Security & Prosperity Partnership

A promising sign of meaningful change in U.S. foreign policy toward the hemisphere would be the official demise of the SPP of North America, whose apparent failure none of the three governments so far have dared to acknowledge. This creature of Bush's imperial presidency was agreed to and announced with great fanfare by the U.S., Canadian and Mexican presidents in 2005. Since then, it has been an obscure process in which the executive powers of the governments, along with the CEOs of 30 of the largest corporations in the three countries; many of them military contractors, have extended the security perimeter of the United States to "ensure that North America is the safest and best place to live and do business."

Why did it fail? Among the reasons were because it became evident that the SPP wasn't going to perform, as advertised, to provide more security and prosperity to "North American" people. What better proof of this than the failed war on drugs in Mexico that took about 6,200 lives in 2008 alone? The SPP has failed also thanks to the oppositionof a wide array of civil society groups in the three countries of Canada the U.S. and Mexico, that denounced its secret dealings.

And since the Mexican economy is more dependent on the United States than is any other Latin American economy, it's going to be the hardest hit by the economic crisis. In addition, the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) remains in place, privileging major corporate interests and making it harder for small and medium business to participate in the export sector. Therefore, enormous challenges for civil society organizations remain.