Economic and Social Interests

Abstract

Foreign economic policy has assumed a level of importance in the 2000s comparable to the position long held by military and political policy. For the global south, the world attention to economics should have come as a relief inasmuch as these nations’ primary goal has normally been economic development, with foreign policies keyed to achieving this domestic aim. However, the turn to economic goals has carried certain pitfalls for southern states: beginning in the late 1980s, the thrust toward economic liberalization forced them to open their weak economies to greater penetration and competition from economic interests in the north. In the case of small dependent states like those in the Caribbean, the imperative to liberalize heightened their inherent vulnerability by fostering changes in their relationships with their major economic partners in Europe and North America. In the 2000s, these changes are presenting Caribbean Community (Caricom) decision makers with some of the most challenging issues on the foreign policy agenda.