Washington's dubious crusade for hemispheric democracy.

• Author: Vasquez, Ian

AS MARKET economies and democratic politics have spread throughout most of Latin America in recent years, Washington has sought to redefine its relationship with its hemispheric neighbors. The U.S. has strengthened its economic ties to the region and welcomed the development of multi-party democracy. Many commentators and policymakers, eager to see hemispheric democracy prevail, want Washington to go further--to play a larger role in ensuring that outcome. As desirable as the democratic ideal may be, little, if any, consideration is given to Washington's ability to "export" democracy successfully. Humbling U.S. experiences on that score are ignored or forgotten, and there is hardly any discussion about whether Washington should become involved in democracy-promotion campaigns.

In the past, regional instability was considered a U.S. security risk because of its potential to trigger the involvement of outside powers. Today, lack of democracy has become a matter of major concern to U.S. policymakers. Pres. Clinton is especially enthusiastic about Washington's role in exporting democracy, although he has displayed an inclination to rely on multilateral efforts to advance that mission. In remarks to Latin American leaders in December, 1992, for example, he emphasized the "commitment to mutual efforts among all of us in this hemisphere to promote democracy."

Clinton's policy differs only marginally from that of his predecessor, George Bush. The President even has adopted the Bush Administration's emphasis on working through the Organization of American States to defend democracy whenever it is threatened. Using the OAS as a vehicle for strengthening democracy has many pitfalls for the U.S. and provides very few, if any, real benefits, though.

That became apparent over the past two years as the OAS and the United Nations, despite the full support of the U.S., were incapable of restoring democracy in Haiti following the overthrow of Pres. Jean-Bertrand Aristide. The collective response of the inter-American community only served to make matters worse in Haiti, devastating that nation's economy and harming its poor. Even against the most destitute nation in the hemisphere, the policies applied by the OAS--and endorsed by the U.S.--have proven ineffective.

If the U.S. insists on exporting democracy and backing OAS efforts in support of that goal, the entanglements Washington potentially will face in Latin America will be virtually limitless. Domestic conflicts in many parts of the region--including bloody coup attempts in Venezuela, the abrogation of constitutional rule in Peru in 1992, and the suspension of democracy in Guatemala in 1993--suggest that stable democracies are far from firmly established in the hemisphere. Moreover, the complexity of the region's internal disputes is likely to pose far greater problems for outside promoters of democracy than did the ongoing Haitian quagmire. Washington must consider whether becoming involved in a host of democracy-promotion efforts would be proudent and whether those efforts would be likely to produce beneficial results.

In June, 1991, the OAS established an interventionist policy that requires the ministers of foreign affairs to meet within 10 days of "any event giving rise to the sudden or irregular interruption of the democratic political institutional process of legitimate exercise of power by the democratically elected government in any of the Organization's member states." Furthermore, whenever constitutional government is suspended, the OAS is "to look into the events collectively and adopt any measures deemed appropriate" to restore democratic rule. The Santiago Commitment to Democracy and Renewal of the Inter-American System (Santiago Declaration) and the resolutions that accompanied it sought to revitalize the OAS and free the organization from its image of irrelevance.

The passage of the declaration marked a significant change in the nature of inter-American relations. During the Cold War era, national sovereignty had been a particularly sensitive issue for Latin American countries. Given the record of U.S. military incursions and other interference in the internal affairs of Washington's neighbors, that preoccupation was not unjustified. Indeed, the OAS was founded in part to assure Latin American governments that the U.S. would not violate their sovereignty. In exchange, if an outside power threatened the area's security, Latin American governments agreed to cooperate with Washington to defend the region. As it turned out, the OAS did not serve either purpose effectively. The end of superpower rivalry, moreover, eliminated any relevance that the inter-American security system might have had. New missions were needed to justify its existence.

In Washington, the predominant argument was that the U.S. finally could devote its attention to building democratic institutions in the region without being preoccupied with containing communist influence. That belief, combined with an emphasis on collective approaches to the promotion of democracy, led the U.S. to support the fortification of the OAS. The Santiago Declaration, then, was meant to convert the OAS into a vibrant and functioning organization and create the blueprint for a new era in inter-American relations, one in which all countries of the hemisphere would be collectively responsible for defending an ideal form of government.

Several important events preceding the Santiago Declaration set the stage for a larger multilateral role in the internal affairs of the region's nations. The 1987 Central American peace plan (Esquipulas Accord) called for both the OAS and the UN actively to monitor the 1990 Nicaraguan elections. It would be the first time that the UN would undertake such a mission within a sovereign country and the OAS would be more than passively involved in observing elections. That precedent led to OAS and UN monitoring missions in Haiti, Suriname, and El Salvador in the following years. The aborted May, 1989, elections in Panama were another important factor behind the emergence of a renovated OAS. Although the organization refrained from taking punitive measures against Panama, it did condemn Gen. Manuel Noriega for election fraud and declared his rule unconstitutional.

Bush Administration initiatives to strengthen the OAS also predated the Santiago Declaration. In 1989, the White House appointed Luigi Einaudi U.S. ambassador to the OAS. Since Einaudi was the first Spanish-speaking Latin Americanist to represent...