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Caribbean Islands FOREIGN RELATIONS
Relations with the United States, Britain, and Canada
Close ties with the United States, Britain, and Canada
traditionally have been of prime importance and have existed at the
political, commercial, and personal levels. After World War II, the
United States, Britain, and Canada all provided economic assistance
to Jamaica through international organizations, private
investments, and encouragement of the idea of West Indian
federation. By the 1950s, the United States and Canada had replaced
the once-dominant British trade role. On August 7, 1962, the day
after independence, Prime Minister Bustamante described Jamaica as
pro-Western, Christian, and anticommunist, and he announced "the
irrevocable decision that Jamaica stands with the West and the
United States."
Independent Jamaica adopted Western models for internal
development and external perspective. Jamaican leaders, recognizing
the strong United States disapproval of Soviet influence in Cuba
and British Guiana (present-day Guyana), rejected the Soviet
alternative. As British influence in Jamaica eroded rapidly
following independence, the United States began paying closer
attention to political events on the island. Beginning with the
seizure of power in Cuba by Fidel Castro, Jamaica's proximity to
both Cuba and the United States raised Jamaica's profile in
American foreign policy circles. Growing United States economic
interest in Jamaica paralleled the former's increasing political
interest. Jamaica sided frequently with the United States in its
United Nations (UN) voting on cold war issues during the first few
years of independence. The nation became visibly less pro-West in
its UN voting beginning in 1965-66, however. Jamaica moved out of
the United States orbit for the first time when it abstained on the
1971 vote to admit China into the UN. According to a survey by
academic researchers, favorable attitudes toward Jamaica's
alignment with Western nations declined from 71 percent in 1962 to
36 percent in 1974.
Nevertheless, during his visit to the United States in 1970,
Prime Minister Shearer declared that his party, the JLP, had
reoriented its foreign relations priority away from Britain to the
United States. Relations between Jamaica and the United States,
Canada, and Britain remained generally friendly. Tensions arose
occasionally, however, over the dominance of foreign firms in the
Jamaican economy in the 1970s, continuing colonial patterns of
trade, racial antagonism, emigration of well-educated Jamaicans to
the United States, and the nation's ambivalent attitude toward the
United States as a global power.
Jamaica's foreign policy orientation shifted again under
Michael Manley, who decided that Jamaicans, in order to solve their
economic problems, needed to break out of their traditional
reliance on the United States and the Commonwealth of Nations.
Jamaican-United States relations were strained after the Manley
government established diplomatic relations with Cuba in late 1972,
at a time when a majority of the Organization of American States
(OAS) had voted against such recognition. In July 1973, the Manley
government declared the United States ambassador, who was a
political appointee, persona non grata; the ambassador had claimed
before a congressional committee that he had made a "deal" with
Manley, promising American support of Manley's candidacy in the
1972 elections in exchange for his promise not to nationalize the
bauxite industry. Also contributing to strained relations were the
Manley government's imposition in mid-1974 of a production levy on
companies producing bauxite in Jamaica and its move to acquire 51-
percent control of the industry (see Role of Government, this ch.);
however, subsequent negotiations largely overcame these issues. In
the late 1970s, Jamaican-United States relations were aggravated
further by Manley's anti-United States rhetoric in Third World
forums, his government's close relations with Cuba, his staunch
support for Cuban interventionism in Africa, and his defense of the
placement of Soviet combat troops in Cuban bases.
After becoming prime minister in 1980, Seaga reversed Jamaica's
pro-Cuban, Third World-oriented foreign policy and began close,
cooperative relations with the United States administration of
President Ronald Reagan. Seaga was the first foreign leader to
visit Reagan following the latter's inauguration in January 1981.
A Stone Poll conducted that month indicated that 85 percent of the
Jamaican electorate supported Seaga's close ties to Reagan. That
year United States aid to Jamaica increased fivefold; it averaged
more than US$125 million a year during the 1981-86 period, but was
cut by 40 percent in 1987 (see External Sector, this ch.). The
Reagan administration made Jamaica the fulcrum of its Caribbean
Basin Initiative (CBI), a program that Seaga helped to inspire (see
Appendix D). Seaga met periodically with Reagan and other senior
United States government officials, during 1980-87, and in April
1982, Reagan became the first United States President to visit
Jamaica. In addition to its pro-CBI stance (see The Economy, this
ch.), Jamaica adopted pro-United States positions on Grenada and
relations with Cuba. The Seaga government favored a return to
principles of dètente in hopes of ensuring the security of small
states, and firmly supported nuclear weapons reductions with
adequate verification. The Seaga government has disagreed strongly
with the United States, however, on two issues in particular: South
Africa and the Law of the Sea Treaty. Jamaica, example, disputed
territorial water boundaries recognized by the United States.
Jamaica's international horizons remained limited mainly to the
United States, Canada, and Britain, with the principal exception of
the 1970s, when Manley's government maintained close relations with
the Soviet Union and Cuba. Although twenty-seven countries had
missions in Kingston in 1985, Jamaica maintained a minimal
diplomatic presence in foreign capitals. Even its most important
missions abroad--in London, Washington, Ottawa, and at the UN--were
kept small. Jamaican ambassadors usually were accredited
concurrently to several countries.
Data as of November 1987
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