For much of the twentieth century, Third World economies that were based upon import-substitution industrialization (ISI) were dominated by authoritarian regimes. When economic liberalization began to overtake many of these countries, however, as happened in recent years, the question arose as to whether authoritarian rule had not become anachronistic in mediating the relations between state and economy in the Third World.

The experience of Mexico strongly suggests that authoritarian rule remains a potent force in this era of economic change. Although Mexico's authoritarian government continued to retain power even in the presence of a liberal economic agenda, adopted during the early 1990s, it did find it expedient to make some adaptations in the system. The most significant of these, by far, was to make alterations in the ruling coalition that had governed the country since the early 1930s, rather than to embark upon a transition to democracy. These changes represented the regime's most critical initiative in attempting to meet, if not reconcile, the conflicting claims of authoritarianism on the one hand with the demands of economic liberalization on the other.

Like the reports of Mark Twain's death, the claims of a wave of democratization sweeping Latin America may be exaggerated. Yet the resurgence of electoral politics and the receding of military rule since the 1980s are trends that hold significance both for the future of Latin America and for inter-American relations. The transitions from bureaucratic-authoritarian rule in South America, and from the oligarchy-military alliances in Central America, have been a major focus of recent US policy attention. From the human rights approach of the Carter administration to the Reagan rollback doctrine, US policy became more actively engaged in controversial attempts to define and impose “democracy” in the region. After the end of the Cold War, US action or inaction remained key factors in the events surrounding the 1989 elections in Panama and the 1990 elections in Haiti and Nicaragua.

One of the three basic themes slated for discussion at the 1994 Summit of the Americas (9-10 December) is “Making Democracy Work.” Under this heading are topics related to combatting official corruption, dealing with narcotics trafficking, encouraging and expanding the roles played in civil society by the nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), and enhancing the capacity of the Organization of American States (OAS) to strengthen democracy (Summit, 1994: 4-5). The other two major areas of consideration-Hemispheric economic integration and sustainable development - are also related to the need to stimulate and support the movement towards more democratic governments and societies.

The international financial community has recently joined the arms control community in scrutinizing the relationship between military spending and economic growth. The Independent Group on Financial Flows to Developing Countries, headed by Helmut Schmidt, recommended (in Facing One World) that priority in financial assistance be given to countries that spend less than 2% of their gross domestic product (GDP) on security (The Economist, 1991a: 61). Robert McNamara, past president of the World Bank as well as a former US Secretary of Defense, supported this proposal in his speech before the World Bank Annual Conference on Development Economics (April 1991), recommending that military expenditures, as a percentage of GDP, be reduced by 50%. Nicole Ball, in Pressing for Peace: Can Aid Induce Reform?, argues cogently for conditioning international assistance on the initiation, or acceleration, of reforms in defense spending in the developing world (Ball, 1992).

Once again, Chile stands out within the Latin American region. In the early 1970s, Salvador Allende's brand of socialism attracted worldwide attention and captured the imagination of the international Left. In the years thereafter, Pinochet's authoritarianism set the pace for a global resurgence of the new Right. Finally, in just the last few years, Chile has become a symbol of a new sort, rapidly establishing itself as a democratic success story. Chile's democratic progress becomes especially evident when viewed alongside the large set of Latin American countries that have democratized since the late 1970s. Indeed, an analysis of the last presidential and congressional elections in Chile (11 December 1993) indicates that it has undoubtedly made greater strides toward democratic consolidation than any other country in Latin America — all the more striking when one considers that its transition from authoritarian rule was concluded only as recently as 1990.

Despite its manifest heterogeneity—linguistic, ethnic and political—and the significant imbalances between nations, the Caribbean Basin has gradually come to be viewed as a distinctive subregion within the Western Hemisphere. This process began during the Cold War when a number of extraregional actors with interests in the region considered it of strategic importance. As in previous phases of its history, the Caribbean found itself defined geopolitically, not only in terms of its potential for conflict but for its significance to external (North American or European) actors as well (Serbín, 1989 and 1991a).

More recently, changes on the international scene (the end of the Cold War and recognition of the increasing interdependence of the world economy) have begun to alter these old perceptions and ways of dealing with the region.

Venezuela, once the most governable democracy in Latin America, is now a very fragile democracy. This article describes the formula that made Venezuela governable in the 1970s, traces its development in the 1960s, and explains why it broke down in the 1980s, leaving the democratic regime in danger in the 1990s. This historical perspective is necessary for anyone seeking to understand the prospects for democratic govemability in the Caldera government, for this administration will be expected to provide an alternative to the old formula. At the same time, it will be judged by comparison with the achievements of the old formula. If Caldera's democratic alternative is judged a failure, many Venezuelans will be inclined to give the nondemocractic alternative a second look. The historical perspective is also useful in deriving lessons that can be applied to other Latin American democracies. First, because Venezuela's formula worked well for a while, it helps to identify the elements of democratic govemability.

On 5 April 1992, Peruvian President Alberto Fujimori dissolved the Congress and suspended all constitutional guarantees, thus rendering Peru the first, among the seven leading countries of Latin America, to initiate a formal break away from the trend toward legally-elected civilian regimes which has been sweeping the region since the early 1980s. Peru's rupture of democratic rule occurred during a wave of domestic violence that evolved from, and is the consequence of, at least three major developments.

Since the conclusion of the Earth Summit - or, more formally, the UN Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED) - in 1992, the world's political leaders have had to deal with an ambitious environmental agenda whose mission is nothing short of saving the biosphere, a spectacular quest that carries an equally impressive price tag. The acceleration of a global environmental agenda over the first part of the 1990s, combined with the accumulated commitments of earlier years - of which the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Flora and Fauna (CITES), the Ivory Ban, and the Montreal Protocol, are among the most prominent - and the high profile assigned to the environment by the Clinton administration, mean that the December 1994 Hemispheric Summit in Miami will have the opportunity (and the challenge) to set a new environmental agenda.

For only the fifth time since 1978, the Dominican Republic held concurrent elections in 1994 for candidates at every level of government — presidential, congressional and municipal. The most important of these contests, for the presidency, saw the incumbent, Joaquίn Balaguer, returned to the post he has held for so long, defeating his principal challenger, José Francisco Peña Gόmez, by a margin of 22,281 votes. The most recent election, on 16 May 1994, proved to be just as traumatic and incident-prone as those that preceded it, dating back to the first democratic election in 1978. Unlike the last election (in 1990), however, in which Balaguer also won a narrow victory, this time the charges of electoral fraud were well-documented and the accuracy of the tally widely disbelieved, not just domestically but internationally as well.

The bitter rivalry between the United States and Cuba has occupied a position as one of the principal political disputes in the Western Hemisphere for the past 35 years. Since the rise of Fidel Castro, the governments of these two countries have placed themselves on opposite sides of almost every major regional and global issue. They have long held vastly different ideas about what constitutes a good and just government, what kind of international behavior is legitimate, and the ends that foreign policy should serve. Moreover, they have not only harbored political differences but also maintained a very intense dislike of one another. The United States has attempted to sustain a picture of Cuba as an international outlaw, the source of much turmoil, crisis, and mischief in the world. Adding a personal dimension to the attacks, the United States has also sought to demonize Castro, creating and continually portraying an image of him as the embodiment of evil.

The free-lance writer Claire Sterling has done what academics have so far failed to do: document the fact that corruption and the violence which so often accompanies it, represent a real security threat to the nations of this world (see Sterling, 1984, 1990, 1994). In three data-packed books, Sterling has exposed the ugly, dark side of the waves of money which flow through many major financial systems and, quite literally, flood some of the small states. Even the most jaded student of the Caribbean, for instance, has to take seriously some of her most recent revelations, not the least of which is the following startling assertion:

While Sterling errs in calling Aruba a sovereign state - its defense and foreign policy are still under control of The Netherlands - her account of how the Caracas-based Cuntrera brothers had managed to penetrate Aruba and buy everything “from hotels . . . to the prime minister . . . ” found partial corroboration in the massive investigation of the Sicilian Mafia launched in Italy in the early 1990s.

The recent passage of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) between Canada, Mexico and the United States (US) marks an important step in the movement towards greater regionalism of trade among the countries in the Americas. From the perspective of the United States, the potential benefits to be gained from the anticipated increase in trade, economies of scale in production, increased access to the resources of production, and lower prices for the US market (due to the increased competition for consumer goods) combine to make its involvement in NAFTA desirable despite whatever limitations are posed, in the short and medium term, by Mexican underdevelopment (SerraPuche, 1992;US-ITC, 1991a).

The Western Hemisphere summit, which has been called by President Bill Clinton and is scheduled to be held in Miami (FL) in December 1994, will no doubt prove to be yet another major milestone along the evolving path of inter-American relations. Nevertheless, the significance of this meeting has been muted by the scanty information and limited signals given out by the host country regarding the meeting's purpose and agenda. In some ways, the upcoming summit projects a double image: of an event that is both transcendental and superficial at one and the same time. At least two elements point in this direction. On the one hand, much like similar previous conferences in history, not all members of the Hemisphere will attend, since some nations - like Cuba - have not been invited, an aspect that will affect the nature, spirit, and scope of this long-awaited assemblage of the Americas.

In 1979, over two-thirds of Latin America's people were living under military rule. By 1993, however, not a single military regime remained in Central or South America or the Spanish-speaking Caribbean. Elected presidents (even if former generals, as in the case of Paraguay's first post-Stroessner government) and legislatures replaced military dictators and juntas. Foreign observers certified the “fairness” of elections in Ecuador, Peru, Chile, Honduras, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Guatemala, and Paraguay — even when outgoing military regimes permitted elections only after certain parties or candidates had been excluded from participation. Political parties and opponents of incumbent governments operated openly. Media censorship declined, and fewer cases of politically-motivated abuses of human rights were reported. “Democratization” seemed to be underway.