This post orignally appeared on IMBAblog.When Carolyn invited me to outline my experience with business in Central America, I thought I would discuss the surprisingly sophisticated tourist infrastructure spurred on by the relatively recent boom in ecotourism. But in the process, I stumbled upon a poignant irony of doing business in areas still recovering from the civil war and economic chaos typical of nations struggling to shed the cocoon of colonialism and foreign control: companies “forced” to break the laws of their own nation to do business in another.
This week McClatchy Newspapers reported that Ohio-based Chiquita Brands International paid off a Columbian paramilitary group on the U.S. terrorist list to insure its right to continue doing business in the troubled and banana-rich Antioquia province.
The company’s presence is ubiquitous all over Central and South America. Watching the countless Chiquita logo emblazoned trailers clogging the two lane highway between Guatemala City and Puerto Barrios was but an allusion to the company’s long and chequered past in the region, which includes the stains of countless dead labor protestors, connections to child labor and even a political coup.
But Chiquita is only the most recent foreign company caught up in an imbroglio far too common among companies whose profits hinge on political and social elements beyond their control. According to the McClatchy Newspapers report, both Atlanta-based Coca-Cola and Alabama based coal company Drummond Co. also “face civil lawsuits alleging their Columbian operations worked with the same group to kill several trade unionists.”
“The Chiquita case simply demonstrated what we’ve been saying all along: that companies doing business in Colombia are necessarily in bed with the paramilitaries,” Terry Collingsworth, executive director of the Washington-based Labor Rights Fund, told McClatchy.
And it’s not just the poor little rich companies that are faced with this moral dilemma. During my most recent visit to Honduras, the charismatic eldest brother of three siblings running a thriving ecotourism business told me of having to hire a group of goons and thugs to put down a rash of thievery perpetrated by residents of the nearby Garifuna village. There’s just no other way, he said.
On some level we all know this stuff happens. It’s the cost of doing business, blah, blah. But where do we draw the line? As business executives who have been schooled during an era where business ethics have become a topic of academic discussion and companies unwilling to self-police have resulted in accounting scandals of epic proportions, we should be asking ourselves why this is necessary. How far is too far to go for business? And is it ever justified to break the laws of our own countries – or others’ – to secure the almighty profit?
As our nation continues on its recent free trade agreement binge, it’s likely we’ll see even more of this type of corporate rationalization – the when in Rome defense for corporate anarchy. Interestingly, the Chiquita incident will likely delay, at least temporarily, a free trade deal with Columbia. But the trend of our government steering profits in these countries toward the big multinationals and away from local businesspeople will continue unabated and eventually compromise the very reason entrepreneurial ex pats seek them out – the ability to still achieve the American Dream…south of the border.
While we flirt with laws that could send millions of Central Americans home, they are tightening restrictions for American and European ex-pats with stringent income and visa requirements. We don’t want your deviants, the same business owner told me. Tit-for-tat. Robberies targeting gringos are increasingly common too. Tit-for-tat.
So why do we continue doing business where we are not wanted? American business can offer so many ways to help the wonderful people and the promising economies of Central America. Clean diesel technology is one that comes to mind. While Americans and Europeans continue to flock to these areas for ecotourism, they are in desperate need of measures to protect their environments which are being overrun by hand-me-down, exhaust spewing busses and trucks.
For too long, Central America has been One Way Jesus for foreign businesses. It’s time we started paying them back for all we’ve taken.
2 Comments
April 22, 2007 at 9:27 pm
[...] The Fruits of Anarchy [...]
May 10, 2007 at 8:38 pm
Here, here! How long will the abused allow themselves to be abused? It always comes back to bite you in the tush. Every action has an equal and opposite reaction, and it’s about time the friction let up on the other end.