Human security emergent? Post- authoritarian and post- neoliberal discourse and public policy in Latin

Introduction 1994-the year that the human security concept was first specifically articulated and promoted by the United Nations Development Program (UNDP)―was also a significant year in Latin America. In that year, El Salvador held its first ever democratic elections and the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) took effect in Mexico (and Canada and the US). The Salvadoran national elections, in a country that had suffered from decades of brutal authoritarianism and bloody civil conflict, symbolized the extension and durability of the regionally transformative democratization trend that had begun in Latin America in the late 1970s. NAFTA represented the ascendance and expansion of the norm of economic neoliberalism in the region. Since 1994, the political democratization trend has remained generally strong in Latin America while economic neoliberalism has peaked and then faltered in the face of various competitors. As human security depends on democracy and is one of the (moderate) alternatives to strict economic neoliberalism, the recent and current conditions for human security in Latin America seem propitious. Why would Latin American states pursue human security goals and approaches? Simply put, this chapter argues that the failures of both political authoritarianism and economic neoliberalism foster human security-friendly innovations in political economy discourse and public policy in contemporary Latin America. This chapter is divided into four major sections. First, after brief review of the concept of human security and some theoretical literature, the chapter provides a schematic historical overview of, first, the rise and fall of political authoritarianism and, second, the rise and fall of economic neoliberalism in Latin America over the last several decades. The failures of both authoritarianism and neoliberalism have resulted in human security finding more fertile ground in twenty-first century Latin America. Second, the chapter comments on Latin America’s modest but significant engagement with post-1994 human security discourse and institutions as well as Latin America’s substantial if uneven state-and citizendirected movements toward policies and programs that have advanced the human security agenda over the last two decades. This section identifies two nations (Chile and Costa Rica) and two regional think-tanks (Inter-American Institute ofHuman Rights and the United Nations Economic Commission on Latin American and the Caribbean) that have led the way on human security discourse and institutions in Latin America. Third, the chapter highlights two illustrative human security case studies in Latin America: first, as an example of the role of states in fighting extreme poverty, Brazil’s Family Grant program (2004present), and second, as an example of the international community’s efforts to foster human security, the United Nations Trust Fund for Human Security financing of a municipal-level peaceful coexistence and citizen security project in El Salvador (2008-2011) (UNTFHS 2012). Fourth, informed by the human security literature and aware of the importance of regional dynamics-which operate between global and national systems-for the human security project, the final major section of the chapter offers critical theoretical commentary on the opportunities and the limits of human security in contemporary Latin America. With reference to issues and questions raised in Sangmin Bae’s Introduction to this Human Security, Changing States, and Global Response volume, the chapter concludes with a short review of the motivations and behaviors of Latin American states which have incorporated human security into their domestic and foreign policies.

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