aimed to explain why democracies are more peaceful toward each other. Immanuel Kant was the first to observe, or
rather to forecast, the pacific inclination of democracies. He reasoned that "citizens . . . will have a great hesitation in . . . . calling
down on themselves all the miseries of war." (8) But this valid insight is incomplete. There is a deeper explanation. Democracy
is not just a mechanism; it entails a spirit of compromise and self-restraint. At bottom,
democracy is the willingness to resolve civil disputes without recourse to violence. Nations that
embrace this ethos in the conduct of their domestic affairs are naturally more predisposed to
embrace it in their dealings with other nations. Russett aimed to explain why democracies are more peaceful
toward one another. To do this, he constructed two models. One hypothesized that the cause lay in the mechanics of democratic
decision-making (the "structural/institutional model"), the other that it lay in the democratic ethos (the "cultural/normative
model"). His statistical assessments led him to conclude that: "almost always the cultural/normative
model shows a consistent effect on conflict occurrence and war. The structural/institutional
model sometimes provides a significant relationship but often does not." (9) If it is the ethos that makes
democratic states more peaceful toward each other, would not that ethos also make them more peaceful in general? Russett implies
that the answer is no, because to his mind a critical element in the peaceful behavior of democracies toward other democracies is
their anticipation of a conciliatory attitude by their counterpart. But this is too pat. The attitude of live-and-let-live cannot be turned
on and off like a spigot. The citizens and officials of democracies recognize that other states, however governed, have legitimate
interests, and they are disposed to try to accommodate those interests except when the other party's behavior seems threatening or
outrageous. A different kind of challenge to the thesis that democracies are more peaceful has been posed by the political scientists
Edward G. Mansfield and Jack Snyder. They claim statistical support for the proposition that while fully fledged democracies may be
pacific, Ain th[e] transitional phase of democratization, countries become more aggressive and war-prone, not less." (10) However,
like others, they measure a state's likelihood of becoming involved in a war but do not report attempting to determine the cause or
fault. Moreover, they acknowledge that their research revealed not only an increased likelihood for a state to become involved in a
war when it was growing more democratic, but an almost equal increase for states growing less democratic. This raises the
possibility that the effects they were observing were caused simply by political change per se, rather than by democratization.
Finally, they implicitly acknowledge that the relationship of democratization and peacefulness may change over historical periods.
There is no reason to suppose that any such relationship is governed by an immutable law. Since their empirical base reaches back to
1811, any effect they report, even if accurately interpreted, may not hold in the contemporary world. They note that "in [some] recent
cases, in contrast to some of our historical results, the rule seems to be: go fully democratic, or don't go at all." But according to
Freedom House, some 62.5 percent of extant governments were chosen in legitimate elections. (12) (This is a much larger
proportion than are adjudged by Freedom House to be "free states," a more demanding criterion, and it includes many weakly
democratic states.) Of the remaining 37.5 percent, a large number are experiencing some degree of democratization or heavy
pressure in that direction. So the choice "don't go at all" (11) is rarely realistic in the contemporary world. These statistics also
contain the answer to those who doubt the second proposition behind Fukuyama's forecast, namely, that the world is growing more
democratic. Skeptics have drawn upon Samuel Huntington's fine book, The Third Wave: Democratization in the Late Twentieth
Century. Huntington says that the democratization trend that began in the mid-1970s in Portugal, Greece and Spain is the third such
episode. The first "wave" of democratization began with the American revolution and lasted through the aftermath of World War I,
coming to an end in the interwar years when much of Europe regressed back to fascist or military dictatorship. The second wave, in
this telling, followed World War II when wholesale decolonization gave rise to a raft of new democracies. Most of these, notably in
Africa, collapsed into dictatorship by the 1960s, bringing the second wave to its end. Those who follow Huntington's argument may
take the failure of democracy in several of the former Soviet republics and some other instances of backsliding since 1989 to signal
the end of the third wave. Such an impression, however, would be misleading. One unsatisfying thing about Huntington's "waves" is
their unevenness. The first lasted about 150 years, the second about 20. How long should we expect the third to endure? If it is like
the second, it will ebb any day now, but if it is like the first, it will run until the around the year 2125. And by then--who knows?-perhaps mankind will have incinerated itself, moved to another planet, or even devised a better political system. Further,
Huntington's metaphor implies a lack of overall progress or direction. Waves rise and fall. But each of the reverses that followed
Huntington's two waves was brief, and each new wave raised the number of democracies higher than before. Huntington does,
however, present a statistic that seems to weigh heavily against any unidirectional interpretation of democratic progress. The
proportion of states that were democratic in 1990 (45%), he says, was identical to the proportion in 1922. (13) But there are two
answers to this. In 1922 there were only 64 states; in 1990 there were 165. But the number of peoples had not grown appreciably.
The difference was that in 1922 most peoples lived in colonies, and they were not counted as states. The 64 states of that time were
mostly the advanced countries. Of those, two thirds had become democratic by 1990, which was a significant gain. The additional
101 states counted in 1990 were mostly former colonies. Only a minority, albeit a substantial one, were democratic in 1990, but since
virtually none of those were democratic in 1922, that was also a significant gain. In short, there was progress all around, but this was
obscured by asking what percentage of states were democratic. Asking the question this way means that a people who were subjected
to a domestic dictator counted as a non-democracy, but a people who were subjected to a foreign dictator did not count at all.
Moreover, while the criteria for judging a state democratic vary, the statistic that 45 percent of states were democratic in 1990
corresponds with Freedom House's count of "democratic" polities (as opposed to its smaller count of "free" countries, a more
demanding criterion). But by this same count, Freedom House now says that the proportion of democracies has grown to 62.5
percent. In other words, the "third wave" has not abated. That Freedom House could count 120 freely elected governments by early
2001 (out of a total of 192 independent states) bespeaks a vast transformation in human governance within the span of 225 years. In
1775, the number of democracies was zero. In 1776, the birth of the United States of America brought the total up to one. Since then,
democracy has spread at an accelerating pace, most of the growth having occurred within the twentieth century, with greatest
momentum since 1974. That this momentum has slackened somewhat since its pinnacle in 1989, destined to be remembered as one
of the most revolutionary years in all history, was inevitable. So many peoples were swept up in the democratic tide that there was
certain to be some backsliding. Most countries' democratic evolution has included some fits and starts rather than a smooth
progression. So it must be for the world as a whole. Nonetheless, the overall trend remains powerful and clear. Despite the
backsliding, the number and proportion of democracies stands higher today than ever before. This progress offers a source of hope
for enduring nuclear peace. The danger of nuclear war was radically reduced almost overnight when Russia abandoned Communism
and turned to democracy. For other ominous corners of the world, we may be in a kind of race between the emergence or growth of
nuclear arsenals and the advent of democratization. If this is so, the greatest cause for worry may rest with the Moslem Middle East
where nuclear arsenals do not yet exist but where the prospects for democracy may be still more remote.
AT: Alliance DA – ALBA – Democracy Turn – 1AR
Dismantling ALBA through increased U.S. influence is key to resolve threats to
democracy --- it won’t die off by itself
Kaufman, 11 (Chuck, national coordinator of the Alliance for Global Justice, cites Otto Reich,
former senior official in the administrations of Presidents Ronald Reagan, George H. W. Bush
and George W. Bush, and cites Joel Hirst, a Fellow on the Council of Foreign Relations, former
Acting Head of the Office of Transition Initiatives in the US embassy in Venezuela, “Right-Wing
Unleashes Campaign Against Democracy in Latin America,” 6/3/11,
http://venezuelanalysis.com/analysis/6240, Tashma)
The attacks on ALBA would be laughable if it weren’t for the fact that those making the charges hold positions capable of setting
public policy and molding public opinion. ALBA is a cooperative trade agreement entered into by
Venezuela, Cuba, Nicaragua, Bolivia, Ecuador and several small Caribbean island nations. Under
ALBA, Venezuela trades oil to Cuba in exchange for Cuban doctors. It trades oil to Nicaragua in exchange for beef and black beans
(which Nicaraguans won’t eat). Nicaragua trades beef and other food products to Cuba in exchange for doctors and literacy trainers.
Cooperative trade is anathema to the neoliberal “free” trade ideology because it doesn’t force
nations to compete and most importantly does not force down wages. Ros-Lehtinen made the link clear
when she used the briefing to criticize US “special interest groups” that stand in the way of signing free trade agreements, singling
out the the Colombia FTA as an example. The congresswoman criticized the role that Chavez played (along with Colombian
President Juan Manuel Santos whom she didn’t mention) in the negotiated return of ousted Honduran President Manuel Zelaya.
Under Zelaya, Honduras was also a member country of ALBA. Ros-Lehtinen, who vocally supported the coup in Honduras said
about the likely return of its membership in the Organization of American States made possible by Zelaya’s return, “Honduras
should not have been suspended and its return is long overdue.” She went on to say about Venezuela that sanctions are “just the first
step and more must be done.” She went on to say that Otto Reich “will be very involved in these efforts” and will take a more “active
role” on trade, democracy and security. Since he is now a paid lobbyist, one wonders just what role Ros-Lehtinen sees for Reich? The
role she sees for the master propagandist may have been revealed in Reich’s remarks following hers. He called ALBA an
“ideology” and a “threat to democracy.” He said the “dictatorships” are trying to spread their
ideology to other Latin American countries. Reich, who is an expert in the “Big Lie” technique perfected in his
namesake, the Third Reich, called for the US to take more of a role in “ending ALBA” because,
he claimed, “ALBA exiles or imprisons without charges whoever disagrees with it.” Most of the other panel
speakers said the predictable things, usually without any evidence to back their claims. Notable though for one upping Reich was
Joel Hirst, a Fellow on the Council of Foreign Relations. Hirst was Acting Head of the Office of Transition Initiatives in the US
embassy in Venezuela from 2004-2008. In that position he had the responsibility for allocating funds to the Venezuelan opposition.
In 2006, when I led a delegation to Venezuela to investigate US interference in that year’s presidential elections, we were refused a
meeting with Hirst. He
accused the ALBA countries of supporting the doctrine of “asymmetric
warfare”, which he described as guerrilla warfare, terrorism, arming children, contempt for the
Rules of War and International Humanitarian Law, and “imperial” control. He predictably threw the
FARC, Hezbollah, and Iran into the mix. Carlos Ponce, the Reagan-Fascell Fellow at the mis-named National Endowment for
Democracy, laid out the right-wing case that the presidents of Venezuela, Ecuador, Nicaragua and Bolivia, though democratically
elected, then proceed to break down democratic institutions in their countries. He used as an example Daniel Ortega’s winning of a
ruling by the Nicaraguan Supreme Court that the constitutional provision against running for a consecutive term was void. However,
the strategy Ortega used to permit him to run again is precisely the same as that used by Nobel Peace Prize winner Oscar Arias in
Costa Rica which allowed him to serve run and win a second term. No one on the right uttered a breath of criticism when Colombian
President Alvaro Uribe amended the constitution to run a second time. Uribe tried, and failed, to amend it again so he could run for
a third term. In the ALBA countries, Hirst said, “no one else can be elected because the current
elected leaders have changed the laws.” This is an absurd statement. In these countries no one else has yet to be
elected because the poverty reduction programs and economic and political democracy they’ve
implemented have made the current leaders the most popular candidates in their countries.
Venezuela has the most fraud-proof election mechanisms in the world – much more so than the US. It’s electronic voting complete
with paper trail, thumb print verification and large sample recount system leaves little room for manipulation. There is no legitimate
way that anyone can claim election fraud in Venezuela.
AT: Alliance DA – CELAC – 2AC
CELAC is ineffective and deprioritized --- won’t become a major player in Latin
America
Shifter, 12 (Michael, President of the Inter-American Dialogue, Adjunct Professor of Latin
American Studies at Georgetown University's School of Foreign Service, “The Shifting
Landscape of Latin American Regionalism,” Current History, Volume 111, Issue 742, February
2012, pg. 56-61, Proquest, Tashma)
Yet, unless a regional leader decides to give it a high priority and more structure, it is doubtful that CELAC will be
transformed into a formal institution. There will be periodic meetings of heads of state the next ones are scheduled to take place in Chile, followed by Cuba - but without a secretariat or any political
decisions with teeth. Mexico is content to be part of the grouping, which reconnects it to South American political affairs, but
at the same time enables it to focus on its NAFTA partners. Brazil's priority in the Americas is clearly centered
on UNASUR, which is seen as an instrument for maintaining social peace and order in the wider
region.
AT: Alliance DA – MERCOSUR – 2AC
MERCOSUR declining now
Carranza, 4 (Dr. Mario E., Associate Professor of Political Science, Texas A & M UniversityKingsville, Ph.D., University of Chicago, “LATIN AMERICAN PERSPECTIVE: MERCOSUR,
THE FREE TRADE AREA OF THE AMERICAS, AND THE FUTURE OF U.S. HEGEMONY IN
LATIN AMERICA,” 27 Fordham Int'l L.J. 1029, February 2004, lexis, Tashma)
First, the recharged hegemony thesis argues that "the end of the Cold War has if anything strengthened the
drive in Washington to consolidate its informal empire in Latin America." 10 MERCOSUR would
be just an instrument to achieve that goal, serving the function "of more thoroughly
incorporating ... [member countries] within the world capitalist system while preserving their
subordinate status in that system." 11 From this perspective, MERCOSUR is not an autonomous
project of regional integration and is destined to perish , absorbed by the Free Trade Area of the Americas; or
to become irrelevant, after the [*1034] successful conclusion of the Doha round of global free trade
negotiations.
MERCOSUR is ineffective --- declining over time
Shifter, 12 (Michael, President of the Inter-American Dialogue, Adjunct Professor of Latin
American Studies at Georgetown University's School of Foreign Service, “The Shifting
Landscape of Latin American Regionalism,” Current History, Volume 111, Issue 742, February
2012, pg. 56-61, Proquest, Tashma)
In fact, careful examination of the performance and record of subregional groupings to date raises questions about the potential
effectiveness of more far-reaching regional arrangements. Mercosur, which was to serve as a customs union involving Brazil,
Argentina, Uruguay, and Paraguay, witnessed
a jump in trade in the 1990s, but over time its functioning
has become problematic. Protectionist practices have introduced considerable strain within the
bloc. In addition, Mercosur's inability to resolve a rancorous dispute between Argentina and
Uruguay over the operation of a paper mill on their border exposed serious limitations in its
effectiveness. Yet, for all of its shortcomings, Mercosur is generally regarded as less troubled than other subregional
groupings in Latin America. For example, the Andean Community of Nations, which has existed since 1969, has been riven by
political differences and high levels of mistrust. Other subregional arrangements face similar obstacles.
AT: Alliance DA – MERCOSUR – Hegemony Turn
Failure to reassert U.S. influence in Latin America leads to a hegemonic transition
toward MERCOSUR
Carranza, 4 (Dr. Mario E., Associate Professor of Political Science, Texas A & M UniversityKingsville, Ph.D., University of Chicago, “LATIN AMERICAN PERSPECTIVE: MERCOSUR,
THE FREE TRADE AREA OF THE AMERICAS, AND THE FUTURE OF U.S. HEGEMONY IN
LATIN AMERICA,” 27 Fordham Int'l L.J. 1029, February 2004, lexis, Tashma)
V. FROM COOPERATION TO DISILLUSIONMENT: U.S.-LATIN AMERICAN RELATIONS BEFORE AND AFTER SEPTEMBER
11TH [*1049] Most people in the region feel that two decades of neoliberal economic policies have
done little to alleviate poverty in Latin America. Several U.S. analysts noted that by ignoring the Latin
American economic and social predicament, the United States was "losing Latin America." 65 As a
result, the strong Latin American solidarity with the United States after the September 11th tragedy slowly vanished. These
sentiments turned into resentment and animosity , especially after the U.S. decision to invade Iraq, which was
widely perceived in Latin America as a neocolonial enterprise. This decision was not supported by the Latin
American non-permanent members of the United Nations Security Council, Mexico and Chile, despite their close economic ties with
the United States. The Summit of the Americas Process and the FTAA negotiations, launched at the Second Summit of the Americas
in Santiago, Chile, 1998, were originally perceived in Latin America as marking the beginning of a new era in U.S.-Latin American
relations. Despite structural asymmetries between the United States and Latin America, the two sides would embark on a mature
relationship and the United States would be willing and able to deliver sufficient concessions in the FTAA talks to compensate the
concessions it wanted from Latin America. However, the inability of the Clinton administration to obtain fast-track negotiating
authority from the U.S. Congress raised serious doubts during and after the Santiago summit about the seriousness of the U.S.
commitment to the FTAA. In October 2002, the U.S. Congress finally granted fast-track authority (renamed Trade Promotion
Authority, "TPA") to President Bush, but it imposed severe limitations on his power to sign free trade agreements without
amendments from Congress. 66 Since the last stage of the FTAA talks coincides with the [*1050] 2004 election year, the Bush
administration is unlikely to make concessions on issues such as agricultural subsidies, which have strong domestic constituencies in
states like Florida (which are crucial battlegrounds in President Bush's drive for reelection). These domestic political constraints
have made it difficult to achieve a comprehensive FTAA treaty in January 2005. On one hand, Brazil has consistently refused to
accept the U.S. position of excluding farm subsidies from the FTAA negotiations, leaving them for the Doha Round of global trade
talks (which have stalled). On the other hand, as Brazilian Foreign Minister Celso Amorim recognized at the Miami Trade ministerial
meeting in November 2003, trying to push the United States to discuss U.S. agricultural subsidies in the FTAA talks is like "believing
in fairy tales." 67 The history of the FTAA negotiations challenges former U.S. Trade Representative Charlene
Barshefky's claim that the United States, will always be at the center just because of the structural
weight of its US$ ten trillion economy. In the mid-1990s it was widely believed that the Latin American countries had no
alternative to moving in the direction of the FTAA. This interpretation underestimated the potential of subregional blocs such as MERCOSUR to challenge U.S. hegemony.
US primacy prevents global conflict – diminishing power creates a vacuum that
causes transition wars in multiple places
Brooks et al 13 [Stephen G. Brooks is Associate Professor of Government at Dartmouth
College.G. John Ikenberry is the Albert G. Milbank Professor of Politics and International
Affairs at Princeton University in the Department of Politics and the Woodrow Wilson School of
Public and International Affairs. He is also a Global Eminence Scholar at Kyung Hee
University.William C. Wohlforth is the Daniel Webster Professor in the Department of
Government at Dartmouth College. “Don't Come Home, America: The Case against
Retrenchment”, Winter 2013, Vol. 37, No. 3, Pages 751,http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/abs/10.1162/ISEC_a_00107, GDI File]
A core premise of deep engagement is that it prevents the emergence of a far more dangerous global security
environment. For one thing, as noted above, the United States’ overseas presence gives it the leverage to
restrain partners from taking provocative action. Perhaps more important, its core alliance commitments also deter states with
aspirations to regional hegemony from contemplating expansion and make its partners more secure, reducing their incentive to adopt solutions to their security problems that
threaten others and thus stoke security dilemmas. The contention that engaged U.S. power dampens the baleful effects of anarchy is consistent with influential variants of realist
theory. Indeed, arguably the scariest portrayal of the war-prone world that would emerge absent the “American Pacifier” is provided in the works of John Mearsheimer,
who forecasts dangerous multipolar regions replete with security competition, arms races, nuclear proliferation and associated preventive wartemptations, regional rivalries,
and even runs at regional hegemony and full-scale great power war. 72 How do retrenchment advocates, the bulk of whom are realists, discount this benefit? Their arguments
are complicated, but two capture most of the variation: (1) U.S. security guarantees are not necessary to prevent dangerous rivalries and conflict in Eurasia; or (2) prevention of
rivalry and conflict in Eurasia is not a U.S. interest. Each response is connected to a different theory or set of theories, which makes sense given that the whole debate hinges on a
complex future counterfactual (what would happen to Eurasia’s security setting if the United States truly disengaged?). Although a certain answer is impossible, each of these
responses is nonetheless a weaker argument for retrenchment than advocates acknowledge. The first response flows from defensive realism as well as other international
relations theories that discount the conflict-generating potential of anarchy under contemporary conditions. 73 Defensive realists maintain that the high expected costs of
territorial conquest, defense dominance, and an array of policies and practices that can be used credibly to signal benign intent, mean that Eurasia’s major states could manage
regional multipolarity peacefully without theAmerican pacifier. Retrenchment would be a bet on this scholarship, particularly in regions where the kinds of stabilizers that
nonrealist theories point to—such as democratic governance or dense institutional linkages—are either absent or weakly present. There are three other major bodies of
scholarship, however, that might give decisionmakers pause before making this bet. First is regional expertise. Needless to say, there is no consensus on the net security effects of
U.S. withdrawal. Regarding each region, there are optimists and pessimists. Few experts expect a return of intense great power competition in a post-American Europe, but
many doubt European governments will pay the political costs of increased EU defense cooperation and the budgetary costs of increasing military outlays. 74 The result might be
Europe that is incapable of securing itself from various threats that could be destabilizing
within the region and beyond (e.g., a regional conflict akin to the 1990s Balkan wars), lacks capacity for global security missions in which U.S. leaders
might want European participation, and is vulnerable to the influence of outside rising powers. What about the other parts of Eurasia
where the United States has a substantial military presence? Regarding the Middle East, the
balance begins toswing toward pessimists concerned that states currently backed by
Washington— notably Israel, Egypt, and Saudi Arabia—might take actions upon U.S. retrenchment
that would intensify security dilemmas. And concerning East Asia, pessimismregarding the region’s
prospects without the American pacifier is pronounced. Arguably the principal concern expressed by area experts is
that Japan and South Korea are likely to obtain a nuclear capacity and increase their military commitments,
a
which could
stoke a destabilizing reaction from China . It is notable that during the Cold War, both South Korea and Taiwan moved
to obtain a nuclear weapons capacity and were only constrained from doing so by astill-engaged United States. 75 The second body of scholarship casting doubt on the bet on
defensive realism’s sanguine portrayal is all of the research that undermines its conception of state preferences. Defensive realism’s optimism about what would happen if the
United States retrenched is very much dependent on itsparticular—and highly restrictive—assumption about state preferences; once we relax this assumption, then much of its
basis for optimism vanishes. Specifically, the prediction of post-American tranquility throughout Eurasia rests on the assumption that security is the only relevant state
preference, with security defined narrowly in terms of protection from violent external attacks on the homeland. Under that assumption, the security problem is largely solved as
research across the social and
other sciences, however,undermines that core assumption: states have preferences not only for security but
also for prestige, status, and other aims, and theyengage in trade-offs among the various objectives. 76 In addition, they define
security not just in terms of territorial protection but in view of many and varied milieu goals. It follows that even states that
are relatively secure may nevertheless engage in highly competitive behavior. Empirical studies show that this
is indeed sometimes the case. 77 In sum, a bet on a benign postretrenchment Eurasia is a bet that leaders of major countries will never allow these nonsecurity
preferences to influence their strategic choices. To the degree that these bodies of scholarly knowledge have predictive leverage, U.S. retrenchment would
result in a significant deterioration in the security environment in at least some of the world’s key regions. We
have already mentioned the third, even more alarming body of scholarship. Offensive realism predicts that the withdrawal of the American
pacifier will yield either a competitive regional multipolarity complete with associated insecurity,
arms racing, crisis instability, nuclear proliferation, and the like, or bids for regional hegemony, which may be beyond
the capacity of local great powers to contain (and which in any case would generate intensely competitive behavior,
possibly including regional great power war).
soon as offense and defense are clearly distinguishable, and offense is extremely expensive relative to defense. Burgeoning
AT: Alliance DA – MERCOSUR – AT: Trade
Mercosur hurts trade and structural asymmetries means Mercosur
inevitably fails
Hornbeck 08, J. F. Hornbeck Specialist in International Trade and Finance¶ Foreign
Affairs, Defense, and Trade Division (Updated March 26, 2008, “Mercosur: Evolution and¶
Implications for U.S. Trade Policy”, CRS Report for Congress,
http://assets.opencrs.com/rpts/RL33620_20080326.pdf, jj)
The Mercosur pact calls for an incremental path to a common market, but after 15 years only a limited customs union has been achieved. From the
outset, Mercosur
struggled to reconcile a basic inconsistency in its goals for partial economic
union: how to achieve trade integration, while also ensuring that the benefits would be balanced among members and that each country would
retain some control over its trade, production, and consumption structure. This delicate balance faced serious structural
and policy asymmetries that became clear when Brazil and Argentina experienced financial crises and deep recessions. These
economic setbacks disrupted trade flows among members, causing friction, the adoption of new bilateral
safeguards, and a retreat from the commitment to deeper integration. ¶ For now, Mercosur has turned to expanding rather
than deepening the agreement. Many South American countries have been added as "associate members" and Mercosur has reached
out for other South-South arrangements in Africa and Asia. These are limited agreements and unlikely paths to
continental economic integration. Internal conflicts have highlighted Mercosur's institutional
weaknesses and slowed the integration process. Uruguay has diversified its trade more toward the United States, and is
showing signs of reconsidering the benefits of an "exclusive" Mercosur trade arrangement. Venezuela's accession to the pact adds a
decidedly anti-American factor and may complicate both Mercosur's internal balance and regional trade
relationships.
AT: Alliance DA – UNASUR – 2AC
Lack of Brazilian involvement makes UNASUR ineffective --- no prospects for
growth
Flannery, 12 (Nathaniel Parish, Contributor at Forbes, “Can South America Become the New
European Union?,” Forbes, 11/30/12,
http://www.forbes.com/sites/nathanielparishflannery/2012/11/30/can-south-americabecome-the-new-european-union/, Tashma)
On November 30, 2012 the heads of state from South America gathered in Peru, for a meeting under the banner of UNASUR, an
international organization that promotes economic integration and regional dialogue between countries in South America. A few
years ago, UNASUR was touted an important political development for the region. Following the
outbreak of troubles in the European Union, the organization’s prospects now seem a bit more dim. In a
recent article for the Americas Society, I explained “Although UNASUR had looked to the European Union as a model for creating a
common currency and central bank, its members shelved such proposals in the summer of 2011. During its tenure, the group has
helped mediate conflicts between member countries, aided in disaster response, and fostered collaboration on collective defense and
development projects.” Although UNASUR has served as an effective forum for dialogue and has helped member countries
less success in building European-style
multinational institutions. Three days before the November 30, 2012 UNASUR meeting, Brazil’s
president, Dilma Rousseff, announced she would not attend the summit in Lima due to conflicts with
other “commitments” in her schedule. Her failure to attend may hint at the level of importance
Brazil places on the cooperative club. Brazil has also shied away from financing a South American development bank,
peacefully resolve a number of diplomatic disputes, the group has had
but has enthusiastically worked to finance the construction of the Interoceanic Highway, a freeway that links Brazil to Pacific coast
ports in Peru. Brazil has not emerged as a vocal proponent of collective financing of regional infrastructure projects that would foster
more trade ties between UNASUR member countries. During a recent conversation Victoria Murillo a Latin America-focused
political scientist from Columbia University told me “Brazil wants access to the Pacific [and] needs infrastructure to access Asia,
that’s where the markets are now.” UNASUR has had less success in coordinating collective action to
finance regional infrastructure projects. Brazil is currently focused mainly on building up its internal market and
expanding its exports to Asia. The opportunities for economic cooperation with the rest of South
America seem at the present to be somewhat limited for Brazil. In my article for the Americas Society, I explained
that UNASUR’s “ability to cooperate is affected by the disproportionate size of Brazil’s economy,
which accounts for about 60 percent of UNASUR’s total economic output. World Bank data shows that
Brazil, the country with the strongest internal market in Latin America, is also the least trade-dependent economy in UNASUR. In
2011, Brazil’s exports accounted for less than 12 percent of GDP, less than half of the average rate of the Spanish-speaking countries
in South America.” Victoria Murillo told me, “Brazil to UNASUR is like Germany to the EU. Success will depend on member
countries’ willingness to accept Brazil as a leader.” For UNASUR to come together Brazil will need to take on more of a leadership
role, working with other member-countries to lower trade barriers and create a common market. Joao Castro Neves, a Brazil analyst
at the Eurasia Group, a political risk consultancy recently told me that in the short term UNASUR’s
institutionalization “will be very slow and incremental ” and the group will “remain a forum for dialogue in the
foreseeable future.”
Tons of regional barriers to the effectiveness of UNASUR
Saaverdra, 9 (Luis Angel, “REGION: UNASUR--MORE WEAKNESSES THAN STRENGTHS,”
NotiSur - South American Political and Economic Affairs, 8/21/09,
http://www.thefreelibrary.com/REGION%3A+UNASUR-MORE+WEAKNESSES+THAN+STRENGTHS.-a0206213397, Tashma)
The future of the Union de Naciones Suramericanas (UNASUR) seems to be that of an entity without much
weight in Latin American geopolitics, since there are no common guidelines motivating the
countries to work for its immediate consolidation. UNASUR was more a response to demagogic discourse than a
real interest in creating an organization that unifies Latin American nations. In November 2007, its first secretary-general, former
Ecuadoran President Rodrigo Borja (1988-1992), expressed his doubts about the efficacy of the new regional bloc. "UNASUR is
on the road to becoming a new source of bureaucracies and budgets because it will not achieve
concrete and quantifiable results in integration matters," said Borja upon resigning from the UNASUR leadership in
May 2008. Similarly, Ecuadoran President Rafael Correa called for a change in the founding statutes of UNASUR, since, he said, the
statutes as presented would not contribute to integration. Despite the criticism, Correa signed the document with the promise that
modifications would be made to facilitate real South American integration, but this commitment remains unfulfilled. Tensions
between and among countries create obstacles The first criticisms of UNASUR were followed by a series of disagreements so serious
that the mere election of a new secretary-general in December 2008 rekindled the animosity between some delegations, and
Uruguay threatened to withdraw if former Argentine President Nestor Kirchner (2003-2007) was elected secretary-general. Trade
interests and existing asymmetries in the South American countries are the principal stumbling
blocks for total integration, since MERCOSUR, led by Brazil and Argentina, wants to impose its
commercial interests on the other countries. Venezuela, with influence in some Comunidad Andina de Naciones
(CAN) countries, also wants to lead the integration process, in keeping with its strengths in the energy area. If the regional blocs'
trade barriers were not enough, new obstacles have arisen with the individual initiatives of countries that
are moving away from regional trade and prefer trade agreements with the US and Europe, like
Chile, Peru, and Colombia. Other countries have unilaterally put safeguards on an extensive list of products to protect their domestic
industries and the "hard currency that began to dry up because of the global financial crisis," such as Ecuador, which has restricted
trade with its neighbors on more than 1,300 products. To complicate the situation further, problems on the Colombia-Ecuador
border led to a break in diplomatic relations between the two countries, following Colombia's bombing of a Fuerzas Armadas
Revolucionarias de Colombia (FARC) camp in Ecuadoran territory (see NotiSur, 2008-03-07). More recently, the Colombian
government's decision to allow US troops to use its military bases threw more fuel onto the fire (see NotiSur, 2009-07-31). In this
situation, the South American presidents agreed to meet in Quito, Ecuador, on Aug. 10, taking advantage of President Correa's
invitation to attend his investiture for a second term. At the meeting, Ecuador became president pro tem of UNASUR. The tense
diplomatic situation and the request by various UNASUR countries that Colombia explain the scope of the agreement that it is
negotiating with the US, which will allow that country to use seven Colombian military bases to monitor the region, provoked a
reaction from the Colombian government. It announced that it would not attend the meeting, and, at the same time, it questioned
the choice of Correa to lead UNASUR. "Ecuador's taking over as president pro tem of the Union de Naciones Suramericanas could
lead to the regional organization's failure because of the tensions that it maintains with Colombia," said Colombian Vice President
Francisco Santos. US: The elephant in the room The meeting in Quito took place without Presidents Alvaro Uribe of Colombia or
Alan Garcia of Peru, both seen as allies of US policy. Both countries have negotiated free-trade agreements (FTAs) with the US and
are in similar processes with the European Union (EU). Without their presence, the issues dealt with at the Quito meeting were not
momentous and were limited to a series of diplomatic statements, most notably the denunciation of the military coup that ousted
Honduran President Manuel Zelaya, although the statement did not specify concrete actions to pressure for his return to power (see
NotiCen, 2009-08-13). Faced with the evident failure of the Quito meeting, Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva called for a
new UNASUR meeting, and this time he proposed two concrete issues for discussion: to analyze relations with the US, for which he
proposed setting up a meeting between UNASUR and US President Barack Obama, and to analyze the imminent military agreement
between Colombia and the US. The governments of Venezuela, Bolivia, and Ecuador have expressed their unequivocal opposition to
the installation of US military bases in Colombia, arguing that this would strengthen Uribe's bellicose policies. In that regard, Lula
will try to ease the tension at the next meeting, to be held in Argentina, but he points out that it is necessary to discuss the military
issue since the US is still interfering in the internal affairs of various countries in the region. Lula says that the few
advances achieved and the existing climate of confrontation threaten the future of regional
integration. "We are going to have to come to an agreement regarding UNASUR's future because we need to have a cordial
relationship among ourselves, a level of trust and sincerity among us," said Lula. The Colombian government has indicated that it
might attend a future UNASUR meeting, but it insists that signing a military agreement with the US is "a sovereign act." The US
military bases have become a highly sensitive political issue and have forced the US to clarify its role in Colombia. "We have said
very clearly that we are not creating or establishing any bases in Colombia. We are working with our Colombian partner to try to deal
with a problem in the hemisphere, which is drug traffic," said State Department deputy spokesperson Robert Wood. Wood's
explanation does not convince Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, who says the agreement could "set off a war in South American,"
nor does it convince Bolivian President Evo Morales, who accuses the US of using the military bases "to halt the revolutionary
processes taking shape in America." The initial difficulties and those that have arisen in the short three
years of this new South American integration process make it clear that its consolidation will
not be easy, and current circumstances even indicate that it is not a viable process. Although
theoretically necessary for regional development, UNASUR has many more weaknesses than strengths,
which is what, in the long term, is leading it toward failure. (Sources: )
AT: Alliance DA – UNASUR – AT: LA Instability
Latin america literally poses no security threat
Naim 6 (Moises, Foreign Policy no157 40-3, 45-7 N/D 2006, editor of foreign policy magazine)
For decades, Latin America's weight in the world has been shrinking. It is not an economic
powerhouse, a security threat, or a population bomb. Even its tragedies pale in comparison to Africa's. The
region will not rise until it ends its search for magic formulas. It may not make for a good sound bite, but patience is Latin America's
biggest deficit of all. Latin America has grown used to living in the backyard of the United States. For decades, it has been a region
where the U.S. government meddled in local politics, fought communists, and promoted its business interests. Even if the rest of the
world wasn't paying attention to Latin America, the United States occasionally was. Then came September 11, and even the United
States seemed to tune out. Naturally, the world's attention centered almost exclusively on terrorism, the wars in Afghanistan, Iraq,
and Lebanon, and on the nuclear ambitions of North Korea and Iran. Latin America became Atlantis--the lost continent. Almost
overnight, it disappeared from the maps of investors, generals, diplomats, and journalists. Indeed, as one commentator recently
quipped, Latin America can't compete on the world stage in any aspect, even as a threat. Unlike
anti-Americans elsewhere, Latin Americans are not willing to die for the sake of their
geopolitical hatreds. Latin America is a nuclear-weapons free zone. Its only weapon of mass
destruction is cocaine. In contrast to emerging markets like India and China, Latin America is a minor
economic player whose global significance is declining. Sure, a few countries export oil and gas, but only
Venezuela is in the top league of the world's energy market. Not even Latin America's disasters seem to elicit global concern
anymore. Argentina experienced a massive financial stroke in 2001, and no one abroad seemed to care. Unlike prior crashes, no
government or international financial institution rushed to bail it out. Latin America doesn't have Africa's famines,
genocides, an HIV/AIDS pandemic, wholesale state failures, or rock stars who routinely adopt
its tragedies. Bono, Bill Gates, and Angelina Jolie worry about Botswana, not Brazil. But just as the five-year-old war on terror
pronounced the necessity of confronting threats where they linger, it also underscored the dangers of neglect. Like Afghanistan,
Latin America shows how quickly and easy it is for the United States to lose its influence when Washington is distracted by other
priorities. In both places, Washington's disinterest produced a vacuum that was filled by political groups and leaders hostile to the
United States. No, Latin America is not churning out Islamic terrorists as Afghanistan was during the days of the
Taliban. In Latin America, the power gap is being filled by a group of disparate leaders often lumped together under the banner of
populism. On the rare occasions that Latin American countries do make international news, it's the election of a so-called populist,
an apparently anti-American, anti-market leader, that raises hackles. However, Latin America's populists aren't a monolith. Some
are worse for international stability than is usually reported. But some have the potential to chart a new, positive course for the
region. Underlying the ascent of these new leaders are several real, stubborn threads running through Latin Americans' frustration
with the status quo in their countries. Unfortunately, the United States'---and the rest of the world's--lack of interest in that region
means that the forces that are shaping disparate political movements in Latin America are often glossed over, misinterpreted, or
ignored. Ultimately, though, what matters most is not what the northern giant thinks or does as much as what half a billion Latin
Americans think and do. And in the last couple of decades, the wild swings in their political behavior have created a highly unstable
terrain where building the institutions indispensable for progress or for fighting poverty has become increasingly difficult. There is a
way out. But it's not the quick fix that too many of Latin America's leaders have promised and that an impatient population
demands.
AT: Backlash DA – 2AC
No backlash – Latin America loves Obama
Grandin 10 (Greg Grandin -- professor of history at NYU -- "EMPIRE'S SENESCENCE: U.S.
Policy in Latin America -- ProQuest -- Winter 2010
search.proquest.com.proxy.lib.umich.edu/docview/237226098) SM
There are no immediate threats to the U.S. in Latin America. A majority of the region's political
elite - even most of its current governing leftists - share many of the same values the United
States claims to embody, even more so following the election of the first African-American
president, who is wildly popular in Latin America. As a result, there is no other place in the world that offers U.S.
president Barack Obama the opportunity to put into place the kind of intelligent foreign policy that he and his closest advisors, such
as United Nations (UN.) ambassador Susan Rice, believe is necessary to stop the hemorrhaging of U.S. prestige - one that would
both improve Washington's ability to deploy its many competitive advantages, while removing key points of friction.
Obama administration is working towards a policy of shared leadership
Niblett 9 (Robin Niblett -- PhD with expertise UK foreign policy, US foreign policy, and
economic security -- Director of the Chatham House -- The Royal Institute of Internatoinal
Affairs in the United Kingkdom
www.chathamhouse.org/sites/default/files/public/Research/Americas/r0209us_role.pdf) SM
During his inaugural address on 20 January 2009, Barack Obama declared to ‘all other peoples and governments who are
watching today, … know … that we are ready to lead once more’. In the following four weeks to the publication of this report,
President Obama has set the United States on a course that is meeting widespread approval around the world. He has ordered the
closure as soon as possible of the Guantánamo Bay detention facilities and of other secret facilities
outside the United States that had so undermined America’s international
credibility with its allies and confirmed the
anti-US narrative of its opponents. He has appointed special envoys for Middle East Peace and to implement
an integrated strategy for both Afghanistan and Pakistan. He has offered to ‘seek a new way
forward’ with the Muslim world as well as to ‘extend a hand’ to authoritarian governments if they are willing ‘to unclench
[their] fist’. His Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, has said that America will be more effective if it can ‘build
a world with more partners and fewer adversaries’. Both have recognized the virtues of
pragmatism over ideology and the reality of interdependence. At the core of this ambitious international
agenda lies the belief that America must strengthen its position of global leadership if it is to
remain a ‘positive force in the world’. But the call for a renewal of US leadership comes at a time when,
as President Obama also recognized during his inauguration, ‘the world has changed’. This report looks at America’s future
international role from an outside perspective and asks how American global leadership might be rethought in the
context of a changed world. Its conclusion is that the Obama administration needs to introduce an
important shift in how America wields its power – leading directly where its leadership is still
clearly needed, but also sharing leadership where partners have as much or more to offer,
supporting international institutions where the need for collective response outweighs the value
of American leadership and leading by example where collective responses are not yet being
formed.
US leadership policies are focused on building new partnerships and alliances
Niblett 9 (Robin Niblett -- PhD with expertise UK foreign policy, US foreign policy, and
economic security -- Director of the Chatham House -- The Royal Institute of Internatoinal
Affairs in the United Kingkdom
www.chathamhouse.org/sites/default/files/public/Research/Americas/r0209us_role.pdf) SM
President Obama and Secretary Clinton have laid out the steps that the United States will take in
order to renew its leadership position. Strengthening alliances and institutions, building new
partnerships, engaging opponents where possible, tackling common global challenges such as climate
change and nuclear weapons proliferation, as well as immediate crises in the Middle East and South Asia and
tightening the bond between the United States’ internal values and its external policies – these are
all laudable goals and vital ingredients of a more positive American international role. Indeed, they
are steps which are advocated in the US-authored reports mentioned above and which are also echoed later in this report. Moreover,
as the US reports observe and as this report also recognizes, America remains the only country in the world that both aspires to lead
and has the attributes to live up to its aspiration.
AT: Brazil DA – 2AC
Brazil influence does nothing for Latin America—four reasons
Espach and Tulchin, 10 - Ralph H. Espach, Ph.D. is a senior research scientist and
director of the Latin American Affairs program at CNA’s Center for Strategic Studies, Joe
Tulchin is a Latin Americanist with extraordinarily broad experience, Senior Fellow in the
Mexico and Central America Program at Harvard University's David Rockefeller Center for
Latin American Studies (“Brazil’s Rising Influence and Its Implications for Other Latin
American Nations,” June 2010,
http://www.cna.org/sites/default/files/CNA%20Brazils%20Rise%20and%20Implications%20f
or%20Neighbors.pdf)//HAL
As it has emerged on the global stage, Brazil has strived to establish mutually supportive strategies at the
regional and global levels. Most importantly, Brazil desires a stable, peaceful, and economically vibrant South America so that Brasilia can
focus its diplomatic efforts on establishing its role as a great power. However, the realization of
this vision is complicated by several factors within the hemisphere: • Significant ideological
fractures within Latin America that make active leadership potentially treacherous for Brazil ,
whose traditional policy has been to maintain friendly relations with all ten of its neighbors • Resistance to Brazilian leadership
on the part of other Latin American countries, which believe that Brazil’s policies reflect selfinterest more than a commitment to collective security and development • The weakness of
international institutions in the Americas, which complicates regional coordination or
leadership as diplomatic initiatives must be pursued country by country • The pervasive, and in
many ways dominant, influence of the United States. Another complicating factor, just as important as
these external conditions, is that Brazil’s foreign policy elite remain locked in a debate over the nation’s
foreign policy strategy. There are three general groups within this debate. One, led in the public arena by former
President Cardoso, envisions Brazil’s future as a world power—a rule maker in the international system, whose
influence would flow from its democratic values, its economic weight, and its productive cooperation with other great powers within the United Nations
and other institutions. These “internationalists” would like to see Brazil participate with traditional allies in North America and Europe in creating an
international community of democratic powers seeking peace, non-proliferation, and free-market-based development throughout the world. The
current government under President Lula includes the two other intellectual groups. One, the “leftists,”
consists of ideologically minded former academics and special advisors who still adhere to ideas and strategies from the neoMarxist Leftist movement of the 1960s and 1970s. These individuals—represented by the Director of the
Ministry for Strategic Affairs Samuel Pinheiro and presidential advisor Marco Aurelio Garcia—tend to be strident antiAmericanists and believers in the logic of South-South collaboration. The final group, which we term the “realists,” can be
considered as less ideological, more pragmatic, but equally nationalistic. These realists, represented by the current Foreign Minister
Celso Amorim and concentrated within the diplomatic corps of Itamaraty, envision a Brazil active in world institutions and seeking peace and nonproliferation, but also enjoying autonomy by virtue of its strong relations with powers around the world, including China, Russia, and Iran.
Brazil can never take over US influence in the region
Jordan, 13 – PhD from the London School of Economics, former Minister of Environmental
Affairs and Tourism for South Africa (Z Pallo, “Brics aiming for no less than a new world order,”
Business Day (South Africa), March 28, 2013, BDFM Publishers PTY Ltd, LexisNexis)//HAL
Brazil, too, has a diverse population, numerically dominated by Afro-Brazilians, but otherwise dominated by whites. It lives in
the shadow of the US, which, invoking the Monroe Doctrine, regards that country as part of its
sphere of influence. Consequently, unlike tiny Cuba, Brazil has been unable to project its power in
the region, let alone challenge the US on the world stage. Brazil's leftist government has redefined its role and
seeks to build new transcontinental alliances with other developing countries. Until recently, Brazil's rapacious capitalist
class plundered the rainforests and brutally exploited the indigenous peoples to near extinction.
Several barriers to Brazilian hegemony
PB, 12 (The Political Bouillon, an independent and non-partisan inter-university journal of
political analysis run by university students from McGill University, Concordia University,
Université de Montréal and Université du Québec à Montreal, “Finally, Becoming Brazil,”
3/27/12, http://thepoliticalbouillon.com/en/finally-becoming-brazil/, Tashma)
Skeptical View
Some believe, however, that the
BRICS may not yet be capable of becoming world powers, mainly
because of the West’s military and diplomatic muscle. Despite their impressive economic and
regional expansion recently, the extent to which this has been translated effectively into political
weight is still questionable. For example, Brazil – even if it is now the sixth largest economy in the world – could not
have projected its own military power to intervene in Libyan theatre, compared to the British or
French or any other NATO power, or even have much of a say in the geostrategically vital Middle East. The Western
hemisphere is still under the U.S hegemonic umbrella at least for a while, and there are simply limits
to Brazilian geopolitical rise for the time being. Nevertheless, it is clear Brazil will be a strong pole to be regarded
highly by other hegemonic powers. Yet one of the problems, not limited to Brazil alone, is the recent deindustrialization
which has led to protectionist measures. Undermining the idea of a customs union (Mercosur), Brazil has
imposed trade tariffs. Intra-Latin American trade is relatively low compared to intraregional
trade elsewhere. Brazil should send a different economic message to its own neighbors – that it is committed to economic
modernization, before projecting its power any further. Also, according to The Economist, Brazil is in the red zone with
regards to its monetary maneuverability and fiscal flexibility. The “wiggle-room index” offers a rough ranking
of which economies are best placed to withstand another global downturn, and Brazil’s indicators are concerning in
that respect.
Brazilian leadership does nothing
Malamud, 11 – research fellow at the Institute of Social Sciences (ICS) of the University of
Lisbon. PhD in Political Science from the European University Institute (EUI) in Florence.
(Andres, “A Leader Without Followers? The Growing Divergence Between the Regional and
Global Performance of Brazilian Foreign Policy,” LATIN AMERICAN POLITICS AND SOCIETY,
© 2011 University of Miami, MALAMUD: BRAZIL’S FOREIGN POLICY,
http://americo.usal.es/iberoame/sites/default/files/malamud_brasil_leader_without_follower
s.pdf)//HAL
In spite of its regional preeminence, Brazil has been unable to translate its structural and instrumental
resources into effective leadership. Its potential followers have not aligned with Brazil’s main
foreign policy goals, such as its pursuit of a permanent seat on the UNSC, of the WTO Directorship-General, or of the IDB
presidency, and some have even challenged its regional influence. By playing the regional card to achieve global
aims, Brazil has ended up in an unexpected situation: while its regional leadership has grown on
paper, in practice it has met growing resistance. Yet the country has gained increasing global recognition. Today,
Brazil is acknowledged as an emergent global player by the established world powers, such as the G-8 members and the European
Union. This article has analyzed the mounting mismatch between the regional and global recognition of Brazilian status. Due to
lasting cleavages, divergent interests, and power rivalries in South America, the mismatch is not
likely to be bridged anytime soon. Paradoxically, however, if the Brazilian quest for regional leadership
has been unsuccessful, promoting it has been beneficial for Brazil’s national interests. This paradox has lately come to the
attention of the country’s foreign policy elite, which is increasingly advocating a more pragmatic stance based on diversified
strategies to minimize dependence on a troublesome region (CEBRI-CINDES 2007). Although subregional integration has not
ceased to be a goal, it is no longer a priority (Vigevani et al. 2008). Furthermore, the increasing pluralization of actors with a stake in
foreign policy (Cason and Power 2009) may also be making Brazil more globally—as opposed to regionally—sensitive. The
Brazilian bid for leadership has been hindered by several factors, which can be understood in light of the
concepts presented in the first section of this article. The structural components of its leadership project (i.e.,
military power and economic might) have been insufficient to cajole or buy support, especially
facing rivals such as Venezuela, the United States, and even Taiwan, which are willing to give
money or military support to win over undecided followers. The instrumental components of
leadership have been either unavailable or insufficient. Brazil is reluctant to build common
institutions because it feels they would tie it to unreliable neighbors rather than consolidate
regional integration. In terms of ideas and values, its regional strategies look to some neighbors like
hegemonic incursions rather than enlightened leadership based on the pursuit of shared
interests. And regarding higher education and migrant destinations, the main attractors for most South American
countries continue to be extraregional powers; namely, the United States and Europe.
No rising Brazil—lack of innovation
Bodman and Wolfensohn, 11 - U.S. secretary of energy from 2005 to 2009, a BS from
Cornell University and a PhD from MIT, where he was also associate professor of chemical
engineering, James D. Wolfensohn is chairman of Wolfensohn & Company, LLC,
chairman of Citigroup’s international advisory board, and adviser to Citigroup’s senior
management on global strategy and on international matters, He is a honorary trustee of the
Brookings Institution, a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, Master of Business
Administration (MBA) degree at Harvard Business School, (“Global Brazil and
U.S.-Brazil Relations,” Independent Task Force Report No. 66, Council on Foreign Relations,
July 12th, 2011, http://www.cfr.org/brazil/global-brazil-us-brazil-relations/p25407)//HAL
Fostering innovation and enterprise is squarely on the domestic and international agenda of the Brazilian government. Indeed, the
Ministry of Science and Technology has acknowledged and begun to address Brazil’s deficit in innovation. The Brazilian government
also recognizes the importance of technology transfer from abroad as an engine of domestic innovation and growth. Trends are
positive as, over the past five years, the Brazilian government has moved toward the commercialization of innovation, shifting away
from the state-based investment in science and technology that characterized the military era and has since remained. For example,
the Rousseff administration has moved to privatize Brazil’s civil aviation industry, which has traditionally been controlled by the
military. Research and development (R&D) are underfunded in Brazil relative to other countries, and the
funding that is in place does not produce results at the rates seen elsewhere.12 Notably, Brazil and
South Korea had similar levels of GDP per capita thirty years ago. Today, however, South Korea has grown to be more than three
times richer than Brazil (in purchasing power parity terms). South Korea invests more than 3 percent of its GDP in innovation; in
Brazil the figure is just over 1 percent. Brazil’s historic and current comparative advantage in commodities has itself distorted the
incentive structure for innovation. In 2000, manufactured goods accounted for nearly 60 percent of Brazil’s exports, and primary
goods totaled just over 20 percent. In 2009, primary goods overtook manufactured goods—a reversal that starkly illustrates the
growing competitive disadvantage. The sheer volume of foreign demand, from India and especially China, for raw goods like soya,
iron ore, and beef drives Brazil’s growing emphasis on commodities exporting. The quality of science education and know-how in
Brazilian academia is strong, but the gulf between the academy and ideas reaching the market is large. At universities, leading
academics tend to view a disconnection between the scholarly research they conduct and the commercial application of their results.
Academia is not viewed as an instrument of economic development as it is in Boston or San Francisco, for example. Brazil’s
inefficient and complex regulatory environment—along with poor infrastructure, inadequate
education, high and complex taxes, and rigid labor requirements—make it costly and difficult to
commercialize new technology and start new businesses in Brazil. According to the World Bank, it takes 120
days to register a business in Brazil, compared with twenty-two in Chile and just six in the United States. A tradition of heavy state
involvement in industry from the time of Brazil’s independence, through industrialization, and up to the present day has led
Brazilians to look to the state for guidance in what and how to produce. Brazil’s Financing Agency for Studies and Projects (FINEP,
associated with the Ministry of Science and Technology) has an annual budget of approximately $2.5 billion to fund scientific and
technological development, from R&D for large companies to local innovation systems. Annually, FINEP provides financing for
three thousand companies in Brazil (both domestic and foreign), the majority of which are start-ups. Moreover, some parastatal
companies have themselves been sources of innovation and demonstrate Brazil’s ability to become a world-class innovator in certain
scientific and technical sectors. Brazil increased its agricultural productivity via Embrapa and built the world’s second-largest
biofuels industry, as a result of Pro-alcool, the government’s ethanol promotion program. State-controlled Petrobras has likewise
emerged at the forefront of deep-sea oil drilling technology. The Fundação Oswaldo Cruz (Fiocruz), a state-funded public health
institution, and its Farmanguinhos and Bio-Manguinhos programs in particular, are world-class examples of innovation in the
health sector. These successes suggest that state-driven industrial policy can yield significant results on a large scale, although
economists are divided over the long-term benefits of state-directed industrial policies. Although Brazil lacks a strong
culture of private innovation, individual entrepreneurship is common—one of every eight adults has created his or her
own business, one of the highest rates in the world, though many of these businesses are likely outside the formal economy.
Conclusions and Recommendations The Task Force finds that low levels of innovation in Brazil and a dearth
of
mechanisms needed to foster innovation hamper the country’s potential over the long run.13 The
legacy of heavy state intervention in industry will be hard to overcome, and, indeed, many
Brazilians prefer the status quo. Though a drastic shift in the culture of innovation is unlikely in
the near term, the Brazilian government can pursue steps to encourage small and medium-sized businesses by beginning to
simplify government bureaucracy and by promoting private-sector collaboration with the nation’s universities.
No rising Brazil—structural challenges
Stewart, 11 - Army Comptroller Colonel, has served in Bosnia, Germany, Japan, as well as
duty on the Army, Joint, and Office of the Secretary of Defense Staffs at the Pentagon (Vance, “Is
Brazil Actually Ready to be a World Economic Power?,” Center for Strategic Leadership, U.S.
Army War College, Volume 13-11, July 2011,
http://www.csl.army.mil/usacsl/publications/IP13_11.pdf)//HAL
Despite disciplined government policy and a booming economy, Brazil has not yet solved all its problems and still
faces considerable social ills. The government and the people continue to struggle with dismal
poverty, soaring crime, limited infrastructure to facilitate future growth, and a novice capability
in handling trade disputes. First, despite reducing the percentage of the population subsisting below the poverty line, a
significant portion of the population lives in isolated rural villages or urban ‘favelas.’13 Estimates of more than 36 million live in
these vast urban slums or shanty towns, on the outskirts of Brazil’s metropolises, without access to clean water, electricity or
sustainable housing.14 Second, an analysis conducted by the Library of Congress states, “the skewed distribution of income in
Brazil, one of the most unequal in the world, may be partially responsible for an endemic and increasing problem of nonpolitical
crime.”15 Roberto Ramos, CEO of The Vio Collective, attributes the high crime rate to “violence wrought by drugs.”16 The U.S. State
Department issues caution to Americans visiting Brazil, noting: “…crime throughout Brazil has reached very high
levels. Brazil’s murder rate is more than four times higher than that of the U.S.”17 Next,
Mr. Biato summarizes the current status
of Brazilian infrastructure: “The dearth of transport, communications and energy links goes a long way to explaining the region’s
long history of economic fragmentation and meager trade. Even today, Latin America has nowhere as dense an infrastructure grid
as that enjoyed by the United States or Western Europe in the mid-19th century.”18 While the award of both the World Cup and the
Olympic Games provided the impetus for massive infrastructure improvements, many of which will have use after the competitions,
these plans may prove too ambitious for the Brazilian government. Legal, business and labor entities still need to be overcome in
order to ensure construction is completed on time. Instead, these events may yet end up providing a ‘black eye’ for the government
and the people collectively. According to a Reuters investigation, the more than $1 trillion in construction projects: “…now seem
likely to fall well short of President Dilma Rousseff’s ambitions. Numerous high-profile projects are falling victim
to a long list of problems including endemic corruption, red tape, insufficient funds and – above
all – a glaring lack of leadership and know-how.” 19 The investigators also note that these shortfalls are not limited
to President Rousseff’s critics. “Paulo Resende, one of the country’s top independent infrastructure experts, pleads with
world investors to stop treating Brazil like an inevitable success story. He says the government’s
current projections are ‘totally unrealistic’ and estimates that fewer than half of the planned works
will be completed on time.” 20 While poverty, crime, corruption and inefficient government institutions are not exclusive
to Brazil, in order to be considered among the top-tier of developed nations, it must redouble its
efforts to combat these social ills and strengthen the effectiveness of its governmental bodies.
Finally, the government of Brazil has recently shown its limited skills in dealing with international
trade disputes. Upset by what they perceive as continued Chinese currency manipulation, “prompted Brazil’s finance minister,
Guido Mantega, to complain in October 2010, that his country was a potential casualty of a ‘currency war.’”21 Apparently unable to
counter the effect on Brazilian goods of what the Brazilian’s identify as an undervalued Chinese Renminbi, on the eve of the April
2011 BRIC session in China, President Rousseff announced the application of “import tariffs on specific goods
from China and the United States, the latest measures to help stem a flood of cheap imports that
is eroding the country’s trade balance.”22 Applying new tariffs is not a lasting solution, merely a knee-jerk reaction
that stifles trade between nations and further globalization. Critics also lash back at President Rousseff, claiming, “… a rising tax
burden and low productivity at home are equally to blame for the falling competitiveness of
Latin America’s largest economy”23 If Brazil desires to be among the world’s economic leaders, it should work to create
lasting solutions, not resort to retaliatory measures.
No Brazilian hegemonic rise --- they lack hard power resources
Hurrell, 10 (Andrew, Montague Burton Professor of International Relations, Balliol College at
the University of Oxford, “Rising States, Rising Institutions: Challenges for Global Governance,”
pg. 141-142, Tashma)
Unlike India or China, Brazil does not have the hard-power resources to claim status within a
more traditionally Great Power–centric concert or club. The more international society moves toward
Westphalia, the more serious is the dilemma for Brazilian foreign policy. It is true that Brazil’s natural resources and
environmental goods are important in an age of geopolitical competition and neo-Malthusian resource
conflicts. Notwithstanding the concentration on soft power, it is also worth noting that the past five years have seen the first
glimmering of a more focused discussion of the links between foreign policy and military strategy, especially within the region. The
reassessment of the importance of nuclear technology and plans to develop a nuclear-powered submarine also point in this
direction. But it is precisely in such a world that the limits on Brazil’s hard material power
capabilities come sharply into focus. These limits apply both to the country’s capacity to be a
player in core major power relations and to its role as a regional power.
Spreading resentment in the region and lack of direction erode Brazilian
leadership
Shifter, 12 (Michael, President of the Inter-American Dialogue, Adjunct Professor of Latin
American Studies at Georgetown University's School of Foreign Service, “The Shifting
Landscape of Latin American Regionalism,” Current History, Volume 111, Issue 742, February
2012, pg. 56-61, Proquest, Tashma)
But it is not hard to discern spreading resentment among some of Brazil's South American
neighbors - a natural product of increasingly marked power asymmetries in the continent. As The
New York Times noted in a November 2011 report, some of the misgivings voiced by Brazil's neighbors have echoes of longstanding
grievances leveled at the United States, including heavyhanded tactics, and dictating rather than negotiating as equal partners.
Other common complaints include Brazil's failure to consult adequately with its neighbors
before it takes stands at global meetings. Also, other South American nations tend to identify
more closely with "Latin America" than Brazil does, and are therefore uneasy with what they view
as Brazilians' focus on South America at times to the exclusion of the rest of the region, including Spanish-speaking
Mexico. Brazil, acutely aware of such sentiments, seeks to mollify its neighbors' concerns, often resorting to multilateral
instruments. Regional mechanisms like UNASUR are in part designed to smooth the rough edges that inevitably accompany the
differentials in power on many crucial dimensions between Brazil and its neighbors. Despite its dominant role, however, Brazil
has no discernible agenda for regional governance. And it is probably a stretch to refer to what is taking place as
"integration" in any strict sense of the term. Rather, there is a move toward increased cooperation and political
dialogue, which constitute the spirit and tenor of "regionalism," but without any serious attempt
to cede sovereignty, which is the essence of integration. In fact, careful examination of the performance and
record of subregional groupings to date raises questions about the potential effectiveness of more far-reaching regional
arrangements. Mercosur, which was to serve as a customs union involving Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay, and Paraguay, witnessed a
jump in trade in the 1990s, but over time its functioning has become problematic. Protectionist practices have introduced
considerable strain within the bloc. In addition, Mercosur's inability to resolve a rancorous dispute between Argentina and Uruguay
over the operation of a paper mill on their border exposed serious limitations in its effectiveness. Yet, for all of its shortcomings,
Mercosur is generally regarded as less troubled than other subregional groupings in Latin America. For example, the Andean
Community of Nations, which has existed since 1969, has been riven by political differences and high levels of mistrust. Other
subregional arrangements face similar obstacles. In this context, some Latin American countries have intensified
bilateral ties with economic powerhouses like Brazil - but have simultaneously pursued
options to offset any one nation's excessive influence. The case of Colombia is particularly telling. From the
start of his presidency in August 2010, Juan Manuel Santos has assigned a high priority to reengaging with South America, from
which Colombia had become relatively isolated during the Uribe administration. Uribe had concentrated on his country's battle
against domestic insurgents and had, as a result, invested heavily in cultivating Washington to ensure continued support.
AT: Brazil DA – U.S. Hegemony Turn
No positive consequence to rising Brazil but Brazil regional power kills US
hegemony
Soares de Lima and Hirst, 6 - PhD in Political Science from Vanderbilt University
(1986). Currently she is a professor at the Institute of Social and Political Studies (IESP-UERJ)
and coordinator of the South American Politics Observatory, OPSA/UERJ (Maria and Monica,
“Brazil as an intermediate state and regional power: action, choice and responsibilities,”
International Affairs, 2006,
http://disciplinas.stoa.usp.br/pluginfile.php/43103/mod_resource/content/1/Brazil%20as%20
an%20intermediate%20state%20and%20regional%20power%20%20action,%20power%20and%20responsabilities.pdf)//HAL
US–Brazil relations have gone through different phases, oscillating between ‘good’ and ‘cool’ without ever
tipping into open hostility. The two states have shared a notion of ‘limited divergence’ which, while always
avoiding open confrontation, has resulted in frustrations on both sides that have long dominated their
relationship. US–Brazil relations have faced cyclical crises of expectations caused by erroneous
calculations on both sides. Nevertheless, all through the twentieth century, bilateral relations played a crucial role in
Brazil’s foreign affairs as well as in the US hemispheric agenda. Though US–Brazil relations have always been dominated by an
intergovernmental agenda, non-governmental actors have recently expanded their presence and grown in importance. NGOs,
cultural and educational entities, as well as a diverse set of private economic interests, all now contribute to a complex and
increasingly intense bilateral interaction. As US–Brazil relations have become more complex on both sides,
military, economic, political and cultural interests have led to a more open agenda and
introduced a broader range of concerns and pressures. For the United States, the importance of
Brazil in world politics and international security is small, especially when compared to crucial allies such as Canada and the
UK, or to other states such as Germany, Japan and Russia. For Brazil, the picture is very different. Brazil keeps a
permanent watch on the United States and what it does in world politics, and its foreign policy decisions
consistently involve an assessment of the costs and benefits of convergence with or divergence
from the US. Such caution has increased in the unipolar world, particularly since September 11. Differences
between Brazil and the United States over the latter’s intervention in world and regional crises have been visible in such episodes as
the Gulf War (1991), the crisis in Haiti (1996) and the Kosovo tragedy (1998). In all cases, the US would have welcomed Brazil’s full
support. In summary, stateto-state political relations between the United States and Brazil primarily aim for prudent coexistence,
possible collaboration and minimal collision. While the United States moves ahead towards the
consolidation of an uncontested power position, Brazil searches for a secure and legitimate
economic and political platform in South America. Brazil’s economic relations with the United States today are
far more complex than they were 30 years ago, covering a multifaceted set of trade negotiations and financial/monetary pressures.
Bilateral trade developments have become inextricably linked to multilateral trade disputes carried forward at the WTO and to
regional trade negotiations. From the beginning of the Lula administration more innovations were expected in interstate regional
trade negotiations than in the relationship with private investors, the banking system and the Washington-based multilateral credit
institutions. During the first year of the Lula administration the Free Trade of the Americas (FTAA) negotiations became the crucial
terrain of bilateral relations, and an increasingly fragile one. Through 2003–2004, as both countries co-chaired the process, the
FTAA negotiations lost their way and turned into a US–Mercosur battlefield, fragmenting into sets of parallel negotiations between
Washington and the other subregional blocs (Caribbean, Central America and Andean community). Concerns were raised
in the US, albeit discreetly, regarding the possibility that a more active Brazil could assemble
South America into a single bloc that would destabilize Washington’s pre-eminence in the
hemisphere. As Brazil aims to become more active in regional affairs, clashes with the US in
regional trade and security issues tend to politicize US hemispheric affairs, and the idea that
Brazil could be forging a unified regional front in negotiations with the United States has gained
some impetus within South American diplomatic and political circles. In fact, however, the inauguration of
the Lula administration has led to a more positive character in the shape and direction of US–Brazil relations. For Brazil, it is not
easy to deal with the constraints imposed by the perennial status of South America as a US sphere of influence.
US primacy prevents global conflict – diminishing power creates a vacuum that
causes transition wars in multiple places
Brooks et al 13 [Stephen G. Brooks is Associate Professor of Government at Dartmouth
College.G. John Ikenberry is the Albert G. Milbank Professor of Politics and International
Affairs at Princeton University in the Department of Politics and the Woodrow Wilson School of
Public and International Affairs. He is also a Global Eminence Scholar at Kyung Hee
University.William C. Wohlforth is the Daniel Webster Professor in the Department of
Government at Dartmouth College. “Don't Come Home, America: The Case against
Retrenchment”, Winter 2013, Vol. 37, No. 3, Pages 751,http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/abs/10.1162/ISEC_a_00107, GDI File]
A core premise of deep engagement is that it prevents the emergence of a far more dangerous global security
environment. For one thing, as noted above, the United States’ overseas presence gives it the leverage to
restrain partners from taking provocative action. Perhaps more important, its core alliance commitments also deter states with
aspirations to regional hegemony from contemplating expansion and make its partners more secure, reducing their incentive to adopt solutions to their security problems that
threaten others and thus stoke security dilemmas. The contention that engaged U.S. power dampens the baleful effects of anarchy is consistent with influential variants of realist
theory. Indeed, arguably the scariest portrayal of the war-prone world that would emerge absent the “American Pacifier” is provided in the works of John Mearsheimer,
who forecasts dangerous multipolar regions replete with security competition, arms races, nuclear proliferation and associated preventive wartemptations, regional rivalries,
and even runs at regional hegemony and full-scale great power war. 72 How do retrenchment advocates, the bulk of whom are realists, discount this benefit? Their arguments
are complicated, but two capture most of the variation: (1) U.S. security guarantees are not necessary to prevent dangerous rivalries and conflict in Eurasia; or (2) prevention of
rivalry and conflict in Eurasia is not a U.S. interest. Each response is connected to a different theory or set of theories, which makes sense given that the whole debate hinges on a
complex future counterfactual (what would happen to Eurasia’s security setting if the United States truly disengaged?). Although a certain answer is impossible, each of these
responses is nonetheless a weaker argument for retrenchment than advocates acknowledge. The first response flows from defensive realism as well as other international
relations theories that discount the conflict-generating potential of anarchy under contemporary conditions. 73 Defensive realists maintain that the high expected costs of
territorial conquest, defense dominance, and an array of policies and practices that can be used credibly to signal benign intent, mean that Eurasia’s major states could manage
regional multipolarity peacefully without theAmerican pacifier. Retrenchment would be a bet on this scholarship, particularly in regions where the kinds of stabilizers that
nonrealist theories point to—such as democratic governance or dense institutional linkages—are either absent or weakly present. There are three other major bodies of
scholarship, however, that might give decisionmakers pause before making this bet. First is regional expertise. Needless to say, there is no consensus on the net security effects of
U.S. withdrawal. Regarding each region, there are optimists and pessimists. Few experts expect a return of intense great power competition in a post-American Europe, but
many doubt European governments will pay the political costs of increased EU defense cooperation and the budgetary costs of increasing military outlays. 74 The result might be
Europe that is incapable of securing itself from various threats that could be destabilizing
within the region and beyond (e.g., a regional conflict akin to the 1990s Balkan wars), lacks capacity for global security missions in which U.S. leaders
might want European participation, and is vulnerable to the influence of outside rising powers. What about the other parts of Eurasia
where the United States has a substantial military presence? Regarding the Middle East, the
balance begins toswing toward pessimists concerned that states currently backed by
Washington— notably Israel, Egypt, and Saudi Arabia—might take actions upon U.S. retrenchment
that would intensify security dilemmas. And concerning East Asia, pessimismregarding the region’s
prospects without the American pacifier is pronounced. Arguably the principal concern expressed by area experts is
that Japan and South Korea are likely to obtain a nuclear capacity and increase their military commitments,
a
which could
stoke a destabilizing reaction from China . It is notable that during the Cold War, both South Korea and Taiwan moved
to obtain a nuclear weapons capacity and were only constrained from doing so by astill-engaged United States. 75 The second body of scholarship casting doubt on the bet on
defensive realism’s sanguine portrayal is all of the research that undermines its conception of state preferences. Defensive realism’s optimism about what would happen if the
United States retrenched is very much dependent on itsparticular—and highly restrictive—assumption about state preferences; once we relax this assumption, then much of its
basis for optimism vanishes. Specifically, the prediction of post-American tranquility throughout Eurasia rests on the assumption that security is the only relevant state
preference, with security defined narrowly in terms of protection from violent external attacks on the homeland. Under that assumption, the security problem is largely solved as
research across the social and
other sciences, however,undermines that core assumption: states have preferences not only for security but
also for prestige, status, and other aims, and theyengage in trade-offs among the various objectives. 76 In addition, they define
security not just in terms of territorial protection but in view of many and varied milieu goals. It follows that even states that
are relatively secure may nevertheless engage in highly competitive behavior. Empirical studies show that this
is indeed sometimes the case. 77 In sum, a bet on a benign postretrenchment Eurasia is a bet that leaders of major countries will never allow these nonsecurity
preferences to influence their strategic choices. To the degree that these bodies of scholarly knowledge have predictive leverage, U.S. retrenchment would
result in a significant deterioration in the security environment in at least some of the world’s key regions. We
have already mentioned the third, even more alarming body of scholarship. Offensive realism predicts that the withdrawal of the American
pacifier will yield either a competitive regional multipolarity complete with associated insecurity,
arms racing, crisis instability, nuclear proliferation, and the like, or bids for regional hegemony, which may be beyond
the capacity of local great powers to contain (and which in any case would generate intensely competitive behavior,
possibly including regional great power war).
soon as offense and defense are clearly distinguishable, and offense is extremely expensive relative to defense. Burgeoning
AT: Brazil DA – Relations Turn
Brazilian rise kills US-Brazilian relations
Wigell, 11 – Researcher at the Finnish Institute of International Affairs, Global Security
Programme, focusing on Latin American politics, PhD, London School of Economics, 2011
(Mikael, “ASSERTIVE BRAZIL: AN EMERGING POWER AND ITS IMPLICATIONS, FIIA
BRIEFING PAPER 82 • May 2011, The Finnish Institute of International Affairs,
www.fiia.fi/assets/publications/bp82.pdf)//HAL
Brazil’s more assertive foreign policy has caused friction in its relations with the
United States . Indeed, under Lula, Brazil assumed a series of postures perceived as “unhelpful” by
the Bush and Obama administrations. Brazil voiced strong criticism of the US’s unilateral
interventions, such as that in Iraq. It also criticized plans to expand the US military presence in Colombia
as well as in Haiti for the purpose of disaster recovery, and refused to support the US position over the Honduras
affair following the ousting of President Zelaya in June 2009. Lula’s embrace of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and the nuclear deal he
helped broker with Iran enraged the Obama administration as well as the EU, who argued that it enabled Iran to employ a delaying
tactic to avoid UN sanctions, while continuing to develop a nuclear weapon. Other postures such as the courting of Cuba’s Castro
brothers, warning the States of strong Brazilian reactions if the US tried to destabilize Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez, and
organizing the initiative for Latin American countries to recognize Palestine as a sovereign state according to its 1967 borders also
formed part of Lula’s more independent foreign policy, through which he sought to boost multilateralism and carve out a more
autonomous and proactive role for Brazil in international politics. Crucially, Brazil’s efforts to promote regional
integration have deliberately excluded the United States. Lula rejected the FTAA (Free Trade Area of
the Americas) sought by the US. Instead, initiatives such as UNASUR and the expansion of Mercosur to include
countries like Venezuela were designed to cut loose from restrictive trade agreements and undercut US
hegemony in the region. Brazil has also voiced strong criticism of America’s handling of the
financial crisis, accusing it of triggering a “currency war” through its policy of quantitative easing, while disputes over trade
issues such as the US tariff on ethanol and its farm subsidies remain unresolved. Brazil’s assertiveness does not, however, mean it is
adopting the abrasive style of Venezuela’s Chávez. To be sure, within the Itamaraty, Brazil’s foreign office, “autonomists”
have become the dominant group of policymakers.4 They have
reservations about US hegemony in the region
and want to boost the autonomy of Brazilian actions. But they are ultimately pragmatists who, via engagement
and negotiation, rather than by direct confrontation, want to create a favourable context for Brazil’s rise. Regional and international
multilateralism is seen as the main instrument for curbing US hegemony and improving Brazil’s relative position in the global power
structure.
US Brazil relations k2 solve Middle Eastern oil dependence
Wigell, 11 – Researcher at the Finnish Institute of International Affairs, Global Security
Programme, focusing on Latin American politics, PhD, London School of Economics, 2011
(Mikael, “ASSERTIVE BRAZIL: AN EMERGING POWER AND ITS IMPLICATIONS, FIIA
BRIEFING PAPER 82 • May 2011, The Finnish Institute of International Affairs,
www.fiia.fi/assets/publications/bp82.pdf)//HAL
The US has much to gain from a closer relationship with Brazil. Brazil’s growing economic and
diplomatic clout provides a strong incentive for the US to improve relations. As the US looks for ways to
boost its export industry in the wake of the financial crisis, closer economic cooperation with a booming Brazil
looks increasingly attractive. US companies see great opportunities in Brazil’s large and expanding consumer market.
They also want to enter the burgeoning market forming around Brazil’s massive natural gas and oil discoveries, as well as the vast
business opportunities associated with its upcoming organization of the 2014 World Cup and the 2016 Olympic Games. As Brazil
is set to become a major energy player within the next ten years, it also provides an opportunity
for the US to reduce its dependence on oil imports from the volatile Middle East . Also, closing any
new deal on international trade will require the cooperation of Brazil, as demonstrated by the failed Doha
Development Round.
Oil dependence causes extinction
Lendman, 7 (Stephen, renowned author and research associate at the Center for Research on
Globalization, “Resource Wars - Can We Survive Them?”, July 2007,
http://www.rense.com/general76/-resrouce.htm)
***This card edited to remove holocaust rhetoric which we do not endorse
With the world's energy supplies finite, the US heavily dependent on imports, and "peak oil" near or
approaching, "security" for America means assuring a sustainable supply of what we can't do without. It
includes waging wars to get it, protect it, and defend the maritime trade routes over which it travels.
That means energy's partnered with predatory New World Order globalization, militarism, wars,
ecological recklessness, and now an extremist US administration willing to risk Armageddon for world
dominance. Central to its plan is first controlling essential resources everywhere, at any cost,
starting with oil and where most of it is located in the Middle East and Central Asia. The New "Great Game" and Perils From It The
new "Great Game's" begun, but this time the stakes are greater than ever as explained above. The old one
lasted nearly 100 years pitting the British empire against Tsarist Russia when the issue wasn't oil. This time, it's the US with help
from Israel, Britain, the West, and satellite states like Japan, South Korea and Taiwan challenging Russia and China with today's
weapons and technology on both sides making earlier ones look like toys. At stake is more than oil. It's planet earth with
survival of all life on it issue number one twice over. Resources and wars for them means militarism is
increasing, peace declining, and the planet's ability to sustain life front and center, if anyone's paying attention. They'd
better be because beyond the point of no return, there's no second chance the way Einstein explained after the atom was
split. His famous quote on future wars was : "I know not with what weapons World War III will be fought, but World War IV will be
fought with sticks and stones." Under a worst case scenario, it's more dire than that. There may be nothing left but resilient
beetles and bacteria in the wake of a nuclear [catastrophe] meaning even a new stone age is way in the future, if at all.
The threat is real and once nearly happened during the Cuban Missile Crisis in October, 1962. We later learned a miracle saved us at
the 40th anniversary October, 2002 summit meeting in Havana attended by the US and Russia along with host country Cuba. For
the first time, we were told how close we came to nuclear Armageddon. Devastation was avoided only because Soviet submarine
captain Vasily Arkhipov countermanded his order to fire nuclear-tipped torpedos when Russian submarines were attacked by US
destroyers near Kennedy's "quarantine" line. Had he done it, only our imagination can speculate what might have followed and
whether planet earth, or at least a big part of it, would have survived.
AT: Brazil DA – AT: Africa War Impact
No risk of great power conflict over Africa
Barrett 05 Robert, PhD Military & Strategic Studies, U of Calgary,
6/1, http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/Delivery.cfm/SSRN_ID726162_code327511.pdf?abstractid=7
26162&mirid=1
Westerners eager to promote democracy must be wary of African politicians who promise democratic reform without sincere
commitment to the process. Offering money to corrupt leaders in exchange for their taking small steps away from autocracy may in
fact be a way of pushing countries into anocracy. As such, world financial lenders and interventionists who wield leverage and
influence must take responsibility in considering the ramifications of African nations who adopt democracy in order to maintain
elite political privileges. The obvious reason for this, aside from the potential costs in human life should conflict arise from hastily
constructed democratic reforms, is the fact that Western donors, in the face of intrastate war would then be faced with channeling
funds and resources away from democratization efforts and toward conflict intervention based on issues of human security. This is a
problem, as Western nations may be increasingly wary of intervening in Africa hotspots after
experiencing firsthand the unpredictable and unforgiving nature of societal
warfare in both Somalia and Rwanda. On a costbenefit basis, the West continues to
be somewhat reluctant to get involved in Africa’s dirty wars, evidenced by its political hesitation
when discussing ongoing sanguinary grassroots conflicts in Africa. Even as the world apologizes for bearing
witness to the Rwandan genocide without having intervened, the U nited S tates, recently using the label ‘genocide’in the context of
the Sudanese conflict (in September of 2004), has only proclaimed sanctions against Sudan, while dismissing any suggestions at
actual intervention (Giry, 2005). Part of the problem is that traditional military and diplomatic approachs at
separating combatants and enforcing ceasefires have yielded little in Africa. No powerful nations
want to get embroiled in conflicts they cannot win – especially those conflicts in which the intervening nation has
very little interest.
Outside powers won’t intervene in African conflicts
Docking 07 Tim, African Affairs Specialist with the United States Institute of Peace, 2007, Taking Sides Clashing Views on
African Issues, p. 376
Since the tragedy in Somalia,
the trend has been for Western nations to refuse to send troops into
Africa's hot spots. Jordan recently underscored this point when it expressed frustration with the
West's failure to commit soldiers to the UNAMSIL mission as a reason for the withdrawal of its
troops from Sierra Leone. America's aversion to peacekeeping in Africa also reflects broader
U.S. foreign policy on the continent. Africa occupies a marginal role in American foreign policy
in general (a point highlighted by conference participants).
AT: Brazil DA – AT: AIDS Impact
The end of AIDS is within sight
Gerson 11 (Michael Gerson -- Aide to President George W. Bush as Assistant to the President
for Policy and Strategic Planning -- Writer for the Washington Post -- "Putting AIDS on the road
to extinction" November 10th, 2011 charticles.washingtonpost.com/2011-1110/opinions/35282108_1_aids-prevention-aids-treatment-aids-free-generation) SM
After 30 years and 30 million funerals, the end of the global AIDS epidemic is suddenly, unexpectedly, within
sight. It would be a final victory for this clever killer if America were too preoccupied and inward-looking to notice and act.
During the last 18 months, the science of AIDS prevention has been transformed. Studies have shown
dramatic results from male circumcision — a more than 60 percent reduction in the risk of
transmission from women to men. New technologies such as microbicides have proved effective
when used before exposure to the disease. Then, three months ago, came an article in the New England Journal of
Medicinetitled “Prevention of HIV-1 Infection with Early Antiretroviral Therapy.” The study found a
96 percent decrease in transmission to a heterosexual partner when AIDS treatment was begun
early. Treating AIDS sooner than later is a dramatically effective form of AIDS prevention.
Scientists began considering something previously unimaginable. What if these methods of AIDS prevention were combined —
along with condom use and the prevention of mother-to-child transmission — and aggressively applied
in the most affected regions and among the most vulnerable groups in Africa? Scientific models project that transmission rates,
already declining in most places, would fall an additional 40 percent to 60 percent. This raises a prospect comparable to medical
achievements such as the eradication of smallpox or advances in cancer treatment. Currently, for every new AIDS patient put on
treatment, about two more become infected. Millions of lives are saved — but ground is still lost to the disease. With combination
prevention, the balance would shift. For every person who begins treatment, there would be fewer than one who becomes infected.
This would effectively be the epidemic’s end. The Obama administration has officially adopted the goal of
“creating an AIDS-free generation.” “While the finish line is not yet in sight,” said Secretary of
State Hillary Rodham Clinton on Tuesday, “we know we can get there, because now we know the
route we need to take. It requires all of us to put a variety of scientifically proven prevention tools to work in concert with
each other.” But the political timing of these scientific breakthroughs is poor. The budget crisis has resulted in a Darwinian
competition for resources. Clinton accompanied her ambitious AIDS objective with the not-very-ambitious reprogramming of $60
million for demonstration projects in four countries. Additional resources can eventually be squeezed from existing AIDS programs.
In 2004, the cost of treatment averaged about $1,200 per person. Today, it is less than $350 and still declining. Other donor nations,
along with African countries themselves, can take additional burdens. Yet the objective is not a minor one. Earlier AIDS treatment in
the developing world would expand the pool of people in need of medicine. In the main U.S. HIV/AIDS program, Africans currently
start drugs when their CD4 count — the measure of immune system strength — is, on average, about 150. Beginning at a CD4 count
of 350 — the recommendation of the World Health Organization — would increase the number of Africans on treatment by more
than 5 million. An aggressive treatment-as-prevention program would start treatment even earlier. In normal economic times, the
case for this effort would be fairly easy. American spending on all humanitarian aid programs amounts to about 0.7 percent of the
budget. What other marginal spending increase could save millions of lives, end an epidemic and allow public officials to take part in
a historic enterprise as admirable as the Marshall Plan? The proposed prevention strategies do not involve much culture war
controversy. Religious conservatives have no objections to treatment and are neither shocked nor alarmed by circumcision — an old
biblical acquaintance. But with economic times far from normal, the case is complicated. Ending the global AIDS epidemic would
require a major presidential push. It would also require congressional Republicans to make a human life exception to austerity. This
uphill effort would, however, be aided by a pragmatic argument. Since 2003, the United States has helped place millions on AIDS
treatment. In the process, we have assumed what economists call a “treatment mortgage” — obligations that can’t be abandoned
without catastrophic consequences. A major prevention effort — reducing the number of new infections to below the number of new
people placed on treatment — is the only morally acceptable strategy that eventually reduces American commitments on AIDS.
Having abruptly gained the scientific tools to defeat this epidemic, what remains is a test of will and conscience.
AIDS doesn’t lead to war
Security Council Press Release 1, “SC Meets on HIV/AIDS and PKOs, 1-19-01, SC/6992,
http://www.un.org/News/Press/docs/2001/sc6992.doc.htm
KAMALESH SHARMA (India) said India had tried to follow the Council’s reasoning on the issue, because HIV/AIDS
was
not, and had not been, a cause of conflict. No country had gone to war because of
AIDS. Resolution 1308 (2000) had, of course, made no such claim, but it did say that the
“pandemic is also exacerbated by conditions of violence and instability”. The evidence did not
support that either.
AIDS will be cured in the next five years
Sample 10 (Ian Sample -- PhD in biomedical materials from Queen Mary's, University of
London, Science Corresondent at The Guaradian "Blanket HIV testing 'could see AIDS dying out
in 40 years'" February 21st, 2010 powww.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/feb/21/blanket-testinghiv-aids) SM
Health officials are considering a radical shift in the war against HIV and Aids that would see everyone
tested for the virus and put on a lifetime course of drugs if they are found to be positive. The strategy, which
would involve testing most of the world's population for HIV, aims to reduce the transmission of the virus that causes Aids to a level
at which it dies out completely over the next 40 years. Brian Williams, professor of epidemiology at the South African Centre for
Epidemiological Modelling and Analysis in Stellenbosch, said that transmission of HIV could effectively be halted
within five years with the use of antiretroviral drugs (ARVs). "The epidemic of HIV is really one of the worst
plagues of human history," Williams told the American Association for the Advancement of Science meeting in San Diego. "I hope
we can get to the starting line in one to two years and get complete coverage of patients in five years. Maybe that's being optimistic,
but we're facing Armageddon." Major trials of the strategy are planned in Africa and the US and will feed into a final decision on
whether to adopt the measure as public health policy in the next two years. The move follows research that shows blanket
prescribing of ARVs could stop HIV transmission and halve cases of Aids-related tuberculosis
within 10 years. More than 30 million people are infected with HIV globally and two million die of the disease each year. While
ARVs have been a huge success in preventing the virus from causing full-blown Aids, scientists estimate only 12% of those living with
the infection receive the drugs. The disease is overwhelmingly prevalent in sub-Saharan Africa, which
accounts for a quarter of all HIV/Aids cases globally. Half of these are in South Africa. In general
epidemics, a person with HIV infects between five to 10 others before succumbing to
complications of Aids. Treating patients with ARVs within a year of becoming infected can
reduce transmission tenfold, enough to cause the epidemic to die out. In the trials, people will be offered
HIV tests once a year, either as routine when they visit their GP, or through mobile clinics in more remote regions. Those testing
positive will be put on a lifetime course of ARVs. "Over the past 25 years we have saved the lives of probably two to three million
people using antiretroviral drugs, but almost nothing we have done has had any impact on transmission of the disease," Williams
said. "We have stopped people dying but we haven't stopped the epidemic." If patients take ARVs
when they should, the amount of virus in their bodies can fall by 10,000 times, to a level at
which they are extremely unlikely to pass the virus on. "The question is, can we use these drugs
not only to keep people alive, but also to stop transmission and I believe that we can. We could
effectively stop transmission of HIV in five years." Scientists estimate that the cost of implementing the strategy
in South Africa alone will be $3bn-$4bn a year. The world currently spends $30bn (£19.4bn) a year on Aids research and treatment,
a figure that some experts believe will double over the next decade. Sub-Saharan Africa has seen a dramatic rise in cases of
tuberculosis among HIV patients, who are also susceptible to other infections because their immune systems are weakened. "If you
factor in all of the costs, in my opinion, doing this would be cost saving from day one, because the cost of the drugs would be more
than balanced by the cost of treating people for all of these other diseases and then letting them die," Williams said. "We're killing
probably half a million young adults every year in the prime of their life just at the point where they should be contributing to society
and the cost of that to society is enormous," he added. "The only thing that's more expensive than doing this is not doing this." HIV
patients in southern Africa are more likely to take ARVs when they should than people living in developed countries, according to
health officials. The finding gives doctors hope that the blanket administering of drugs might suppress the virus enough that it dies
out naturally. Last year, scientists reported marginal success of a HIV vaccine following a large scale trial in Thailand. The vaccine
benefited only 31% of those who received it. A vaccine is generally regarded as worthwhile if it protects more than 70% of those
treated.
AT: Brazil DA – AT: BRICS Impact
No impact --- they’ll just bandwagon with the U.S.
Brilliant, 12 — senior vice president for international affairs at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce
(Myron, “The World in 2030: Are we on the path to convergence or divergence?”, Global Trends
2030, 5/27/2012, http://gt2030.com/2012/05/27/the-world-in-2030-are-we-on-the-path-toconvergence-or-divergence/, Deech)
While it is true that leaders from Brazil, Russia, China and India now meet to discuss regional and global
issues, this is at this time largely a talk-shop; nothing profound has come out of these discussions. Certainly, it is hard to see these
countries agreeing to map out a radical departure from the existing international system through alternative institutions. However,
these countries will begin to demand changes to the existing system or they won’t play ball with the mandates issued by these
governance organizations. It is worth noting that most of these countries see
directional alignment with the
United States as essential for global stability — even if they at times have different views on critical geopolitical
issues (e.g., five plus one on Iran or six-party talks with North Korea). Certainly, China sees itself as more of a partner
of the United States on economic and security matters than it would India or Russia, where the dependency
and trust factor is even lower. And Brazilian President Dilma made it quite explicit when she articulated in
Washington, D.C. during her winter visit that her country’s aspiration is to have a strategic relationship
with the United States; in contrast, she said Brazil only wanted a commercial relationship with
China.
AT: Brazil DA – AT: Democracy Impact
Democracies go to war – Israel and India both prove
Shaw, 00 (Martin, Professor of International Relations and Politics, University of Sussex,
2000, “Democracy and peace in the global revolution,”
http://www.sussex.ac.uk/Users/hafa3/democracy.htm, Hensel)
In the global era, established liberal-democratic states do not fight each other. But once again, it obvious that this is
not simply because they are democracies, but because they are embedded in the raft of
common Western and global state institutions. Indeed it is not just liberal democracies which do not fight each
other: the major non-Western states (Russia, China, India, Brazil, etc.), whether democratic or not, are not
likely to fight with the dominant Western powers. Outside the Western core of global state power, however,
national centres are more weakly integrated with its institutional structures, and regional
institutions which might inhibit local conflicts are much weaker than they are in the core. In the
Cold War era, interstate rivalries between major regional powers - such as between Russia and China, India and Pakistan and China,
Indonesia and Malaysia, Iran and Iraq, Israel and the Arab states - led to wars and border incidents. While the integrative
tendencies in the emerging global polity, including the democratisation trends, may increasingly
inhibit wars, it clearly remains possible that such interstate rivalries will generate new
wars. It is clear that democratisation in itself is not a guarantee of war-avoidance in such conficts.
Israel, the only internally democratic state in the Middle East, has also been the most belligerent;
Indian democracy has been quite compatible with bellicosity towards Pakistan. Democratic as well as
military governments may see war, so long as it can be kept limited and relatively cost-free, as a means of boosting popularity. Thus
Yeltsin’s Russia sought a military solution in the breakaway republic of Chechnya, despite the lessons of the late-Soviet failure in
Afghanistan. Only in defeat did Russia’s weak democracy penalise the regime for the new disaster, and then not decisively.
Democracy doesn’t solve violence within states – empirics
Ferguson, 06 (Niall, Laurence A. Tisch Professor of History at Harvard University, senior
fellow at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University, 2006, The War of the World: History’s
Age of Hatred, p. xxxviii, Hensel)
Did it matter how states were governed? It has become fashionable among political scientists to posit a correlation between
democracy and peace, on the ground that democracies tend not to go to war with one another. On that basis, of course, the long-run
rise of democracy during the twentieth century should have reduced the incidence of war. It may have reduced the incidence of war
between states; there is, however, at least some evidence that waves of democratization in the 1920s,
1960s, and 1980s were followed by increases in the number of civil wars and wars of secession .
This brings us to a central point. To consider twentieth-century conflict purely in terms of warfare
between states is to overlook the importance of organized violence within states. The most
notorious example is, of course, the war waged by the Nazis and their collaborators against the
Jews, nearly six million of whom perished. The Nazis simultaneously sought to annihilate a variety of other social
groups deemed to be ‘unworthy of life’, notably mentally ill and homosexual Germans, the social elite of occupied Poland and the
Sinti and Roma peoples. In all, more than three million people from these other groups were murdered. Prior to these events,
Stalin had perpetrated comparable acts of violence against national minorities within the Soviet
Union as well as executing or incarcerating millions of Russians guilty or merely suspected of
political dissidence. Of around four million non-Russians who were deported to Siberia and Central Asia, at least 1.6 million
are estimated to have died as a result of the hardships inflicted on them. A minimum estimate for the total victims of all political
violence in the Soviet Union between 1928 and 1953 is twenty-one million. Yet genocide predated totalitarianism. As we
shall see, the
policies of forced resettlement and deliberate murder directed against Christian
minorities in the last years of the Ottoman Empire amounted to genocide according to the 1948
definition of the term.
AT: Brazil DA – AT: Israeli Conflict Impact
Israel/Palestine conflict has never escalated
Satloff, 6 (Robert, Executive Director – Washington Institute, “The Iraq Study Group:
Assessing Its Regional Conclusions”, 12-21,
http://www.washingtoninstitute.org/templateC05.php?CID=2549)
The report's greatest analytical leap of faith is the notion that all the key issues in the
Middle East are "inextricably linked." In the past, it was believed that the export of the Iranian
revolution would undermine pro-West regimes throughout the Middle East, or that failure to resolve the IsraeliPalestinian conflict would spark a regional war. Today, the idea of linkage implies that Sunni-Shiite
violence will spread throughout the region. The problem with all these theories is that there is no
evidence to back them up. To the contrary, military success in the Gulf does not translate into diplomatic success in
the Arab-Israeli arena. The Madrid process had a promising opening session, but when it came down to bargaining it ran up against
the reality of Israeli-Palestinian differences. Furthermore, there is no evidence that local disasters
translate into regional disasters. Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini's Iran failed to export the
revolution despite national efforts. There is no evidence to support the proposition that IsraeliPalestinian violence has substantial regional repercussions, let alone that it can lead to
regional war. The years 2000 to 2003 saw the worst period of Israeli-Palestinian
relations, but the regional implication was zero. Not one state threatened to fight
Israel, the Arab street did not rise to protest, and no Arab regime's stability was
threatened. The United States should not view the Middle East as an organic unit. Iraq's problems are primarily Iraqi in
origin and Iraqi in solution. Iran alone poses a serious challenge, and the Israeli-Palestinian problem is important to solve because it
is the right thing to do.
AT: Brazil DA – AT: LA Instability Impact
Latin america literally poses no security threat
Naim 6 (Moises, Foreign Policy no157 40-3, 45-7 N/D 2006, editor of foreign policy magazine)
For decades, Latin America's weight in the world has been shrinking. It is not an economic
powerhouse, a security threat, or a population bomb. Even its tragedies pale in comparison to Africa's. The
region will not rise until it ends its search for magic formulas. It may not make for a good sound bite, but patience is Latin America's
biggest deficit of all. Latin America has grown used to living in the backyard of the United States. For decades, it has been a region
where the U.S. government meddled in local politics, fought communists, and promoted its business interests. Even if the rest of the
world wasn't paying attention to Latin America, the United States occasionally was. Then came September 11, and even the United
States seemed to tune out. Naturally, the world's attention centered almost exclusively on terrorism, the wars in Afghanistan, Iraq,
and Lebanon, and on the nuclear ambitions of North Korea and Iran. Latin America became Atlantis--the lost continent. Almost
overnight, it disappeared from the maps of investors, generals, diplomats, and journalists. Indeed, as one commentator recently
quipped, Latin America can't compete on the world stage in any aspect, even as a threat. Unlike
anti-Americans elsewhere, Latin Americans are not willing to die for the sake of their
geopolitical hatreds. Latin America is a nuclear-weapons free zone. Its only weapon of mass
destruction is cocaine. In contrast to emerging markets like India and China, Latin America is a minor
economic player whose global significance is declining. Sure, a few countries export oil and gas, but only
Venezuela is in the top league of the world's energy market. Not even Latin America's disasters seem to elicit global concern
anymore. Argentina experienced a massive financial stroke in 2001, and no one abroad seemed to care. Unlike prior crashes, no
government or international financial institution rushed to bail it out. Latin America doesn't have Africa's famines,
genocides, an HIV/AIDS pandemic, wholesale state failures, or rock stars who routinely adopt
its tragedies. Bono, Bill Gates, and Angelina Jolie worry about Botswana, not Brazil. But just as the five-year-old war on terror
pronounced the necessity of confronting threats where they linger, it also underscored the dangers of neglect. Like Afghanistan,
Latin America shows how quickly and easy it is for the United States to lose its influence when Washington is distracted by other
priorities. In both places, Washington's disinterest produced a vacuum that was filled by political groups and leaders hostile to the
United States. No, Latin America is not churning out Islamic terrorists as Afghanistan was during the days of the
Taliban. In Latin America, the power gap is being filled by a group of disparate leaders often lumped together under the banner of
populism. On the rare occasions that Latin American countries do make international news, it's the election of a so-called populist,
an apparently anti-American, anti-market leader, that raises hackles. However, Latin America's populists aren't a monolith. Some
are worse for international stability than is usually reported. But some have the potential to chart a new, positive course for the
region. Underlying the ascent of these new leaders are several real, stubborn threads running through Latin Americans' frustration
with the status quo in their countries. Unfortunately, the United States'---and the rest of the world's--lack of interest in that region
means that the forces that are shaping disparate political movements in Latin America are often glossed over, misinterpreted, or
ignored. Ultimately, though, what matters most is not what the northern giant thinks or does as much as what half a billion Latin
Americans think and do. And in the last couple of decades, the wild swings in their political behavior have created a highly unstable
terrain where building the institutions indispensable for progress or for fighting poverty has become increasingly difficult. There is a
way out. But it's not the quick fix that too many of Latin America's leaders have promised and that an impatient population
demands.
AT: Brazil DA – AT: Smoking Impact
Smoking isn’t that bad- has health benefits
Sample, 3 [ “Smoking is good for you” - *Ian Sample The Guardian, Wednesday 6 August
2003 citing Jodi Flaws at the University of Maryland school of
medicine,http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2003/aug/07/shopping.health]//ADB
Smoking Talk to physicians and they'll tell you there are few things you can put in your mouth that are worse for you than a
cigarette. But it's not all doom and gloom. Smokers are at least doing their bit to slow down the
runaway obesity epidemic that is sweeping through the western world. "In many studies, you often
find smokers are slimmer. We've certainly seen it in our studies," says Jodi Flaws at the
University of Maryland school of medicine. "Some people think it's due to certain chemicals in cigarettes
somehow making them burn more calories, but others believe it suppresses appetite. It may well be
both." Drastically upping your chances of cancer and heart disease might not be the best way to avoid obesity, but it's certainly easier
than running round the block. Scientists have also found evidence that smoking might, in some
circumstances, help prevent the onset of various dementias. Many dementias go hand-in-hand
with a loss of chemical receptors in the brain that just happen to be stimulated by nicotine. Smoking seems to
bolster these receptors, and smokers have more of them. The theory is that smokers may then have more to lose before they start
losing their minds. "It does seem that nicotine has a preventative effect, but the problem is that the other stuff in the cigarette tends
to rot everything else," says Roger Bullock, a specialist in dementia and director of the Kingshill Research Centre in Swindon. So if
your time is nearly up anyway, and you have somehow managed to steer a course past the Scylla and Charybdis of heart attacks and
tumours, smoking
might just help you retain your marbles.
AT: Brazil DA – AT: Soft Power Impact
Empirics prove – no nuke prolif and no impact
Gavin, 9 (Ph.D. in Diplomatic History from the University of Pennsylvania, a Master of Studies
in Modern European History from Oxford, and a B.A. in Political Science (with honors) from the
University of Chicago, Professor of International Affairs at Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public
Affairs at the University of Texas at Austin, “Same as it ever was,” MIT press journals,
http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdfplus/10.1162/isec.2010.34.3.7)
One of the greatest fears of nuclear alarmists is that if a key state acquires nuclear weapons, others will follow. This idea of a
nuclear tip- ping point, chain reaction, or “domino” effect, however, is by no means new. Consider this headline—
“Many Nations Ready to Break into Nuclear Club”— from a front-page article in the Washington Post from June 1981.39 Articles
with similar titles can be found from almost every year since at least the early 1960s. Fears of a tipping point were
especially acute in the aftermath of China’s 1964 detonation of an atomic bomb: it was predicted
that India, Indonesia, and Japan might follow, with consequences worldwide, as “Israel, Sweden,
Germany, and other potential nuclear countries far from China and India would be affected by proliferation in Asia.”40 A U.S.
government document identiaed “at least eleven nations (India, Japan, Israel, Sweden, West Germany, Italy, Canada,
Czechoslovakia, East Germany, Rumania, and Yugoslavia)” with the capacity to go nuclear, a number that would soon “grow
substantially” to include “South Africa, the United Arab Republic, Spain, Brazil and Mexico.” and complexity of this problem by
creating strong pressures to develop inde- pendent nuclear forces, which, in turn, could strongly inouence the plans of other
potential nuclear powers.”These predictions were largely wrong. In 1985 the National Intelligence Council noted that
for “almost thirty years the Intelligence Community has been writing about which nations might next get the bomb.” All
of these
esti- mates based their largely pessimistic and ultimately incorrect estimates on fac- tors such as
the increased “access to assile materials,” improved technical capabilities in countries, the
likelihood of “chain reactions,” or a “scramble” to proliferation when “even one additional state
demonstrates a nuclear capa- bility.” The 1985 report goes on, “The most striking characteristic of the present-day
nuclear proliferation scene is that, despite the alarms rung by past Estimates, no additional overt proliferation of nuclear weapons
has actually occurred since China tested its bomb in 1964.” Although “some proliferation of nuclear explosive
capabilities and other major proliferation-related develop- ments have taken place in the past
two decades,” they did not have “the damaging, systemwide impacts that the Intelligence
community generally an- ticipated they would.”43
AT: Brazil DA – AT: Warming Impact
Brazil won’t solve warming – conflicting priorities
Bodman and Wolfensohn, 11 - U.S. secretary of energy from 2005 to 2009, a BS from
Cornell University and a PhD from MIT, where he was also associate professor of chemical
engineering, James D. Wolfensohn is chairman of Wolfensohn & Company, LLC,
chairman of Citigroup’s international advisory board, and adviser to Citigroup’s senior
management on global strategy and on international matters, He is a honorary trustee of the
Brookings Institution, a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, Master of Business
Administration (MBA) degree at Harvard Business School, (“Global Brazil and
U.S.-Brazil Relations,” Independent Task Force Report No. 66, Council on Foreign Relations,
July 12th, 2011, http://www.cfr.org/brazil/global-brazil-us-brazil-relations/p25407)//HAL
Despite Brazil’s goals, mitigating climate change often conflicts with other governmental
priorities, such as poverty reduction, economic development, and expansion of trade. Reducing
Amazon deforestation competes with large-scale hydropower development and construction of
transcontinental highways to link Brazil’s hinterland with the Pacific Ocean. Reductions in land-use and agricultural
emissions compete with Brazil’s growing agricultural sector. Even the proposed reduction plans
have limited capacity and can offset each other—expanding biofuels and hydropower may result
in greater land-use emissions. The Task Force warns that these conflicts can reduce the effectiveness of
GHG reduction programs and put their sustainability at risk. The Task Force welcomes Brazil’s aggressive
position toward reducing domestic GHG emissions, going materially beyond its obligations under current climate
agreements. Achieving these goals, however, will be complicated by multiple competing priorities of
economic growth, social development, and trade.
Developing countries, lax regulation, and profit maximization means warming is
inevitable
Porter, 13 - writes the Economic Scene column for the Wednesday Business section (March
19, Eduardo, “A Model for Reducing Emissions”
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/20/business/us-example-offers-hope-for-cutting-carbonemissions.html?_r=1&)
Even if every American coal-fired power plant were to close, that would not make up
for the coal-based generators being built in developing countries like India and China. “Since
2000, the growth in coal has been 10 times that of renewables,” said Daniel Yergin, chairman of
IHS Cambridge Energy Research Associates.¶ Fatih Birol, chief economist of the International
Energy Agency in Paris, points out that if civilization is to avoid catastrophic climate change,
only about one third of the 3,000 gigatons of CO2 contained in the world’s known reserves of
oil, gas and coal can be released into the atmosphere.¶ But the world economy does not work as if
this were the case — not governments, nor businesses, nor consumers.¶ “In all my experience as
an oil company manager, not a single oil company took into the picture the problem of CO2,”
said Leonardo Maugeri, an energy expert at Harvard who until 2010 was head of strategy and
development for Italy’s state-owned oil company, Eni. “They are all totally devoted to replacing
the reserves they consume every year.”
Their studies prove the existence of warming, not the impact – doomsday
predictions are empirically denied and ignore scientists
John Stossel, Award-winning ABC News correspondent, 2007
The Global Warming Myth?, http://abcnews.go.com/2020/Story?id=3061015&page=1
Dr. John Christy, professor of Atmospheric Science at the University of Alabama at Huntsville
said: "I remember as a college student at the first Earth Day being told it was a certainty that by
the year 2000, the world would be starving and out of energy. Such doomsday prophecies
grabbed headlines, but have proven to be completely false." "Similar pronouncements
today about catastrophes due to human-induced climate change," he continued, "sound all too
familiar and all too exaggerated to me as someone who actually produces and analyzes
climate information." The media, of course, like the exaggerated claims. Most are based on
computer models that purport to predict future climates. But computer models are lousy at
predicting climate because water vapor and cloud effects cause changes that computers fail
to predict. In the mid-1970s, computer models told us we should prepare for global cooling.
Scientists tell reporters that computer models should "be viewed with great skepticism." Well,
why aren't they? The fundamentalist doom mongers also ignore scientists who say the effects of
global warming may be benign. Harvard astrophysicist Sallie Baliunas said added CO2 in the
atmosphere may actually benefit the world because more CO2 helps plants grow. Warmer
winters would give farmers a longer harvest season, and might end the droughts in the Sahara
Desert. Why don't we hear about this part of the global warming argument? "It's the money!"
said Dr. Baliunas. "Twenty-five billion dollars in government funding has been spent since 1990
to research global warming. If scientists and researchers were coming out releasing reports that
global warming has little to do with man, and most to do with just how the planet works, there
wouldn't be as much money to study it."
AT: Democracy DA – 2AC
Promoting U.S. influence in the region now is key – past democratic advances are
slowly being reversed
Sabatini, 13 (Christopher, Editor in Chief of Americas Quarterly and Senior Director of Policy
at the Americas Society and the Council of the Americas, “WILL LATIN AMERICA MISS U.S.
HEGEMONY?,” Journal of International Affairs, Volume 66, Issue 2, Spring 2013, pg. 1-XVI,
Proquest, Tashma)
One such area is human rights. President Chavez pulled Venezuela out of the esteemed Inter-American Court of Human Rights and
Presidents Correa (of Ecuador) and Morales have sought to reduce the independence of the InterAmerican Commission on Human
Rights - two regional human rights bodies nominally under the OAS. In its fifty plus years of history, the inter-
American system of human rights has protected citizens and defended human rights against
unelected tyrants and unaccountable elected governments. Unfortunately, much of the region
remained silent as countries have tried to gut these institutions. At the same time, the much-lauded advances
in electoral standards that ushered in the longest history of democracy in the region and led to
greater levels of political and social inclusion are at risk of being rolled back. In countries like the
Dominican Republic in 1994 and Peru in 2000, after sitting presidents attempted to deny citizens their right to vote to choose their
leaders, the United States helped to catalyze the regional coalitions that ultimately ensured that those
citizens' demands and rights were recognized. The standards that the United States supported and
U.S. leadership are now being eroded, as governments like Venezuela and Ecuador are refusing to invite
electoral missions.
Democracies go to war – Israel and India both prove
Shaw, 00 (Martin, Professor of International Relations and Politics, University of Sussex,
2000, “Democracy and peace in the global revolution,”
http://www.sussex.ac.uk/Users/hafa3/democracy.htm, Hensel)
In the global era, established liberal-democratic states do not fight each other. But once again, it obvious that this is
not simply because they are democracies, but because they are embedded in the raft of
common Western and global state institutions. Indeed it is not just liberal democracies which do not fight each
other: the major non-Western states (Russia, China, India, Brazil, etc.), whether democratic or not, are not
likely to fight with the dominant Western powers. Outside the Western core of global state power, however,
national centres are more weakly integrated with its institutional structures, and regional
institutions which might inhibit local conflicts are much weaker than they are in the core. In the
Cold War era, interstate rivalries between major regional powers - such as between Russia and China, India and Pakistan and China,
Indonesia and Malaysia, Iran and Iraq, Israel and the Arab states - led to wars and border incidents. While the integrative
tendencies in the emerging global polity, including the democratisation trends, may increasingly
inhibit wars, it clearly remains possible that such interstate rivalries will generate new
wars. It is clear that democratisation in itself is not a guarantee of war-avoidance in such conficts.
Israel, the only internally democratic state in the Middle East, has also been the most belligerent;
Indian democracy has been quite compatible with bellicosity towards Pakistan. Democratic as well as
military governments may see war, so long as it can be kept limited and relatively cost-free, as a means of boosting popularity. Thus
Yeltsin’s Russia sought a military solution in the breakaway republic of Chechnya, despite the lessons of the late-Soviet failure in
Afghanistan. Only in defeat did Russia’s weak democracy penalise the regime for the new disaster, and then not decisively.
Democracy doesn’t solve violence within states – empirics
Ferguson, 06 (Niall, Laurence A. Tisch Professor of History at Harvard University, senior
fellow at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University, 2006, The War of the World: History’s
Age of Hatred, p. xxxviii, Hensel)
Did it matter how states were governed? It has become fashionable among political scientists to posit a correlation between
democracy and peace, on the ground that democracies tend not to go to war with one another. On that basis, of course, the long-run
rise of democracy during the twentieth century should have reduced the incidence of war. It may have reduced the incidence of war
between states; there is, however, at least some evidence that waves of democratization in the 1920s,
1960s, and 1980s were followed by increases in the number of civil wars and wars of secession .
This brings us to a central point. To consider twentieth-century conflict purely in terms of warfare
between states is to overlook the importance of organized violence within states. The most
notorious example is, of course, the war waged by the Nazis and their collaborators against the
Jews, nearly six million of whom perished. The Nazis simultaneously sought to annihilate a variety of other social
groups deemed to be ‘unworthy of life’, notably mentally ill and homosexual Germans, the social elite of occupied Poland and the
Sinti and Roma peoples. In all, more than three million people from these other groups were murdered. Prior to these events,
Stalin had perpetrated comparable acts of violence against national minorities within the Soviet
Union as well as executing or incarcerating millions of Russians guilty or merely suspected of
political dissidence. Of around four million non-Russians who were deported to Siberia and Central Asia, at least 1.6 million
are estimated to have died as a result of the hardships inflicted on them. A minimum estimate for the total victims of all political
violence in the Soviet Union between 1928 and 1953 is twenty-one million. Yet genocide predated totalitarianism. As we
shall see, the
policies of forced resettlement and deliberate murder directed against Christian
minorities in the last years of the Ottoman Empire amounted to genocide according to the 1948
definition of the term.
AT: Dollar Bad DA – 2AC
No dollar replacement in Latin America
Weibel, 11 (Mauricio, “EU crisis pushes billions of dollars into Latin America,” DPA,
BUSINESS AND FINANCIAL NEWS, 11/15/11, lexis, Tashma)
Nov. 15--SANTIAGO -- Billions of dollars continue to flow into Latin America amid the ongoing
economic crisis in Europe and the United States. "Today Latin America is seen as an interesting
alternative for foreign direct investment, given the lower demand in developed countries," Daniel
Titelman, head of Development Studies at the UN's Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC), told dpa.
According to the ECLAC, foreign direct investment in Latin America grew by 54 percent , or 82 billion dollars,
in the first half of this year. Brazil, Mexico, Chile and Colombia alone received a total of 68 billion dollars over that period. Foreign
direct investment was joined by short-term funds and exports, which alone amounted to more than 100 billion dollars from January
to June. "The challenge for the region is to get that capital to finance productive investment," Titelman said, as he called for
restructuring Latin America's financial markets. The ECLAC official noted that China is crucial for the future of South America, and
stressed that Latin America will continue to benefit from extra funds for as long as Europe and the
United States continue to grow, even if they do so modestly.
Latin American banks are resilient --- no collapse
Malkin, 11 (Elisabeth, “Pushing Latin American Banks to Lend,” The New York Times,
11/29/11, http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/11/29/pushing-latin-american-banks-tolend/, Tashma)
MEXICO CITY — As economic turmoil whiplashes banks in Europe and poses new threats to
American financial institutions, the view from Latin America is very different. Well off the radar screen
of the global economic crisis, Latin America’s banks have proven their sturdiness, emerging
relatively unscathed from the collapse. The problem, according to a study released by the World Bank on Tuesday,
is that they just don’t lend very much. Latin America’s banking crises are well behind it, part of the detritus
of economic mismanagement in the 1980s and 1990s. Since then, regulators, particularly in the region’s
most developed countries, have focused on ensuring the banks’ stability and resiliency. Worries about a contagion
effect on the Latin American subsidiaries of European and North American banks are held in check because they
have to follow local capital requirements.
AT: Dollar Bad DA – AT: Inflation Impact
No hyperinflation
Baker, 10 (Dean, Co-director, Center for Economic Policy and Research, September 2010,
http://www.cepr.net/documents/publications/deficits-2010-9.pdf)
For these reasons, any inflation that resulted from the Fed’s decision to buy large amounts of debt at present
would be a plus for the economy rather than something to be feared. If inflation threatened to get out of control, then it
would be a serious problem, but there is little possibility that this could happen given the depth of the downturn. Furthermore,
inflation does not just begin skyrocketing overnight in developed economies. Inflation increases
gradually in response to excess demand. If there was evidence that tight labor markets or bottlenecks in
production were creating inflationary pressures, then the Fed would have plenty of time to reverse
course and adopt policies to slow the economy. In short, the decision to buy large amounts of debt at present holds
little risk.
Money supply is down four trillion in last five years
Brown, 12 (Ellen, attorney and president of the Public Banking Institute, 9/21/12, “Why QE3
Won’t Jumpstart the Economy—and What Would”
https://webofdebt.wordpress.com/2012/09/21/why-qe3-wont-jumpstart-the-economy-andwhat-would-2/)
None of these moves would drive the economy into hyperinflation. According to the Fed’s figures, as of
July 2010, the money supply was actually $4 trillion LESS than it was in 2008. That means that as of
that date, $4 trillion more needed to be pumped into the money supply just to get the economy
back to where it was before the banking crisis hit.
Their epistemological basis is flawed --- hyperinflation theories are non-falsifiable
and it’s at a 50 year low
Karabell, 13 (Zachary Karabell, PhD from Harvard, historian, money manager and economist,
president of River Twice Research, where he analyzes economic and political trends, 1/18/13,
“Inflation Hawks Are Waging War Against Their Own Hallucinations”,
http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2013/01/inflation-hawks-are-waging-waragainst-their-own-hallucinations/267333/)
Earlier this week the Bureau of Labor Statistics released its monthly inflation report . The numbers
came in at 1.7 percent a year for all items. Excluding the ever-volatile food and energy, it was 1.9 percent. That's
about as low as inflation has been in the last 50 years. Only 1986 (1.1 percent), 1998 and 2001 (1.6 percent),
2008 (0.1 percent) and 2010 (1.5 percent) have come in lower, and a few years in the mid-2000s registered the same. The
disappearance of inflation over the past 20 years, however, has barely dented the pervasive belief that
inflation remains one of the greatest threats to economic stability. These convictions persist in
spite of all evidence to the contrary: Inflation is nowhere visible. For many, that is just proof that we are
living in a lull -- a phony war soon to be disrupted when that age-old enemy reappears and wreaks havoc. At the Federal
Reserve -- legally mandated guardian of price stability and responsible for monitoring and containing inflation -- the president of
the Richmond Fed, Jeffrey Lacker, has been warning that the current policy of very low interest rates and expansion
of the balance sheet is almost certain to spark inflation in the near future. In Europe, those views are even more
deeply held. The German Bundesbank -- still seared by memories of hyperinflation in the 1920s and the collapse of political order
that gave rise to the Nazis -- remains ever vigilant. Its president, Jens Weidman, is strongly opposed to many of the recent sovereign
bailouts to preserve the euro on the grounds that good money chasing bad will spark inflation. These officials tend to be firm yet
measured in their concern ‑ something that cannot be said of populist politicians and analysis. The Tea Party is fueled not just by
debt animus but by a deep-seated belief that "real" inflation is much higher than what the government reports, and it insists that the
spending habits of the government will end in the collapse of the dollar, hyperinflation and the government's de facto stealing from
hard-working Americans' money. That is the fear of gold bugs, and added to the mix are the views of former Representative Ron
Paul and his son, Senator Rand Paul (R-Ky.), that the Fed is putting the United States in inflation peril. Many professional
investors and economists are similarly convinced that the current policies of zero interest rates and
deficit spending are setting the stage for massive inflation. How to explain the inverse relationship between
inflation concerns and inflation realities? Yes, low inflation in recent years has been juxtaposed with modest economic growth and
wage stagnation for most Americans ‑ as well as for most Europeans and Japanese. Given that perceptions of economic well-being
are ultimately tied to disposable income, these forces have largely canceled each other out. In addition, people tend to be acutely
aware of the volatility of energy and food prices, which have spiked - and then receded - many times in past years. Yet even with food
and fuel, inflation perceptions can be deceptive. Many people are aware that the price of a loaf of
bread has risen from less than 40 cents in the 1970s to an average of more than $2 today. Food prices have also
risen periodically over the past few years in the face of global demand and droughts. That cements a perception of inflation. Yet
over the past few decades, food as an overall percent of income has gone down, down and down.
In 1972, Americans spent 15 percent of their disposable income on food; today, that figure is 11
percent. The only shift has been in eating out ‑ people spend more on restaurants and much less on food at home. And that has
happened even as incomes have stagnated. Gasoline, which has fluctuated widely, has maintained a steady share of disposable
income for decades, at about 3.5 percent, which is now decreasing because of production from shale oil deposits and ever-moreefficient vehicles. One of the strongest arguments for vigilance against inflation comes from economists following the dicta of Milton
Friedman that "inflation is always and everywhere a monetary phenomenon." In that view, the actions of governments and central
bankers are the determining factor, and the experience of the 20th century was that inflation often followed government policies,
especially promiscuous government spending. Since that is what happened in the past, many are firmly convinced that it
will, perforce, happen in the future. One pernicious cliché is that history repeats itself. It doesn't.
Historians repeat each other ‑ and economists then pile on with theorems based on a limited
amount of history that then constitute "laws" of economics. Unquestionably, inflation was a systemic threat
not just in the 20th century but for centuries before. Thus the absence of inflation today is explained as an
anomaly soon to end; an artificial state of affairs generated by easy-money policies of governments
and central banks around the world; or a false statement in that inflation is underreported by governments interested in
pretending it doesn't exist. The virtue of these arguments is that they are not falsifiable. You can't prove
there isn't a government conspiracy about "real" inflation, and you can't prove that something
isn't about to happen. If you argue that there has been a systemic shift - that, say, technology and globalization have
combined to send manufactured goods ever lower (with food as much a manufactured good as a computer) - you can easily be
dismissed for foolishly contending that "this time it's different." What, then, is the statute of limitations for inflation? How long must
there be low, low inflation before the risk of it is judged as de minimus? Yes, it might rear up in future. Yes, past patterns may prove
correct. It would be foolish not to be on guard about the possibility and the risk ‑ just as it would be foolish not to forget that we still
live in a world suffused with nuclear weapons. Yet it would be equally foolish to
ignore the weight of evidence
about low inflation everywhere around the globe, not just for the past few years but over the past
few decades. The consequences of planning for a war that never happens can be just as
deleterious as fighting that war unprepared. If inflation is not the proximate risk of today's
economy, then we are radically misjudging our problems and missing solutions. If inflation is
not a dire threat, then we need not be so concerned about government spending or central bank policy.
We should instead focus on the ability of our national economies and the global economic
system to generate sustainable living standards for billions of people. Right now, so many are so fixated on
inflation that these other challenges receive short shrift. If inflation revives, that fixation may be justified. If not, we will have
squandered our time chasing echoes instead of meeting our present with eyes wide open to the possibili