The ministers meeting of the fourth China-CELAC Forum was held in Beijing on May 13. This meeting is special in that it marks the 10th anniversary of the official inauguration of the event, and it's a symbol of a new stage of cooperation between China and Latin America.More important, the forum coincides with a critical juncture in China-U.S. competition, and Latin American nations' active support for the event reflects new dynamics in geopolitics. Although the meeting is not technically a summit, the outcomes and effects will be just as significant. It won't take long the for the forum mechanism to be upgraded.
U.S. politicians' view
For many American politicians and scholars, the forum is seen as an attempt to undermine the United States. For more than two centuries, regardless who occupied the White House, Latin America has been considered a strategic bulwark for the U.S. in the Western Hemisphere.Because the United States couldn't tolerate any non-regional actor getting involved in its backyard, the ghost of the old Monroe Doctrine has continued to haunt the region. Domestically, while the Democratic and Republican parties have continually locked horns, they have formulated a rare consensus — that they must forestall the growing Chinese presence in Latin America by all means.
Since his return to the White House, Donald Trump has underscored four elements concerning Latin America: deporting immigrants, cracking down on drug-related crimes, suppressing Bolivarian Alliance member nations (such as Venezuela) and containing the growing Chinese presence. It is worth noting that the four missions originally carried equal weight, but suppressing Chinese influence has obviously taken precedence, becoming the “weightiest of the weightiest” in Trump's Latin America policy.It was unusual that Secretary of State Marco Rubio chose Latin America as his first foreign destination after being appointed. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth stated in Panama that the U.S. must forcefully contain the “threat” from China in the Western Hemisphere. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, who visited Argentina with an anti-China agenda, pressed the country to cancel its local currency swap with China. These are some of the explicit signals that the U.S. seeks to hedge against China in Latin America and achieve geopolitical advantage.A major move like holding the China-CELAC Forum soon after Trump began his second term in office will not only tremendously undermine his inner circle's comfort level but will also inevitably be misjudged as part of a new trend, with China and Latin America joining hands to confront the U.S.
Latin America's view
In Latin American political and academic circles, the forum is seen as a rare opportunity for the region to hop aboard the China Express, as well as an effective means for the region to expand its space for wrangling with the United States. For more than 200 years, Latin America has suffered from bullying and pillaging by its northern neighbor.The bitterness and misery were laid out in “Open Veins of Latin America” by Uruguayan poet Eduardo Galeano (1971). The line “The United States has been uncivilizedly participating in the long-term control and plunder of Latin America in the guise of civilization” captures the essence of U.S.-Latin America relations and its cycles of “control and anti-control.”In the face of China's rapid rise and the fruitful Forum on China-Africa Cooperation, Latin American nations — which have been steadily moving from dependence to autonomy — have found a strategic dovetail with China, which has used the China-CELAC Forum to its advantage for a decade.
Some scholars think Latin America intends to expand the space for maneuver in their struggle with the U.S. In fact, facing the wrangling between the U.S. and China in recent years, the majority of Latin American countries don't want to sacrifice their relations with the U.S. to get close to China. They generally tend to take a balanced stance between the two major powers.This pragmatist strategy is based on a basic reality: China is South America's largest and Latin America's second-largest trading partner. The U.S. is the largest trading partner and investor of Latin America. Although Latin American countries don't want to take sides in major power competition, they're even less interested in befriending the remote while attacking the nearby.Trump's words and deeds since returning to the White House, however, have indeed disappointed and frightened Latin American nations. Trump has wielded his baton of tariffs indiscriminately against all Latin American countries. Tariffs on steel and aluminum as well as autos have already seriously weakened the already fragile Mexican economy by hurting sales in the United States. Trump's threat of taking back the Panama Canal by force if necessary awakened the whole region to the dawn of the ghost of neo-imperialism.By comparison, the affinity of Chinese diplomacy and economic progress have led some Latin American countries to choose estranging the U.S. while approaching China. For this reason, U.S. scholars have published multiple articles lamenting America's neglect and arrogance, which sent Latin America into China's embrace.
China's view
China believes the China-CELAC Forum has no geopolitical calculations, and has always followed the “three-no principles” — no targeting, no confronting, no replacing. It sees Latin America not as an arena for battle with the United States but rather as a bridge for win-win cooperation. The China-CELAC Forum has become a new standard-bearer for the unity and cooperation of the Global South, which serves both sides' development needs and thus has been welcomed in Latin America.Because the China-CELAC Forum features concentrated consultation, overall planning, collective expression of concerns and economies of scale, its group characteristics — including high efficiency — have made it a shortcut for comprehensive cooperation between China and Latin America. In recent years, relative to rapidly growing China-Latin America bilateral cooperation, the weak links in overall cooperation have been effectively strengthened, led by such mechanisms as the ministers meeting, the China-CELAC “quartet” foreign ministers dialogue, meetings involving national coordinators and subforums in specific fields. The China-CELAC partnership has been consolidated. Both overall China-Latin America cooperation and bilateral cooperation have advanced simultaneously, displaying the benign interactive effects of multilateral cooperation pulling bilateral cooperation and bilateral cooperation pushing multilateral cooperation.
Promoting high-quality development
The China-CELAC Forum will show its true potential in the next decade. More private companies, transnationals, non-governmental organizations and social institutions will participate in various cooperation projects under the forum's framework, strengthening the long-term viability of the mechanism. In terms of forms of cooperation, the forum will not only enhance interaction with such Latin American regional cooperation organizations as MERCOSUR, CAN，Pacific Alliance, and ALBA, but will also dovetail with such mechanisms as the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation, the China-Arab States Cooperation Forum and the Forum for East Asia-Latin America Cooperation, to help fill needs and learn from each other, while expanding the subjects of China-Latin America cooperation. It will invite other Global South nations and developed nations to participate in overall cooperation. In terms of the content of cooperation, the forum will show its strength in new fields, take advantage of the reshuffling of global industrial and value chains to deepen China-Latin America cooperation on digital and green economies, build green China-Latin America industrial and supply chains, and open up fresh prospects for bilateral cooperation.
To sum up, Trump 2.0 has shocked the international order. Significant changes have taken place in the China-CELAC Forum's external environment, and in-depth adjustments are underway in the China-U.S.-Latin America “big triangle.”Amid the rise of unilateralism and bullying, the China-CELAC Forum's international role in fighting protectionism and promoting a multipolar world is becoming increasingly prominent. China and Latin America will join hands with the Global South to break U.S. constraints and impediments. They will actively respond to changing conditions and uncertainties and will inject stability and energy into global development.
