External Influences on Latin America

Paper Summary:

The paper offers an assessment as to whether the countries of Latin America are less subject to external control today than they were twenty years ago. Latin America consists of the countries that traditionally formed part of two of the great continental European empires from the 16th century onwards. The paper shows through the use of historical examples that although the nature of control has altered, Latin America is still the subject of external influence and direction. As such, the actual position in 2008 is little different from that of 1988 or 1788. The paper states that Colonial and Cold War doctrines have been replaced by the almost invisible control posed by globalisation. The paper confirms that only when the region acts in a united manner that safeguards its natural and agricultural resources against outside encroachment will we be able to say that Latin America has freed itself from external control.

From the Paper:

"From the early 1950s onwards this protection of interest centered on the perception of threat from Soviet communism, in particular the theoretical assumption that communism could spread from one country to another like the falling of dominos (Ambrose and Brinkley, 1997; p.76). This certainly accounts for President Kennedy's endorsement of the "Bay of Pigs" invasion attempt of Cuba in 1961 and President Johnson's overt support in 1964 for a right wing revolutionary coup in Brazil (Ibid, p.103-107). In the same fashion, the Soviet Union attempted to bolster and intervene on the side of left wing groups and movements."

Sample of Sources Used:

• Ambrose, Stephen and Brinkley, Douglas. "Rise to Globalism: American Foreign Policy Since 1938" New York: Penguin, 1997.
• Lopez- Alvis, Fernando. "State formation and democracy in Latin America". Durham, Duke University Press, 2000.
• Williamson, Edwin. "The Penguin History of Latin America". London: Penguin, 1992.
• Skidmore, Thomas E. "Modern Latin America". New York: Oxford University Press, 2005

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