Climate change does not recognize borders, and policies to address its consequences need to be equally international. Over the last year, the Center for Latin American Studies (CLAS) has been engaged in discussions and collaborations on this issue from Antofogasta, Chile, to Berkeley, California. Participants have included Chile’s former President Ricardo Lagos and renewable energy scientist and innovator Stanford Ovshinsky. Now, as part of our program “Alternative Energy and the Americas,” we are including Europe in the dialogue.
We begin this issue of the Review with an article about the Berkeley visit of Daniel Cohn-Bendit, a leader of the Greens in the European Parliament. Robert Collier, a visiting scholar at Berkeley’s Goldman School of Public Policy, lays out Cohn-Bendit’s argument that Europe has “the potential to join with Latin America to pursue multilateralism and low-carbon energy policies” and documents the political leader’s comments on the challenges that need to be surmounted.
In the same global frame, Kevin Gallagher writes about the meteoric rise of China’s influence in Latin America over the last decade. He notes that China “has created an unprecedented demand for Latin American and Caribbean goods, particularly commodities, which has helped boost the region’s growth” and then explores the possibilities and consequences this phenomenon entails.
As part of a year-long commemoration of Mexico’s centen-nials — the 1810 War for Independ-ence and the 1910 Revolution — this Review presents three historical articles on Mexico. Brian DeLay discusses the role of indigenous peoples in the Mexican–American War (1846-48); Margaret Chowning examines the relationship between women, politics and the Church from 1810 to 1910; and Barry Carr looks at Mexico City as a haven for radicals and exiles in the decade after the Revolution. The last two articles were drawn from a conference convened by Berkeley’s Bancroft Library and co-sponsored by CLAS.
Finally, CLAS had an unusually active film program this fall, including advanced screenings of two films widely mentioned as possible Academy Award nominees for best documentary. Charles Ferguson came to present his riveting film “Inside Job,” which deconstructs the meltdown of the U.S. financial system, a catastrophic event with implications from Iceland to Latin America. And Berkeley anthropologist Nancy Scheper-Hughes reviews “Waste Land,” an unusual and compelling film about Brazil, garbage pickers and art.
— Harley Shaiken