"Latin America Confronts the United States offers a new perspective on US-Latin America relations. Drawing on research in six countries, the book examines how Latin American leaders are able to overcome power asymmetries to influence US foreign policy. The book provides in-depth explorations of key moments in post-World War II inter-American relations - foreign economic policy before the Alliance for Progress, the negotiation of the Panama Canal Treaties, the expansion of trade through NAFTA, and the growth of counternarcotics in Plan Colombia. The new evidence challenges earlier, US-centric explanations of these momentous events. Though differences in power were fundamental to each of these cases, relative weakness did not prevent Latin American leaders from aggressively pursuing their interests vis-...-vis the United States. Drawing on studies of foreign policy and international relations, the book examines how Latin American leaders achieved this influence - and why they sometimes failed"--

Latin America Confronts the United States offers a new perspective on US-Latin America relations. Drawing on research in six countries, the book examines how Latin American leaders are able to overcome power asymmetries to influence US foreign policy. The book provides in-depth explorations of key moments in post-World War II inter-American relations - foreign economic policy before the Alliance for Progress, the negotiation of the Panama Canal Treaties, the expansion of trade through the North American Free Trade Agreement, and the growth of counternarcotics in Plan Colombia. The new evidence challenges earlier, US-centric explanations of these momentous events. Though differences in power were fundamental to each of these cases, relative weakness did not prevent Latin American leaders from aggressively pursuing their interests vis-à-vis the United States. Drawing on studies of foreign policy and international relations, the book examines how Latin American leaders achieved this influence - and why they sometimes failed.

"Latin America Confronts the United States offers a new perspective on US-Latin America relations. Drawing on research in six countries, the book examines how Latin American leaders are able to overcome power asymmetries to influence US foreign policy. The book provides in-depth explorations of key moments in post-World War II inter-American relations - foreign economic policy before the Alliance for Progress, the negotiation of the Panama Canal Treaties, the expansion of trade through NAFTA, and the growth of counternarcotics in Plan Colombia. The new evidence challenges earlier, US-centric explanations of these momentous events. Though differences in power were fundamental to each of these cases, relative weakness did not prevent Latin American leaders from aggressively pursuing their interests vis-...-vis the United States. Drawing on studies of foreign policy and international relations, the book examines how Latin American leaders achieved this influence - and why they sometimes failed"--

In March 1961, President John F. Kennedy announced the formation of the Alliance for Progress, a program dedicated to creating prosperous, socially just, democratic societies throughout Latin America. Over the next few years, the United States spent nearly $20 billion in pursuit of the Alliance's goals, but Latin American economies barely grew, Latin American societies remained inequitable, and sixteen extraconstitutional changes of government rocked the region. In this close, critical analysis, Stephen Rabe explains why Kennedy's grand plan for Latin America proved such a signal policy failure. Drawing on recently declassified materials, Rabe investigates the nature of Kennedy's intense anti-Communist crusade and explores the convictions that drove him to fight the Cold War throughout the Caribbean and Latin America--a region he repeatedly referred to as "the most dangerous area in the world." As Rabe acknowledges, Kennedy remains popular in the United States and Latin America, in part for the noble purposes behind the Alliance for Progress. But an unwavering determination to wage Cold War led Kennedy to compromise, even mutilate, those grand goals.

Historical overview from both perspectives of the often-troubled and always uneven relationship between the United States and the nations of Latin America.