In an Effort to extend and accelerate regional cooperation and coordination in the “War on Drugs” in the Western Hemisphere, President George Bush hosted a widelypublicized, regional, anti-drug presidential summit in San Antonio (Texas) on 26-27 February 1992. This cumbre was conceived as an expanded sequel to the first “Andean” drug summit held in Cartagena (Colombia) on 15 February 1990. In addition to the original four-country participants in Cartagena I — the United States, Colombia, Peru, and Bolivia — Ecuador, Venezuela, and Mexico attended Cartagena II as well.

In September 1989, President Bush outlined a comprehensive, multi-faceted drug control strategy with both national and international dimensions. The strategy focused on reducing both the demand and supply of illicit drugs. Treatment, prevention/education, research, law enforcement, and international efforts are major components of the strategy. An important goal of the strategy was to reduce the amount of illicit drugs illegally entering the United States by 15% within 2 years and by 60% within 10 years. The president refined the strategy and forwarded it to Congress on 25 January 1990 (US-ONDCP, 1990: 49-52, 120-121). The following year, in February 1991, policymakers modified goals to a 20% reduction by 1993 and a 65% reduction by the year 2001 (US-ONDCP, 1991: 15).

The Growth of the illegal, psychoactive drug industry has had a dramatic impact on Colombia. Most studies of the financial effects of this industry — mainly cocaine and its by products, but extending also to marijuana, quaaludes, other psychoactive substances, and, more recently, heroin — have focussed upon trying to estimate its size and determining its impact on the national economy. On the whole, the conclusion of most observers has been that its effects on the latter have been more negative that positive (Kalmanovitz, 1989; Reyes, 1990; Sarmiento, 1990; Urrutia, 1990; Thoumi, 1987).

In Just 20 Years Peru has shifted from beacon of hope to basket case. As late as the mid-1970s, Peru's reformist military government (1968-1980) appeared to offer significant possibilities for economic and political development (defined as improved distribution of income and greater participation by the citizenry). From 1940 to 1975, economic growth and low inflation had been the norm. A major agrarian reform during the military docenio (12-year rule) created production cooperatives nation wide; the industrial community gave workers a meaningful management role in the operation of their firms. Both stirred the imagination of many Peruvians and the academic community alike.

The Flow of drugs from Mexico to the United States has been a source of trouble in US-Mexican relations for at least two decades. The dominant view in Mexico is that the problem arises from the inability of the United States to control its domestic demand for heroin, cocaine, and marijuana. The dominant US view has been that the Mexican government has failed to make effective efforts to control the supply of drugs. At times — in particular after the killing of Enrique Camarena, an agent of the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), in 1985 — US government anger at Mexico's alleged failure to maintain the integrity of its anti-drug efforts has been the dominant source of friction between the two nations.

Paraguay and its closest neighbors, the Rio Plata Basin from one point of view or the Southern Cone from another, have experienced an increasing challenge from the drug traffic in recent years. Initially, everything linked to drug use and traffic was considered—in general, much oversimplified terms — mainly as the social problem of a rich society, primarily that of the United States. The South American countries, preoccupied with surviving the blows of the “lost decade” while trying, simultaneously, both to throw off authoritarian regimes in terminal crisis and to negotiate transitions from democracy, assumed this problem could not affect them. In any event, that aspect of the drug trade which concerned the countries of South America above all was the growing tragedy of Colombia, which was just beginning to make headlines in the world press.