North American Congress on Latin America (NACLA)
The North American Congress on Latin America (NACLA) is an independent, nonprofit organization founded in 1966 that works toward a world in which the nations and peoples of Latin America and the Caribbean are free from oppression and injustice, and enjoy a relationship with the United States based on mutual respect, free from economic and political subordination. To that end, its mission is to provide information and analysis on the region, and on its complex and changing relationship with the United States, as tools for education and advocacy—to foster knowledge beyond borders. Together with MERIP and Jadaliyya, the Congress is a partner in the cross-regional, cross-platform collaboration that makes up the Latin East project.
NACLA Report on the Americas Vol. 50, No. 1, Spring 2018
NACLA’s Report on the Americas is the oldest and most widely read progressive journal covering Latin America and its relationship with the United States. The first issue of the Report’s 50th volume found the publication reaching well beyond the borders of Latin America in search of the region’s wider, global, and reciprocal influences in relation to the Middle East.
Responding to Latin America’s striking and strategic outreach to the Middle East during the Pink Tide, contributors engaged with questions—as yet largely unasked, much less answered—about how the image and role of Latin America in the Middle East changed in the process, permitting new and more dynamic comparative research agendas between both regions.
Key questions included: what informed Latin America’s turn to the Middle East during the Left turn, and how was it manifested? How did it draw on, and how did it alter, previously existing images of Latin America in the Middle East in popular culture, literature, and media? How powerfully did common cause around anti-US sentiment in Latin America and the Middle East inform new solidarities, and with what consequences? How did different meanings of “Left” in each region shape understandings and misunderstandings of a new relationship? Did new state-to-state level relations between leaders in Latin America and the Middle East percolate among populations at large? How were longstanding areas of South-South cooperation—in terms of energy, trade, and diplomacy—affected? And after the Pink Tide in Latin America and the Arab Spring’s turn to deadly winter, what is left of these changes, and what is their future?
Below you can find a list of the articles featured in the issue, including links to pieces through Taylor & Francis.
Nasrin Alavi, “Problematic Brothers: Iranian Reaction to Chávez and Ahmadinejad”
From NACLA Report on the Americas: Volume 40, Issue 5, 2007—The Multipolar Moment?
Fernando Camacho Padilla, “Reading Latin America in Tehran”
Through his experiences teaching in Iran, a Latin American Studies professor finds deep historic links and growing interest. But there is still much room for mutual discovery.
Nadim Bawalsa, “Palestine West of the Andes”
Chile is home to the world’s largest Palestinian diaspora community. How did Chile’s Arabic newspapers contribute to its formation?
Tariq Dana, “Palestine Beyond Slogans”
The Palestinian struggle has long been at the forefront of Left solidarity movements. But behind simple understandings lie a complex web of factions and splits.
Lena Meari, “Reading Che in Colonized Palestine”
On analyzing and drawing inspiration from revolutionary Latin American texts.
Farid Matuk, “Not a Person but an Occasion”
A statement on three poems.
Houzan Mahmoud & Ismail Hamalaw, “The Latin Boom in Iraqi Kurdistan”
In Latin American and Kurdish literature, magic and reality meet.
Omar Imseeh Tesdell, “Planting Roots, Claiming Space”
How the tangled histories of dryland farming in the U.S. West shaped political aspirations in early Palestine and post-revolutionary Mexico.
K. Flo Razowsky, “Up Against the Wall”
From Israel-Palestine to U.S.-Mexico to Spain-Morocco, a visual exploration of the physical reality of nation-state imposed borders and barriers.
Paul Amar, “Military Capitalism”
In Egypt and Brazil, the foundations of a terrifying new “para-populism”are taking shape at the intersection of international finance, mega-construction, and military rule.
Marwan M. Kraidy, “A Tale of Two Modernities”
What two preeminent scholars in Saudi Arabia and Latin America tell us about modernity and cross-cultural connections.
Relevant articles from the back catalogue
Michael Tanzer, “Solidarity at the Oil Pump: A Proposal for the Oil Exporting Nations of the Third World” (from NACLA 34, no. 1, 2001)
Jane Hunter, “Israel: The Contras’ Secret Benefactor” (from NACLA 21, no. 2, 1987)
Milton Jamail & Margo Gutierrez, “Getting Down to Business” (from NACLA 21, no. 2, 1987)