Everybody loves infrastructure

Latin America invests about 2% of GDP on infrastructure. Between 1992 and 2011 China invested an average of 8.5% of GDP in infrastructure per year. Given the demonstrated effects of infrastructure on development and poverty reduction, it’s time for the region to make a concerted effort to attract foreign investors.

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The new and not-so-new foreign policies in the Americas

When we started this website, the idea was to begin a broad discussion of Latin America’s emerging foreign policy and its implications for inter-American relations, economic development and democracy and human rights. Here is the outline for a book chapter I’m working on on the topic of Latin America foreign policy—part of a larger book project by New York University and, later, my own book. Here I post the precis for comments. Any and all are welcome—in the spirit of the website and public debate. (Please forgive any typos.) The goal is to provoke discussion. Your comments will help.

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What India is learning from Brazil

India is looking to adopt Latin America’s famous and popular conditional cash transfer (CCT) programs. But are they transferable to a country of 1.2 billion people, in which 363 million of them live below the poverty line, 260 million live in rural areas?

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Guns and gangs and the sad role U.S. lax gun laws play

There are multiple causes for the escalating crime and violence that is sweeping the region and making Latin America the region with the highest murder rates in the world. Narcotics trafficking, weak states, misguided anti-narcotics policies are all partly to blame. But given the numbers of U.S.-purchased weapons turning up in crime scenes in Central America, the U.S.’s lax gun control laws are another.

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Sobre la próxima elección de miembros de la CIDH y de la Corte Interamericana de Derechos Humanos

El próximo 15 y 16 de junio se llevará a cabo en Washington D.C. la 45ª Asamblea General (AG) de la Organización de Estados Americanos (OEA). En esta ocasión elegirán 4 nuevos miembros de la Comisión Interamericana de Derechos Humanos (CIDH) y 4 nuevos jueces de la Corte Interamericana de Derechos Humanos. Esas elecciones también definirán el futuro y fuerza moral de la organización hemisférica. 


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Determining and gaining U.S. influence in Latin America

Rather than focusing old time notions of levels of economic and military aid or large inspiring policy declarations, analysts and policymakers should focus their attention where policy and its return (i.e. influence) is most impactful—communication, contact and exchange that improve the daily lives of Latin American and Caribbean citizens.

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