The Importance Of United States Involvement in Latin America And The Caribbean

By: Charlotte Sparling

Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) region are crucial regional trading partners with the United States. Beyond their geographic proximity, these countries share economic interests and security concerns. Therefore, it is crucial to have strong relationships as instability concerns in LAC often impact the United States. 

As such, US Congressional members have sought to strengthen relations with LAC. However, the US is not alone in its interest in the region. China has increasingly inserted itself as a major player. 

Following the Venezuelan elections, which were widely viewed as fraudulent, President Xi Jinping of China was among the first to congratulate Nicolas Maduro on his victory. Instances like these concern the United States that China’s presence in the region is a stability concern.

Currently, the United States provides roughly 31% of LAC merchandise imports and 16% of foreign direct investments to the region. Among LAC, however, Mexico is the United States’s biggest trade partner, accounting for 71% of trade. In turn, 62% of US exports to LAC go to Mexico.

While the United States has sought to continue its regional involvement, US investors face challenges in the region. These include transportation problems, corruption, lacking property rights protection, and nontransparent regulatory and legal frameworks.

Continued efforts, including President Biden’s America’s Partnership for Economic Prosperity plan to increase competition and investment in the region to bolster supply chains, have sought to strengthen relations. However, what has been done so far is not enough. 

Over the past decade, China has surpassed the US as South America’s biggest trading partner. China has sought influence through coordinating financing, trade, and investment. From 2005 to 2020, they provided over $138 billion in loans to Latin America, and from 2000 to 2021, regional trade increased from $12 billion to $445 billion. Such programs have placed China in a valuable role as an indispensable trade partner to several LAC countries. This threatens the United States presence in the region and could disrupt trade relations with the US.

In addition to trade and economic efforts, China has invested in public messaging to boost their image as an invaluable ally through efforts that include bidding for high-profile projects.

Worryingly, since 2012, President Xi Jinping has visited the region eleven times, in contrast to President Obama, who visited the region twelve times, and President Trump, who only visited once during his first term. Undeniably, Chinese efforts have seen success. China’s Belt and Road Initiative has twenty-one Latin American countries' signatures. Brazil, Argentina, and Mexico saw China’s involvement as a net positive. However, there are growing sentiments of weariness over bad behavior by the Chinese, “including debt traps, cheap goods flooding the market, and crowding out domestic manufacturers.”

In Brazil, Chinese investments fell to an all-time low in thirteen years. In Panama, 68% said the Chinese government was “untrustworthy” in both 2018 and 2021, a rise from 48% in 2016. Similar to Chinese involvement in Africa, the Chinese government’s foreign direct investments did not live up to their initial claims. Adding to this, since their peak in the 2010s, Chinese investments have slowed down, creating a window of opportunity for the US.

The United States should prioritize meaningful engagement to address pressing and specific issues through positive messaging. Instead of combating China head on, the US should allow China to continue its existing programs which have already shown the people of LAC the long term associated costs. Instead, the United States should focus on what it can do to improve its own reputation in the region.

Already, US companies have been shown to operate with “transparency, environmental standards, and labor standards.” Unlike the Chinese Belt and Road Initiative, the US hires local workers. While benefiting the US, this involvement also helps the region as a whole.

The seeds of doubt towards China have been sowed; it is now time for the US to take advantage of this gap and revamp its efforts in the region to ensure strong US-LAC relations.

The Wage Economy Contributes To Food Insecurity Among the Inuit

By: Priya Buddhavarapu

We live in a world where one jar of nutella costs $48 for some Inuit communities. 

The Inuit people, traditionally spread across the northern regions of North America, Greenland, and Russia, are a vast and diverse indigenous group that have, for centuries, thrived in the relentless Arctic environment. By engaging in cultural practices such as seasonal subsistence hunting, gathering, and preservation methods, as well as values such as sharing, respect for elders, and extended familial units, the Inuit people are able to call the Arctic tundra their home. The term Inuit Qaujimajatuqangit (IQ) refers to the various types of Inuit traditional knowledge that encompass these values. 

In the recent past, many of these communities have been undergoing a transition from the traditional subsistence economy to a wage economy, perpetuated by the increasing costs of hunting and fishing, the effects of climate change in Arctic regions, changing interests, and loss of IQ. The average Inuit wage worker, however, faces an extreme disparity compared to the average urban citizen. From factors such as job shortages to a lack of affordable housing and healthcare, there exist several barriers to the economic wellbeing of several Inuit communities. 

One consequence of this economic transition stands out, an acute food security crisis. Food insecurity refers to when a household or community has limited or uncertain access to safe and healthy food. Due to environmental changes and the manpower of communities being diverted to the wage economy, many Inuit people are no longer able to rely on IQ and traditional practices to self-sustain. In one Inuit region, 70% of adults were found to be living in a food-insecure household.  In Nunavut, a large region in northern Canada populated by twenty-five Inuit communities, food insecurity is at crisis level. 

A solution to this, some offer, is to treat Inuit individuals like other citizens, expecting them to rely on the transport and purchase of market foods, or food shipped from southern areas. This is, in fact, what is currently being done in several communities across Canada and Alaska.

This, however, is unfeasible. 

Due to the longer distance and lack of adequate transportation across these northern regions, produce spoils quickly. If products do make it to their destination, costs are unattainably expensive. Additionally, the food that is readily available in these areas is usually highly processed and calorically dense, leading to high obesity rates among Inuit populations. This is juxtaposed with the starvation arising from inconsistent access. Furthermore, Inuit adolescents and children are at heightened risk for mental health issues such as depression and anxiety, compounding the adverse health effects of food insecurity.

Moreover, the shift to the wage economy has also driven a shift in traditional Inuit values. Most notably, this has been the destruction of the Inuit family structure and culture of sharing. Research has consistently shown that subsistence hunting is crucial to Inuit identities and economic wellbeing. Fully employed Inuit are significantly more likely to adapt to solely sharing within a nuclear family structure, whereas partially employed or sport-hunting guides are more likely to share subsistence food with extended family and distant kin. 

Values of sharing,cooperation, and the traditional Inuit familial structure are being disrupted by this economic shift. What was once collective now is becoming individualistic. 

The issues that the shift from a subsistence to a wage economy has caused  have severely contributed to the enormous food insecurity crisis present in these regions. Compounded with the effects of climate change, communities are seeing effects from health degradation to community collapse. 

In combating this issue, governments must listen to the voices of representative Inuit bodies, relying on IQ and their longstanding knowledge of their lands to address and ensure consistent access to safe and nutritious foods. While a solution to this complex issue will not come easy, it is imperative to rely on deeply relevant guidance that has survived centuries of obstacles. 

Trump’s Harmful New Plan For Gaza And It’s Pushback

By: Jacob Rabin

Trump recently produced global shockwaves when he announced an American plan to control Gaza during a bilateral press conference with Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu. Although the Gaza Strip has been governed by different nations and groups since the Mandate of Palestine began after the end of World War II, the United States has absolutely no claim to any of Gaza or its resources. 

Trump’s plan to “take over” and “own” Gaza is borderline insane as a result. Furthermore, Trump’s proposition that other Middle Eastern nations would absorb the current Palestinian population that resides in Gaza is unthinkable, particularly as American allies in the region scoff at the notion.

The conflict in the Middle East between Israel and Hamas that also involved Iran and Hezbollah has been a traumatic event involving the loss of much life and the destruction of much property. Beginning with Hamas’s incursion into Israel on October 7, 2023, Israeli military action has been across the region as the country has sought to protect itself from further attack. 

As Israel’s longest-standing ally, the United States has provided billions of dollars in aid since the country was first recognized, reflecting not just a desire for an independent Israel but also showing the importance of Israel’s security to American interests in the Middle East. As the only true democracy in the Middle East, the United States relies on Israel immensely. 

Nothing changed after the October 7th attack, with the United States having provided nearly $18 billion in military aid as of October 2024, the one-year point of the conflict. The reintroduction of a Trump administration into the picture has only led to a renewal of the United States’ commitment to Israel.

Some have even argued that Israel and Prime Minister Netanyahu were extending the war in Gaza until an eventual Trump re-election – with Netanyahu being the first foreign head of state to visit the White House, those beliefs have not been dissuaded. The bilateral press conference between the two leaders simply reinforced the argument that Trump and Israel are in essential lockstep. 

However, even as the two agreed on topics such as their opinion on the Biden administration and the dangers of Iran, a clear (if unsaid) division occurred. President Trump introduced his new plan that would entail the United States taking control of Gaza, saying, “We'll own it.”

Even Prime Minister Netanyahu seemed to view the proposal negatively, saying, “President Trump is taking it to a much higher level. His words and tone overwhelmingly make clear that Israel would not be a fan of further American presence in the region.

In addition to several American allies rejecting the plan, Republican lawmakers also expressed discomfort, feeling that it was just another empty plan similar to Trump’s ideas about the Panama Canal and Greenland.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt seemed to walk Trump’s plan back, saying that the United States would simply rebuild Gaza and Palestinians would only be temporarily displaced.

Even with pushback from nearly every avenue, Trump only doubled down on his plan, posting an AI-generated video depicting a resort in Gaza being built out of the rubble. Even if this talking point is nonsense, it is still absurd that the President of the United States is engaging in such spitballing.

While peace in Gaza, and the Middle East more broadly, is necessary, the solution is not more American involvement. The United States has no business or right to involve itself deeply in foreign affairs strictly for American benefit. This is especially true when Americans' lives are at risk. Instead, we should continue to work with Israel to maintain a ceasefire, allowing peace to return to the region.