Memo from Mexico
By Allan Wall
Is Mexico a part of North America—or is it part of Latin America?
It’s an important question. The SPP (Security and Prosperity Partnership) is drawing the U.S., Canada and Mexico into ever-closer union. It could well culminate in some sort of North American Community/Union along the lines of the European Union across the pond.
So which is it?
Geographically, of course, Mexico is part of the continent we call North America. But culturally, Mexico is part of Latin America.
The U.S.-Mexican border, what’s left of it, anyway, is not only an international border between two nations. It’s a socioeconomic border between the First World and the Third World. And it’s a cultural border between Anglo-America and Latin America, two cultures that still, despite globalization, have profound differences.As I reported in an earlier VDARE.COM article, there is opposition here in Mexico to the developing SPP, just as there is opposition to NAFTA.
Why do Mexicans oppose integration with the U.S.?
In the first place, Mexicans don’t want to become Americans.
They also fear that NAFTA and the SPP are tricks for the U.S. (called “The Colossus of the North”) to steal Mexico’s natural resources.
Another objection: if Mexico is going to integrate, it should be integrating with the Latin American “sister nations”, not with the Anglo-Saxons of the north. That’s an argument of Miguel Pickard, prominent Mexican opponent of the SPP. He writes:
“Deep integration would mean foregoing an independent future. For Mexico it would forever cancel the Bolivarist dream of a united Latin America, with Mexico spurning its historic relationship with the rest of Latin America. The North American identity to be forged would be spurious and forced. The right of Mexicans to decide the future of the Mexican nation is at stake…” [http://www.vdare.com/awall/070821_memo.htm
The “Bolivarist dream” refers to “El Libertador”, Simon Bolivar (1783-1830), the great South American general/politician who had a vision of a Latin American federation. Bolivar’s dream failed—even his Gran Colombia broke up into 3 countries—but it provides a reference point for Latin Americans, of various persuasions, who favor some sort of Latin American integration.
(Interestingly, James C. Bennett in his book The Anglosphere Challenge gives new life to this notion by arguing that the internet is placing a premium on common language, so that linguistic blocs—what he calls the Anglosphere, the Hispanosphere, the Sinosphere—will inevitably emerge regardless of government ambitions).
Mexico’s government, nevertheless, has been pursuing free trade and growing integration with the U.S. since the 1980s.
http://www.vdare.com/awall/070906_memo.htm