In Their Own Best Interest : A History of the U.S. Effort to Improve Latin Americans

For over a century, the United States has sought to improve the behavior of the peoples of Latin America. Perceiving their neighbors to the south as underdeveloped and unable to govern themselves, U.S. policy makers have promoted everything from representative democracy and economic development to oral hygiene. Whatever the problem, a bureaucratic culture in Washington D.C. is committed to finding solutions that will uplift Latin Americans. The United States' paternalistic role as improver of nations began in the Progressive Era, Lars Schoultz shows, when an altruistic belief in bettering others gained currency. During the Cold War, institutions were established to turn that belief into concrete commitments designed to shore up national security against the threat of communism. Many of these institutions, such as the Agency for International Development and the National Endowment for Democracy, live on in the contemporary uplift industry. Through exponential expansion, they now employ tens of thousands of government workers and outsource to private contractors the job of improving peoples around the globe. But is improvement a progressive impulse to help others, or a realpolitik pursuit of a superpower's interests? In Their Own Best Interest wrestles with this tension between helping the less fortunate and demanding payback in the form of subordination. In the twenty-first century, Schoultz writes, the uplift industry is embedded deeply in our foreign policy, extending well beyond relations with Latin America, and the consequences are troubling. Many Latin Americans now say: You have a habit of giving--we have a habit of receiving. For over a century, the United States has sought to improve the behavior of the peoples of Latin America. Perceiving their neighbors to the south as underdeveloped and unable to govern themselves, U.S. policy makers have promoted everything from representative democracy and economic development to oral hygiene. Whatever the problem, a bureaucratic culture in Washington D.C. is committed to finding solutions that will uplift Latin Americans.The United States' paternalistic role as improver of nations began in the Progressive Era, Lars Schoultz shows, when an altruistic belief in bettering others gained currency. During the Cold War, institutions were established to turn that belief into concrete commitments designed to shore up national security against the threat of communism. Many of these institutions, such as the Agency for International Development and the National Endowment for Democracy, live on in the contemporary uplift industry. Through exponential expansion, they now employ tens of thousands of government workers and outsource to private contractors the job of improving peoples around the globe.But is improvement a progressive impulse to help others, or a realpolitik pursuit of a superpower's interests?__In Their Own Best Interest__wrestles with this tension between helping the less fortunate and demanding payback in the form of subordination. In the twenty-first century, Schoultz writes, the uplift industry is embedded deeply in our foreign policy, extending well beyond relations with Latin America, and the consequences are troubling. Many Latin Americans now say: You have a habit of giving--we have a habit of receiving. In this book, Lars Schoultz explores the culture of "improvement" that defines the attitudes and values shaping all United States policies towards Latin America in the past and present. Schoultz's aim is to find the sources of this political and intellectual culture which has informed our relations with our southern neighbors and which continues to do so despite its faulty premises and its failure to effect change and transformation. Schoultz focuses on two period in the past as critical to embedding the culture and policies of improvement: the Progressive Era, which established the belief in "uplifting" others for their betterment, and the Cold War Era, which established the institutions for sustaining and implementing the process of uplifting a people and state. In Their Own Best Interest: A History of the U.S. Effort to Improve Latin Americans is a powerful historical indictment of a "constellation of beliefs" that has been a central part of Washington's foreign policy establishment and culture. The notion that the United States knows better than its allies and neighbors what is best for each of them resonates beyond Latin America and underlies much of the United States' foreign policies around the world.-- Provided by publisher Winner of the William M. LeoGrande PrizeFor over a century, the United States has sought to improve the behavior of the peoples of Latin America. Perceiving their neighbors to the south as underdeveloped and unable to govern themselves, U.S. policy makers have promoted everything from representative democracy and economic development to oral hygiene. But is improvement a progressive impulse to help others, or realpolitik in pursuit of a superpower's interests?“In this subtle and searing critique of U.S. efforts to ‘uplift'Latin America, Lars Schoultz challenges us to question the fundamental tenets of the development industry that became entrenched in the U.S. foreign policy bureaucracy over the last century.”—Piero Gleijeses, author of Visions of Freedom“In this masterful work, Lars Schoultz provides a companion and follow-up to his classic Beneath the United States...A necessary and rewarding read for scholars and students of U.S. foreign policy and inter-American relations.”—Renata Keller, The Americas Cover 1 Title Page 4 Copyright 5 Dedication 6 Contents 8 Introduction: Altruists and Realists 10 1. Establishing the Need for Improvement 22 2. Uplifting Begins: The War of 1898 35 3. Money Doctors, Democracy Doctors, and Marines 52 4. Latin American Opposition and the Retreat from Protectorates 79 5. Pledging to Be a Good Neighbor 114 6. Breaking New Ground: Uplifting Institutions 146 7. To Improve or Not to Improve? The Cold War Question 172 8. Cuba Determines the Answer 205 9. Losing Panache, Entrenching Institutions 227 10. The Evolution from Economic to Political Improvement 251 11. Promoting Good Governance 273 Conclusion: Whose Best Interests? 298 Abbreviations 316 Notes 318 Index 392