Cuban–Latin American Relations in the Context of a Changing Hemis ...

relationship with the USSR. The last era described brings the narrative to the present and provides a context for the rest of the volume. Oliva sees the current era as beginning with the triumph of Hugo Chávez in the 1998 Venezuelan election, setting the stage for Cuba’s current situation of full integration into hemispheric affairs through projects ranging from ALBA to the Rio Group.

In chapter 3, Luis Fernando Ayerbe analyzes the Latin American research reports of Washington-based institutions, from the American Enterprise Institute to the Center for American Progress, to gain an understanding of how clearly the Washington policy establishment views the political changes that are underway in the hemisphere. Several of the reports were timed as policy recommendations to the new U.S. president who was to assume office in 2009. Ultimately, Ayerbe found that in spite of ideological differences, the various think tank reports came to the same basic conclusion: the leftward trend in the region’s politics, especially the prominence of the ALBA countries under Cuban and Venezuelan leadership, represent a threat to long-term U.S. interests in the region. With that conclusion in focus, the reports call for a greater U.S. attention to the region, although they offer no comprehensive plan that would address the issues that have brought the leftist governments to power. Ayerbe concludes that such a lack of attention from Washington would likely leave the Latin American countries the political space to pursue policies with greater independence from their northern neighbor.

In chapters 4 and 5, Mexican researcher Jaime Preciado and U.S. political scientist Michael Erisman provide some of the details of how the Latin American countries are in reality shaping policies and programs in the twenty-first century. Preciado provides the broad overview of how with Cuban participation, Latin American countries are reforming an inter-American system that since its creation more than a century ago was designed to foster U.S. domination. Michael Erisman’s chapter on ALBA provides the details on how what began only six years ago as a framework for bilateral agreements between Cuban and Venezuela has morphed into a regional organization of eight countries involving more than 150 projects in a range of fields.¹²