The Region's Blue Chip Investment
Thanks to a Special Relationship Between the Ruling Elite and Multinationals
by Allan Nairn
In the eyes of a Guatemalan labor leader who recently went under ground after an army death squad came calling at his home, 1981 will be grim. "This will be the year of poverty and hunger for Guatemala," he says.
A Bank of America executive, who recently increased his Guatemalan lending capital as a show of confidence in the country's future, has another view. "The economy is very, very strong at this point," says Keith Parker. "This year should be excellent. If we as a bank were looking to lend money to a government, if we looked at it strictly on the numbers, Guatemala would be Al, before any other Latin country."
These men are looking at the two faces of Central America's largest economy (1980 GDP in excess of S7 billion). After decades of U.S. intervention and domination, Guatemala has emerged as a classic case of dependent development. The economy is doing well by conventional business standards. There is a diversified and cosmopolitan oligarchy, a thriving multinational sector with more than 200 U.S. firms, and - for the majority of the population - some of the most abject poverty in the Western hemisphere. '
The 1954 coup (instigated by United Fruit Company and implemented by the CIA), which overthrew the elected reformist government of Jacobo Arbenz, cast the die for the next 27 years of Guatemalan politics and economic development. The structural underpinnings of today's Guatemala -inequitable land distribution, reliance on export agriculture, extensive penetration by multinational capital, and repressive, military-oligarchic government-were locked in place and insulated from democratic challenge by the post-Arbenz regimes.
According to the most recent Guatemalan census, two percent of the population owns 65 percent of the land. On the large estates, 60 percent of the land lies fallow. Roughly two thirds of the population earns its living by working on the land as permanent or temporary farm labor on the large estates or as owners of "subsistence" plots of 2.5 acres or less. In recent years, many such plots have been expropriated by large growers and military officers. Each year more than 500,000 peasants unable to find work in the highlands migrate in search of seasonal work on coastal plantations. Guatemala's population is 7 million.
(snip)
The Region's Blue Chip Investment
Thanks to a Special Relationship Between the Ruling Elite and Multinationals
by Allan Nairn
In the eyes of a Guatemalan labor leader who recently went under ground after an army death squad came calling at his home, 1981 will be grim. "This will be the year of poverty and hunger for Guatemala," he says.
A Bank of America executive, who recently increased his Guatemalan lending capital as a show of confidence in the country's future, has another view. "The economy is very, very strong at this point," says Keith Parker. "This year should be excellent. If we as a bank were looking to lend money to a government, if we looked at it strictly on the numbers, Guatemala would be Al, before any other Latin country."
These men are looking at the two faces of Central America's largest economy (1980 GDP in excess of S7 billion). After decades of U.S. intervention and domination, Guatemala has emerged as a classic case of dependent development. The economy is doing well by conventional business standards. There is a diversified and cosmopolitan oligarchy, a thriving multinational sector with more than 200 U.S. firms, and - for the majority of the population - some of the most abject poverty in the Western hemisphere. '
The 1954 coup (instigated by United Fruit Company and implemented by the CIA), which overthrew the elected reformist government of Jacobo Arbenz, cast the die for the next 27 years of Guatemalan politics and economic development. The structural underpinnings of today's Guatemala -inequitable land distribution, reliance on export agriculture, extensive penetration by multinational capital, and repressive, military-oligarchic government-were locked in place and insulated from democratic challenge by the post-Arbenz regimes.
According to the most recent Guatemalan census, two percent of the population owns 65 percent of the land. On the large estates, 60 percent of the land lies fallow. Roughly two thirds of the population earns its living by working on the land as permanent or temporary farm labor on the large estates or as owners of "subsistence" plots of 2.5 acres or less. In recent years, many such plots have been expropriated by large growers and military officers. Each year more than 500,000 peasants unable to find work in the highlands migrate in search of seasonal work on coastal plantations. Guatemala's population is 7 million.
(snip)
While the oligarchy and the multinationals have prospered together, the population that does their work has been literally fighting for survival. Even Sause of the American Chamber of Commerce admits that "Guatemala has in the past been guilty of the crimes of repressing the peasants, failure to provide social development for the poor, failure to provide opportunity." Sause contends this is changing, but virtually every available indicator of peasant and worker living standards suggest that while changes have indeed taken place since President Lucas Garcia assumed office in 1978, they have overwhelmingly been for the worse.
(snip/...)
http://multinationalmonitor.org/hyper/issues/1981/05/nairn.html~~~~~~~~~~~~~The Persistence of Terror
by Rolando Alecio and Ruth Taylor
from the Report on Guatemala, Fall 1998
~snip~
Resignation by state authorities in the face of crime can be traced in part to the ruling class' historic relationship to the army and to the counterinsurgency war itself. The governing Party of National Advancement (PAN) represents the same oligarchy that financed the war and turned the country over to the military so it would "protect" their interests. But to date, only the army has had to answer-although only at the level of moral sanctions and a reduction in its scope of operations-for the crimes committed during the terror. Members of the army who lost their jobs because of the armistice, as well as those who remain within the institution, know the "truth" about the oligarchy's role in the war, and may be using it as their trump card to ensure that they retain a degree of power, or at least a free hand in carrying on their illicit trades.
Kidnappings have proven to be a handy tool for keeping the elite in their place, not to mention a lucrative business. It is perhaps ironic that Guatemala's oligarchy, who in the past politically and materially supported state terror, are now often the target of this transformed and privatized terror.
Furthermore, former military officers, well-equipped with terror skills, are also in good position to destabilize the government should the authorities try to put the squeeze on their operations.
(snip/...)
http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Global_Secrets_Lies/PersistantTerror_Guat.html~~~~~~~~~~~~US Sponsored Terror and Genocide in Guatemala The Glorious Victory
by Carlos Fuentes (translated by Evan Fowler
~snip~
Education, Taxes, Collective Labor Contracts, and Land
Redistribution: this minimal modernization program was rejected, first
with contained anger, then with open hostility, and finally with
treason by the Guatemalan oligarchy and its main ally, the United
Fruit Co., a giant transnational corporation of the Central American
economy. To educate the Indians and the peasants was anathema to the
oligarchy. It was almost in violation of God's law. And to pay taxes
was worse than an heresy, it was Communism.
The United Fruit Company protested the new labor law enacted
in 1947 and threatened to leave Guatemala before complying with new
labor conditions, such as job security, accident compensation, health
care, education, and maternal leave. But, the United Fruit Company
(UFC) did not find support from the US Government which under
President Truman, was still sticking to the "good neighbor policy'
established by FDR during the Depression Era. However when the
Republicans came to power, with the election of Eisenhower, the
entente between the Guatemalan oligarchy, the United Fruit Company and
Washington solidified.
Eisenhower's Secretary of State, John Foster Dulles, an
experienced lawyer, negotiated a profitable agreement between United
Fruit and the American monopoly on the Guatemalan train system. His
brother, Allen Dulles, who had been the lawyer of a bank that
channeled secret funds from the Central Intelligence Agency to
Guatemala, was chosen by Eisenhower to head the CIA and John Moors
Cabot, the appointed Deputy Secretary of State for Latin America, was
also a large shareholder of United Fruit Co. When the Arbenz
government tried to apply agrarian reform laws to idle land owned by
the UFC in 1951, the company asked the CIA to overthrow Arbenz.
ArŽvalo and Arbenz were inspired by the legislative
measures of the American "New Deal." The Guatemalan Social Security
Law came from the equivalent US law, the labor code was a reflection
of the US Wagner Act, and the agrarian reform continued the principles
established after the Mexican Revolution. ArŽvalo and Arbenz did
not demonize their enemies. They asked all Guatemalans to support
these fundamental steps for the modernization of the country. When
the left offered its support, Arbenz asked also that of the right.
However, the right, as conservative Mexicans did during the Mexican
revolution, preferred to ask for foreign support, with the excuse that
Arbenz was a marionette of International Communism.
(snip/...)
http://mit.edu/thistle/www/v9/9.06/7genocide.html~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Cherchez la asshole, you get the oligarch.
Just jump right in there, do a little searching yourself. It will only help.
On edit: Uh, oh, just looked at your question again:
"WHo funds "Guatemala's powerful oligarchy " ?"
What you need is an understanding of what "oligarchy" means, apparently:
oligarchy
One entry found for oligarchy.
Main Entry: ol·i·gar·chy
Pronunciation: 'ä-l&-"gär-kE, 'O-
Function: noun
Inflected Form(s): plural -chies
1 : government by the few
2 : a government in which a small group exercises control especially for corrupt and selfish purposes; also : a group exercising such control
3 : an organization under oligarchic control
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