Good news! I have a forthcoming article in Foro Internacional, published by the Colegio de México, in early 2017. It is titled, “Coloso fragmentado: The ‘intermestic’ agenda and Latin American foreign policy.” The review process was quite positive, with good suggestions from the anonymous reviewers. It will be out in Foro Internacional 227 (vol. LVII-1, enero marzo de 2017). There is a bit of delay because I wrote the piece in English, and Foro is graciously handling the translation for me. So, if you have something you would like to publish to engage with a Spanish-language audience, I would recommend it, even if you don’t want to (or can’t) write it in Spanish. Here is an abstract:
Abstract: “Intermestic” issues, including trade, migration, and drug-trafficking, dominate contemporary U.S.-Latin American relations and matter deeply to Latin American and Caribbean states. Despite their importance to Latin American leaders and publics, Latin American diplomats have had less success influencing U.S. policy than in other spheres. These failures owe, at least in part, to the dynamics that intermestic issues create in the U.S. foreign policy process. While those dynamics have been broadly explored, there has been less attention to the ways in which these dynamics affect Latin American and Caribbean foreign policy towards the United States. Building on work by Putnam, Milner, Tsebelis, and others, this article argues that intermestic issues have more veto players and narrower win-sets than traditional foreign policy issues, which complicates attempts at influencing U.S. policies. The argument is examined against the case of the U.S.-Mexico cross-border trucking dispute, where the Mexican government struggled with U.S. officials and interest groups for two decades to gain U.S. compliance with NAFTA. After briefly exploring other relevant issues, the article suggests that for Latin American policymakers, intermestic issues demand different diplomatic strategies.
Tom Long, PhD 