2008 Program Report
We are pleased to present this summary of the Inter-American Dialogue’s work in 2008.
This year was the 16th time that Dialogue members have met in plenary session for the Sol M. Linowitz Forum. The forum brought together some one hundred leaders from across the Western Hemisphere—led by our co-chairs Ricardo Lagos and Carla Hills—to identify ways the next U.S. president can improve inter-American relations, and to debate policy prescriptions for fast-changing economic scenarios across the region. Drawing on the conclusions and recommendations of the Linowitz Forum, the Dialogue released in March 2009 A Second Chance: U.S. Policy in the Americas, its 10-point agenda for a new U.S. policy in the Americas designed to guide the Obama administration through the most important challenges it is likely to confront in the region.
In 2008, Dialogue staff published a dozen articles and interviews in leading policy journals—Great Decisions, Current History, World Policy Journal, Latin American Politics and Society, Foreign Affairs en Español, and Revista América Economía—that analyzed the policy choices facing the next U.S. president, next steps for Cuba, consequences of Latin America’s increasingly diverse international relations, the impact of globalization on Peru’s economy and social fabric, and the paradoxes presented by Chávez’s Venezuela. Staff also published over 100 articles in newspapers, including The Washington Post, The Miami Herald, El Tiempo, O Estado de São Paulo, El Mercurio, El Universal, El Comercio, ideele, La Prensa, and Confidencial—on topics ranging from Barack Obama’s cabinet picks to questions about free trade with Colombia, the rising tide of women in political power, student achievement, trends in remittance flows, and the state of democracy in the Caribbean. Dialogue staff are regularly quoted by U.S., Latin American, and European newspapers and interviewed on television and radio.