Foreign Policy Provcast

In a weird twist of history, the United States has spent the bulk of its diplomatic energy everywhere but its own backyard: the Western Hemisphere. President Trump has vowed to change that, wisely re-prioritizing Latin America after years of neglect, but may be undermining his chances of success with a counterproductive tariff policy that (ironically) resembles those of many failing/failed Latin American countries—at least, that’s what Providence contributor Eric Farnsworth argues in his recent essay, “Is America Becoming Latin America?” In today’s episode, Mr. Farnsworth defends and explains his argument, fielding questions like: Is America really becoming like Latin America, and if so how? What is the backstory of US-Latin America relations until now? What are the similarities and differences between our two cultural blocs? And why does Latin America matter to the US beyond issues of illegal migration, crime, and area denial (historically, to European empires, the USSR, and now to the Chinese Communist Par