Latin America’s Year in Review

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Latin America Brief A one-stop weekly digest of politics, economics, technology, and culture in Latin America. Delivered Friday. Sign Up By submitting your email, you agree to the Privacy Policy and Terms of Use and to receive email correspondence from us. You may opt out at any time. Enter your email Sign Up ✓ Signed Up Latin America’s Year in Review In 2024, the region secured trade deals, held key elections, and saw some economic surprises. Osborn-Catherine-foreign-policy-columnist15 Catherine Osborn By Catherine Osborn , the writer of Foreign Policy ’s weekly Latin America Brief. Argentine President Javier Milei (from left), Uruguayan President Luis Lacalle Pou, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, and Paraguayan President Santiago Peña pose for a family photo during the Mercosur summit in Montevideo, Uruguay, on Dec. 6. Argentine President Javier Milei (from left), Uruguayan President Luis Lacalle Pou, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, and Paraguayan President Santiago Peña pose for a family photo during the Mercosur summit in Montevideo, Uruguay, on Dec. 6. Eitan Abramovich/AFP via Getty Images My FP: Follow topics and authors to get straight to what you like. Exclusively for FP subscribers. Subscribe Now | Log In Politics Economics North America South America Catherine Osborn December 27, 2024, 8:00 AM Comment icon View Comments ( 0 ) Welcome back to Foreign Policy ’s Latin America Brief, and happy holidays. This week, we’re looking back at some big stories from 2024: the European Union-Mercosur trade deal, Mexico ’s landmark elections, and positive economic indicators in Argentina and Brazil . Welcome back to Foreign Policy ’s Latin America Brief, and happy holidays. This week, we’re looking back at some big stories from 2024: the European Union-Mercosur trade deal, Mexico ’s landmark elections, and positive economic indicators in Argentina and Brazil . Trending Articles What to Expect at Elise Stefanik’s Confirmation Hearing The U.N. ambassador-nominee might face questions about Trump’s threats to U.S. allies, relations with Russia on the… Powered By Advertisement What to Expect at Elise Stefanik’s Confirmation Hearing X Sign up to receive Latin America Brief in your inbox every Friday. Sign up to receive Latin America Brief in your inbox every Friday. Sign Up By submitting your email, you agree to the Privacy Policy and Terms of Use and to receive email correspondence from us. You may opt out at any time. Enter your email Sign Up ✓ Signed Up Multilateralism Produces Results One of the biggest geopolitical events in Latin America came late in the year: the announcement that Mercosur and the European Union had finalized a trade deal that was 25 years in the making. The agreement would create one of the world’s largest free trade zones. European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen flew to Uruguay to seal the deal in early December, convinced that she could whip sufficient support to make a big announcement in the capital of Montevideo. France was long opposed to the deal but put up less resistance as its government collapsed in the first week of this month. The South American side also overcame dissonance to reach the agreement. Argentine President Javier Milei, who took office last year, campaigned on pulling out of Mercosur but abandoned those threats. Proponents of the deal argued that it would not only promote economic growth but also help countries navigate grand strategy in a world increasingly divided by great-power competition. By cooperating more closely, Europe and Latin America could defend shared values and maintain autonomy, an advisor to then-EU foreign-policy chief Josep Borrell told Foreign Policy last year. The EU-Mercosur deal must be ratified in the national legislatures of Mercosur countries, the European Parliament, and the Council of the European Union before it is implemented. (France still aims to tank the agreement in the council, where it needs a larger majority to pass.) But by moving forward after years of stagnancy, South American countries managed to overcome ideological differences to think bigger geopolitically. It wasn’t the only effective case of multilateralism in Latin America this year. In November, Brazil hosted the G-20 leaders’ summit. A year prior, speculation around the event focused on the question of whether Russian President Vladimir Putin would attend—and whether the Russia-Ukraine war would continue to stymie decision-making in multilateral forums. (The International Criminal Court indicted Putin for war crimes and has a warrant out for his arrest; Brazil is a member of the court’s founding statute.) By the time of the summit, divisions over Russia’s war conduct still loomed large. But Brazil also introduced topics that allowed for new consensuses. G-20 ministers devoted significant attention to discussing a potential global tax on the super-rich as well as the need to reform the United Nations Security Council and multilateral development banks. Venezuela’s Opposition Organizes In recent years, efforts to resist government repression in Venezuela were often complicated by divisions among the country’s multiple opposition parties. That changed in 2024, delivering a major blow to President Nicolás Maduro’s legitimacy in July elections. Venezuela’s opposition unified this year in part thanks to coalition building. Talks between the Maduro administration and hemispheric neighbors—especially the United States—also helped encourage a relatively competitive vote. That gave the opposition an incentive to coalesce around one candidate, Edmundo González. Venezuela’s July 28 vote was not free and fair, and authorities hastily declared Maduro the winner. Even so, by collecting receipts from voting machines across the country, the opposition produced disaggregated voting data that many experts say is proof that González won. Sign up for Editors’ Picks A curated selection of FP’s must-read stories. Sign Up By submitting your email, you agree to the Privacy Policy and Terms of Use and to receive email correspondence from us. You may opt out at any time. Enter your email Sign Up ✓ Signed Up You’re on the list! More ways to stay updated on global news: FP Live Enter your email Sign Up ✓ Signed Up World Brief Enter your email Sign Up ✓ Signed Up China Brief Enter your email Sign Up ✓ Signed Up South Asia Brief Enter your email Sign Up ✓ Signed Up Situation Report Enter your email Sign Up ✓ Signed Up View All Newsletters The effort diminished Maduro’s legitimacy domestically and internationally. It swayed some neighbors that were friendly with Maduro, including Brazil and Colombia, to distance themselves somewhat from his regime. But it has not stopped Venezuelan authorities from arresting, harassing, and disappearing activists. Maduro is due to be inaugurated for another term in January; González has since fled to exile in Spain. Morena Triumphs in Mexico Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum delivers a speech as part of her inauguration at Zócalo Square in Mexico City on Oct. 1. Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum delivers a speech as part of her inauguration at Zócalo Square in Mexico City on Oct. 1. Cristopher Rogel Blanquet/Getty Images Polls and analysts predicted that Mexico’s ruling Morena party would win the country’s June presidential election. The whopping scale of the party’s victory —33 percentage points—underscored its dominance of Mexican politics. Claudia Sheinbaum also became Mexico’s first female president. Sheinbaum’s win had several international implications. First, it bucked a global pattern in 2024 of incumbent parties losing elections amid persistent global inflation. After Democrats’ losses in the United States, observers noted that one thing Morena did differently was repeatedly raising Mexico’s minimum wage. In actions as well as messaging, Morena ran explicitly as a pro-poor party—and won. Second, Sheinbaum’s rise is proof of the power of gender parity requirements, which are enshrined in the Mexican Constitution. Mexico’s top two presidential candidates were women, as are the country’s Supreme Court chief justice and central banker. Such quotas don’t guarantee feminist policies, but they do normalize women’s leadership. Third, the scale of Morena’s victory may leave it less sensitive to criticism of controversial policies. Sheinbaum supported a sweeping overhaul to Mexico’s court system in September over objections from the U.S. government and international investors, who said the reform could politicize the justice system and worsen Mexico’s business environment. But amid threat of trade wars from U.S. President-elect Donald Trump, domestic support can only get Mexico’s leaders so far. Trump’s threat of a blanket 25 percent tariff already appears to have prompted major action from Mexico City, including large-scale fentanyl busts . Morena’s popularity may protect its leaders from pushback if they take dramatic policy steps, such as stepping up sweeping detentions of northbound migrants. Economic Surprises One of the reasons that Latin America is not more influential on the world stage is that it has been mired in at least a decade of low economic growth. The U.N. Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean dubbed 2015-2024 “the second lost decade,” a grim reference to the region’s debt crises during the 1980s. Since 2015, Latin American economies grew by an average of just 0.9 percent per year, the commission estimated in August. So it’s notable that Brazil, the region’s largest economy, may end the year with more than 3 percent GDP growth. That outpaces most early-year forecasts from major banks. One factor behind Brazil’s growth is new multibillion-dollar spending packages under President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva’s administration. What remains unclear is whether his policies will make Brazilian industry more productive —or just flush with cash that may be quickly burned through. This month, Lula’s spending packages prompted investor concerns over Brazil’s deficit that caused currency devaluation. Meanwhile, Argentina has exited the recession caused by Milei’s economic shock therapy. Monthly inflation has fallen from around 25 percent when he took office last December to 2.4 percent last month . Poverty in Argentina has skyrocketed amid Milei’s policies, yet he has retained a surprisingly high approval rating of around 50 percent—a testament to how disillusioned Argentines were with previous center-left and center-right governments. Public acceptance of Milei’s policies may not last . But Argentina, Latin America’s third-largest economy, looks closer than it did a year ago to warding off the kind of debt crisis that has so often destabilized the country in the past. Balancing U.S. and Chinese Influence Workers are seen at the megaport in Chancay, Peru, on Oct. 29. Workers are seen at the megaport in Chancay, Peru, on Oct. 29. Cris Bouroncle/AFP via Getty Images In 2024, the United States and China showed off what their diplomacy can offer Latin America. The year began with the inauguration of Guatemalan President Bernardo Arévalo, an anti-corruption figure whom allies of outgoing President Alejandro Giammattei tried to block from taking office. U.S. diplomats were part of the pressure campaign to get Arévalo’s opponents to back down. The episode echoed Brazil’s 2022 election, where U.S. officials waged an intense behind-the-scenes effort to encourage Brazilian military officers and politicians to respect the results of the vote that saw Lula elected. Taken together, U.S. actions in the region during Joe Biden’s presidency proved to be some of his strongest deliveries on his pledges to shore up democracy abroad. China, for its part, did not wade into electoral politics similarly. But its infrastructure-forward policy in the region took the spotlight in November, when Chinese President Xi Jinping visited Peru to inaugurate the first phase of a $3.5 billion port complex in the town of Chancay. Peruvian officials had long sought funding for the port when Chinese state-backed shipping firm COSCO stepped in as a partner on the project in 2019. The site is expected to facilitate trade between South America and Asia. It would be an oversimplification to classify U.S. policy toward the region as values-based and China’s as funding-based, not least because Washington remains its biggest foreign direct investor by far. But Biden’s attention to electoral democracy and Xi’s to strategic infrastructure created some of the region’s biggest headlines this year. This may change dramatically under Trump. We’ll look at the regional implications of his looming presidency next week. Catherine Osborn is the writer of Foreign Policy ’s weekly Latin America Brief. She is a print and radio journalist based in Rio de Janeiro. X: @cculbertosborn Read More On Central America | Economics | North America | Politics | South America Join the Conversation Commenting on this and other recent articles is just one benefit of a Foreign Policy subscription. Already a subscriber? Log In . Subscribe Subscribe View 0 Comments Join the Conversation Join the conversation on this and other recent Foreign Policy articles when you subscribe now. Subscribe Subscribe Not your account? Log out View 0 Comments Join the Conversation Please follow our comment guidelines , stay on topic, and be civil, courteous, and respectful of others’ beliefs. You are commenting as . Change your username | Log out Change your username: Username I agree to abide by FP’s comment guidelines . (Required) Confirm CANCEL Confirm your username to get started. The default username below has been generated using the first name and last initial on your FP subscriber account. 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