Dollar Diplomacy

First Published in 2000

United States economic assistance programs in Latin America have been frequently restructured during the course of the past four decades. This book examines the evolution of US aid to the region, describes and explains US aid to the region since 1960. Focus is placed on four successive initiatives, the Alliance of Progress for the 1960s, the New Directions Mandate of the 1970s, the Private Enterprise Initiative of the 1980s and the Democracy Initiative of the 1990s. Empirical examples of actual programs, drawn from primary source documents, are used to illustrate more general propositions. The primary objectives of this study are to describe and explain US assistance policy toward Latin America during the past four decades and account for changes in the aid regime over time. Such assistance is typically linked to either the developmental needs of recipient countries, or the economic interests of transnational corporations.