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In geography, the Caribbean Basin or Caribbean Proper (or the Caribbean Basin region[1]) is generally defined as the Caribbean Sea and any territories in or touching the Caribbean Sea. This means countries like Barbados and The Bahamas, which are culturally and politically Caribbean, are not included.[2]
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During the Cold War, the then US President Ronald Reagan coined the term to define the region benefiting from his administration's Caribbean Basin Initiative (CBI) economic program, approved in US law in 1983. Thus, the the Caribbean basin included only the countries of the Caribbean insular and Central America that met the requirements of the CBI, and Cuba and Nicaragua, which the American government viewed as politically "repressive" and "economic failure" were excluded.[3][4][1]
Canadian historians and academics, Professor Graeme S. Mount and Professor Stephen Randall, citing historian Bruce B. Solnick, posits that:
- "...one area of the modern Caribbean basin owes its heritage to the legacy of the Spanish Empire; other segments were traditionally British preserve; a third area was French, and a final area, more diminutive, was dominated by the Netherlands in the colonial years. It is not surprising, therefore, as Solnick notes, that "often the history of the region is treated solely as a function of European colonial expansion."[5][6]
In the latter part of the 20th century, following the collapse of European colonialism, the Caribbean became "an American lake" which American hegemony seek to provide a form of unity in the region[7], though the USA never saw itself as a Caribbean nation, nor did Venezuela until the 1970s.[8] That view is supported by the America historian and author, Professor Robert Pastor who argues that: "...all the nations in and around the Caribbean Sea seemed to have in common was a view of the United States as the "colossus of the north" and the U.S. view of them as a "backyard."[8]
Geographical area edit
The geographical area runs from the north in the Greater Antilles (such as Cuba, Hispaniola, Jamaica, and Puerto Rico) to the west along the Caribbean coast of the Yucatan Peninsula, in Mexico and the Caribbean coasts of Central America, continuing towards the east by the arc formed by the Lesser Antilles and to the south by the Caribbean coasts of Panama, Colombia, and Venezuela. It is customary to include Bermuda and the Bahamian Archipelago within this region, although they are located in the Atlantic Ocean outside the arc, since they share the cultural and historical legacy of the countries of the Lesser Antilles.
Modern Caribbean Basin countries edit
Anguilla (
United Kingdom)
Antigua and Barbuda
Aruba (
Netherlands)- Bajo Nuevo Bank
Colombia (Disputed by 
Jamaica, 
Nicaragua and 
United States) 
Belize
British Virgin Islands ( United Kingdom)- Caribbean Netherlands ( Netherlands)
- Colombia
- Caribbean region of Colombia
Antioquia
Atlántico
Bolívar
Cesar (Does not border the Caribbean Sea)
Chocó
Córdoba
La Guajira
Magdalena
San Andrés y Providencia
Sucre
- Caribbean region of Colombia
Cayman Islands ( United Kingdom)
Costa Rica
Cuba
Curaçao ( Netherlands)
Dominica
Dominican Republic
France
Grenada
Haiti
Honduras
Guatemala
- Jamaica
Mexico
Montserrat ( United Kingdom)
Navassa Island (Disputed by Haiti)- Nicaragua
Panama
Puerto Rico ( United States)- Saint Barthélemy ( France)
Saint Kitts and Nevis
Saint Lucia- Saint Martin ( France)
Saint Vincent and the Grenadines- Serranilla Bank Colombia (Disputed by Honduras, Jamaica, and United States)
Sint Maarten ( Netherlands)
Trinidad and Tobago
United States Virgin Islands ( United States)
Venezuela
See also edit
Further reading edit
- McCalla *, R., Slack, B., & Comtois, C. (2005). "The Caribbean basin: adjusting to global trends in containerization. Maritime Policy & Management", 32(3), 245–261. [7]
- Pastor, Robert, "Sinking in the Caribbean Basin." Foreign Affairs. Vol. 60, No. 5 (Summer, 1982), pp. 1038-1058. Council on Foreign Relations (1982) [in] JSTOR [8]
References edit
- ^ a b United States. Congress. Senate. Committee on Finance, "Caribbean Basin Initiative--1983: Hearing Before the Committee on Finance, United States Senate, Ninety-eighth Congress, First Session, on S. 544, April 13, 1983." Volume 98, Issue 277 of S. hrg, United States Congress. U.S. Government Printing Office (1983), pp. 53-55 [1] (retrieved 26 April 2024)
- ^ Williams, Ernest H.; Bunkley-Williams, Lucy (24 May 2021). "What and Where is the Caribbean? A Modern Definition". The Florida Geographer. 52 (1): 3–28.
- ^ Barca, Alessandro, "EE. UU. y la cuenca del Caribe. Crónica de un fracaso anunciado." [in] Nueva Sociedad NRO. 64 Enero-Febrero (1983), pp. 110-115. [2] (retrieved 26 April 2024)
- ^ Mendoza, María de Lourdes Sánchez, "Un acercamiento a la región del Caribe: su importancia estratégica y económica." UNAM (Relaciones Internacionales). (2006) [in] Catalogo Revistas UNAM [3]
- ^ Mount, Graeme, and Randall, Stephen; "The Caribbean Basin: An International History." The New International History. Routledge (2013), p. 1, ISBN 9781136141164 [4] (retrieved 26 April 2024)
- ^ Solnick, Bruce B., "The West Indies and Central America to 1898." New York: Knopf (1970), pp. ix, 188-9
- ^ Mount, Graeme; Randall, Stephen; "The Caribbean Basin: An International History." The New International History. Routledge (2013), p. 1, ISBN 9781136141164 [5] (retrieved 26 April 2024)
- ^ a b Pastor, Robert, "Sinking in the Caribbean Basin." [in] United States. Congress. Senate. Committee on Finance, "Caribbean Basin Initiative--1983: Hearing Before the Committee on Finance, United States Senate, Ninety-eighth Congress, First Session, on S. 544, April 13, 1983." Volume 98, Issue 277 of S. hrg, United States Congress. U.S. Government Printing Office (1983), p. 203 [6] (retrieved 26 April 2024)