It is increasingly apparent to me that whatever its operational deficiencies and political challenges – characteristic of all multilateral groupings - news of Caricom’s demise constitutes a gross exaggeration rooted in appalling, publicly exhibited ignorance of its structure, role, and functions.
Yes, breaches have widened along one critical
pillar, but there remain other sturdy functioning structures. International
relations expert Nand Bardouille’s suggestion of a widening Caricom “breach” is
valid regarding the foundational pillars of foreign policy coordination, and
associated regional security concerns, and cannot be dismissed.
However, past quarrels – Guyana, Grenada,
Taiwan/China, Malvinas/Falklands – brought bruises and fractures, but nothing
close to death.
It is also true, and not for the first
time, the body blows have been bruising and extensive. Yet, there is no
accompanying corpse - which would certainly include a gory exhibition of
important T&T socio-cultural and economic organs and limbs.
For, who is sustaining the blows from whom?
There is a certain nonsense about Caricom comprising a “them” and an “us.” It’s
also there in the language that somehow “Caricom” comprises a monolithic
“other.”
Regional political coordination is, by
definition, a highly problematic pursuit. We may recall the early years that brought
us Guyana’s chronic electoral challenges, the Grenada Revolution, and the embrace
of Cuba as a regional partner.
We’ve also had the problematic embrace of
Haiti as a member, the Taiwan/China divide, and differing perspectives on the
Gaza genocide.
In this, all of us have at some point been
unreliable allies on the consensus field. T&T stood its ground on the US invasion
of Grenada in 1983. And let us not forget politely divided opinions surrounding
the Falklands/Malvinas War in 1982.
On matters such as these we have not been
alone. Who, indeed, is “the United Nations” or “the OAS” or “the EU” or “ECOWAS.”?
Among the more important issues explored by
OAS Secretary General, Albert Ramdin in my recent interview with him were the
numerous challenges to the process of multilateralism amid current global
turbulence.
It concerns many that while all of this
comes down to questions of defensive self-preservation, there has been a
growing trend by countries – big and small, rich and poor, the powerful and the
powerless – to contemplate the
dismantling of regional and global alliances designed to address conditions
that conduce to peace, cooperation, and ensuing development gains.
The Ramdin interview unveiled real-life
experiences associated with the OAS and its place as a hemispheric platform for
the realisation of declared multilateral values.
He was able to cite the “ups and downs (of)
the United Nations in the 1940s and the later crises of the 1960s and 1970s which
were bilateral in nature, in the first instance, but later expanded to global levels.
Since then, everywhere, there have emerged regional
integration arrangements such as Caricom to distil the dynamics of
multilateralism in measures of collective geographical self-interest and to
activate the potential of joint enterprise.
As explained in this space two weeks ago,
the longstanding Caricom project is ambitiously multidimensional in nature with
core mandates including economic integration, foreign policy coordination,
human and social development, and security cooperation.
Its rules of engagement, especially in
foreign policy, have never pretended to undervalue individual posture.
Despite this, there has been general
consensus on international candidatures, and bloc representation in hemispheric
and global decision-making. There is also the pursuit of a notion of open
regionalism reliant on a high measure of policy coherence within Caricom.
“Not for the first time in their
post-independence history, Caricom member states are mired in a foreign
policy-related trajectory in which national and regional interests are pulling
in opposite directions,” Dr Bardouille wrote recently.
In my view, the critical point to monitor
would be the extent to which Caricom’s sometimes faltering foreign policy “pillar”
teeters and destabilises other key structures.
Adjoin regional security and problematic
foreign policy cohesion and witness what confronts the region now in the face
of the US military attack on Venezuela and abduction of Nicolás Maduro and his
wife. This was plainly a violation of international law.
The statement by the Caricom Bureau
(comprising the heads of Jamaica, Saint Kitts and Nevis, and Saint Lucia) covers
some essential points including “the fundamental principles of international
law and multilateralism enshrined in the UN Charter, including sovereignty and
territorial integrity of States and respect for human dignity.”
This is neither bland nor ideologically
neutral. It is a useful guide. Propagandists and social media trolls had hoped
for either congratulatory declarations or unqualified condemnation. That’s not
how this works.
Here’s hoping all reliable regional partners
meet and discuss even before the St Kitts and Nevis Summit next month. There
are wounds, but none of them fatal.
