Globalisation and Economic Vulnerability: The Caribbean and the 'Post 9/11 Shift

• Author: Emilio Pantojas-García and Thomas Klak
• Pages: 176-198

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Caribbean Security in the Age of Terror

Globalisation

and Economic Vulnerability:

The Caribbean and the

‘Post-9/11 Shift’

Emilio Pantojas-García and Thomas Klak

Introduction

The vulnerability of the Caribbean to shifts in the international political

economy has been amply documented from studies of dependency to the

more recent studies of the impact of globalisation (Beckford and Girvan

1989; Klak 1998; Pantojas-García 2001). The Editor’s Introduction to the

proceedings of the first Conference of Caribbean Economists begins by

affirming this consensus view:

The acute degree of dependency of Caribbean economies on the world

economy in general, and on the economies of their main metropolitan

trading partners in particular, is an historical and contemporary fact. This

dependency not only stems from the structural features which are shared,

to a greater or lesser extent, with all developing economies; but also from

the relatively small size of most of the countries, and their current or recent

political relationships with colonial powers. (Beckford and Girvan 1989:

ix)

Whatever the paradigm selected to approach the study of the Caribbean,

the position of the region as colonial, neo-colonial, dependent, peripheral, or

price takers within the international political and economic communities is

a necessary point of departure. Hence, critical economic and political events,

such as oil shocks (sharp and sudden increases in oil prices), the fall of the

Berlin Wall (and the subsequent collapse of the socialist bloc), or the conclusion

of the Uruguay Rounds of GATT negotiations (and the creation of the World

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Globalisation and Economic Vulnerability

Trade Organization), have a critical impact on and accentuate the

vulnerabilities of the Caribbean economy and polity.

Against this backdrop of enduring, region-wide vulnerability, we ask

how conditions have changed since the dawn of the twenty-first century. It

could be argued that 9/11 is a critical event that marks the beginning of the

new century in the American hemisphere if not the world.1 This event resulted

in a major shift in the foreign policy doctrine of the United States. The

concept of homeland security represents a new understanding of the linkage

between foreign and domestic policy. Terrorism is now the centre of attention

of US foreign and domestic policy alike. The axis of American foreign policy

shifted from securing US interests throughout the world – i.e., national security

– to that of securing the integrity of its national territory through a range of

new and enhanced interventions both at home and abroad.

Put another way, the logic of ‘globalisation’ (the process of trans-

nationalisation of political, social and economic life) has brought forth the

linkage between foreign and domestic policies for the United States. The old

priorities have been redefined, making international terrorism the new fulcrum

of foreign policy. The twin problems of drug trafficking and money laundering,

which sometimes overlap but are nonetheless distinctive, have now become

subsumed under the label narco-terrorism. The issue of undocumented or

illegal immigration to the United States is now approached from the

perspective of an anti-terrorist policy aimed at securing the borders of the

United States continental land mass. The available evidence shows that the

9/11 perpetrators entered through various points in the northern part of the

hemisphere, the US and Canada. Nevertheless, the Caribbean and Mexico

are now seen and treated as potential points of entry for terrorists.

It is important to note also that the events of 9/11 took place as the

American economy was initiating a downward turn after nearly eight years

of sustained growth. The convergence of recession and the fear of terrorism

in the US has resulted in a heightened sense of socioeconomic as well as

strategic insecurity. The calls of President Bush to the American citizenry to

go on with their lives, travel and spend, have translated into more domestic

travel and spending, rather than into travel and spending abroad (CTO 2002:

9). This cut-back of US international travel since 9/11 follows a pattern seen

after the war with Iraq in 1991. Then, US citizens became more fearful of

flying abroad and Caribbean tourism, otherwise unrelated to the source of

fear, suffered. Responding to their president’s call, American patriotism since

9/11 has been turned into an ‘inward-oriented’ economic device, although it

has not reversed the downward trend in the US economy.