THE BOLIVARIAN ALTERNATIVE

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THE BOLIVARIAN ALTERNATIVE FOR THE AMERICAS AND
THE CARIBBEAN the institution of "ALBA" and the
process of "alba"
KEN COLE International Institute for the Study of
Cuba London Metropolitan University December 2008
Ken.Cole_at_cubastudies.org
7/Cuba/Work/ALBA and alba 2008.ppt (15/11/08)
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LATIN AMERICA THE PROCESS OF REGIONAL INTEGRATION
In recent times there have been a number of
attempts to institutionally coordinate economic,
political and social life in Latin America
Each advancing particular political interests
associated with distinct economic strategies
Organización de los Estados Americanos - OEA
Organization of American States - OAS
(1948) Comunidad Andina de Naciones CAN
Community of Andean Nations CAN
(1969) Comunidad del Caribe CC Caribbean
Community CARICOM (1973) Asociación
Latinoamericana de Integración ALADI Latin
American Integration Association LAIA
(1980) Mercado Común del Sur MERCOSUR Southern
Common Market MERCOSUR (1985) Grupo de Rio
Rio Group (1986) Plan Puebla Panamá - PPP
Puebla-Panama Plan PPP (2001) Unión de
Naciones Suramericanas - UNASUR Union of South
American Nations UNASUR (2007) Etc
ALBA alba
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U.S. President George H. Bushs Enterprise for
the Americas initiative (June 1990) was intended
to establish a competitive free market zone
from Alaska to Tierra del Fuego
The first stage in this process was the
inauguration 1st January 1994 of the North
American Free Trade Association NAFTA
NAFTA is an agreement between Mexico, Canada and
the U.S.A., intended to increase trade and
regional investment through the expansion of
competitive markets
ALBA alba
For twenty years Mexico had hosted U.S. owned
component factories exploiting cheap labour in
the maquiladora zone along the border, now,
effectively Mexico became one vast duty-free zone
Real wages fell on all three sides In
Mexico, labourers pay per hour dropped 40 in
the first seven years while in all three
nations productivity and profits rose Palast
2007 306

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And while U.S./Mexican trade increased in 1995 by
23, total output in Mexico fell by 7 (see
Greider 1997 270-3)
In December 1994, at the Summit of the Americas
in Miami, the process of expanding NAFTA to
become La Área de Libre Comercio de las Américas
ALCA (The Free Trade Area of the Americas
FTAA) was initiated by the United States
ALBA alba
Negotiations leading to the inauguration of FTAA
were intended to be concluded in Mar de Plata
(Argentina) in 2005
Our objective is to guarantee our national
business free access, without difficulties, for
our products, services, technology and capital
throughout the hemisphere U.S. Secretary of
State Colin Powell, cited in Cockcroft 2004 6,
authors translation.

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But after 2 decades of austerity (poverty,
unemployment, inequality, etc) resulting from
neo-liberal inspired economic policy imposed on
the indebted economies of Latin America by the
IMF, World Bank and WTO opposition from global
mass movements in Seattle, Genoa, the World
Social Forum and elsewhere Third World
governments failure to agree in the Doha round of
trade negotiations in the WTO etc
With regional opposition to ALCA being
articulated through the Hemispheric Social
Alliance of trade unions, social movements,
indigenous, environmental and citizen
organizations from throughout the region (see
Saguir 2007)
ALBA alba
It was politically impossible for Latin American
governments to reach agreement on ALCA
Negotiations became stalled in 2003, and the
November 2005 Summit of the Americas in
Argentina intended to start the talks again,
ended without any agreement or final communiqué

"In the future, we will speak of US-Latin
American relations in terms of the era before Mar
del Plata, and the era after it," remarked
President Hugo Chávez in his weekly televised
talk show, Aló Presidente.

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Also in December 1994, in Havana, President Fidel
Castro (Cuba) met Hugo Chávez (to become
President of Venezuela in 1998) for the first
time
Chávez spoke with passion and depth about the
program of the Bolivarian Revolution in
Venezuela, and the possibility of realizing the
dream of Simón Bolívar the union of Latin
America Elizalde and Báez 2005 47, authors
translation
ALBA alba
Such a dream is one of self-determination for the
peoples of Latin America, so that, in a spirit of
cooperation, human dignity and solidarity, which
respects diversity, individuals might realize
their creative, human potentials

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as its name indicates ALBA is an
alternative to the global capitalist model, a
concept of a geo-economic, geopolitical, social,
cultural and ideological space that is in
construction Hugo Chávez, at the 6th Summit of
the Bolivarian Alternative for Latin America,
January 30th 2008, quoted, Janicke 2008, emphasis
added.
A dream which led to the conception of a
Bolivarian Alternative for the Americas - ALBA
The first official declaration and subsequent
agreement made under the framework of ALBA was
signed between Cuba and Venezuela in Havana on
December 14th, 2004.
ALBA alba
Bolivia joined in April 2006, Nicaragua in
January 2007, Dominica in January 2008 and
Honduras August 2008

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The initials ALBA
Even in the original Spanish this is not an exact
translation La Alternativa Bolivariana para las
Americas y el Caribeño
Signify the institution of regional integration
The Bolivarian Alternative for the Americas and
the Caribbean
But the word alba, translates as dawn of day
(Velásquez Spanish and English Dictionary)
ALBA alba
The implication is that there is a dawning of a
new (non-capitalist) reality

a geo-economic, geopolitical, social, cultural
and ideological space that is in construction
Hugo Chávez, at the 6th Summit of the Bolivarian
Alternative for Latin America, January 30th 2008,
quoted, Janicke 2008, emphasis added (quoted
above).
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The institution of ALBA is an essential element
in an emergent socialist consciousness, which is
the process of alba
A process which is driven by individuals
self-consciously reflecting on the experience of
existence
To be able to understand we have to examine
reality the most credible source of truth comes
from our own existence that is our experience
we have to learn to observe in order to create
we have to think about our experience that is
we have to reflect. José Martí 2001 362,
authors translation
ALBA alba

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The institution of ALBA formally includes 6
members who are committed to the alba process
But the various components of ALBA the process
of alba incorporate Ecuador, Argentina,
Brazil, Antigua and Barbuda, Belize, Grenada,
Montserrat, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, Turks
and Caicos Islands, The Bahamas, British Virgin
Islands, Guyana, St. Kitts and Nevis, Suriname,
Jamaica, Saint Lucia, Colombia, Paraguay and
Uruguay
ALBA alba
These components address regional needs
petroleum (PETROSUR), information and media
(TELESUR), education (Universidad del Sur),
international credit (Banco de la Alternativa
Bolivariana para las Américas), a regional seed
bank and Agro-Ecology School organized by the MST
(Brazil), regional health initiatives (e,g,
Operación Milagro to tackle ophthalmic problems,
and Latin American medical schools in Havana and
Caracas), etc

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The process of alba also includes other
regional institutions
In July 2006 Venezuela acceded to MERCOSUR,
Mercado Común del Sur Southern Common Market, a
trading block, made up of Brazil, Argentina,
Paraguay, Uruguay and Venezuela, which
constitutes some 75 of South Americas economic
activity and includes 65 of the continents
population, containing some of the largest
reserves of water and hydrocarbons on the planet.
ALBA alba

Although, with the addition of Venezuela and
recent economic accords signed with Cuba,
MERCOSUR has assumed more of a social/political
focus, it is still essentially a trading bloc
organized according to economic imperatives.
However, Hugo Chávez sees the involvement of
Venezuela in MERCOSUR as a crucial step in the
integration of the Americas and the ALBA/alba
process
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And on the 16th April 2007, at the 1st Energy
Summit, Venezuela was one of (twelve) founder
members of Union of South American Nations
UNASUR
Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez stated during
the meeting that Unasur is a very important
treaty for the continent and that it will
strengthen the governments of the southern
hemisphere. We are all governments of the left,
we have a lot in common and we are committed to
making the union of South America dynamic, he
declared. Prado 2008
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ALBA/alba is essentially a 21st century
embodiment of the ideals of José Martí and Simón
Bolívar (both 19th century Latin American
revolutionaries fighting for liberation from
Spanish colonial rule, who recognized that the
U.S.A. would become an obstacle to regional/local
self-determination)

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I am in danger each day now of giving my life
for my country and for my obligation of
preventing in time through Cubas independence
the United States from extending its control
and falling with that much more force upon our
countries of America. Whatever I have done till
now, and whatever I shall do, has been with that
aim José Martí 1885, quoted Castro 1962.
Alba is a process of conscientization fomenting
individuals understanding of the emerging social
context of their experience
ALBA alba
ALBAs primary areas of activity are promotion
and development of a peaceful democratic culture
focusing on integration in Latin America and the
Caribbean, through exchanges of ideas and
implementation of social, economic, and cultural
development projects eradication of extreme
poverty education combating corruption
employment generation and elimination of
discrimination for reasons of gender or race.
Carmen Jacqueline Giménez Tellería, President of
the ALBA Governing Council, (Tellería, 2006,
emphasis added).
The United States seems destined to plague the
Americas with misery in the name of
liberty. Simón Bolívar (1829), quoted Pividal
2006169, authors translation.
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REFERENCES Bolívar S, (1829), Letter to Colonel
Patrick Campbell, in Bushnell (2003)
172-173. Bushnell D (ed), (2003), El
Libertador Writings of Simón Bolívar, Oxford,
Oxford University Press. Castro F, (1962), The
Second Declaration of Havana, New York,
Pathfinder. Cockcroft J, (2004), America Latina y
Estados Unidos historia y política país por
país, La Habana, Editorial de Ciencias
Sociales. Elizalde R M and Báez L, (2005), El
Encuentro, La Habana, Oficina de Publicaciones
del Consejo de Estado. Greider W, (1997), One
World ready or not, London, Penguin Janicke K,
(2008), Summit of the Bolivarian Alternative
(ALBA) Concludes in Venezuela, Global Research,
at, http//www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?contex
tvaaid7935, accessed 12th June 2008. Martí
J, (2001), Volumen 19, Viajes, Diarios, Crónicas,
Juicios, in, José Martí Obras, La Habana,
Centros de Estudios Martianos CD, ISBN
959-7006-60-X. Palast G, (2007), Armed Madhouse,
London, Penguin.
Pividal F, (2006), Bolívar
pensamiento precursor de antiimperialismo, La
Habana, Fondo Cultural de Alba. Prado C, (2008),
The Socialist United States of Latin America?,
Information Clearing House, at http//www.informa
tionclearinghouse.info/article20003.htm,
accessed 14th June 2008 Saguier M I, (2007),
The Hemispheric Social Alliance and the Free
Trade Area of the Americas Process the
challenges and opportunities of Transnational
Coalitions against neo-liberalism, in
Globalizations, Vol. 4, No. 2 251-265. Tellería
C J G, (2006), SUMMARY OF INFORMATION CONCERNING
ALTERNATIVA BOLIVARIANA PARA LAS AMERICAS,
document prepared for the Permanent Council of
the Organization of American States, at,
http///www.scm.oas.org/doc_public/ENGLISH/HIST_06
/CP15956E07, accessed 8th January 2008.
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