The announcement by the United States and Cuba that they would seek to resume normal relations will in some measure be seen by some observers as an indication of a fulfilment of gradual, but persistent changes in Caribbean geopolitical relationships, some more prominent than others.
Those who supported the diplomatic initiatives, directed at widening Caribbean diplomatic relations, by Michael Manley and Forbes Burnham in the 1970s, will probably be now seeing present initiatives as justifications of their early stances; though they will no doubt feel it necessary to admit that these have, in a way, already been legitimized by the collapse of the Soviet Union, and the de facto end of the Cold War with a normalization of relations between the US and Russia.
President Obama’s current initiative towards Cuba can therefore now be seen as permitting a definitive end to any Cold War residues in the hemisphere of which we are a part, this being quite clearly, acceptable to the Cuban government. Though the President’s initiative can also be seen as a dragging of his own country into the global post-Cold War environment, for the most part already fully accepted in the hemisphere.
The period since the 1990s has seen an assumption of active relations by all Caricom states with Cuba, unhindered by fears of American retaliation, as well as of an insistence on the part of even the smallest of the Caricom entities that American descriptions and advisements against the Chávez and post-Chávez regimes in Venezuela as de facto communist, can have no diplomatic resilience. This can be seen even more clearly following the death of Chávez and the assumption of the presidency by Maduro.
As the siren sounds of anti-Americanism become more and more prominent, even the smallest of the Caricom states – many of them members of the Organisation of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS) – decided prior to a period of gyrating oil prices, that there are benefits to be derived in these times of economic stringency, not only from PetroCaribe, but from the Bolivarian Alliance Alba, their substitute for lost Western assistance for major infrastructural works.
Yet the actions of those small states have also been characterized by a certain realism, indicated by the fact that in 2009, in the era of Chávez’s dominance, a request by Venezuela for consideration of membership of the OECS was not considered by its member states, no doubt cognizant of maritime contentions that prevail between that country and Caricom states. And we can attribute a reticence on their part not simply to such considerations, but to an inability to believe that a substantial imbalance of size within the organization could necessarily be beneficial and sustain autonomy.
In that context, it is noticeable that in 2008, the same OECS states seemed not entirely willing to accept an initiative from then Prime Minister Patrick Manning of Trinidad & Tobago, that suggested the formation of a political union between his country and their countries, though some of their governments might have felt that his offer might well have been influenced by the formation and attractiveness of PetroCaribe.
But beyond the sphere of Cold War inheritances, what is also visible are indications of a willingness of anglophone Caricom states, in particular those of the OECS, to now entertain a widening of their own institutional regional relations to include the proximate colonies of France – Martinique and Guadeloupe. For as announced on February 4, Martinique, located between St Lucia and Dominica was accepted within the OECS as an Associate Member, and Guadeloupe, on the northern tip of Dominica, has virtually been assured of a similar status in the near future.
The OECS states will have been well aware that Martinique and Guadeloupe, as entities of France, are full beneficiaries of the European Union. The initiation of the WTO arrangements have virtually liquidated the substantial agricultural trade with the EU which the Windward Islands of the OECS previously had, and in can be surmised that the OECS states do not believe that the Caricom-EU Economic Partnership Agreement signed in the wake of that arrangement, allows them to be competitive with the French Caribbean entities in their economic relations with the EU, particularly in the sphere of agricultural trade.
Already, the per capita income of say, St Lucia (population 173,000), presently stands at US$2,071M, while that of Martinique (386,000) is US$27,688M. And the anticipated inclusion of Guadeloupe will accentuate these differences. Clearly the OECS governments will be feeling that an inclusion of the French Departments can enhance the interest of the French government, and therefore the EU, in the development requirements of the OECS, including not only in terms of infrastructural development which is partly covered in the EPA, but also in enhancing possibilities for the attraction of their tourism industries, and therefore air transportation facilities, beyond the anglophone countries of the globe.
We can surmise that there will also be entreaties to join the OECS from the countries under the sovereignty of the Netherlands Antilles, and it will be interesting to see whether, with Suriname a member of Caricom, an interest on their part in the wider organization becomes a possibility.
Clearly, much of the emerging reconfiguration of Caribbean states’ relations that will be induced by a Cuba-US normalisation, including those with the Spanish-speaking hemisphere, will likely lead to a reconfiguration of Caricom itself; and the increasing interest of specific Caricom states in the wider hemispheric, especially development, institutions.
Changing hemispheric relations, directed from this or that Latin American state, and in particular the influence in Caribbean regional relations of a Cuba now well within the hemispheric diplomatic sphere, will increasingly influence how the Caricom is able to anticipate them and, consequently, delineate appropriate institutional responses to them. And by inference, that process will influence the integrity of Caricom itself.
