The Words of the Davies Family
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The Words of the Davies Family |
On Thursday, May 29, Drs. J.W. Bertens spoke, in Dutch, at the UPF-NL Dialoogcentrum in Amsterdam Zuid on the topic "Latin America: third or our world".
The evening was opened by UPF-NL General Secretary Wim Koetsier, who gave a short introduction to UPF, the principles and practices. He mentioned that he had been at a meeting the previous week where there had been a discussion about missionizing, whether it was a good thing or not. He said everyone was a missionary of one sort or another. Politicians were trying to make their point, businesses were trying to sell their product, it would be very boring if no one promoted anything. After showing a video about UPF, he introduced Dr. Bertens.
Dr Bertens started his talk by giving a summary of his career. He had studied history at university and had entered the diplomatic service, serving in a number of countries, including Africa and the Middle East, and as Press Chief in the Foreign Ministry in the Hague. He had served the longest time in Latin America including six years as Ambassador to Central America, based in Costa Rica. He had later been a member of the European Parliament, representing D66, and was currently, among many other activities, vice-chairman of NCDO (Nationale Commissie voor Internationale Samenwerking en Duurzame Ontwikkeling -National Committee for International Cooperation and Sustainable Development).
Latin America had been colonized by Spain, except for Brazil, by Portugal, in accordance with a ruling by the Pope and for 300 years had had exactly the same government system, centered on the King, supported by the government, military and church (Roman Catholic). After the Battle of Waterloo, 1815, and the Congress of Vienna, Spain and Portugal left Latin America, but the centralized system stayed the same, the king being replaced by juntas, and generals, who, like Simon Bolivar, created the countries of today. There was always a “boss”.
These new countries had not fought each other, though there had been civil wars, but though they spoke one language (Portuguese was very similar to Spanish), they did not cooperate very well. Though Latin Americans tended to be conservative, there was a tendency towards new voters, native-Americans (Indians), non-establishment people, youth to bring change, one new president had proclaimed “my victory is the end of a long, somber night in our land, the end of an era (of domination by the church, politicians and army -- by Spain).
There was certainly an oil and food crisis coming. Latin America had tremendous natural resources, Argentina was immensely rich, there was more oil on the coast of Brazil than in Saudi Arabia, and Latin America was said to have one third of the world’s fresh water.
Since 911, the US had been focused on Afghanistan and the Middle East, in particular on Iraq. There was surprisingly little trade between North and South America. India and China were both showing interest, their presidents had made visits.
Dr. Bertens discussed various ideas about how the world would develop in the coming years, quoting from a book, “Divided World: The struggle for primacy in 2020”, and about how the “West” should relate to other countries. Since the end of the “cold war”, the US had been the only super power, but now other countries and blocs were emerging.
The theme running through his talk, which became explicit as he reached the end, was that Europe should seek an alliance with Latin America. Europe’s post WWII experience of building the European Union could be valuable in helping Latin American nations cooperate with each other and Latin America’s huge resources could help Europe deal with the shortages that were surely coming.
The European influence was still central to the culture of Latin America, and “yes, Latin America is our world.”