Globalization and Development in Latin America and the Caribbean: A Review

Globalization and Development: A Latin American and Caribbean Perspective (2003) is a study of the process of globalization in the economic, political and cultural spheres, focusing mainly on the economic developments. Understanding the process as being multidimensional in nature, the authors, José Antonio Ocampo and Juan Martin, the Executive Secretary of the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) and the Special Advisor to the Executive Secretary respectively[i], analyze globalization as a historic event realized in three well-differentiated phases, which prove, that it is not an irreversible process. The authors define globalization as the growing influence exerted at the local, national, and regional levels by financial, economic, environmental, political, social and cultural processes that are global in scope (Ocampo & Martin, 2003, p.1); a process in which dynamics are based on inequalities of various types. Globalization poses great opportunities, but also great challenges, and the unevenness of the international arena makes it hard for sustainable development to occur without the intervention of proper international institutions.� Developing countries, especially those of Latin America, should adopt a positive standing on the issue of globalization, and work together to take advantage of the opportunities it offers. Many years have past since this book was published in the early 2000\u27s, and although it lacks the more current statistics and data, the theoretical analysis, its implications and the trends the authors observed are still valid, and so is the positive agenda they proposed. It is on their analysis and recommendations that this essay is based, adding to their original themes the latest developments and the newest trends in Latin American development