Neoliberalism K—UMich 2013 neg 1NCs 1NC: Generic
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- American engagement in Latin America threatens progressive political action and re-entrenches neoliberalism
LinkLink: Latin AmericaLatin American trade promotion brutalizes the region—it’s the new imperialismGrandin, American historian and professor of history at New York University, 07 -- (Greg, “Empire's Workshop: Latin America, the United States, and the Rise of the New Imperialism”, 5/1/07,http://books.google.com/books/about/Empire_s_Workshop.html?id=t5itdZ7oycUC)//AS Of course, the promotion of capitalism has long been a concern of American foreign policy, yet the kind of capitalism advanced by the Bush Doctrine is innovative, at least in its arrogant disregard for the lessons of history. It is a militarized and moralized version that under the banner of free trade, free markets, and free enterpriseoften makes its money through naked dispossession. It was in Latin America where this brutal new global economy was initially installed, beginning in the 19705, resulting in what could be called the region's "third conquest"-the first being led by Spanish con quistadores, the second by American corporations starting in th American engagement in Latin America threatens progressive political action and re-entrenches neoliberalismRenique Associate Professor in the Department of History at the City College of the City University of New York 10-- ( Gerardo, “Latin America today: The revolt against neoliberalism”, Socialism and Democracy, 19:3, 9/20/10, http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/08854300500284561#.UcnZQvnVCSo)//AS In opposition to this agenda, the new subaltern movements offer a politics of hope, which is the focus of this special issue of Socialism and Democracy. Analysis of Latin America’s anti-systemic rebellions and social movements becomes all the more imperative as the US hastily regroups forces to restore the neoliberal order, which has been under attack since the early 1990s. The recent visit of Condoleezza Rice to Latin America, the White House’s aggressive campaign to force the approval of CAFTA (Central American Free Trade Agreement), Bush’s threats to interfere with the transmissions of Telesur (the news and TV network established between Venezuela, Cuba, Argentina, and Uruguay), and, more ominous, the expansion of Washington’s geostrategic reach with the Paraguayan government’s recent authorization of a military base in the Triple Border region with Brazil and Argentina, are telling expressions of the US effort to reassert its imperial presence and to restore the confidence of its chastised local elites. The neoliberal offensive had its foundational moment in that other September 11, in 1973, when General Augusto Pinochet, with the support of the United States, led a bloodycoupd’e´tat against the government of Salvador Allende – the first elected Marxist president in Latin America. For the most reactionary sectors of global ruling elites, the establishment of the Pinochet regime offered an unsurpassed opportunity to voice openly and aggressively an ultra-liberalism which had previously been constrained both by Keynesian strictures of the welfare state and by political compromise with social-democratic forces and organized labor. The Chilean junta’s free market policies, uncompromising anti-communist discourse, and hostility toward any state welfare functions, galvanized an ideological and political offensive, guided by economist Milton Friedman and his “Chicago Boys,” against the regulatory and social policies that they viewed as fetters to the “invisible hand” of the market. Today their multinational cadre of followers educated in mainly US universities hold key executive posts both in multilateral institutions, such as the World Bank and the IMF, and in Latin American central banks and ministries of economy and finance. Not only did Pinochet enjoy the personal admiration of Henry Kissinger, Margaret Thatcher, and their ilk, but any of his measures, such as the privatization of social security, were swiftly incorporated into the emerging neoliberal orthodoxy. Operacio´nCo´ndor – a secret multinational effort aimed at eliminating left-wing and popular opposition – marked the beginnings of a regional reactionary offensive that had managed, by the 1980s, to defeat other leftwing and popular movements and to largely isolate the Cuban regime The affirmative sense of the need to globalize Latin America is an instance of and therefore reinforces neoliberalism Torres &Schugurensky, Graduate School of Education and Information Studies, and Latin American Center, UCLA, and Paulo Freire Institute, São Paulo, Brazil; OISE-University of Toronto, Canada, 2002 (Carlos A. and Daniel, “The political economy of higher education in the era of neoliberal globalization: Latin America in comparative perspective” http://www.del.ufrj.br/~ricardo/DocsArcuSur/Carlos.pdf)//JS Economic globalization is shaped by a business offensive to restore rates of profits. Hence, it is accompanied by a process of deregulation which calls for drastic cutbacks in social spending, environmental destruction, regressive revisions of tax systems, loosened constraints on corporate power, downward leveling of salaries and working conditions, widespread attacks on organized labor, and increased spending on weapons (Dale 1989). Indeed, a major criticisms to the neoliberal policies is that while high costs are already being paid in terms of drastic deterioration of wages, cutbacks in spending on education, health and infrastructure, and massive unemployment, the majorityof the populationhave not yet felt the benefitsof these policies. It is alsoclaimed that economic restructuringleadsto a model of social exclusion thatleaves out large sectors of the world population from accessing economic andsocial civic minimums. Another criticism is that with the implementation ofneoliberal policies, the state withdraws from its responsibility to administerpublic resources and from the liberal premise of pursuing egalitarianism,replacing them with a blind faith in the market and the hope that economicgrowth will eventually generate enough of a spillover to help the poor anddisenfranchised.Globalizationisnotonly expressed in the economic arena, butalsocultural and political realms. Inculture, there is democratic dimension ofglobalization via expandedaccess to the internet and electronic mail, but atthe same time there is a homogeneizing dimension product of the unidirectional character of cable TV, by which a few media conglomerates promote the Americanization of taste and values. In politics,thereisanascendanceof the power of supranational institutions in prescribing policies and policingits enforcement. A critical perspective has termed the new forms of capitalistdevelopment loosely associated with the historical experience of globalization as institutional capitalism, and this, in turn, has serious implications for the transformation of higher education. The Affirmative’s attempts to exert US influence over Latin America would further reinforce the neoliberal policies that Latin America is trying to escape Kellogg 2007, A master of arts in integrated studies at Athabasca University he has a PhD in political studies from Queen’s, a M.A. in political studies from York, and a B.A. in political studies also from York. (Paul, “Regional Integration In Latin America: Dawn of an Alternative to Neo-liberalism?.” New Political Science Vol. 29.2 June 2007 http://www.reginanockerts.com/Readings/Kellogg%202007%20_%20Regional%20Integration%20in%20Lat%20Am%20Dawn%20of%20an%20Alternative%20to%20Neoliberalism.pdf)//JS What this article will do is—after sketching the surprising new economic conjuncture facing Latin America—outline two of the new institutions emergingin the wake of the impasse of the FTAA, two institutions based on regionalintegration outside the terms of the FTAA. One is the Union of South American Nations (UNASUR), a continuation of the South American Community ofNations (CSN), whose summit, December 8–9, 2006, brought together representatives from 12 Latin American nations, including eight heads of state.8An initiative centered on the Brazilian state, the UNASUR/CSN, if successful,could represent a very real challenge to US hegemony in Latin America. Thesecond is the BolivarianAlternative for the Americas (ALBA), an initiative centered on the Venezuelan state. ALBA means “dawn” in Spanish, and there is areal feeling that what we are witnessing is what Hugo Cha´vez Frı´ as, president of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, has called “the dawn of a new era” in Latin America9 —an alternative at last to the long night of neoliberalism. This articlewill argue that, while both initiatives are frequently treated as one—theemergence of a new regionalism in opposition to the US-led FTAA—they in factneed to be treated separately. The UNASUR, while a challenge to US hegemony in the region, is completely embedded in a very familiar logic of capital accumulation and corporate rule. ALBA, by contrast, is closely associated with the mass movements, which are at the core of the leftward move of many of the region’s politics. If there is to be an alternative to US hegemony in the region that can challenge capitalism as well as neoliberalism, it will be in relation to the ALBA initiative, not that of the UNASUR. Download 1.47 Mb. Share with your friends:
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