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Originally Posted by knowledgeiskey
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I have heard this often enough but I really wonder about this. Look at the EU with the tensions between nations like Greece and Germany. Greece lacks the flexibility to resolve its problems because it is locked in to the euro. But it cannot leave the euro as a replacement currency would not be viewed as credible. So they are trapped, dependent on decisions made by Germany.
The OECS seems to have done a decent job integrating. This is because there is less differentiation between among these islands. All small and highly vulnerable. Populations ranging from 180,000 in St Lucia, to 50,000 in St Kitts Nevis. Maybe Barbados with its 280,000 can now join, given that they have been dumped off their lofty throne of superiority, with the current severe fiscal problems. With the exception of Dominica and St Vincent, all very dependent on tourism and the related construction sectors. Financial services in a few cases as well.
But it is much harder to envisage a one size fits all strategy that would assume that resource dependent economies like Guyana could be handled the same way as an almost 100% service economy like Antigua.
The Federation didn't work because Eric Williams didn't want to single handedly suppprt the remaining members, once Jamaica pulled out. Guyana for reasons of its own domestic ethnic issues, never joined.
I see little difference today except now Jamaica and Guyana can now be added to the ranks of the vulnerable OECS and Barbados, and Trinidad & Tobago would be the Germany of the group. Except that T&T is no Germany, riddled with many of the same problems of poverty and crime as are the others. And it has no supporting cast of The Netherlands, the Nordic nations, and Austria.
This is not to say that CARICOM cannot be much more vigorous in implementing the decisions made by heads of state to more closely coordinate their economies and their public sectors. But given that this is a region stretching from Belize to Suriname, separated by water, and stretching 2,000 miles, its not a surprise that displacing a nationalistic sentiment with a regional one is hard. How many people in the Eastern Caribbean know anything about Belize?
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