The Latin East

New Perspectives on Latin America-Middle East Ties

At the height of Latin America’s “pink tide” in the mid-2000s, left wing governments throughout the region developed unprecedented economic, political, and cultural ties with the Arab world as part of a larger effort to disrupt US hegemony globally. Meanwhile, in the Middle East, entrenched power regimes appeared to teeter against a wave of social and political movements broadly identified as the Arab Spring. Today, as the Pink Tide recedes and renewed conflict and authoritarianism grips the Middle East, the time is ripe to consider the origins, contours, and legacies of a relationship forged in a moment of deep regional and global flux, between parts of the world infrequently considered side by side.

The Latin East is a cross-regional and cross-platform collaboration dedicated to exploring these new and longstanding links between Latin America and the Middle East. Pooling the resources, expertise and experience of NACLA (North American Congress of Latin America), MERIP (Middle East Research and Information Project), and Jadaliyya, we hope to bring together scholars, artists, and activists to explore the social movements, cultural exchanges, political and economic institutions, and transnational solidarity and diaspora politics between the two regions.

Our inaugural two-day international conference took place in April 2018 at New York University, with further conferences and panels planned for 2019 and beyond.