African American Research Center, Library, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Notes:
14 p., This paper has to do with a question that is important for the future of the Hemisphere: namely, what to do about the Organization of American States (OAS)? On February 23, 2010, heads of state from throughout Latin America and the Caribbean met in Cancun and formed a new organization: the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC). It has the same membership as the OAS, but without the United States and Canada, and it includes Cuba.
A central weakness in U. S. policy toward Cuba has been the undervaluation of the utility of negotiation and the overvaluation of the utility of penalties. The tendency has been to adopt symbolic policies toward Cuba in response to domestic political pressures in the United States
"In our Cold War fight with Castro, (we were) willing to subsidize Cubans to leave to come here and at the same time lock Haitians out. That is not fair, and we deserve a different policy," [Jesse L. Jackson Sr.] said. He said the U.S. pays to bring Cubans here, subsidizes them, but pays to send Haitians back to Haiti. "That's not fair," he stated. "Haiti fought for our freedom." "The Cubans are political refugees looking for political freedom, and they're given money to come, but, the Haitians are economic refugees so they must go back. There are more Haitians who've died... than Cubans," Jackson said calling for an end to the double standard of refugees between Cuba and Haitians seeking to come to America.
