Caribbean Development in the New Multipolar World Order

Dennis C. Canterbury

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2021
• ISBN:
  9781000431575
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Sociology
• Index: Social Sciences

This book addresses the subject of critical development alternatives for the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) states in a post-neoliberal, new multipolar world order based on competition and co-operation by the United States, the European Union, China, and Russia for natural resources and markets. Neoliberal globalization has traditionally restricted economic and political activities in the Caribbean region to Western-style free-market capitalism and liberal democracy. However, through an exploration of the new multipolar world order, which replaces the US-led unipolar global order that existed since the collapse of the former Soviet Union, the author argues that today, the Caribbean Community states now have real economic and political options for development alternatives. Through examining how countries such as China and Russia have risen to economic success in recent years, the book seeks to explore how the Caribbean Community states might adopt such features which would allow them to formulate "another" development, such as introducing measures which can bring about a reconciliation between resource use and endowment, and reduce inequalities. As such, it will appeal to scholars of sociology and development studies with interests in the Caribbean region and world order.

1Introducing an alternative development idea

DOI: 10.4324/9781003092414-1

Introduction

This book employs a historical critical development studies method to undertake a post-neoliberal globalization analysis of development alternatives for the Caribbean in the new multipolar world order (NMWO). The goal is to shift the analysis of Caribbean political economy off the deconstructionist perch it occupied in the neoliberal era, to new constructionist explorations in the NMWO. The analysis, therefore, falls under the purview of the critical tradition of the “golden age” in Caribbean political economy that vigorously searched for and attempted to construct development alternatives to colonial capitalist exploitation. The Caribbean Community countries are in the political independence stage of their evolution, from their status as colonies of imperial European powers to autonomous self-governing nation-states. Political independence however was a mechanism to continue the utilization of the new countries’ economic resources for capital accumulation in the imperial European economies. These countries have had half a century to transcend that neocolonial trap set for them at the time of their political independence. Also, the neoliberal globalization era that constrained their economic and political behaviors within the boundaries of free-market fundamentalism and neoliberal democratization is over. Their political and economic actions must now reflect the evolutionary phase of their development. The Caribbean states are at a historical conjuncture at which they have had 50 years to unshackle neocolonial relations, and neoliberal globalization economic relations that fettered them for three decades. They must now embark on a new course of development in the post-neoliberal NMWO.

The Caribbean cannot stand idly by while the post-war liberal and neoliberal economic structures that control it but which it had no part in creating, are being dismantled. The gravity of international power is shifting from the West to the East, and new international institutional structures are emerging. The politically independent Caribbean states collectively through the CARICOM have an opportunity and obligation to contribute at the level of ideas and practice to shape the vision of the NWMO. They were merely passive albeit important participants in hitherto economic orders such as neocolonialism and neoliberal globalization created by Western powers. The leading Eastern country shaping the NMWO is not doing so from the perspective of a colonizer modeling an economic order for its colonies. Countries are being invited to determine for themselves the extent of their economic participation in the NMWO. This idea is at the core of China's Belt and Road Initiative that is reordering international economic transactions away from the Western-centered institutions created at Bretton Woods and the policies they prescribe.

The question is: what are the Caribbean states going to do about the new situation in which they have found themselves? Are they brave and practical enough to realign their economies with China and the BRICS, and renegotiate their economic relations with the United States (US) and European Union (EU)?

The immediate post-independence period was the golden age for alternative models of political economy in the Caribbean. But, the region slipped into a deconstructionist mode in the neoliberal era when it was constrained only to operate in the free-market model. Caribbean scholarship lost its way to generate original critical ideas on how to provide working people their basic needs. A wide chasm emerged between the subject matters of Caribbean scholarship and solutions to the poverty conditions in which working people live. Thomas (2001) expressed the need for the Caribbean to return to its ways of constructing alternative development models. This book about development in the Caribbean Community in the NMWO is intended as a contribution toward that need. It is a premeditated return to the sources, as it were, in the furtherance of the tradition of independent critical thinking in the Caribbean.

The globe has transitioned to a NMWO comprising four poles of power – China, the EU, Russia, and the US. China and Russia are a part of the BRICS with Brazil, India, and South Africa. The BRICS, which at times is identified as a separate pole of power, constitute about 42 percent of the world's population, 23 percent of its GDP, 30 percent of the territory, and 18 percent of global trade, and are larger than were all of the advanced countries at the end of World War II (Stiglitz, 2018). The transition to the NMWO is based on the assumption that the US-led unipolar neoliberal global order has collapsed. This global order was in place since the demise of the former Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR).

The Caribbean Community comprises 15 member states – Antigua and Barbuda, The Bahamas, Barbados, Belize, Dominica, Grenada, Guyana, Haiti, Jamaica, Montserrat, St. Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, St. Vincent, and the Grenadines, Suriname, and Trinidad, and five associate members – Anguilla, Bermuda, British Virgin Islands (BVI), Cayman Islands, and Turks and Caicos Islands (TCI) (CARICOM, 2018). The 15 member countries of the CARICOM had a total population of approximately 18,848,730 persons in 2020 covering a land mass 177,000 square miles or 458,428 square kilometers. These countries are relatively small considering their diverse population, size, geography, culture, and economic and social development. They are located in the Americas that give them close access to North and Latin American markets. The economies in several of these countries depend on tourism, financial services, agricultural, and natural resources extraction. Their primary constraints are periodic natural disasters – hurricanes, floods, and mudslides, and their small size, dearth of scale economies, and vulnerabilities to external shocks.

These small island developing states (SIDS) and mainland countries have evolved within the historical frameworks of capitalist theory and practice since their encounter with European feudalism and mercantile capitalism. They have been subjected to mercantile, classical political economy, neo-classical, Keynesian, and neoliberal theories; experimented with Marxism, and advanced their own theoretical approaches to explain and advance their social, political, and economic realities. They have actively participated as colonies and independent countries in different international environments and orders – multipolar, bipolar, unipolar and now a NMWO which is the product of a contradictory process. Neoliberal economic policies intended to universalize the free market, catapulted communist China to superpower status. China now wants to have more state-led free market policies in the NMWO, while the US through Trumpian “America first” policies is implementing protectionist measures in the form of tariffs. Stiglitz's (2018) analysis of the new protectionism demonstrates the extent to which neoliberal free market fundamentalism has lost its way.

Another dimension of the NMWO is that the world has traversed imperialism and colonialism and has arrived at a stage where there is not a preponderance of colonies directly owned by imperial or colonial powers. The age of those imperial empires is gone (Harvey, 2003), although, imperialism continues to be manifested in different forms other that direct ownership of one country by another (Canterbury, 2012; Harvey, 2003; Noonan, 2017; Petras and Veltmeyer, 2001; 2014). The former European colonizers, now with the exception of the UK due to Brexit, have merged as a single force the EU on the world stage. The US is disengaging from neoliberal globalization under Trumpian “America first” nationalist doctrine labeled “patriotism.” The US and UK seem ready to take the world into newer forms of imperialism as the US disengages from neoliberal globalization and the UK from the EU. The vast majority of the nation-states in the world are politically independent, save for the small number of existing UK and US colonies.

The CARICOM countries emerged from colonies that had no say in their insertion into the world capitalist economic system. Today they are independent states and do have a say about the direction of their economic policies in the NMWO. They do not have to conform to the false dichotomy of having to choose between state-led and market-led economic policies to develop their economies. The capitalist state is controlled by business interests that elect political representatives that make laws that govern the economy. The Caribbean can choose to replace the capitalist multinationals with state-owned companies supported by economic policies of the domestic political elites. The difference is whether state elites or private individuals control the commanding heights of the economy and not about the economy being state-led or market-led.

The economic model that has emerged in China combines several large state-owned companies with privately owned businesses under the aegis of the Chinese state to lead the economic development process. These companies partake in domestic and international markets as directed by the state and in accordance with market conditions. China has implemented market reforms but in a sequenced gradual manner rather than in a chaotic way as happened in Russia where liberalization was rapid (Stiglitz, 2018). Stiglitz (2018) speaks of a multipolar globalization in which China can circumscribe the abuse of market power by the advanced countries and their companies but warned that the interests of these companies and those of China may converge in the future to limit competition.

The Caribbean has had a very violent beginning marked by the decimation of pre-Colombian peoples and their economic, political, and social organizations and the burden of slavery. European conquest, plunder, and colonial settlement from the late fifteenth century to the early seventeenth century was followed by the imposition of a colonial slave mode of production or slavery-cum-capitalism from the mid-seventeenth century to the early nineteenth century. The emancipation of slaves, introduction of indentured labor, collapse of the colonial slave mode of production, transformation of the planter class and slave labor into full-fledged capitalist and working classes, and the emergence of the US as a major capitalist power, shaped capitalist development in the Caribbean.

The book addresses the subject of critical development alternatives for the CARICOM states in a post-neoliberal globalization new multipolar world order. The NMWO is based on competition and co-operation between the US, EU, China, and Russia for natural resources and markets. The CARICOM states have real economic and political options for development alternatives. Neoliberal globalization restricted their economic and political activities to Western-styled free-market capitalism and liberal democracy. Economic prosperity in the NMWO is derived through different styles of economic and political organization. There are the Chinese, Russian, US, and European paths to economic success. The US and EU succeeded through imperialism and colonialism, unlike current successes in China and Russia which have not been imperial powers in the Caribbean.

Caribbean development is about the people and they are the ones to choose the economic path they wish to pursue. The economic prosperity of the Caribbean is being held back by four key factors. The first are the historical constraints placed on the region by its role as former European colonies and by European and US imperialisms. Second, the consumption patterns do not satisfy the basic needs of the population. Third, there is a disjuncture in the pattern of resource use and resource endowment. Fourth, the inequalities associated with property ownership and the social relations it engenders are worsening (Thomas, 1988). The solution to these problems requires the CARICOM states to pursue development alternatives. The principal challenge for Caribbean states in constructing another development in the twenty-first century is for them to engage in a win-win navigation of the NMWO in the furtherance of their self-interest. The Caribbean must recognize the NMWO as a framework for the creation of paths to alternative development. What are the prospects for the Caribbean engaging the NMWO as a means to construct another development?

Selected economic indicators in the CARICOM

The CARICOM emerged after the British West Indies Federation which existed between 1958 and 1962, was aborted. Various heads of government meetings on regional cooperation from 1963 led to the establishment of the Caribbean Free Trade Area (CARIFTA) in 1965. The CARIFTA was transformed into a Common Market and the Caribbean Community was established in 1972. The Treaty of Chaguaramas founded the CARICOM in 1973. The Treaty of Chaguaramas was revised between 1993 and 2000 and is now officially entitled, The Revised Treaty of Chaguaramas Establishing the Caribbean Community, Including the CARICOM Single Market and Economy. The main purpose of the revision was to create a new version of the Treaty, to bring it in line with the neoliberal free trade ideology.

The CARICOM (2018) has identified the objectives of the agency as that of improving the standard of living and work of Caribbean people. The CARICOM promotes full employment of the productive factors, as well as accelerated, coordinated, and sustained economic development and convergence, the expansion of trade and economic relations with third states, and enhanced levels of international competitiveness. Its objective includes organizing member-states for increased production and productivity, the achievement of a greater measure of economic leverage and effectiveness in dealing with third states, groups of states and entities of any description, and enhancing the co-ordination of their foreign and international economic policies. The CARICOM's objective is to enhance functional cooperation which includes the stimulation of more efficient operation of common services and activities for the benefit of Caribbean peoples, accelerated promotion of greater understanding among Caribbean peoples and the advancement of their social, cultural and technological development, and the intensification of activities in health, education, transportation and telecommunications (CARICOM, 2018).

Currently, the CARICOM economies are in a pretty bad shape which requires the region to recalibrate its development strategy within the framework of the NMWO. The community has failed to reach a 2 percent annual growth rate in gross domestic product (GDP) at constant prices between 2010 and the preliminary reporting on the statistic for 2018. The percent annual growth rate in GDP at constant prices ranged between −1.7 and 1.9 percent (ECLAC, 2019). The annual growth rate in per capita GDP was preliminarily reported to grow 1.4 percent in 2018 but it failed to reach 1 percent in the entire period between 2010 and 2017. It was as low as −2.3 percent in 2016 and only recovered to −0.5 in 2017 (ECLAC, 2019). New resource transfers remained in the negative quadrant through the period 2010–2018 which indicated that outflows to service debt continue to exceed inflows which come primarily from direct foreign investment. When net resource transfers are considered in conjunction with the precipitous decline in foreign direct investment from US$2,500M in 2010 to US$596M in 2018, the economic situation is even more dismal.

Meanwhile, the total gross external public debt increased from US$18,567M in 2011 to US$25,805M in 2018 (ECLAC, 2019). The gross international reserves declined from US$18,262M in 2010 to US$15,773M in 2018. The average non-financial public sector gross public debt as a percentage of GDP fluctuated between a high of 82.5 percent in 2013 and a low of 78.6 percent in 2018. The average gross central government public debt as a percentage of GDP increased from 69.8 percent in 2011 to 71.8 percent in 2018 but was at its highest point 74.3 percent in 2017 (ECLAC, 2019). Neoliberal economic theory holds, a debtor country cannot grow out of debt when the debt stock is over 75 percent of GDP (Bernal, 2017). Thus, the economic plight of the CARICOM states is revealed by the debt/GDP ratio which in 2014 was 130.5 percent for Jamaica, 108.5 percent for Barbados, 99.1 percent for Grenada, 96.4 percent for Antigua, 82.4 percent for the Bahamas, 79.4 percent for St. Vincent, 78.4 percent for St. Lucia, 78.0 percent for...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Series Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication Page
• Contents
• 1 Introducing an alternative development idea
• 2 The imperialist frameworks of Caribbean development
• 3 The Caribbean in the “New American Century”
• 4 The Caribbean making America great again
• 5 The new multipolar world order
• 6 Theoretical advances with Caribbean capitalist development
• 7 The CARIFORUM-EU EPA and Brexit
• 8 Neoliberal financialization in the Caribbean
• 9 Caribbean agriculture in the new multipolar world order
• 10 PetroCaribe and the CARICOM–China development alternative
• 11 China–US policies and the CARICOM
• 12 Conclusion: Economic policy for the new multipolar world order
• Index