For Pol Dec Making Latin Amer

3 Credits · Level: Graduate, Undergraduate

This course examines the foreign policy of the United States towards Latin America in the post-Cold War era, paying particular attention to the foreign policy decision making-process. In Latin America the end of the Cold War led to the rise of elected governments and the shift to market economies, trends that U.S. administrations strongly encouraged through bi-lateral and multilateral initiatives. U.S. policy forged a new pattern of cooperation through the Summit of the America’s process, while bringing closure to internal conflicts in Central America, addressing the challenge of internal war in Peru and Colombia, restoring democracy in Haiti and seeking the resolution of international disputes such as the boundary conflict between Chile and Argentina and Ecuador and Peru. U.S. policy also focused on the security threats posed by an increasingly inter-dependent world manifested by such phenomena as increased migration flows, international crime, drug trafficking, terrorism, and environmental degradation. Finally, it sought to encourage trade and investment while addressing the problems associated with volatile international financial markets that disrupted national economies.