Latin America Workshops 2012
Workshops Coordinators
Vanessa Kritzer and Ben Leiter
Latin America Working Group
In Latin America, wars have been fought and societies turned upside down by strife over economic inequality. But what does it look like now? The United States has a history of involvement in Latin America, creating trade agreements and providing military and socioeconomic aid. How can we ensure that our government provides aid that will help not hurt our Latin American brothers and sisters? Join us for six exciting workshops that will address these questions. Come learn about free trade agreements, U.S. aid for refugees, the Cuban embargo, the harmful effects of gold mining and biofuel production, alternative national economic models, and more!
Workshops
- Successful Economic Alternatives in Latin America
- All That is Gold Does Not Glitter: How Latin America's Gold Rush is Poisoning Communities
Organizer: Dave Kane, Maryknoll
In the past decade, many Latin American countries have elected progressive governments that have initiated a myriad of alternative economic programs with mixed success. What are some of the more promising examples of working alternatives? How have they been able to improve people's lives? What do they tell us in the United States as we look to reform our own economic system?
Organizers: Center for International Environmental Law (CIEL), Earthworks
Peace Brigades International (PBI) – Amanda Kistler and Moira Birss
Throughout Latin America, transnational corporations have in recent years begun extracting gold on a large scale, taking advantage of local poverty and weak governance to reap unparalleled profits for their investors in the Global North. Their operations, which generate conflict, shred social fabric, and contaminate the environment, continue to grow at an alarming rate due to the passage of free trade agreements and record gold prices. This panel will examine how the corporate gold rush in Latin American is harming communities, what those communities are doing to resist, and how we can best support them.
- A Shared Responsibility: Supporting Colombian Refugees in their Countries of Refuge
Organizer: Shaina Aber, Jesuit Refugee Service USA
Ecuador, Panama, and Venezuela have increasingly become destinations for Colombian refugees fleeing targeted and violent persecution by Colombian armed groups. While well-over 4 million people have been displaced internally by Colombia's armed conflict, another 500,000 to 750,000 have fled over Colombia's borders to neighboring countries in search of safety, security, and new start. Frequently settling in under-developed and economically depressed border towns in Ecuador, Panama and Venezuela, Colombian refugees are often viewed as a burden rather than as a boon for these already struggling communities. What strategies are being deployed by faith-based and humanitarian organizations to create a hospitable environment for Colombian refugees while increasing access to education, clean drinking water, and human security in host communities? How can the United States and the international community support the local integration or Colombian Refugees? What do the current U.S. budget battles mean for the mid and long term prospects for durable solutions for Colombian refugees?
- Trade Agreements and Human Rights: How the Victimizers Sue the Victims in Latin America
Organizer: Manuel Perez Rocha, IPS
How the victimizers sue the victims of environmental harm for millions in closed-door international tribunals, and the resistance of communities throughout Latin America.
In the context of high global prices for natural resources, several countries in Latin America that seek to increase the benefits of those resources for their own people, while attempting to maintain an environmental balance, are finding themselves increasingly at odds with transnational corporations. Transnational companies in the extractive industries are increasingly using their new rights under free trade agreements (FTAs) and bilateral investment treaties (BITs) to sue governments in unaccountable and non transparent international arbitration tribunals.
Democracy, sovereignty, the right of people to decide over the use of their lands and resources and the sustainability of entire regions are all subverted by the right given to corporations to demand multi millionaire compensations for the profits they expected to have –that is, not even for the actual investment they may have lost – when governments respond to the demands of their communities. Moreover, these investor – State rules (as they are known) are designed to prevent many governments from acting in favor of public interests and environmental imperatives.
- Ignoring economic reforms by our neighbor? How the U.S. embargo on Cuba is only isolating the United States
Organizer: Emily Chow, LAWG
New economic reforms within Cuba that have allowed citizens to start small private enterprises are only one of many significant changes occurring on the island. With these small enterprises, Cuban citizens are able to work for themselves, earn their own incomes independent of the State, and also hire employees. These types of reforms are examples of initiatives that the United States government should support. Instead, our government continues to tout an economic embargo to attempt to stifle the Cuban economy and bring down their government. However, after 50 years of the same policy we still haven't seen the outcome that the creators of the embargo had desired – "regime change." What can we do to make a difference?
- Green or Red? How Bio-fuel Production Is Causing Bloodshed and Displacement in Colombia
Organizer: Shannan Vance-Ocampo, Presbyterian Peace Fellowship
How palm oil production in Colombia is fueling violence and displacement. How we can be more socially conscious consumers.
+ + +
Click below to view previous years' Latin America workshops: