Latin America and the Agonies of the "Non-aligned"

Feb 21

Feb 21 Latin America and the Agonies of the "Non-aligned"

January saw the convening of a peculiar conference in Havana. Billed as a convening of ‘scholars, diplomats, parliamentarians, and policymakers from across the world,’ the Havana Congress on the New International Economic Order was hailed among its organisers as a seminal moment in the history of ‘global south’ solidarity, harkening back to the Bandung Conference of 1955. Though heralded as part of a rising tide of third world sovereignty, the Congress revealed at least as much about the challenges and limitations of the non-aligned project.

The origins of the programme dubbed the New International Economic Order (NIEO) lie in the 1970s, in dissatisfaction with the United Nations and its inability to address crises in the third world. Among these were shortages in energy and food supplies, all unfolding under the backdrop of Cold War tensions and nuclear proliferation. With the raising of interest rates in the ‘80s, the economies of non-aligned states collapsed, the project faltered and its influence waned.

Prominently featured at the Congress was David Adler, General Coordinator of the Progressive International, a jet-setting Rhodes Scholar who spent most of his time denouncing yanqui imperialism and recounting a litany of crimes committed by the United States in Latin America. It seems notable that most of the examples cited took place in the 1980s, and the recent US support for Lula da Silva in the face of a reactionary coup attempt went unmentioned, as it might complicate the perception of US policy in Latin America being insisted upon by those at the Congress. People like Adler resemble Alden Pyle of Graham Greene’s The Quiet American more closely than they would care to admit, dispatching themselves to far-flung places looking to recruit nations to a bloc that made more sense in the context of the Cold War than it does now. In the bipolar world of the mid-twentieth century, when the US and the USSR engaged in proxy wars across the world and menaced one another with nuclear weapons, the appeal of a non-aligned movement that resisted recruitment into the two camps is not difficult to understand. But today, such calls seem more anachronistic. Lula’s recent refusal to aid Ukraine seems less like a principled stand against twin imperial powers than a moral abdication as a small nation mounts a defence against the aggression of a larger one.

Speaking at the Conference, former Greek finance minister Yanis Varoufakis declared, preposterously, that ‘we have never been closer to a nuclear holocaust than today.’ This hyperbole, though unwarranted, is emblematic of the kind of obfuscation that is necessary to continue to imply that the bipolar world of the Cold War is analogous to the contemporary one.

That said, the coalition of forces given expression at the Congress are not without promise. Their calls for a ‘Green Keynesianism’ that would funnel money to poor nations in order to spur development and curb climate change are a welcome addition to a scene that is in acute need of alternatives to the existing order. Writing about efforts in the ‘70s that first advanced the New International Economic Order, Adam Sneyd writes that ‘the NIEO also served as a rallying cry that enabled numerous despots and authoritarians to sound like change-makers on the global stage, even as they repressed their people and looted state coffers.’ To his credit, Varoufakis seems to recognise this, writing that ‘we need to beware not only the functionaries in Washington or London or Brussels (…) but also government officials in the pocket of capitalists in the Global South, including China, who use the US trade deficit to exploit their people, their country, and then stash their dollarised surplus value within the circuits of Wall Street and the City of London.’

After thanking his Cuban hosts, Varoufakis concluded with a furious crescendo, proclaiming that the ‘twin democratisation, of capital and of money (…) is nothing short of the precondition for our species’ survival.’ On the question of whether the delegates assembled at the Havana Congress are in a position to achieve this, the jury is very much out. The prospect of instead being lost in the incoherence of their own non-aligned position seems at least as likely.

The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of the wider St Andrews Foreign Affairs Review team.