Banana Wars: European Globalization and the Effect on the Caribbean

The world today is continually becoming more and more advanced through the development of new technology and scientific data. This incremental process has sped up dramatically in the last two decades as technological advances make it easier for people to travel, communicate, and do business internationally. Thus, Europe has been a leader in this advancement and has contributed greatly to the process the world calls globalization. “Globalization is an objective, empirical process of increasing economic and political connectivity, a subjective process unfolding in consciousness as the collective awareness of growing global interconnectedness, and a shot of specific globalizing project that seek to shape global conditions.” Europe has followed all the examples in this definition and has been a key contributor, along with the United States, to connecting many countries economically. An important aspect in globalization and world economies is trade relations. Through the implementation of trade organizations, such as the World Trade Organization (WTO), the Single Market Act and North American Free Trade Act (NAFTA), countries are able to trade freely in order to boost their economies. However, as seen in the Caribbean, Europe and other world powers have abused the world trade systems, leaving these small nation-states vulnerable and dependent. One case in particular that abuses world trade relations is the banana import establishment. The dispute between the European Union (EU), the United States and the Caribbean over the banana import regime shows that an agreement prescribed to help the small banana growers of the Caribbean nations were overridden by corporate and supranational interests supported by international trade rules. Therefore, the bananas coming out of the Caribbean have both helped and hurt the economy, but more importantly helps explain Europe’s globalization motives and the effect it has in the Caribbean.

European countries and the Caribbean have had a relationship ever since Christopher Columbus discovered the region in 1492. With an imperialistic attitude Europe sought out to colonize the Caribbean community for production of goods in order to benefit themselves rather than the Caribbean civilians. From the point of view of the Europeans they believed the Caribbean was weak and needed to be colonized and changed. Therefore, in their viewpoint it was the European’s right to impose and dominate with violence if necessary in order to promote the ideals and traditions of the Europeans. It was not too long after the Europeans arrived that they were able to colonize the Caribbean which allowed European traditions, communities,