Perspectives on the Seventh Summit

Presidency of Argentina / CC BY-SA 2.0

The seventh Summit of the Americas in Panama City comes at a critical moment in hemispheric relations. Much of the region faces considerable economic and political turmoil and regional cooperation seems both more tenuous and yet more important than any time in recent memory. Meanwhile, with the ongoing opening towards Cuba and escalating rhetorical confrontation with Venezuela, the US relationship with Latin America also seems to be in flux.

To provide perspective and analysis in anticipation of this critical moment, the Inter-American Dialogue assembled a private press roundtable of leading analysts and journalists covering the Summit.

After Michael Shifter, the president of the Dialogue, opened the event, three top experts offered reflections. Thomas F. “Mack” McLarty III—White House chief of staff, counselor to the president, and special envoy for the Americas under President Clinton, in effect the principle architect of the first Summit of the Americas—gave an optimistic overview of how this meeting relates to past Summits and how regional dynamics are likely to play out. Jorge I. Domínguez—Antonio Madero Professor for the Study of Mexico and vice provost for international affairs at Harvard University—explained the state of the rapprochement between the US and Cuba, as well as the considerable depth of preexisting collaboration between the two countries. Finally, Peter Hakim—president emeritus and senior fellow at the Dialogue—expanded the conversation to include the ongoing diplomatic conflict between the US and Venezuela as well as broader trends in US-Latin American relations.

From there, the event addressed a range of general and specific aspects of the upcoming summit.

Regarding Cuba, there are many reasons to be optimistic about the opening, even beyond the “handshake moment,” as McLarty described it, between Barack Obama and Raúl Casto. In particular, much of the roundtable noted both the upbeat tone around the negotiations and public expressions of trust in the process coming from both sides. Domínguez went so far as to predict “that at least one president in Panama at the Summit will publicly praise President Obama for his ‘wise and courageous decision,’ and that will be Raúl Castro.” Moreover, the Cuba opening is likely to echo across the rest of the Summit. As McLarty described, “there's no doubt that the bold initiative on Cuba takes away a very complicated, contentious issue that you saw at Cartagena and summits before."

On Venezuela, however, the dynamics seem more uncertain. As Hakim described, "predicting what Maduro will do is very hard at this point.” Although this does not necessarily mean the Summit will be the same platform for Venezuelan anti-US rhetoric that it has been in the past. According to McLarty, “it's pretty hard to argue against human rights and democracy, and I hope that the president will get some broad support from other leaders in the region in that regard." Hakim too noted that countries such as Brazil, Chile, Mexico, and perhaps even Cuba all have reasons to gain favor with the US at this moment in time, and that could help defuse tensions with Venezuela at the Summit. Yet as Shifter asserted, if Latin American countries are to rebuke Venezuela in favor of the US, they should do so not “in exchange” for the US policy change towards Cuba, but rather in response to the deteriorating human rights situation in Venezuela.

Through all of this, the United States and President Obama come into the Summit with what Shifter described as a “strong hand.” This credibility comes not just from the Cuba opening, but also from the ongoing Iran talks, the relatively strong US economy, and genuine attempts to engage with Latin America. “The administration is trying to pursue a different, more conciliatory approach,” he said, “something that’s viewed pretty sympathetically by most of the Latin Americans at the Summit.”

Finally, the roundtable noted how the Summit is evolving over time. In the words of Domínguez, perceptions around the Summit have undergone a “reinvention away from a club of democracies into a club where Latin American governments talk to the United States.”

Also participating in the roundtable were Dialogue member Karen DeYoung, associate editor and senior national security correspondent for the Washington Post, PBS NewsHour’s Margaret Warner, NPR’s diplomatic and State Department correspondent Michele Kelemen, as well as journalists from Bloomberg, the Associated Press, Univision, El País, Agence France Presse (AFP), EFE News Services, Notimex, the Christian Science Monitor, Estadão (Brazil), El Espectador (Colombia), El Gráfico (Guatemala), El Comercio (Peru), and El Tiempo (Colombia).