Latin American Nations in World Politics by Heraldo Muñoz

Author:Heraldo Muñoz [Muñoz, Heraldo]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Political Science, General
ISBN: 9780429963605
Google: Xf7EDwAAQBAJ
Goodreads: 38795201
Publisher: Routledge
Published: 1984-11-07T00:00:00+00:00

Political Ideologies and External Pressures

The Conservative Surrogate

With the August 10, 1984, inauguration of León Febres Cordero, Ecuador turned to a hardheaded businessman who championed free-market economic policies while energetically urging renewed foreign investment. Faced with a stagnating economy, he immediately turned to the United States for assistance. Warmly received by the Reagan administration, he was to become an ardent representative of U.S. policies in the region. Even before taking the oath of office, in fact, the president-elect had flown to Washington and New York for private conversations with President Reagan, Secretary of State George P. Shultz, and representatives of creditor banks and international investors. He promised to give high priority to foreign capital, urged rapid disbursement of funds from international lending agencies, and publicly praised U.S. policy in Latin America. Even so, he was subsequently to proclaim a lack of interest in ideological concerns, contending during his inaugural address that it was “senseless to stake out a position to right or left;... We will not lose our perspective by adopting sectarian stances.”19

His minister of foreign relations had underlined this position in his first official declaration by promising that foreign policy under the new president would be “very open and pragmatic.”20 In practice, however, this would mean skepticism toward the United Nations and other international organizations, a pulling back from OPEC and from the Andean Pact, and a continuing effort to court the Reagan administration. In April 1985 Febres returned to the United States, where he met with government officials and New York financiers and attended a baseball game with then Vice President George Bush. While this trip was unofficial, Febres returned in January 1986 as an invited guest of the Reagan administration, to be lauded by the North American president as a model leader for the hemisphere. He was viewed by the administration as a true-believing ideological soulmate and, in addition, a reliable defender of Washington’s policies.

Although Febres had confounded his domestic critics with a surprise trip to Havana in April 1985, in general his policies effectively ingratiated the president himself with the Reagan administration. He became critical of the Contadora effort to mediate the strife in Central America and eventually used the organization as a means of breaking with Nicaragua. After having agreed to join the Contadora Support Group in October 1985, he then provoked the Nicaraguans by demanding that they hold popular elections without recourse to violence and to “beatings.” Daniel Ortega retorted that Febres was a tool of the Yankees who was violating his own constitution at home. In a matter of hours Quito announced a rupture of relations, and soon it withdrew from the Contadora Support Group as well. For the remainder of his term Febres remained openly hostile to the Sandinistas while deemphasizing multilateral relationships.

Not only were Hurtado’s initiatives left dangling but such traditional organizations as the Andean Pact and OPEC were either criticized or largely ignored. Ecuador’s involvement with the former had been increasingly unenthusiastic during the years since the May 25, 1969, signing of the pact in Cartagena, Colombia.

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